The Dangers of Stupidity

Chapter XIX: Rarity's Hall

"So, what exactly could you do in here that would demonstrate your powers and the Element of Generosity?" Rarity asked as we walked through the massive room. I was thinking the exact same thing.

"I have absolutely no idea. I have extremely violent tendencies, I never show mercy in combat, I basically have done nothing related to anything generous."

"That's exactly what I was thinking. Perhaps a test of your inability to show mercy? That could still incorporate your powers."

"Seems legit. Wait just a fuckmothering minute! What is that?"

"There is no reason for such vulgarit-well rut me with Luna's sacred horn!"

We both ran over to a large shrine in the room's center. It was a stack of beautifully designed white marble blocks almost three times my height and topped with three gems shaped identically to Rarity's cutie mark.

"My goodness!" Rarity remarked. "These stones are just divine! And those gems! Who made this? I must meet them! Arrick, my dear, could you do me a favor and grab those gems? Pleeeeeaase?" She fluttered her eyelashes as she begged, almost as if she thought it would persuade me.

"You do realize that no matter how cute you try to look, it won't have an affect on me. Sure, you're freakin' adorable, but it's not enough to make me do something that dangerous. With my luck, when I fall off that thing, I'm going to break my neck. Sorry, Rare."

"Do not call me that! There is only one pony who I can stand to hear that come from, and you are definitely not her!"

"Her, huh?" I raised my eyebrow suggestively at Rarity, eliciting a moderately deep blush from the mare.

"N-Never mind that! Just get the darned gems!"

"One question."

"Yes?"

"Who is she?"

"Get the gems and I'll tell you!"

"Okay!"

I flung one of my Blades of Exile towards a ledge on the pillar and pulled myself up. At the notch's lip, I released my blade, grasped the top of the pillar with all my might, and frontflipped onto it. I picked up the three gems.

"Rarity, catch!" I tossed them to Rarity, who caught them with her magic. The dark purple gems looked quite beautiful in her almost cyan magic aura.

"So, who is this mare?" I asked, swinging back down beside her.

"Fine." She grumbled. "Okay, that mare I was talking about was..." She trailed off at the end of her sentence.

"I'm sorry?"

"It`s... Applejack, okay! I've been borderline obsessed with her for three years now, and I was thinking about telling her. Is that good enough for you?"

"Yep."

"Just, please don't tell her. Please?"

"My lips are sealed."

That same voice from Fluttershy's hall spoke to me again.

We meet again, Hero of Equestria. Tell me, what was it that the unicorn just told you?

"I'm not telling you!"

Oh, well. I guess I will have to force the answer out of you...

That second, an unholy pain shot through my entire body, forcing me to the floor. I couldn't move, and the only sound I could make was a pained scream. An unseen force lifted me into the air.

Tell me, or you will die!

"N-N-No! I don`t care if you kill me! If I tell you Rarity's secret just to protect myself, that would be pure selfishness!"

"Listen to me!" Rarity called out. "I don't care if you tell him! Just save yourself! You`re completely overreacting to this! It's just a foalish little secret!"

"Shut up, Rarity! I-I-I'm not going to tell him! I promised! I'm not that self- OH MY FUCKING GOD, IT HURTS!"

"Tell him! Now!" She used a spell to amplify her voice.

"Rarity, will you just shut the hell up and listen for once!? I know what I'm doing! Just. Trust. Me!"

The pain nearly became too much to bear. Finally, it subsided. I fell to the ground with an unceremonious thud.

If you will not tell me, then I will destroy you. However, I will not do it with my own hands, but with a certain warrior of mine. He is not as powerful as the Ultima Gemini, but he is still strong in a different way.

A tornado of smoke formed in front of me, transforming into a ghostly version of Sephiroth. He rose his sword and charged at me. His attack was denied and returned by a flurry of lightning bolts exploding against his back and slamming him into a wall. I moved forward, quickly impaling the ghost on my Blades of Exile. With a swift motion, I threw him into another wall. 'Sephiroth' turned around and was caught by my blades flying downward in a V shape and creating an identically shaped cut in his neck. I pulled backwards with all my might, sending his head to the ground. The apparition's head floated back into the air, reforming his body.

"Dammit." I whispered. The ghost swung at me a few times. It almost looked like he was missing on purpose. His head extended out towards me and embedded itself in my chest, causing the rest of his body to disappear into me. I fell to my knees and passed out.

I awoke standing in complete darkness. The only thing I could see was what looked like a gigantic screen in front of me. I heard the spectral Sephiroth's voice, but I couldn't see him.

"Watch, young weakling. This is what will happen if you do not give in now."

The large screen shifted, showing an image of Rarity standing in the hall, trying to wake me up to no avail. An immense shadow in the shape of a wolf formed behind her, but she didn't notice until it was almost too late. The shadow lunged forward, but Rarity dashed out of the way and picked my body up with her telekinesis.

She ran away, right into a corner.

"Rarity!" I shouted as the shadow crept towards her. She stood in the corner, paralyzed with fear and grasping my body tightly.

"Get that thing away from her!" I ordered the ghost. There was no answer.

The screen shifted again, this time showing Vinyl Scratch standing in the middle of her bedroom with something in her magic. Upon closer inspection, I realized that it was a large kitchen knife. I could hear her voice as it floated ever closer to her neck.

"It's true. He's dead. That bastard Sephiroth took him from me!" She was sobbing loudly as she spoke. I could hear Octavia pounding on the door and yelling for Vinyl.

"I'll see you again soon. In just a few more seconds..."

"No! Vinyl!" A lone tear fell from my eye. The screen changed again.

"Damn you!" I screamed at the top of my lungs.

Now the screen held a visual of the Elements standing in a corner while the wolf shadow dove at them. The screen went black for a moment. When it returned, I saw a haunting vision that I still remember to this day.

The Elements of Harmony wearing those dark necklaces, and Vinyl Scratch standing in a perfectly straight line. Their bodies all had been horribly mutilated.

Twilight's horn was snapped off her head and driven straight through her left eye. The other was now a spiraling abyss of black with a single red dot in its center. Blood flowed from both of her eyes and her wide-open mouth, which was now filled with bloodstained fangs.

Pinkie Pie looked almost like her 'other self', Pinkamena. Her mane and tail were deflated and coated in blood. Her eyes were similar to Twilight's in appearance, but they were literally hanging out of their sockets. She was missing her right foreleg, but I finally saw that it was lodged into her throat.

Applejack stood perfectly still. Her entire body was coated in blood. Her left eye was sliced in half, as was her left ear. The other ear was jammed into her mouth. The same went for what was apparently her heart, if the giant hole in her chest and the pool of blood around her legs was anything to go by. She was no longer wearing her hat.

It was sticking out of her neck.

Rainbow Dash's wings had been messily chopped off and wrapped around her neck like a scarf. Her forelegs were now jammed into the spots that her wings previously occupied. She was crying blood, which formed into a pool around her body. She had the same blood-spraying mouth as Twilight, but with even more fangs.

Rarity's horn was also removed, but I could not even describe where it now was. A bolt of cloth was wrapped around her throat, and she had a diamond shoved into both of her eyes. All four of her legs had been cut off and now occupied her bleeding mouth. A large amount of her skin was gone, but I had no idea where it was.

Fluttershy was standing in a pile of dead and dismembered animals with a pair of bloody rabbit ears replacing her own. Her intestines hung freely from her underside, blood dripping out of her body. She had the heads of three rabbits stuck inside of her fanged mouth, and was wearing a necklace made from numerous bird beacks and other animal bones.

Vinyl's horn was stabbed through her neck. Her throat was slit, with the knife in question impaled through the top of her skull. She had records buried in various parts of her midsection, and one hung from her mouth. The worst part, though, was that she could still talk.

"Why did you have to leave me?" She was still sobbing as she talked, just like in the video.

"Vinyl, I... I didn't leave you for anything. I'm still here, and I'm trying to save you all."

"No, you aren't! You left me without even saying a word! I thought that you were the love of my life, but I guess I just fell for some other idiot that would leave me after a few days, just like always. I can't even look at you anymore without wanting to kill you."

"W-W-What the hell..." I couldn't look at this any longer. I fell to the ground, clutching my stomach, and began retching violently. I hadn't eaten anything in about a day, so not very much happened.

"Goodbye." Vinyl said flatly.

"Before you go, I need to tell you something.

I've realized something. Sephiroth has ruined this world. In no more than a day, the beautiful and idyllic place that Equestria once was has become a distant memory. I will fight to make Equestria's bright and innocent past its future again, even if it means fighting against immeasurably stacked odds until there is nothing left of me, for nothing more than the purpose of saving you. I will persevere, making Equestria a better place again one battle at a time. And then, when I am too broken to go on, I will drag my dying body right down the throat of the darkness that has overtaken this world and make it choke on me. Do you hear that, Sephiroth? No matter what you throw at me, I will not give up! I will destroy you even if it costs me my life! But I will not just kill you. I will obliterate your will, and tear your very existence to pieces! You will feel my wrath! I swear it upon my life!"

I threw Zeus' Thunder at the screen, causing it to explode in a shower of sparks. A large portal erupted from its center and pulled me in.

"Wake up! Please, wake up!" I could just barely hear Rarity yelling in my face.

"DAFUQ!?" I screamed, jolting up off of my back and headbutting Rarity.

"What was that for!?" She questioned angrily, slapping me in the face with great strength.

"Damn, that hurts! I should be asking you the same thing! Wait. Rarity? You're still alive? Then that means..."

"What does it mean?"

"I was having this dream... or was it a dream at all? It felt so... so real."

"What dream?"

"You... really don't wanna know. The things I have just seen would kill lesser men." She gave me a dubious look at the end of my sentence.

"Or women." I added sarcastically.

"Whatever. Wait a moment. What is that?" She pointed to a pair of gems just like the ones from the tower shaped like her cutie mark, one purple and the other white. Beside me was a white orb of light, similar to the one from Fluttershy's hall.

"Sweet!" I picked up the orb, tossed it into the air, and slammed my blade against the light, giving the weapon a white tinge that seemed to intermingle with the yellow. I picked up the two gems and stepped towards the door. Outside I could hear something that sounded almost like...

"Screaming? Holy balls. Rarity, we need to get out of here!" I placed the purple gem into the door. Nothing. I pushed it with all my might. Still nothing.

"Fuck my life! Rarity, get over here and help me!" The two of us pushed against the door, but nothing happened at all. We were screwed.

Wait a minute. If I have Kratos' powers, then maybe...

"Gods of Olympus, I beg of you, heed my call!"

With a massive roar, a cyan aura enveloped my body. My Blades of Exile transformed into a one gigantic golden sword that appeared almost like a claymore.

The Blade of Olympus...

I swung the Blade of Olympus in two diagonal lines, halving the door. Before it could even fall over, I shoulder-rammed the door and broke through it. Outside, the Elements huddled together in a corner while Benson fought off a swarm of Undead Legionaries with his Pokemon.

"Senpai, look out!" Benson shouted before one of the skeletal soldiers tried to bash his Alakazam in the head with his shield. The Pokemon returned the attack by levitating the monster's shield into the air with Psychic and decapitating him with it. I took out three more with an electric grenade. After the kills, I continued charging through the crowd, slaughtering more of the monsters. With a powerful flourish, I began jumping and running off the walls, slashing at them randomly, then backflipped onto the ceiling, dove to the ground, and impaled my sword in the ground, sending an immense wave of blue energy across the room, destroying every last one of the Undead Legionaries and draining the Rage of The Gods from my body.

"Dude, you got skeleton guts on my Pokeballs!" Benson complained, trying to wipe the intestines off of the small orbs.

"Better than dying." I retorted plainly.

"Where the hell did you even come from?"

"Duh! Where do you think?" I pointed behind me to the formerly broken door. Somehow, it had rebuilt itself.

"Now, let's get this over with." I placed the other gem in Rarity's brazier, creating a chain of white fire between the brazier and the central door. The dark Element of Generosity's divot began glowing.

"Let's go, Dash." I called, waving over my shoulder and walking towards the next door.