Chapter I - A Prelude To Greater Things
To say that Fiero was bored with her life was an understatement. It was a perfect example of boring complacency, she lived in Canterlot and because she worked for the city she was already given an apartment along with the other ponies of similar occupations. She worked in two of Canterlot's libraries, one being the public library, and the other being the Canterlot Archives, as such she was lucky the apartment was given to her as she doubted her salary working at either one of those places would have been enough to live as comfortably as she did. Sometimes she considered looking into other jobs, but there always seemed to be something that did not sit right with her about them. Either they involved putting in more work and effort than she cared to put forward, or the job did not match her talents.
Fiero rolled over in her bed and took a look at the clock on her bedside table, it was already half past noon, and she would have to be at work in a half-hour at the Canterlot Archives. She sighed and rolled out of bed, still feeling as though she could sleep several hours more despite already having slept for about ten, and grabbed her ID tag and saddle bag. Looking out the window she saw the skies were mostly overcast, and it would probably rain later in all likelihood. At least it isn't raining now. She thought. Not wanting to go through the flights of stairs inside the complex, Fiero trotted over to one of the windows in her living room, spread her wings, and made sure to close the window after she leaped out and flew toward the general direction of the Canterlot Archives.
Fiero had made it to the Archives a little earlier than she anticipated, and had her ID scanned by the Royal Guard unicorn who was stationed at the entrance. She was not frequently asked to come to the Canterlot Archives, but the pay was better than just working at the public library, and whether or not she came in depended more on what archaeologists found, or when very secret and powerful spellbooks were written. Pegasi like her were perfect for this job, they could reach the high shelves and had no use for any sort of highly dangerous or illegal spells which may have been locked in the Archives, which was a primary reason unicorns were not allowed. In fact even knowing students in Celestia's School of Gifted Unicorns was enough to disqualify you for employment, least you try and sneak out a forbidden tome for a friend or a bribe.
Upon entering she saw a unicorn wearing the armor of a Royal Guard officer, she looked up at Fiero.
"Good day, Fiero." The unicorn said, reading the ID tag around Fiero's neck. "My name is Status Quo, if you would kindly follow me." She said, very formally. She lead Fiero down a long hallway, where each door was locked and guarded. Eventually they arrived at a set of two doors. One was the entrance to this particular section of the Archives itself, and the other was for the guards. Status Quo turned to Fiero.
"As you know, I cannot enter the vault because I am a unicorn, so the Private here will follow you in." She gestured to the earth pony guard to her left who was originally there to guard the door, the Private nodded and readied his key, while Fiero pulled her's from her saddle bag. The door to the vault had two locks and needed the key of an employee and another from a guard to open the door. On the count of three they inserted their keys and opened the door.
"Just remember." Status Quo said to her. "Like always we will be watching you." After giving her the cryptic warning she entered the watcher's room while the Private accompanied her inside. On the inside was a shadowy room lined with shelves of books and objects that could do things Fiero could only guess at, and could only imagine why they would need to be locked away in the first place. In the center of the room was a warded shipping crate, with a lock that would only open for her key. When she opened it, she found the box was far larger than the object inside, which was just a book. She held it in her hooves for a moment, the cover felt and looked like it was made of obsidian, and even though it was dark she could feel that carved in it was the letter phi, and that it seems someone tried to color the letter blue with chalk of some kind.
"Fiero, if you would please place the object on the shelf." Status Quo said over an intercom, interrupting her investigation of the book. She shook her head and looked around for some shelf space to place the book, even though the shelves seemed to be crammed full already. Finally she found a space, on the top shelf of a book case that went to the furthest back corner of the vault, and placed it on the shelf.
She left the room as the Private returned to his post, and followed Status Quo to a room just before the main entrance, Fiero knew what was coming, and always hated this part of the job.
"Please surrender all belongings and prepare for a cavity search." Status Quo said, as she placed a glove over one of her hooves.
***
True to her prediction, the overcast skies had turned into a downpour. It was so bad that even with the umbrella she brought in her saddle bag she still felt miserably wet. When she got to her apartment she dropped her sopping wet saddle bag on the floor and went to the bathroom to take a relaxing shower. Fiero turned the nobs in her bath tub and let the hot water relax her into a stupor of daydreams. She would often do this during showers, wondering about what she would do on her days off to whatever she was locking away in the vaults of the Canterlot Archives, but there was something she heard in the distance that interrupted her train of thought. She paused and listened for a moment, even though she had these moments before and they always ended up being nothing, Fiero was paranoid enough to always check anyway.
A tense few moments passed, but just before she was going to dismiss it as nothing, she heard a murmuring from somewhere inside the apartment, just loud enough to be heard over the loud beating of raindrops, yet not loud enough to make out what it was saying, the only thing she could make out was that it was a male voice. A sharp chill ran down her spine. Fiero stepped out of the shower as quietly as she could, not helped by the fact that she was wet and was going to make noise no matter how careful she was. Looking for anything resembling a weapon would not work, she knew everything in her bathroom and nothing in it would do. Instead she grabbed her towel, figuring that if there was an intruder then she could throw it over his head and use the time to run or something.
The apartment was small, so there would not be too many places an intruder could hide. A cautious search of the hall closet and bedroom yielded nothing, all that remained was the living room and kitchen. She tread carefully down the hall, tensing up for a moment before finally working up the nerve to peer inside the room. On the living room side of the room there was nothing but her saddle bag, and on the kitchen side there was no one behind the counter.
Fiero glanced at the front door, but it was locked from the inside, she briefly considered the window, but it was old and very creeky, there would have been no way anypony, no matter how stealthy, would have been able to get in or out through there without her knowing. Possibilities still ran through her head but it all still unnerved her, not that she wanted an intruder but she could have sworn she heard something.
She sighed, but then she heard a low hiss come from her right, her saddle bag specifically. Fiero was now confused and partially intrigued. If it was an intruder, then what could it be? Something small, able to bypass locks and speak in a voice that seemed almost comically deep for it's size? Her mind drew blanks. She crept towards her bag with the towel at the ready to catch whatever it was. She quickly flipped open the flap very quickly, and what she saw was far more surprising than an intruder, in fact it was not a living thing at all.
It was that book from the Archives, the one with the obsidian covers and the blue phi carving. But how? The vault it was in was guarded and warded to a ridiculous degree, even if there was an inside conspiracy there is no way it would go unnoticed by another superior. Then another stark realization hit her, one that filled her with dread. The book was missing, and not only would they find out sooner or later, but it is in her possession and the Royal Guard probably punish her to the nth degree for that alone, and she doubted they would buy the "it just ended up in my bag" story.
The book autonomously slid out of the bag, and flipped open to it's cover page, where text started to appear.
"The Guard is coming for you, and they are not happy. By now you have already seen enough to be charged with treason and terrorism." Fiero shuddered, even though she was already aware of the consequences. "Be it fate or bad luck, this book is now in your possession and you are going to be a criminal." Said the text in the book. "You will be charged for reading this book anyway, so why not go farther? Who knows, it may even help you."
It was a tempting prospect, she was very curious about what was written in it. Yet she also knew that whatever was in here appeared to be dangerous enough to lock away in a high security vault, and also to label anyone who took such an object to be charged with treason and branded a terrorist, merely because of how serious it would be if such artifacts ended up in the wrong hooves. Either way she had to do something about the book, she could not just leave it here and it was also correct in that the Royal Guard would be searching high and low for it.
Before anything else could be done or thought of, her door was rather abruptly bucked open and a bolt of magic struck her body, causing it to instantly go numb. She collapsed to the floor as three Royal Guard ponies rushed into the room, her body partially collapsed on the forbidden book. Fatigue began to course through her body, as the guard members came in and out of focus. One was an earth pony who moved in to collect the book wearing gloves. The second one was also an earth pony, who picked up Fiero and slung her over his back. She recognized the last one, Status Quo, and the look on her face told Fiero that she had already marked her as guilty in her mind, it looked very cold and it probably took all of her composer to keep from exploding into a rage by the looks of it. Shortly after meeting her gaze, the fatigue finally overtook Fiero.
Chapter 2 - The Dark Philosopher and the Covenant King
Fiero was right, they did not buy into the story of "it just landed in my bag", not that she expected it to work, but she at least expect some sort of ethical process of law. She did not remember too much of what happened in the interrogation room, but she remembered enough that it was not a pleasant experience in any regard. The small parts she did remember unsettled her, along with mention of a "mind reading spell", not that she remembered much after that, for all she knew it was merely a scare tactic but if they did use it then she was sure it would have been violating and unethical. Regardless of what actually happened to her, Fiero now felt extremely paranoid, nauseous, and filled with an almost painful anxiety.
Fiero was in the back of a carriage, every limb was bound by rather heavy and uncomfortable shackles, her mouth was gagged and she had a thick blindfold covering her eyes. All the restraints aside, the inside of the carriage was very hot and humid, rather expected as it is summer. She felt like she was going to fall into heatstroke soon too, but she at least hoped the guards would not allow that to happen, if only because it would be easier on them to have her walk to her cell rather than carry her.
This ride had been going on for a while now, so long in fact that Fiero could have sworn that her mind had tuned out the sound of the rain. But there was something wrong, she noticed that she could no longer hear the rain, no matter how hard she tried, and the heat and humidity seemed to vanish as well. Before she could rationalize what she was feeling, her eyes, despite being blindfolded, now showed her in a field outside a forest. In front of her was a cloaked stallion. She was sure that her fatigue and aforementioned ills had finally caught up with her and caused her to imagine all this.
The cloaked stallion gave Fiero a polite bow and removed his hood. He was a unicorn and everything from his coat to his mane and eyes were some shade of purple. He met her gaze.
"Good afternoon Fiero, if only we had met under better circumstances." He said in a Trottingham accent. "Allow me to introduce myself, I am called the King of Covenants." With a flash of his horn all of her bindings disappeared her ailments had diminished as well. Fiero found she could think straighter now, a million questions filled her mind but one simple one got to the surface first.
"What do you want?" She asked, she was very confused by all of this and most of her did not believe it was actually happening anyway. The King of Covenants thought for a moment, as though trying to find the best way to put what he was about to say.
"You are in a bad situation, no doubt caused my colleague's insidious book, yes? From what I understand you are getting a life sentence, and only you." He said. The last part caught Fiero.
"What do you mean by colleague? And 'only you'?" She asked. If The King of Covenants was right, then this certainly got more interesting, though she hope what he had to say was good news, the stress could come back at any time.
"That strange mare Status Quo has had that object re-shelved so many times, and for whatever reason the book only seems to have followed you." He had the look of somepony who was very intrigued by the circumstances. "How very interesting indeed..." He seemed lost in thought now. "Anyway, I can get you out of this, if you agree to form a covenant with me."
Fiero thought for a moment.
"There is more to it then that isn't there." The King of Covenants kept smiling.
"Clever girl." He said. "Of course there is, you would have to deal with some very questionable figures and help them out. But it's surely better than wasting away in a rather dull and unclean prison cell? You'll be drastically altering Equestria in ways I'm not going to go into, but it is for the greater good and it will be a wonderful help for dear Princess Celestia."
Fiero knew there was more to it that he was not telling, but she doubted he would say anything even if asked directly on it. She was not sure of this herself.
"I don't know..." With every word she said, Fiero could feel the weight and discomfort of the shackles, stress and humidity coming back to her again. Sure the King of Covenants seemed like a shady figured hiding one too many secrets, but it became very apparent that if she was not willing to deal with his shadiness, then she would slowly rot away uncomfortably in a prison cell. "....wait! I accept your covenant." She cried out, it made the unpleasantness go away again. The smile on the King of Covenant's face grew larger.
"Excellent." He said, coming closer. The King of Covenants placed a hoof on her forehead as she felt a wave of energy flow through her. "Don't worry about what you have to do, all I need you to do is read that book." He said, before everything faded away along with the scenery that surrounded them. The weight of the bounds came back, but at least her anxiety was down, now replaced with a feeling of uncertainty given what just occurred. She took a deep breath, as best she could with the gag in place, to try and relax just a little more.
***
Fiero was right about the cells in the prison, they were dark, humid and wreaked of some unsanitary stench. She was thanking Celestia that she was given a cell to herself, if this really was the prison where some of the most dangerous criminals in Equestria were kept, then she wanted nothing to do with them. It was described to her earlier that this was no ordinary prison, only ponies who committed the highest transgressions were here. The criteria was so high however that it also meant that it was not often that ponies were placed here. Fiero's cell was so far from the others that she could barely hear them, except maybe if one shouted but even then she doubted she could have made out what it may have said. Once inside she made right for the old bed, it was clearly broken but it was at least better than a freezing stone floor, and she was too tired to care at this point.
She had been asleep for what felt like a few hours when she heard a rather loud creaking at the cell door. Fiero looked up to see if she could see who it was, but no one seemed to be there and she doubted she could have identified who ever it was in the darkness outside her cell. Strangely enough it did not appear to be the guards who were both asleep and not awoken by the creeking. Looking at the floor in front of the cell door was the Obsidian book, which probably was slid through the rusting door slot. She carefully crept out of her bed and went closer to the light of one of the torches, getting a good look at it, before opening the book to the cover page. Flipping through it she noticed that of all the pages, which numbered up to 213, only the first 7 had any writing on them, the rest were blank.
Fiero turned back to the first page and began reading. Contained within the pages was a radical deconstruction of the world and it's meaning. By the time she had made it to page 7, this complex and strange ideology had been defined, promising to go more into detail in the later pages. Turning the page, she saw text appear in a similar fashion to when she first had a conversation about it. The book most certainly did go in depth, and in a way Fiero found unsettling, clarifications were made and expanded upon, but the examples used to illustrate the points were directly taken from her life. Everything from existential crisis, failure, success and even minor things she had taken for granted were taken in by the book and used to advocate an almost nihilistic ideology that Fiero did not agree with. As she continued reading she kept getting the sensation that somepony was not only watching her, but looking over her shoulder, yet no matter how many times she looked, there was no pony there and the guards were still asleep.
Fiero finished the book with unusual speed, and she did not like what was in it, she closed the book and noticed that the blue chalk had now turned into a bizarre and almost reflective red. The world around her began the change radically, all at once she saw colors she never could have fathomed existed, heard noises and sounds she never thought could be made, and then for the coup de grace all semblance of language and emotion disappeared from her mind. She only stood there, being aware of everything that was going on and barely able to think, she was so used to thinking in language which made this experience all the more alien.
What happened next almost made what remained of her mind snap, before her eyes appeared an entity, it was in the shape of a unicorn stallion, but all of his colors were the incomprehensible kind, and the way he looked and moved seemed to clash with the reality around him.
["Fear not for all you appear to have lost, it will return soon."] He spoke in a language that she understood despite how sure she was she did not speak or hear it herself before. It was the language of the divine, with a near infinite amount of words to describe everything known and unknown so as to convey anything perfectly and without misunderstanding. Not all could speak it, but all could understand it. His gaze focused on hers, and with a flash of his eyes she recalled language as she knew it and regained her emotions. ["Time is of the essence, so I have moved it along."]
The unicorn god waived his hoof, and then vanished along with the world around Fiero. She found herself standing on a very scenic and very green landscape, surrounded by trees and standing on a pathway. In front of her was a large temple, and all around the horizon and through the hills were massive mountains. A breeze rolled over her body, where or whenever this place was, the weather was perfect and felt more like spring than anything else. Low in the sky were a few planets, to low and close to this one to be physically possible, but Fiero felt they were beautiful, she could even see that they were also covered in lush green surfaces and massive oceans. She wondered what this place was.
The massive temple doors opened in front of her, they did not seem to be opened by anypony in particular, she trotted inside. She called out inside the temple, after a few minutes of hearing her own echo, another breeze rushed in from behind her as numerous hooded ponies totted past her and down the hall. Fiero decided to follow them, and they led her to a great hall with rows of benches facing away from the door and to a podium on the front, where a mare in a slightly different cloak stood up front, and seemed to be opening ceremony from the podium, in her hooves was the Obsidian Book. Behind her was a statue of a stallion unicorn of similar form to the unicorn god she met in her cell. From out of nowhere appeared the unicorn god with in the form she saw him in the cell, before he changed into a form that anypony could more safely look at, with a sky blue coat, a darker blue mane, amber eyes, and a Phi cutie mark. He looked at her.
"It is good to see you Fiero, welcome to my temple." He said, only speaking in normal Equestrian tongue this time. "I am Deus ex Nihil, god of dreams, meaning, and fireflies, though you may refer to me as The Philosopher, that is what most mortals tend to call me, among other things." On his divine command, the layout of the room changed according to his speech, illustrating the story he was about to tell.
"My time was over two thousand four hundred years ago, when the Royal Sisters were merely a vague prophecy, during an Age Of Empires and grand Kingdoms long lost to history. Back before I was a god, I was a student of philosophy and magic with a friend of mine. But then I began to make the discoveries I wrote down in The Obsidian Book, and discovered a darker kind of magic. With this magic I tried to spread the ideology, but later I found I had little problem using it as a weapon. I always hated the 'holier than thou' sorts after all and there was nothing that felt better then tearing down their pedestals. Alas I had taken it too far, sure enough my friend had found out, and then abandoned me. Shortly thereafter, I was arrested and executed.
My soul was judged and then thrown into Tartarus by the goddess of desires, where it was time for my pedestal to be torn down as well. Time is fluid down there, but it seems my mortal followers did not forget me, most of the people I showed my ideology to were willing, and soon after my death there were those who began to worship me as a god, and so I became one. I used my divinity to break free of Tartarus, but the damage had been done, my lesson was learned as I had deserved to have happen to me, but my name may be forever lost. My old friend, who I'm sure is in high Elysium is probably the only one who would have remembered it, but after our last encounter I am sure he did all he could to forget it. After this my followers, lead by the High Priestess Lilith whom you saw on the podium, built me this temple and obtained and preserved The Obsidian Book. I stayed with my people until a front of intolerance had chased them into a corner, which I got them out of by taking them here.
Even after then I still would go to Equestria, I was asked to take the role of god of dreams about a thousand years ago after Nightmare Moon was banished. I suppose it's ironic that a philosopher who would think deeply into the lack of meaning of things would be creating worlds that always seem to have some meaning to the dreamer, no matter how alien. It is not a problem for me though, I love dreams"
Fiero soaked it all in as The Philosopher dismissed his followers, which promptly vanished into thin air. She had never heard much about the time before the Royal Sisters and had certainly never heard of this religious cult, though given it's age it did not exactly surprise her either. Though there was another question that went to the forefront of her mind.
"Why did you need to do all this for me? And what do you want? The King of Covenants never told me." Fiero said. The Philosopher smiled.
"All we want to to be granted access to Elysium, me and the other gods and goddesses, they have had similar experiences and want the same thing." Said The Philosopher. "I suppose he did not tell you because it involves strange things. I am sure you know what I am talking about, given the wonderful ride my book just took you on. But surely after all this time even you would like to go to Elysium? Either way you accepted the covenant." He had a point, Fiero was going to have to do it anyway. "I had to bring you here because I needed to open your eyes just a little bit more, when we leave I will show you. Whenever you are ready we can carry on." Fiero nodded.
The Philosopher waived his hoof and the world they were in faded away as Fiero was back in her prison cell. One of the guards, who had woken up during their ordeal, jumped at the sight of The Philosopher and attempted to yell. The Philosopher shot out what looked like strands of dark magical energy from his hooves, binding the guard's mouth and ripping his soul out of his body, something Fiero was surprised she could now see. After making sure the guard was no longer a threat, he fired a sleeping spell at the second guard.
He moved towards Fiero and in a flash of yet more magic they found themselves inside yet another strange world. On one side there was complete and utter nonsensical randomness, and on the other was an ivory gate. The Philosopher motioned for her to follow him through the ivory gate. When they did so, they seemed to be in a strange sort of land with pearl and ivory gates the seemed to be everywhere here.
"Welcome to Gibraltar, here you will find the entrances to everypony's dreams, the Ivory Gates are for normal dreams, and the Pearl Gates are for divine revelations." Said The Philosopher. "Down this strait is the entrance of Hades." Looking down it Fiero could see a pair of stone pillars and a massive gate, the way beyond was forlorn and too dark to make out anything beyond it. "Come over here, this one is perfect." He motioned to the dreams of an elderly green earth pony. "She lives in Ponyville, which is near where we need to be. Come on." The Philosopher grabbed Fiero's hoof as they were pulled in by the gate.
