Chapters It was an absolutely BEAUTIFUL day in Ponyville. Celestia's sun was shining, the birds were singing, the sky was clear thanks to the local weather pegasai, and even that one pony that nopony ever speaks about who is normally terrified of sunlight, was out enjoying this absolutely BEAUTIFUL day in Ponyville.
Unfortunately for Twilight Sparkle however, she was not in Ponyville.
"Remind me why we're out here again?" Spike asked his purple mother figure as he followed her into Froggy Bottom Bogg, a place they hadn't been too since the whole incident with Pinkie Pie and the doozy that seemed like forever ago. As much as Spike didn't want to come back here, for obvious reasons, Twilight assured him that if they did encounter that hydra again, she could stop it with her super alicorn magic, or something like that.
"Don't you remember, Spike?" Twilight replied to him without taking her eyes off of the road in front of her. "We're here to test out that spell I found in that old book." At that Spike held up the book in question, which he was carrying for her the only pair of saddlebags that she owned were unfortunately torn thanks to their recent adventure with A.K. Yearling. Thankfully for her, Rarity was on the case. More importantly though, the book that Spike held was an old, almost decrepit thing that seemed like it was bound in leather but Spike was almost certain that it wasn't, and its words were written in some kind of red ink. Also, it was written in a language that Spike, quite frankly, couldn't understand for the life of him.
Basically to him, the book pretty much screamed "DESTROY IMMEDIATELY!" rather than "TRY OUT EVERYTHING IN HERE TO YOUR HEARTS CONTENT!"
"Right," Spike said sarcastically as he tucked the book back under his arm. "Cause these things usually work out so well." Twilight just giggled at what she assumed was Spike's obvious joke.
"Oh, Spike," she said to him with a smile on her face. "When have I ever messed up a spell?" Spike just stared at her with a completely deadpanned expression on his face.
"Really..." was the only word that came out of his mouth.
"Okay, but even when I mess up things still work out in the end don't they?" Twilight said with a bit of a sheepish smile. Spike chose not to dignify that with a response.
Neither of them said anything else for the rest of their walk through the bog.
Eventually, they reached the spot they were looking for, a rather remote part of the bog where despite the rather large, round pool of boggy water in front of them, there didn't seem to be any animals. Even the hydra was nowhere to be seen. Twilight on the other hoof, just walked right up and stopped right at the foot of the bog. Spike stopped a few steps behind her. He didn't want to go anywhere near that water.
"Spike," Twilight said as she stretched her neck a little bit to make her seem just a bit taller than she usually was and closed her eyes in an effort to make her seem even more confident than usual. "Book please." Spike just let out an exasperated sigh as he held up the book for Twilight. Why she had to request the book from him like that though, he didn't even begin to understand. Maybe she was just getting used to being an actual princess now and was actually trying to give him orders now. If that was the case, then he dreaded the coming days, or at least the next few days until she got bored of it.
Twilight however, didn't care about any of that and took the book from Spike's hand with her telekinesis. She then levitated the book over to her, and after flipping through it for a moment, found the page she was looking for.
"Ahem," Twilight cleared her throat while Spike just crossed his arms and kicked a nearby innocent pebble into the bog. "Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!" Twilight spoke out loud like she was reciting the most important speech ever. When she finished speaking, she lowered the book and looked out at the bog with an eager smile on her face. After staring for several minutes though, nothing happened. Spike at this point, had stepped away from her and had taken to leaning against a tree. "Huh," Twilight said as she lifted the book back up and read the page the spell was on. "It didn't work. Here, let me try it again. Ahem..." Then, after breathing in for a moment, Twilight tried the spell again.
"P̀h̢'ǹglui͢ ͡m̵g̨lw͘'̸n̶af̀h̨ ̕Ct͏h̀ulh̸u ̛R̕'̵l̡yeh ̀wga̧h'na͏g̨l͜ f҉h̢t͡a͜gn̴!" Twilight spoke again, this time though, the difference was obvious. Even Spike heard it. The moment she finished speaking, Twilight almost dropped the book and looked back up at the bog, her pupils were about the size of the head of a pin. A single bubble popped up and then promptly popped in the middle of the bog, but Twilight barely noticed it. "D... Did that really come out of me?" She turned and asked Spike, who only shrugged. Confused, she turned back and read through the page one more time. Then, much to the displeasure of Spike, she tried again.
"P̨h̨'̴ńglui mglw'͏na͡f͠h ͢C͘thu̕l̛h͞u ̢R͡'̸l̶y̴e͡h̴ w͟ga̵h͢'̢na͏gl̴ ͠fhta͡gn!͘"
"OH MY CELESTIA IT'S FACE IS MADE OF HENTAI!!!!" Pinkie Pie shouted at the absolute top of her lungs at the horrifying abomination that was The Great Messenger Cthulhu was now attacking Ponyville, causing all of the citizens who were still in hearing range of her, and even Cthulhu himself, stop and stare at her because what she just said. "WHAT IT IS!!!" Pinkie Pie shouted right as Cthulhu's massive foot suddenly came down and crushed the house behind her like a bug. Naturally, everypony panicked like mad and ran at this.
Cthulhu himself threw his head to the sky and let out its monstrous, horrifying screech that was so loud it caused many who heard it to fall, and those who stared at him, found themselves forever completely insane.
"CRAP OH CRAP OH CRAP OH CRAP OH CRAP OH CRAP OH CRAP OH CRAP!!!!" Twilight shouted as she flew through the streets of Ponyville, Spike clinging to her back for his dear life as Cthulhu brought down his other massive foot on one of the other houses behind her.
Quickly, she ducked behind another house and hid there, hoping that Cthulhu didn't see her.
"OH COME ON MAN! CAN'T YOU DO SOMETHING!!!" The voice of Mehrunes Dagon Razor suddenly shouted behind her. Quickly, both Twilight and Spike turned around to see that they were hiding there as well.
"What?" Daedalus replied with a shrug, giving about as many f***s as he usually did, even in this situation. "Its not like I have an unedited version of the Necronomicon in my basement." The moment he finished that remark, Razor, Twilight, and even Spike just stared at him, though Twilight seemed a bit more visibly nervous. "What?" Daedalus said again. "I'm just saying."
Then, suddenly, the house they were all hiding behind was suddenly picked up like a muffin. They didn't even need to turn around to know what was there.
"SCREW THIS!!!" Razor shouted as he created a spear with his magic, lit it on fire, and turned around to face the monstrosity that was there.
"Okay, so Razor's plan of 'punching it till it explodes' didn't work, anypony else have any ideas?" Twilight Sparkle asked her four friends and Spike, who were now all huddled together in the basement of Sugarcube Corner, which was completely dark for some reason.
"CELESTIA NO!!!!" Rarity shouted at them. "I don't even want to go near that thing!"
"As much as Ah hate to agree with Rarity," Applejack said with the raise of a hoof. "Ah kind of don't wanna either."
"If only Rainbow Dash where here!" Pinkie Pie said in a rare moment of actually being worried. "She'd know what to do."
"Somehow..." Applejack stated. "Somehow I doubt that. She'd probably try tha same thing Razor just did."
"Yeah, she pro-" Twilight tried to speak, but before she could even finish that word, they all suddenly heard a loud "CRACK!!!!" like noise. The next thing they all noticed as that the basement of Sugarcube Corner wasn't dark anymore.
"Oh dear Celestia, now Deep Ones are falling from the sky!" Twilight shouted as she and her friends ducked behind a log in the forest that was once the Everfree Forest.
"Um... Twilight?" Fluttershy asked? "How do you know what those things are?" At that, every single one of her friends stopped and stared at her. Twilight could only let out a nervous laugh and rub the back of her head as her face became redder than one of Applejack's apples.
"Uhhahahahahaha...... Well um.... You see...." Twilight tried to say, but before she could she was suddenly interrupted by a Deep one stepping on the log they were all hiding behind and roaring right at them. As if on cue, they all screamed.
Before anything else could happen however, Applejack suddenly jumped up and bucked it right in its head.
"RUUUUUUUNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Twilight shouted as they all made a break for it.
"There," Twilight said as she looked at Ponyville from the safety of the top of Princess Celestia and Luna's old castle in the forest through her spyglass. "The shoggoths are hunting the last of the chthonians, the star spawns, and the deep ones, we're safe."
"Um, Twilight," Applejack interjected. "Are ya'll shore yah thought this through?"
"So Twilight," Princess Celestia said to her once faithful student as she, her sister Princess Luna, Applejack, a still too embarrassed and ashamed to even look at anypony Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Spike all stood in the main street of what was once Ponyville. All of them were staring at her with very, very, very angry looks on their faces, even Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie, which was rare. "What have we learned from all of this?"
"That I should never, ever, ever, ever, ever ever, ever, ever, EVER tamper with powers beyond my control..." Twilight said with her head towards the floor. The crack in the grass at her feet seemed much more interesting than her mentor and princess did right now. "And that I should not stare into the howling abyss, because there are things in there and they will stare back at me.... and that I should never, EVER, bring anything from the other side, because that will only make things worse."
"And, what else?" Princess Celestia said, not satisfied with what she heard. Twilight Sparkle just
"That I should never read the Necronomicon, because its evil," Twilight continued. "And that just because a spell is written in a book doesn't mean I should try it."
"And...." Princess Celestia said again.
"And that I've been a very, very, very, very, very, very, very, naughty pony," Twilight said as she looked from the ground back up at her mentor with very teary eyes. "And I will be punished.... severely."
"That's better," Celestia said. With that, she turned from Twilight over towards her friends. "Now, I have one last question, and one of you better be able to answer it. During all of this. Where? Oh where? OH FOR THE LOVE OF ME WHERE!? Was Rainbow Dash!?"
"I DID NOT THINK THIS THROUGH!!!!!!!!!!" Twilight shouted at she fired a concentrated burst of fire from her horn at another shoggoth right as it attempted to ensnare her for the umpteenth billionth time, only for three more to suddenly appear behind her.
"TWILIGHT!!!!" Rarity shouted at her as she was trying to free herself from the grasp of the tentacle like appendages of another shoggoth. "I really don't like the way this thing is- WAHAHAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!! "
-Meanwhile, not too far away-
"AAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Fluttershy shrieked at the top of her lungs as she lunged downwards from the sky with a giant, double bladed, sword and sliced the appendages of two shoggoths clean off like they were made of soapy water.
The shoggoths screeched this weird screeching noise, presumably in pain, as they moved their amorphous bodies around trying in vain to flail their mission appendages.
At that, Fluttershy then flew right past them, landed on her hooves, and skidded along the ground for a moment as she turned herself around to face the two shoggoths. She kept glaring daggers at them as she spun her double bladed sword around and pointed it at them, her breathing not slowing.
Then, suddenly, from behind her, a weird hissing noise came up. She didn't need to be an expert animal tamer with super sensitive ears to be able to hear that. Quickly, she turned her head around to see one more shoggoth emerging from the bushes right behind her.
"Clever girl," was all she could say.
