The Temple of Found Serenity
" Where could we possibly be going this direction?!" Twilight asked. Equestria's four alicorns had been flying for almost six hours. They were well past the borders and were going deep into a jungle, well above it anyway.
" You'll se." Celestia said, sounding almost excited for something while still managing to stay collected.
" It's something you really need to se for yourself." Luna chimed in.
After another fifteen minutes, Twilight saw what Luna meant. The jungle gave way to a grove of cherry blossom trees. They were in full bloom despite it being around fall. Ponds were spotted with lush water lilies. A beautiful statue of a perched eagle stood at the center, behind it stood a massive palace. The outside look blended perfectly with it's surroundings. Grapevines crawled up the towers, yet looked artistic.
"Who's palace is this!?" Twilight managed to get out, still in awe.
" Nopony's, it's really more of a temple. It is often called The Temple of Found Serenity" said Celestia.
They made their way inside to be greeted with a fountain pouring water out of two lion heads. Twilight ran to it and nearly plunged her hoof in before what sounded like an elderly stallion telling her to stop. She looked up to see a pony with a dark blue coat and a seaweed-colored mane standing on his hind legs in the pool of water above, he held a staff.
"Not a good idea, young one."
Upon further inspection, Twilight noticed two things. One: his cutie mark showed his staff in the middle of a waterspout and two: he had gills and fins (although those were small and hard to notice after looking at him for only a few seconds."
"You're a sea pony!"
The elderly stallion chuckled "I am indeed" he eyed Twilight "and you are an alicorn."
This caught twilight off-guard. Cadence noticed and changed the subject. "So, Pool Tender, have the waters been cooperative?"
"Most of the time but somet-hey!" A sort of water sprite was dancing around and obviously irritating Pool Tender. Their game of cat and mouse lasted about 2 minutes before he was able to absorb the sprite into his staff. He turned his attention back to Twilight. " I serve all who come here with visions. The pools sometimes tell me of the future, or the present somewhere else. Once you can feel the waters and their power, the hard part becomes telling the difference." He smiled, clearly he had made himself laugh a bit.
" You best introduce the young one to a few of the others before you meet with those you wish to see. This type of thing has never happened before, can't have her being unfamiliar! Aw horseapples! Come here, you little..." The last thing they saw of him was him struggling with another water spirit.
They took a turn outside the main pavilion leading them into a library. They entered onto a bridge built into the walls that curved around and lead to a downward staircase. In the middle of the library stood an earthpony yelling at some unicorns! " Come on! We need to get rid of these moths! They'll devour the whole library!" With every pulsing spell the unicorns let off, a dozen or so moths fell to the ground.
" Hello Stone Step." Celestia got his attention.
"Hello, child of sun and moon. I am preoccupied currently."
" I can help." she imagined a moth, as to not hurt anypony there and let off a field of solar energy, wiping out every moth in the room.
"Thank you. Now is this the new one I hear so much about?' He obviously meant Twilight. " you know that something like this is making history, which means I will be there to record it."
They left Stone Step to his business after Twilight glanced at a few of the shelves. They found themselves back at the main pavilion from a door in front of the bottom floor of the library. Standing in front of them was a batpony armed with daggers. She was extremely agile and precise. Twilight would find out that she was named Silent Strike and was in charge of defense of the temple. She had little personality other than her sense of duty. Not long after their last farewells were they called into the meeting room. It was about to begin.
