The Scroll of Exalted Ponies

It was cold that morning in the castle, even with summer having just peaked at its hottest, for most of bed-linens, nearly all the drapes and curtains, as well as most of the tapestries having been removed to keep the thousands of homeless ponies camping outside in the square warm. It was evidently more than the castle-manse’s environmental controls could counter, although by breakfast it was comfortably warm again in most of the castle.

Stepping out into the courtyard Speaker couldn’t help notice the new features dotting the horizon over the castle walls: Huge grey boulders jutted out of the ground all over the flattened parcels that Speaker had leveled the day before – and they were big enough that they ones closest to the castle could be seen from within the castle courtyard, above the castle walls. It looked as if Shimmer very much so had delivered via the elemental summoning.

Speaker rushed out to twin-fountain square and quickly found Shimmer. She stood next to a strange thing that sort of looked like a pony, if you squinted and maybe painted it brown. The equine-looking being appeared as a living statue of semi-transparent crystalline flesh, with red bones of stone shining through from inside of it. Its semi-transparent crystal flesh revealed rusty iron teeth and its whip-like tail which was covered jagged iron spikes also didn’t make it look any less intimidating. This was a Jokun, a kind of earth elemental.

“Well… I think this will be enough stone, at least to begin with” Speaker said, nodding slowly as he looked around at the large five to ten yard tall rocky outcroppings forced up through the ground throughout the leveled half of the city.
Shimmer smirked. She had made the elemental move tons of rocks up to or through the surface, how could this not be enough? “To begin with?”

“Well, Cash has talked about doing the other half of the city over in stone as well, since only fixing up this half would do… things – I think he talked about devaluation and slums or something. His point was that we should work over both, and I agree since it’ll make my geomantic patterns easier to integrate” Speaker explained, waving a hoof about in anticipation of singing staff appearing for him to hold.

Nodding slowly, Shimmer got the gist of what Speaker was talking about quite well. She had seem what happened to western fishing villages when guild merchants set up shop and squeezed the locals for everything by building a fancy mansion and thus suddenly making part of the island far more desirable (and expensive) to live on, completely destabilizing the social, economic and sometimes even spiritual stability of the island. It would split up such a society, creating a divide between the ones who live in the nice part of town or the island… and the poor half would become resentful. Shimmer had seen this happen many times over her long life – so seeing Speaker willingly commit to avoiding such a situation was something Shimmer found quite endearing.

Of course, as Speaker quickly trotted off, singing staff floating by his, Shimmer also realized that she would really have to work hard to make Speaker reciprocate that kind of feelings again. Sighing, Shimmer started to look for Cash, wanting to know how the other half of town was to be demolished.

While Speaker knew that he’d have to change some of his road designs and planned storefronts, then Speaker was still able to start building the new Chung Do. The first priority was making foundations, but to his joy Speaker found that Shimmer’s elemental had replaced pretty much all of the underground of Chung Do with rock, leaving but a few feet of dirt worth of topsoil. How the elemental had done this without causing earthquakes or disturbing the underground geomancy, part of which fed the castle manse, was a mystery to Speaker – but then again… it was an elemental. It could swim through rock like a pony through water.

With the ample supply of stone, Speaker began to play a tune with his singing staff at the edge of the twin fountain square. It was a construction tune, and over the course of an hour or so a large crowd of ponies gathered to watch as the first building of the new Chung Do flowed up from the ground, solidifying into beautifully decorated stone columns around wing after wing of large healing house – all of it modeled after the first age healing house Speaker had searched through in Denansdor for the Pattern Reassertion Rectifier artifact.

By nightfall most of the ponies who had been near death from the plague when the cure had been distributed, who were still so weak that they were bedridden, had been transferred to the healing house. It wasn’t much, for there were no doors, no real beds, no shutters in the windows, but once fires had been started in the various fireplaces and the warmth spread they were at least more comfortable than the ponies still stuck in tents in twin fountain square.

Over the next few days Red and Shimmer led large groups of ponies from Chung Do out into the surrounding forests to collect timber, while Speaker used his educational charms on the citizens of Chung Do, teaching a third of the city basic carpentry. As word spread of Speaker having such powers, many illiterate ponies equally approached Speaker, him gladly giving them a swift and intense primer on reading and writing. It tired him greatly to use his educational charm so much in one day – but a week later it meant that every pony in the city could either help build or outfit the houses that Speaker was making, and the sudden increase in literacy made Cash’s administrative work a lot easier.

Two weeks later, when Heath Rose sailed in from heavenn on the back of a butterfly, elegantly sailing into the castle courtyard after having admired the surprisingly new and half-finished looking city.

The circle greeted Rose, after the guards had been told to stand down – for only the circle had remembered the sidereal. Rose was quite pleased to see how the city had improved, although she wasn’t quite sure what the logic behind the apparently ongoing deconstruction of the west half of the city was. Upon being told of the fire and the circle’s choice to rebuild the entire city Rose simply smiled and laughed: “Really? I guess I’ll have to start getting used to that kind of miraculous things happening regularly now…”

Beyond coming to greet her friends, Rose also explained that the deathknight that the circle had captured had been interrogated – and Rose figured that the information gathered from that interrogation was relevant to the circle’s interest. The circle and Rose gathered in the castle’s war room, a large chamber where the shoguns of old once held council with his generals, warlords and nobles. Around a table replete with rough and worn maps of the hundred kingdoms and the Chung lands in particular, Rose told the circle of what she had learned:

“The Coveter said that the bonestriders he was making were for local use, since they deteriorate quite quickly after extended periods of combat activity. You don’t have to be an oracle to see that this meant that they were built to assault Chung Do – and this kind of activity points to a different Deathlord other than this Barbate Arbiter operating here” Rose began.

The sidereal explained the Deathlord known as the Mask of Winters, the Deathlord who a few years ago had taken the realm satrapi of Thorns south Lookshy with a tide of undead minions snuck in from the shadowland known as the Bayou of Endless Regret, had been linked by the sidereal host with all kinds of trouble in the hundred kingdsoms.
“So you think he’s behind the rebellion?” Red wondered.

The sidereal shook her head: “Not him personally, but it smells like the work of one his Deathknights. We’ve caught them several times trying to instigate wars in the region, usually by encouraging others to take up arms that the deathknights in turn promise to supply… does that sound familiar?”

“You would have to do a lot of talking to convince mortal ponies to fight alongside undead monstrosities like those bonewalkers” Cash noted, wondering just how that was meant to work – because if what Rose said was true, which Cash had no reason to doubt, then this problem would have to have been known to the deathknights influencing the nobles. Of course, the circle had already seen the effects of deathknight mind control, which could easily explain a mortal pony’s acceptance of undead auxiliaries.

Rose couldn’t say for certain if deathknight mind control was the case, but she did note that through heavenly scrying of the loom of fate she had concluded that the actions of the nobles were somewhat out of sync with what should be happening – indicating that there were ponies with enlightened essence at play, nudging events in directions that pure causality couldn’t account for, even with the effects of the plague taken into account.

“But what is the Mask of Winter’s plan by starting wars all ove- oh… right – make us fight and kill each other so they don’t have to when they come to wipe us all out” Sullen Hoof wondered out loud, the obvious answer occurring to him mid-sentence.

Cash nodded: “Exactly. Also if we hadn’t showed up Chung Do might have become a shadowland due to all the plague victims, which would have ended all river commerce on the brown river by making this place a deathtrap to enter – that could be part of a broader scheme to disrupt all commerce in the hundred kingdoms”

“Isn’t that a bit farfetched? But if they did starve the area of trade it might mean that a lot of warlords and kingdoms that benefit from taxing the brown river trade wouldn’t be able to afford to maintain their armies, which would make the whole region more vulnerable to realm invasion” Speaker added, referring to the fact that Lookshy heavily depended on independent warlords aiding during realm invasions of the scavenger lands by lending their forces, something that Lookshy had previously used quite effectively many times over in defense against the Realm which would otherwise have conquered the hundred kingdoms quite a long time ago.

Rose suggested that both were possible outcomes had the circle not come to stop the madness: “Other sidereals have engaged the Mask’s deathknights elsewhere, some near Thorns in the Marukan territories, some in Nexus. They’ve not always come out alive, but we’ve always learned things from these engagements, like how not all the deathknights are equally loyal to the Deathlords, meaning that it is possible for them to defect…”

“Engaged deathknights in Nexus – you mean the Bodhisattva?” Red inquired, recalling that the ghost-limbed deathknight they had encountered north of Chung Do said something about a contact in Nexus.

Rose wasn’t sure if this was the deathknight that the reports mentioned – the Convention of Deathlords was getting quite paranoid about keeping its information safe. Apparently a circle of deathknights had infiltrated Yu-Shan during calibration and attempted to kidnap several gods during the revelry, minor gods of death, decay, lesser gods of specific burial rites and such – Rose said that she didn’t know anything else, which Speaker picked up as a lie, but he figured that it meant that she would probably just get in trouble if she divulged too much specific information about the event.

“Did they get away with any?” Sunrise asked, sounding at the same time uninterested but also as if she actually wanted Rose to yes. Again Rose said that she didn’t know, while Speaker’s truth-telling charm told him otherwise…

Beyond the information from the interrogation and the update on deathknight activity, Rose added a few other details: “Apparently the Coveter says that he and the other deathknights are exalted – exalted of death. He says the proper term for them is Abyssals, although he was ok with being called a deathknight as well”

“Abyssal?” Sullen Hoof wondered, not understanding the meaning. Speaker explained that it was probably a reference to the abyss, as a term for both death and oblivion.

Cash Charmer, hoping to change the subject, gave Rose a sly look: “Say Rose darling, you shouldn’t happen to have a little something for me now that we’re at it?”

Rose perked up, retrieving an oversized parcel that really shouldn’t have been able to fit in the pocket of green robes: “One suit of silken armor, tailored to your specifications, a Recorder of Everlasting Glories and… because you guys fixed up Chung Do so I don’t have to, I’ve tossed in a little something extra for you”

Cash descended up on the brown paper parcel like a hungry predator, annihilating the wrapping with the surgical precision of someone who knew that the contents of the parcel couldn’t be harmed, and who was in a great big hurry to find get to his prize.

The silken armor was functionally identical to Sullen Hoof’s chef uniform – indestructible, incredibly stylish, and offering about as much protection as a good sturdy steel breastplate, only it looked paper-thin and weighed hardly anything. As par Cash’s instructions the new silks were blue and beautifully embroidered with gold and orichalcum thread. In a single swift move Cash removed his current silken jacket and replaced it with his new exquisite silks – there were guild factors who could bathe daily in gold who didn’t have garments this fine.

Second was the recorder. It looked like a large piece of jewelry the size of a small chicken egg – Cash quickly stashed it elsewhere.

Finally Cash got to the little extra surprise that Rose had added – and he was absolutely ecstatic when he saw it and quickly put it on – the golden choker re-sizing itself and clicking into place with effortless easy as Cash fed it a tiny bit of essence: It was a collar of dawn’s cleansing, a type of fairly common artifact – so much so that most unicorns from the realm and in Lookshy owned or at least had easy access to similar devices made of jade – but despite its commonality making it less unique, then its utility made up for it: It made you impervious to filth. Speaker recalled how the prevalence of such neck-born devices in Lookshy had actually made it fairly common, if still not a bit rude, to attract the attention of your unicorn officer by chucking a wad of mud at them… since the mud would just roll off, leaving no stains. Clearly Cash was so happy because now he finally had silks that literally could not be damaged or become dirty. As far as Cash was concerned, he could probably take on anything now.

The revelry aside, Rose was curious as to what the circle planned to do next. Cash told her of some of his plan, the parts involving Chung Do – while leaving out the parts about Denansdor.

“I have to admit – you wanting to wait until spring to deal with the nobles and the blockades, an interesting choice, but I can see the wisdom in wanting to steal their army out from under them and then use it for defense of the land. But what are your plans after all this?” Rose said, clearly curious about what the circle was going to do next.

Speaker was about to say something but Cash interrupted him before he could say a word, stating that they had a request from the Bull to help out up in Plenilune, something they would have to honor at some point as they owed the bull a dept for having helped them – so that might be their next move, unless anything else came up.

“That’s reasonable. By the way, I’ve heard that my gold faction elders finally managed to send a sidereal advisor to the Bull – he’ll make a powerful ally against the realm” Rose said, sounding quite relieved that it clearly wasn’t her who’d been assigned to advice the bull.

Rose stayed for dinner, enjoying Sullen Hoof’s cooking quite a lot – adding that Robed in Splendor had been the talk of the town ever since rumor had spread in Yu-Shan that one of the Orichalcum Chefs had reincarnated. Also, Robed in Splendor’s nemesis, the god of bland food, had pledged his support to the bronze faction because of this: “…although this mostly means that the food served at Bronze faction poetry nights has taken a really sharp dive in quality. So I guess we should thank you for that as well”

The next morning Rose was gone and none of the ponies that worked at the castle, not even the young Shogun, could remember Rose – although they did recall the circle having had a visitor, but they simply couldn’t remember who or what she looked like. Even the guest log’s entry mentioning Rose had disappeared, leaving only the circle with the memories – for such was the nature of the sidereal arcane fate.

The next few weeks progressed quickly, with Speaker finishing the construction of both halves of the city in record time. The new Chung Do was a marvelous sight, and the citizens rejoiced. Adding to that then Speaker’s use of educational charms on the population had made a third of the city into exceedingly competent carpenters, ensuring that all the wooden components to the new city, such as shutters for the windors, doors, new cargo cranes for the brand new harbor that Speaker had wrought were being made as quickly as possible.

Cash’s expert management of the city during this time of transition, coupled with a series of ingenious housing and property-ownership reforms, ensured that conditions such as what Speaker and Shimmer had encountered in the sailor hostel could no longer come into existence – for Cash’s power to magical bind ponies to their oaths meant that the proprietors of the new hostels were sworn to maintain a standard of living for their guests that didn’t make them feel like the cargo of a slave ship. This kind of business reforms weren’t entirely popular with the previous owners of such establishment – chiefly because it meant that they couldn’t squeeze their guests for every coin of silver they had on them, plus they would now actually have to work, but none of them could refuse Cash’s supremely convincing charms. Additionally Cash had taken control of quite a lot of the businesses in Chung Do, a necessary move since the combined plague and fire had pretty much annihilated the city’s economy, but thanks to Cash’s social and bureaucratic charms he was able to restart the city’s economy almost overnight through the sale of rice and other foodstuffs in exchange for money that the city’s ponies earned through working on the reconstruction, while Cash had also incentivized and even helped fund several dozen private ventures via interest-free state loans.

The common pony in Chung Do found these new times wonderful: The ponies now had roofs over their heads, and almost every family now had someone who could build them new beds and furniture. Indeed, Cash expected Chung Do to be able to profit greatly via export of wooden furniture and other such products. With both basic necessities and positive future prospects assured, the ponies of Chung Do began looking into lesser issues. A lot of other businesses and local industries, such as blacksmiths and potters, had become completely devoid of ponies who knew how to work in such trades – and without blacksmiths then making simple thing like door hinges were becoming a problem. Cash called upon Speaker to train a few hundred ponies in blacksmithing techniques, which he did. This quickly turned into hundreds of ponies contacting Cash in order to be taught by Speaker in other fields, resulting in Cash organizing several classes that Speaker would be sent to briefly train, although Cash did try to keep the numbers down so Speaker could focus on the construction effort.

In the meantime, all the while Speaker had been rebuilding Chung Do, Sunrise had been preaching to the ponies of the city. Both sailor ponies trapped by the quarantine blockade and the ponies who lived in the city, all of them found solace in her preaching – indeed, it was clear to the circle that without Shimmer to maintain the morale of the ponies in Chung Do during their darkest hours then the city would have fallen into riots and anarchy.

This had originally led Sunrise to form a cult of her own, devoted to the worship of Celestia, shortly after the circle had arrived in Chung Do. When the city had been on the brink of starvation Sunrise had soothed the worried minds and hungry bellies of the ponies of Chung Do with calming words and hopeful prayer, urging all who would listen to her to be mindful of what little food they had left to share with those who had none. When the city had burned it had been Sunrise’s loud and far-reaching charms that had shouted out warnings across the city, allowing Cash Charmer to organize an evacuation in time to avoid any casualties. As the ponies of Chung Do had sat cold at night in Twin Fountain square Sunrise Glow had been a source of light and inspiration, as she told of wonderous adventures from the first age that distracted from the terrible situation of the present. Now that all was well in Chung Do nearly every pony in Chung Do was at this point a member of the cult, making it the defacto state religion since even the young shogun had voiced his appreciation of Sunrise’s council and maintenance of the spirit of the city.

Cash had little to do with the cult directly, but he did notice that the meager fashion trends of the city were changing because of it. More ponies wore long cloaks or robes to cover themselves, and while linens and cloth in general was in short supply, then the ponies of Chung Do – many now trained via Speaker’s miraculous charms – were finding all kinds of ways to solve this problem, although Cash wasn’t quite sure he agreed with the apparent trend of having ones mane and tail shaved off and woven into cloth. This didn’t seem to bother the ponies who did it as hoods were also becoming popular as well, Cash figuring that the ponies wanted to dress like Sunrise did. Oh well, at least it made the ponies easy to govern since he’d heard whispers that it was now considered sin to defy a solar.

After a busy day of tallying the latest census numbers that he had ordered, Cash figuring that it wouldn’t hurt to known how many ponies had been re-housed in the snazzy new homes Speaker had built for everyone, the exceedingly well dressed stallion sauntered down the street from the city hall towards twin fountain square as the sun began to set. The street was dark as oil for lamps were in short supply, so Cash lit his way by igniting his caste mark.

The street looked as if it was paved with a single huge continuous slab of grey rock, although Cash still recalled with awe how Speaker had made that rock flow like water to cover and displace the dirt underneath it. It was strange to think of, but no less strange than the layout that Speaker had arranged the city it. It was, for the lack of a better word, ‘organic’, with streets that curved like the stalks of flowers, with small squares and plazas to the left and right here and there like leaves. Speaker’s explanation had been that it was to harmonize the entire city with the ambient essence flows that powered the castle, not unlike the geomantic patterns that Denansdor had been built after – only now the overall effect should be that it would be very difficult to actually become sick in the city, plus it should in theory prolong the lifespan of any pony who lived within its walls by a few decades.

Cash wasn’t sure about the promised magical effects of the layout, but he did agree that it was pretty. Trotting down the street, his magical shoes clicking against the rock, Cash looked long and hard at the various storefronts that lined the road. The selection of goods available was pathetic and quite a lot of storefronts were simply empty – there just weren’t enough ponies in Chung Do to fill out his grand design for a revitalized city. The young Shogun had agreed that after the rebellion had been put down there would be issued a call for immigrants to repopulate the city, something Cash looked forward to overseeing – especially since he planned on seeing all new Chung citizens magically sworn in to obey the law and whatnot. It simply seemed like a sensible solution, as it would ease the burden of ruling over them greatly.

Of course, Cash wasn’t looking for stores to shop in, or worrying about population density right now. Cash was looking for a brothel.

He knew that he had ‘zoned’ for several to be dotted throughout the city, but he had yet to find any that actually seemed to be up and running yet, which annoyed him greatly – a pony needed release every now and then, and it wasn’t like Speaker who had a lunar to service him every now and then, well, assuming that Speaker ever warmed up Shimmer again. It occurred to Cash that he might be able to ‘borrow’ Shimmer for some fun until Speaker got his act together, but that thought didn’t have much time to linger in Cash’s mind as he finally came across a small alley where there was a sign that read “House of Comforts” with an arrow pointing into the alloy.

Down the alley there was a door with a lit red lantern above it, Cash entered expecting some good times.

A few days later Speaker joined the circle in the castle banquet hall for breakfast. The topic of discussion over the meager meal of oats and steamed vegetables served was what to do with the city now the restoration of it was almost complete.

“I’ve taught glass-workers to filter and use sand dredged from the riverbed to make glass, so the city’s windows will soon have more than just shutters” Speaker noted.

Red was less interested in exterior decorations and more concerned with the defense of the cit: “Nice, but now that the ponies in the city are spread all over it again we can’t police them properly anymore. Before the fire we barely had more than a few dozen guardsponies left in the whole city, while everyone was jammed into twin fountain square they could just barely keep the peace – but now they’re spread way too thin. Heck, there’s only four ponies left on the castle walls, four!”

“Calm yourself Red” Sunrise admonished: “I’ve declared it sin to transgress against solar law. My cult of Celestia will enforce this, meaning that every pony in Chung Do will report any misdeeds done”

While Speaker found Sunrise’s faith in her parishioner’s sense of justice admirable, then he agreed with Red that more actual guards were necessary: “Have you tried recruiting new guards? I’m sure there’ll be plenty of ponies willing to help with Sunrise speaking so well of her flock”

“The last drill sergeant died three days before calibration. I may be a good warrior, but I’m not a trainer. Can’t you train them with your charms Speaker?” Red implored.

Speaker explained that he could not – for the educational charm he knew was purely academic: “There is something I recall from the first age, it was called the Tiger Warrior training technique”

Red looked oddly pensive at the mention of the term ‘tiger warrior’. Speaker explained that the term was a very old one, one of the original titles of the dawn caste ponies: “They were called the bronze tigers – because at the time tigers were the strongest beast we knew of, and bronze was the strongest metal we knew”

Nodding slowly, Red reminisced memories that weren’t entire her own. It was strange: “Whoa, but you’re saying you know this technique?”

Speaker shook his head: “I remember doing a lot of fun things – but I don’t remember how… sorry”

“I guess I could ask around, see if there are any retired veterans still alive in the city…” Red said, looking lost in thought.
Poking at his decidedly dull and tasteless oatmeal, Speaker sighed: “Right – say, how come the food is so bland? Where’s Sullen Hoof?”

“Beat’s me – maybe he’s off with Cash somewhere. Haven’t seen either of them in days” Speaker noted, adding that he hadn’t seen Shimmer either since she’d done her magic with the elemental.

Sunrise calmly and methodically continued to consume her meal: “I have no seen Cash, but Sullen Hoof has been helping cook for my congregation as of late. Why he is not here I cannot say”

After breakfast Red approached Speaker about making her some training equipment for any new guard recruits she could drum up. Speaker turned her down: “I’m still trying to iron out some geomantic essence flow problems in the west side, so I don’t have time, sorry. Even after I figured out how to tap into essence sight so I don’t have to feel my way around I’m still finding minor details I need to fix to avoid essence buildup – but you should ask the new carpenter guild that Cash set up last week. I’m sure they’ll make any kind of wooden training weapons for you”

Red nodded: “Ya ok – but… essence buildup? You mean this weird geomancy-schmancy city plan of yours can be harmful?”
“Not necessarily, but I don’t want to disturb the dragon lines flowing into the castle manse – that can be dangerous. But beyond that, do you think you’ll have time for another round of training later? What you showed on how to yank Gift out of logs and stones it was stuck earlier is really handy” Speaker added, retrieving his singing staff and a rosined bow from elsewhere.

Red followed Speaker out of the castle courtyard and into the twin fountain square. The grand stone facades of the buildings that now surrounded the square, while somewhat plain in their uniform grey stone color, were beautifully decorated with almost every flat surface sporting engravings of floral patterns. It made the buildings look almost alive, and indeed that was part of the logic, for it made them resonate with the wood aspected essence that flowed in the area. Carpenters were running around everywhere, with hauler-ponies bring cartloads of planks to and from the mostly empty buildings, all of them wearing those new-fangled hoods and thin cloaks made from burlap, woven mane and tail hairs or whatever other textiles the local ponies could scrounge up. Wooden frames for windows were being built, doors were being put up, and all the ponies who spotted Speaker bowed their heads respectfully as he had taught nearly all of them the skills they were applying.
“It’s really impressive how much the ponies here like you – although I’m not really sure I agree with this new fashion trend” Red noted.

Speaker shrugged: “I’m guessing its Sunrise’s work, looks like her style – I don’t mind it, as long as they don’t ask me to shave my mane or beard off”

The two split off, Speaker heading towards the grand bridge while Red began asking around for a pony she could place an order for training weapons at.

Speaker spent the rest of the day ironing out essence flow issues on the west side of town. Having unlocked the secret of the bombastically named Sorcerer’s All-Seeing Essence Sight charm he had found his work much easier, plus being able to see the very essence of creation was surprisingly pleasing to behold - like colored vapors that permeated everything. It was a bit like smoothing out a clogged up stream, only here it meant moving lamp posts and nudging buildings around.

The next day Speaker again had breakfast with Red and Sunrise. Red had placed her order and had begun recruiting for the city guard, while Speaker returned to the west to finish up his work there.

As Speaker stepped out of the castle courtyard he immediately noticed the lack of construction noise. There were no saws sawing, no sound of shoe-hammers bucking in nails, no scraping sound from hoof-cranked drills working in the stone, no sound of carts shuffling around planks… and looking around he couldn’t see a single soul working.

Walking up from the twin fountain square, via the main street, up to the grand bridge, Speaker couldn’t find a single shop that was open – not that there were many shops that had even opened up since the reconstruction, but this was still weird. There were ponies visible up in most of the the second, third and fourth story apartments and some visible in the back rooms of the ground level shops, a few even walking to and from places, but none were working.

As Speaker crossed the grand bridge he figured that it made sense to have all the ponies have a day off at the same time. That way the carpenters wouldn’t suddenly run out of nails when the blacksmiths were taking a day off, and everyone would know when to stock up on a little extra food when the fisherponies wouldn’t be out setting nets in the river. It was probably what Cash had been working on.

Arriving at the spot in the west half of the city where he had left off the previous day, Speaker began playing his singing staff to drain the essence pools that had formed in places where he hadn’t fully finished the architectural geomancy. It was then that a group of three hooded ponies came up to Speaker. One could hear as the hooves of the two ponies following the one in front’s hooves clinked against the roughly textured stone road, revealing that they were both wearing heavy hammer-shoes.

“You should not be working on this day of rest – come join us at the temple” their leader, an old mare by sound of it, said from under her hood in a somewhat condescending tone, as if addressing a wayward youth.

Speaker turned to face the trio of hooded ponies and smirked: “I think this is a little bit more important to finish up than going to temple – even if it is a nice temple, I should know, I built myself it two weeks ago”

To Speaker’s surprise the three ponies either completely failed to catch Speaker’s hint that he was way above their station to order around, or they were consciously choosing to ignore it – then again, every pony in the city knew who Speaker was since he had taught most of them a thing or two. Maybe this was some kind of joke, or perhaps just Sunrise’s heavyhoofed way of inviting him to some ceremony? Either way the old mare, well – she sounded old due to her voice, and her cloak revealed an old and bony body underneath, again demanded that Speaker cease his work and come with him: “It is sin to work on the day of rest, for it defies the word of our prophet – so stop right now and follow us to the temple so that you might pray for forgiveness and repent”

As Speaker didn’t immediately let go of his singing staff or the rosined bow the two heavy-shod and hooded ponies that had accompanies the old mare stepped forth, attempting to grab Speaker. Ok, this was new.

With his supernatural martial arts the two would-be grapplers didn’t stand a chance – but Speaker didn’t wish to hurt any of them either, so here merely swatted them away with his singing staff, but the seismic forces contained within the staff discharging on impact meant that this actually knocked the two ponies out instantly as if struck by a large stone mallet. Speaker took note that the singing staff might be more than a construction tool…

The old mare took a step back as she saw Speaker drop her two enforcers, but this didn’t stop her as she shouted for help: “Help! A sinner in our midst! He must be brought to temple!”

At first Speaker just shook his head at the old mare after he’d checked the two ponies he’d unintentionally knocked out, but moments later the clatter of hooves on rock spread throughout the neighborhood – and soon three dozen ponies were chasing Speaker – and none of them seemed willing to listen to reason, nor did they care that he was a solar.

As he ran – for he did not wish to harm these ponies, no matter what strange influence was causing them to behave like this – Speaker dragged the singing staff along the ground and played it, raising yard high earth walls to hinder his pursuers, allowing him to escape across the grand bridge.

Using his perfect balance charm Speaker was able to leap from the bridge when he reached from the other side and land on a lamp pole, giving him additional distance between him and his pursuers – but they were in turn shouting quite loudly, causing ponies on the east side that Speaker was now in to join the chase. Within moments Speaker was being chased by a mob of angry and relentless ponies, but Speaker still had the advantage of knowing charms that allowed him to avoid fatigue or tiring from prolonged galloping, something that none of the mortal ponies in the mob could do, so Speaker could press himself harder and maintain a healthy distance to her pursuers.

Arriving at the castle gates, Speaker shouted at the hoofful of guards manning the drawbridge to the courtyard to begin raising it – but as the shouts from the mobs decried Speaker as a sinner… the guards did not raise the drawbridge, instead they dropped the portcullis, trapping Speaker at the end of the drawbridge.