Chapter 1: The intro you've all been waiting for!
It was a drowsy, dull, cloudy day in the ruins of Tseldora, the once-famous mining town of Drangleic. However, in the midst of the silent, spider-filled dunes, there was a noise, a distant, but nonetheless clamorous one, that rang across the town, giving sound to the silent, deserted township ruins. The noise, the sound of steel clashing against steel, belonged solely to two warriors, if they can even be called that. One, was a rogue by the name of Mild-Mannered Pate, who wielded a spear, a tower shield, and his wiles to fight, and the other was a Knight by name alone, a murderer and brute of little intellect, but outstanding strength and 'moral flexibility". His name... Was Creighton the Wanderer. And now, at last, after their silent feud had lasted so long, their final battle was at hand. Each blow was struck, and parried, and stuck again as the battle raged, each warrior struggling to gain the upper hand, but failing, resulting in their even, and very long battle.
"Pate, you cheeky prick... I'll make a cloak out of you yet!" Creighton yelled as he swung his twin axes down in a furious charge, which Pate then blocked with his scavenged, but sturdy shield. However, the force of Creighton's swing was simply too much for the thin, light-weight man, and he simply flew into the crates behind him as the force of Creighton's axes sent him flying. Quickly, though, Pate got up, and addressed his assailant with much confusion, anger, and bitterness.
"What'd I ever do to you, you lummox? It's your fault you fell for that gate trap, not mine!" Pate asked, but Creighton only replied with another roar of strength, and as he brought his twin axes down on the wiry rogue, he replied as Pate dodged to the side, hate and venom dripping from his cold, vengeful voice.
"You never told me it would close on me beforehand! Besides, it's not just that!!! You led me on a wild goose chase for TEN DAYS, all to search for YOUR worthless hide! Do you know what I went through because of you!?" Creighton roared as he brought his axes up, stalking toward his mild-mannered prey like some kind of wild animal.
"Yes, last I recall, you got stuck in your own trap, did you not?" Pate joked nervously as he backed into the wall, but Creighton only growled, a harsh, venomous growl, and he swung his axes at Pate's scrawny neck, forcing the thin combatant to duck quickly as the axes impacted the wall, leaving his helmet to float in the air comically for but a moment before it fell once more on his balding head.
"Holy hell, man, can't you take a joke?!" Pate asked once more as he crawled away from the murderous Creighton as he struggled to rip his stuck axes from the frail wall they now were embedded in.
"The only laugh that will be had here, Pate, is mine when I slowly crush your fragile head with my bare hands!!!" Creighton yelled, and with one final pull, he ripped his axes from the sandstone wall, and charged Pate once more with renewed zeal and vigor. However, the tricky Pate knew that this was coming, and with a determined face, the rogue put up his shield, put forth his spear, and prepared to once more counter Creighton and punish him for his recklessness.
"Well then, Creighton, you leave me no choice. Come get some!" Pate yelled, holding his stance as Creighton charged with double his usual vigor and haste. However, despite the entertainment value of the fight to be had, fate had other plans for these two. Suddenly, with a shimmer in the air, Creighton halted in mid-air as he leaped for one last, colossal swing down on the defensive Pate, and Pate himself soon found himself unable to move as the world blurred around them, and the two began to sweat and panic as their world melted away to nothingness, leaving them shocked, confused, and very, very scared.
"W-what is... What is this!?" Pate asked as he looked around wildly, trying to make sense of the scene playing out before him.
"I... I don't know... Creighton, I hate to admit this, but I'm quite scared right now, and not of you this time!" Pate cried, and Creighton looked back at the one he called an enemy, and voiced his own thoughts.
"Pate, if we survive this, you're a dead man!" Creighton yelled, his voice shaky from fear and bewilderment.
"What?! Why!?" Pate asked, and Creighton responded, his tone loud and resolute.
"Because you doubtlessly had something to do with this, you cheeky priiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiick~!" Creighton cried as the sensation of falling overtook them both, and before either could say any more, the scene, and their visions, respectively faded to white as they slipped into unconsciousness, and their world faded, giving way to a newer, more colorful one...
MEANWHILE, IN PONYVILLE
It was another beautiful, uneventful day in the quaint, peaceful town of Ponyville. The birds were singing, a cool breeze was blowing, the sun bestowed its full glory upon the inhabitants of the town as not a single cloud dared obstruct its face, and Ornstein and Smough were nowhere to be seen, as their domain was Canterlot, not Ponyville, though they had sent several ~~death threats~~ requests to Celestia, asking that they be released for such a vacation, all of which were declined. Yes, life they knew it was good in Ponyville, not a villain in sight, not a disaster to be foreseen, and no disasters to strike at the most inconvenient of times... Until now.
Now, as Princess Twilight walked over the town she'd called home, she breathed in the air of peace that had at last been maintained for this long, and enjoyed every second of it. But then, just as she exhaled, a loud, thunderous sound erupted across the town, and curious, all the townsponies looked around, and then to the sky, and promptly gasped in horror at what they saw: As they watched, a great, gaping hole tore itself in the sky, erupting lightning and flames and blackness as the wound in the sky opened as violently as it could, and it wasn't long before Twilight looked up, and her tail and ears drooped in horror as the sight greeted her. Even worse, if it could even GET worse, was the undeniable fact that she had seen this exact anomaly happen before... and the day it did last, was the day those two crashed into Canterlot like meteors, and causing not only untold amounts in property damage on their arrival, but are continuing to do so now as Twilight stared and thought of this. And if this was happening again, that could only mean...
"Oh no..." Twilight murmured in horror. And lo, as if to confirm her worst possible fears, two streaks of fiery yellow flew from the mouth of the dark, jagged hole in the sky, and proceeded to veer eerily downward, right in the direction... Of Ponyville itself.
"No... Not again... NOT AGAIN!!!" Twilight cried as she ran to her home to get something to hopefully repel the two meteors that now only promised misery and destruction, but alas, as she fled, before she even made it to her door, the meteors sped up exponentially behind her back, and soon, they both veered suddenly and drastically away from each other, one landing in the other side of town, and the other... right into Twilight's home, flying right through her door, utterly destroying, nay, annihilating the barrier of wood as if it were made simply of LEGOs. Minutes passed, And Twilight merely stared at the destroyed doorway in a mixture of loss and pain, and she slowly walked inside, to see just how much damage this new potential threat did to her precious home. Suddenly, though, before she could even call out to see if someone was there as she entered the main room, Twilight heard a distant, but audible groan as she looked around, and soon, she located the source of the cry of pain: a destroyed wall, a pile of books and rubble forming on the edge of the wall, and covering something big, but not nearly as big as either Smough or Ornstein. With a sigh of relief that the threat was not as gargantuan as she first thought, Twilight then slowly walked over to the groaning, shifting pile of rubble, eager to see just what was beneath it, and hopefully send it back before it did any more damage.
However, just as Twilight Sparkle got within hoove's reach of the pile, a horrible thought suddenly entered her head, pausing her mid-step: If the new threats to life and society here were not as big as Ornstein and Smough, what if they had other ways to compensate for that? Before she could step away from the shifting pile of rubble to contemplate that question, though, a large, metal blur exploded out of the pile of destruction it was entombed in, and five bright, metal fingers quickly snatched and squeezed twilight's throat, and as she gasped in a mixture of shack, fear, and a desperate need for oxygen, the figure rose from the rubble, its face obscured by a metal plate with several holes over the mouth, and two larger ones through which two bright, dark-blue eyes shone, leering at Twilight with untold malice, and almost no feeling. And from behind the mask, and over Princess Twilight's frequent gasps for air, a dark, predatory voice sounded, ringing in Twilight's ears as it spoke, instilling fear in her with every word it spoke:
"Where's... Pate?"
