PAO: Pony Art Online

The new weapon flowed gracefully in Roseluck's hooves as she practiced in the training hall. She loved the sword Scootaloo had forged her, but the dragon-tier spear drop from one of the minor bosses on floor forty-eight spoke to her in a way no other weapon had before. She spun it around, following a simple ballet routine she learned as a young girl, adding subtle thrusts of the short spear where she could.

The guild hall was nearly empty that day. No one wanted to linger around and wait to be picked off by a guild of killers, and oddly enough, the recent attack on the Knights only inspired players to try harder to defeat the floor's boss. Preparations would be ready by now if it wasn't for the debacle on floor forty. Now everyone wanted to pitch in and help the Clearing Group get ahead of the game.

Roseluck jabbed one of the targets, landing the hit in an Arabesque position, one rear leg on the ground as her other shot back to balance. Like arms, her forelegs reached for opposites directions, balancing her body further. Her hooves also balanced her spear forward, in the direction she was facing.

But her awe at the game's ability to capture ballet was short lived, and as her character's pony body caught onto the fact it was in a very human-like position she felt the sudden loss of balance and tumbled over.

The training hall door opened. Grieve Blossom rushed in, distracted by a message in his menu screen. He began to talk until he looked up from the screen. Roseluck, not wanting to weigh herself down with armor as she practiced, was stripped down to the default undergarments. Fallen on the floor, her flank was very clearly pointed towards the door

"Fucking hell, knock next time Grieve Blossom!" she shouted at him, hurrying to equip her armor.

Grieve Blossom waved away his menu as he covered his eyes. "I'm so sorry, I was just assuming that..."

" I'm busy! Stop looking!" she yelled back at him, flipping through a list of old gear to find her dress.

"I'm not!" he exclaimed, quickly backing out of the training hall. "I'll just wait here until you're done."

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"I swear I wasn't looking at anything!" Grieve Blossomed pressed his case as he and Roseluck wandered the streets of floor forty eight's central city.

"You didn't answer the message Scootaloo sent us so I came to check on you, and, well," he shut his mouth before he continued too far.

"Shouldn't you be helping your guild with raid preparations?" Roseluck interrupted, clearly ready to forget what had happened a few minutes ago.

"Yeah, but I asked my commander if I could work with the Crusaders on the investigation," he answered. "Your leaders already said we should work together, so I don't see why the your guild should be spearheading the search for the killers alone."

Roseluck rounded the corner, keeping her pace quick. "Not alone, we have our soloing allies working on it too."

Grieve Blossom took that with a pinch of salt. "C'mon, everyone knows the Clearing Group's elites are close friends with your guild leaders. Applebloom's sister is Applejack herself. They're practically part of the Cutie Mark Crusaders already."

"Fine. Now stop following me," Roseluck put bluntly.

"Lady Scootaloo said she wanted to meet us both in town," Grieve Blossom countered. "Besides, I thought we were friends."

"We chatted after rescuing your commander, I'd hardly call that a strong friendship." Roseluck continued down the street and walked into a dimly lit restaurant. Supposedly it was a night themed business centered around honoring Princess Luna, and it was where Scootaloo wanted to meet them.

Grieve Blossom followed Roseluck and took the seat across from her. When it was clear to Roseluck that she couldn't shake Grieve Blossom, she agreed to let him stay. "As long as she wants you with us on this, I guess my hooves are tied."

She picked up a knife off the table and stuck it out at Grieve Blossom. "But don't get any ideas. You're not my type."

"Would you let that go? It was an accident!" Grieve Blossom pleaded. Roseluck decidedly ignored him, sitting back and crossing her forelegs as if they were arms.

"No."

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Scootaloo was happy to sit and watch as she had dinner with Roseluck and Grieve Blossom had lunch with her. Something happened, but she didn't need to know. It was only and hour past noon and she had already mediated a trade deal between to smaller rival guilds, helped a few Crusaders clear a dungeon, and read thousands of player reports on the murder investigation.

She wasn't in a rush to sort out another problem. Especially when the two looked so adorably uncomfortable.

"So, Lady Scootaloo," Grieve Blossom started, "why'd you want to talk to us?"

"To get a break, first of all," she said, relaxing in her seat as she drank a cold glass of water. "And to get this investigation steamrolling. Rainbow Dash and Phoenix are already on floor forty-two looking for any clues. RD even said she has some contacts in that mining dimension that could help scour the map."

"So what are we going to look for?" Roseluck asked.

Scootaloo opened her map and switched to the layout of floor thirty-eight. "Remember all the crystals and gemstone on this level?" she asked rhetorically. "A gem from here enchanted the machete Iceblood got hit with, which means our culprits either operate here, or they're connected to someone who does."

"But what if they just bought the gem from the auction house?" asked Grieve Blossom. "They don't necessarily have to be connected if that's how they got it."

She shook her head and clicked open her notepad. She turned her menu screen to show him and Roseluck how she spent part of her morning. "A list of all the Crippling Black Gems sold from the auction house. I sent teams of Crusaders out to monitor all two hundred and twenty-seven buyers. You might be right, and the killers have just used the auction house, but I don't think they'd be so sloppy."

"You checked each player?" Roselucked gasped, unable to comprehend how hard it would be to keep tabs on every possible suspect.

Scootaloo brushed it off like it was nothing. "Well, I am pretty awesome, so don't be too surprised. Besides, Sweetie Belle and Applebloom are preparing the Clearing Group for the raid, so someone had to take the reigns."

Grieve Blossom gazed down the long list of player names, eyes wide with the same astonishment as Roseluck. "So we'll be doign the other part of the search?"

"Strait to the source," Scootaloo confirmed. She rose from her seat. "We've got a lot of ground to cover, so let's get to it!"

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Floor thirty-eight reminded Roseluck of when she first met Phoenix on floor eighteen. Aside from ice and snow being replaced by sharp crystal fragments, which made the entire tunnel system look like one massive crystal geode, the design of the map almost matched the ice caves perfectly. But this time around she wouldn't be hindered by her attributes.

Grieve Blossom scanned the nooks and crannies of the crystal structures, checking for any sign of player interaction. Empty nodes, discarded loot, anything that looked like it could lead to the killers. He found nothing, but remained diligent anyways.Roseluck walked past him as he crawled into a tight gap between two massive quartz slabs. She was busy cataloging all the ingredients she had for alchemy, writing down what she needed to collect later for the boss preparations.

They remained a few meters back behind Scootaloo, who insisted on dealing with any of the monsters that attacked, just so she could get her blood pumping. Neither of them complained, she was a better fighter after all. They made good time together, stopping only occasionally to check their maps.

Scootaloo noticed the message alert on the mail icon next to her map. "Hold up," Scootaloo called back to the two of them. "Got something from Applebloom."

"What's it say?" Roseluck asked, taking her attention off her menu screen. She walked over to see what it said. "Are they already done getting the raid ready?" Grieve Blossom added something, but he was muffled behind the quarts.

"No," Scootaloo answered. "Apparently RD and Phoenix found a lead on forty-two. An orange player that might be connected to the killers. Applebloom has custody of him now, and she wants me to head back up to the front line to help build a house for him. Gonna lock him in it, and she needs my blacksmith skill to make an unbreakable lock."

Grieve Blossom finally managed to squeeze back out of the quartz and catch up to Scootaloo and Roseluck. "Why not just get the NPC's to put him in prison?"

"Probably going to question him," Scootaloo guessed. "If he knows something about the killers, you can bet Applebloom wants to cover all her bases. Crazy farm girl never leaves a chore half finished."

"So where does that leave us?" Roseluck asked. "Because I don't have any skill points in building stuff."

Scootaloo chuckled. "No, you two can keep checking this floor out." She opened her trade menu with Roseluck and handed over a dozen teleport scrolls. "In case you run into any red or orange players."

Tracking criminals solo, or even in teams of two, wasn't common. Most players formed raid-like parties just to make sure a bloodthirsty murderer didn't take their lives. And though both Roseluck and Grieve Blossom easily outmatched anything in the dimension, players were not as predictable.

But Scootaloo could sense the uncertainty in their faces. "I'm not asking you two 'To do a Phoenix' and solo scout the boss dungeon, or single-handedly bring down the mafia; have some confidence in your skills." She patted them both on the shoulder with cheer, reassuring them.

Roseluck nodded along and equipped the teleport scrolls in a secondary slot. "We'll check out the rest of the place and be back before you know it," she assured Scootaloo. "Right Grieve Blossom?"

The stallion bit down his nervousness and simply nodded along.

"Great!" Scootaloo cheered, pulling out her own teleport scroll. "See you two later at the boss raid! Tomorrow afternoon, don't forget it!" Her last words were almost cut off as the scroll whisked her away back to the floor's central portal.

Grieve Blossom turned to Roseluck. "So, ah, ladies first? Want to take point?"

Roseluck sighed and indulged Grieve Blossom. "Fine, I'll lead the way." She turned and trotted deeper into the crystal caves. "But stick to checking out the crystals. I can feel you staring already."

"I'm not even looking at you! I'm... sorting out my inventory!" Grieve Blossom shouted back.

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The two continued with barely a change in pace. Together, they dealt with the Ice Trolls that spawned on the shelves of the crystal caves. As they went on, deeper into the tunnel system, everything gradually became darker. Though they could still see where they were going, nothing seemed as clear as before.

Yet, even the darkest places of the map didn't slow Roseluck. Grieve Blossom's heavy armor, however, began to drain his stamina.

"Hold on," he gasped, "I think we should take a look around here, maybe rest for a while."

Roseluck continued down the tunnel, checking for signs of players. "I have spare cloth armor that fights your build," her voice echoed back to him.

Grieve Blossom gave a groan of slight frustration and pushed to catch up to Roseluck. "Thanks, but -how should I put this?- I kinda don't want to, you know..."

"Know what?" she replied.

Grieve Blossom gave an indifferent shrug before exclaiming. "Oh, I don't know, maybe die!"

"Don't be ridiculous," she said, waving his comment away, "you're not a Tank. Besides, Damages can easily run around with light armor and not even get hit."

"Not all of us can switch to a spear and suddenly gain an extra meter in range," he countered. Roseluck still wasn't convinced. I was wear cloth armor from the start, long before I started using a spear. "Just look at Phoenix! She's fights face-to-face with most bosses but only uses leather armor."

"You know, I haven't met Phoenix yet," Grieve Blossom reminded Roseluck. "I've only heard about her when you're talking with your friends."

Roseluck gave a skeptical look. "How do you not know who she is? She's one of the top Clearing Group players, right up there next to Rainbow Dash, and don't tell me you don't know who Rainbow Dash is."

"Of course I know Rainbow Dash," Grieve Blossom said, feeling a defensive. "But I've never met them. I just assume their like your guild leaders."

"Better," she replied.

Another hour passed, and all but inner caverns had been checked. All that remained was the boss room. Roseluck looked around her map, then turned to Grieve Blossom. "Think we should head back to the surface? Nothing left down here."

Grieve Blossom shrugged. "I don't know, I think if a sinister organization wanted to hide any kind of evidence, the boss room might be a good spot."

"Well, we're not so overpowered that we can take on the boss alone," Roseluck replied.

"Maybe," Grieve Blossom mumbled, walking over to the thick quartz door at the boss room. He placed his hoof on the handle, opening a small dungeon menu.

Available Repeatable Dungeon: Kill Sombra. Are you sure you want to continue without a full party?

"Let's just take a quick peek," he said, tapping the green confirmation button. Roseluck didn't answer back.

"Oh come on, don't tell me you're scared already," Grieve Blossom teased again, but Roseluck didn't make any remark. She didn't even make a sigh of despair at his annoyance.

Grieve Blossom turned around to ask again, but Roseluck was really gone. He looked around, worried she had already headed back for the exit. He hadn't heard her use a teleport scroll, but for going on hoof, she appeared to be long gone.

A mare whispered behind Grieve Blossom.

You poor thing, lost your girlfriend?

He whirled around and drew his sword to face the player, but voice had no body. He turned around again, scanning the cavern walls. There was nothing on the crystal shelves. He thought it could be a rare NPC for a moment, but he saw no markers near him as he checked his map.

And they call me clueless.

"What happened to Roseluck?" he shouted into the darkness.

Left you, of course. I mean, what girl would go for a guy like you?

"What are you talking about? We're barely even friends. We're more like colleagues."

That's not how you look at her.

Grieve Blossom grew angrier by the second. He grabbed a scroll from his inventory and opened it. The paper transformed into a stream of liquid fire, lighting up the cavern in fire and smoke.

"Where are you?"

The only reply was a dagger in the back. It only took a fraction of his health away, but Grieve Blossom lost all control over his body, and he collapsed. A paralysis poison.

Here I am. Boo.