My little pony: Soul of gold

Chapters

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 4
Chapter 13

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Princess Celestia stood at the balcony of her room, after a long day of holding court, diplomatic mediations, dealing with the nobles and other princessesly duties it was now time to lower the sun and hoof over the management of the land over to her sister.

To many, the never-ending stream of petitioners, the literal tidal wave of paperwork and the daily dealings with the snobbish Canterlot nobles would grate their nerves and leave them exhausted both physically and mentally. But Princess Celestia had neither a tired or stressed expression on her face, in its place was a content expression, crowned with a warm smile.

For Celestia such things were a sign that everything was going back to normal. It had not been long since Tirek had rampaged across the land, stealing the magic of her little ponies, he had even attacked Canterlot castle seeking to steal the magic of the alicorns and finally to add insult to injury he had imprisoned her along with her sister and niece in Tartarus where she herself had imprisoned him previously.

Celestia shuddered at the memories of her time spent in Tartarus, no harm had come to them in their brief stay, but the oppressive atmosphere made her wary, it was as if they were being watched by a predator stalking from the shadows ready to pounce at any given moment.

Celestia banished the though, there was no point in brooding over past experiences, she had almost ruined her good mood by reliving the experience. Lighting her horn, Celestia prepared herself to lower the sun, while in the next tower Princess Luna lit her horn to raise the moon in unison with the sun, a warm smile once again adorned Celestia's factions.

“My dearest sister is once again with me, Equestria's foes lay defeated and my dear student Twilight Sparkle has ascended and is on her way to become a proper alicorn, this is truly the beginning of a new email of prosperity for Equestria, what could ever go wrong?”.

Suddenly, as if destiny itself had heard Celestia's challenge and immediately responded with a ironic “What indeed?”, a blinding flash of light illuminated the Canterlot skies, taken aback Celestia raised her wing to shield her eyes from the intense glare of the light, the golden glow was so intense, it was as if a second sun had appeared out of nowhere. Celestia strained her eyes to look at the source of the light but to no avail, before she could make out anything of the source, it broke out into several pieces and flew all across the skies like a meteor shower falling into the confines of Equestria.

“Sister”. The familiar voice shook Celestia from her stupor.

“Sister are you unharmed?” Ashe'd Luna as she landed on the balcony next to her sister, worry evident in her voice

“Yes Luna, I am fine, but I wonder, what could have caused that mysterious light?”

“We must investigate this matter immediately sister, we clearly saw how the closest of the fragments fell into the Everfree Forest, we must make haste.

“The Everfree?” Celestia considered her options and chose to fallback on the time tested tactic of let Twilight take care of the situation. “Perhaps Twilight and her friends can aid us in solving this mystery. ”

//////////

Deep within the Everfree Forest, in a clearing illuminated by the moonlight there was a crater marking the place where a star had apparently fallen, a golden glow lingered in the area like morning mist while in depth of the crater a glowing mass pulsed like a faint heartbeat until it receded leaving only darkness.

For a very prolonged moment nothing seemed to happen, until something in the bottom stirred, the ruling silence was broken by a pained groan as a lone figure crawled out of the crater into the clearing.

“What happened? … Where am I? …” Aioria asked out loud to no one in particular as he regained consciousness.

“Brother!!” Exclaimed Aioria as his memories caught up with him, he shot up to his feet but found that he was unable to maintain balance and fell forward, he stopped his fall by planting his hands in the ground in front of him and frantically began to look around looking for his brother, he found no one, not his brother, or the others.

Still confused Aioria's gaze fell to his hands, or would have if his hands were there when he looked.

“What trickery is this!!”Yelled Aioria, instead of the familiar arms, hands and fingers he was supporting himself on two hairy limbs that ended in a bonelike stump in the end.

“Hooves”. The name came along with the recognition of what these limbs were, inspecting himself further, he noticed several things, one his natural posture was now a four legged stance, two he was covered from head to… hoof with short brown hair, three he had a tail…, four he wasn't very far from the ground.

“I’ve become a tiny horse-like creature”. He summarized. “A pony”. He said in resignation.

“Could this be a punishment from the gods?, it is very likely, when thinking of divine punishments the name Arachne comes to mind, the poor soul transformed into a monstrous spider all because of the jealousy of the goddess Ath~^§ELLIS!! YES ELLIS!!!, the evil goddess of discord, such villainy could only come from such a detestable being, never from the benevolent goddess Athena, surely, probably… maybe.

At the same time in another place a glowing golden apple intensified its glow, as if it were displeased maybe even angry with something, or someone, or somepony.

Back in the forest, Aioria’s frantic re-editing of Greek mythology was interrupted by a dangerous sounding growl, a growl that he was particularly familiar with, it was then that another possibility crossed his mind. “Samsara”. Shaka had once told him of this, the six paths of the weel of life, one of those particularly could be applied to this situation, the path of beasts, those who fell on the path of beasts would turn into an animal and be forced to participate in the never-ending fight for survival.

It felt weird, as a golden saint Aioria’s was already practically walking the path of Asura, and he was more than prepared for Hell having defied Hades himself, after all that being turned into an animal felt overwhelmingly… underwhelming.

There was no time to contemplate this as another growl called for his attention, turning to the source, Aioria could see two glowing eyes focused on him, the everlasting game of tag between predator and prey was about to unfold and judging by the lack of fangs and claws he was not the predator, that role belonged to the lion currently stalking from the shadows.

But, this little game would not go as nature intended, whatever form he had Aioria was still a golden saint and the golden saint of the house of Leo nonetheless, this would not be a predator taking its meat, it would be a fight between two lions. Aioria stood his ground and faced his foe with a look of determination, and then, the lion emerged from the shadows.

//////////

Twilight Sparkle galloped trough the lamp lit streets of Ponyville with a look of determination on her face.

“Twilight slow down.” called a canary yellow pegasus with a pink mane struggling to keep up her pace.

“We can't slow down Fluttershy, we have to go get Applejack so we can go investigate the fallen star in the Everfree Forest.” Twilight answers without casting a glance back at her friend.

“Can't this wait till morning?” said a polychromatic pegasus as she zipped trough the air next to Twilight.

“No Rainbow Dash this is a very important mission entrusted to us by Princess Celestia herself, it can’t wait.” Twilight immediately shot back.

“Darling, while I usually don't agree with Rainbow Dash in many things I do need my beauty sleep.” Said an alabaster white unicorn with a gorgeously styled purple mane.

“Ughhh.” Twilight let out an annoyed groan. “Girls take this more seriously, it's very important that we find out what fell in the Everfree, the Princess is counting on us.”

“B b but, going into the Everfree Forest at night, don’t you think it's a little too dangerous.” Flutters said barely loud enough for everypony to listen.

“Don't worry, we've done this before, it's nothing the six of us can't handle.” Twilight said confidently.

“Yeah we can take anything that forest throws at us” Rainbow Dash said boastfully as she made some shadowboxing moves in the air.

“Besides we can't wait till morning, what if it's gone by then?, what if somepony else finds it first?, Somepony evil, whit if “it” is evil, like demon or an alien, OR AN ALIEN DEMON!!.

“Twilight calm down.” Said a very pink pony that managed to get beside Twilight without her knowing. “You need to calm down and think rationally” Pinkie Pie said in a calm and composed manner witch managed to attract weird looks from the rest. “BESIDES!!” She piped up discarding her stoic façade. “it's not like whatever is there is going to grow hooves and run away.”

//////////

Aioria was running away as fast as his newly acquired hooves could carry him, while he was prepared for a fight he was not prepared for what was currently chasing him, instead of a full grown lion he found himself face to face with a creature from ancient myth, he was not wrong when he identified the growl as that of a lion, said lion however carried some extra features that identified it as something else, large leathery wings attached to its back and a scorpion stinger in place of a tail, a manticore.

Even tough he was at the service of the goddess Athena he never thought he would ever face such a creature. Even in his reduced form Aioria could tell it was many times bigger than a regular lion, he feared no enemy but in this case the circumstances were stacked against him, waking in a strange land in a strange body facing a strange foe, the best option available was to retreat and reassess the situation.

Running from the manticore as well as avoiding its swiping claws, clenching teeth and stinging tail aside from the benefit of avoiding becoming cat food was causing him to get accustomed to his new body, his sluggish and awkward movements were becoming sharper and more controlled.

“Just like training in the sanctuary” he thought, but just like training in the sanctuary one mistake could prove fatal, the manticore's stinger pierced the ground as Aioria jumped to the side successfully evading, but in that instant while he was still airborne the manticore unfolded its massive wings, while massive, they still couldn’t possibly lift the hulking creature from the ground, but that did not make them useless, flapping its wings at the moment it pounced the manticore instantly closed the distance between it and its prey, the manticore's clawed paw impacted Aioria full on his side sending him flying away until he hit a tree with such force it tilted.

For the second time in less than an hour Aioria let out a pained groan as he got back on his hooves, quickly regaining his senses Aioria jumped out of the way just as the manticore came crashing fangs first on the tree bringing it down completely.

Without a moment to waste Aioria got back on guard, it was then that he felt a pang of pain on his left side, glancing at his side he saw four red gashes across his side blood flowing, dripping to the ground, it could have been worse, Aioria's sharp sense of battle allowed him to twist slightly in the air avoiding the worse of the blow, the worse being those dagger-like claws.

Aioria turned his attention back at the manticore witch had just spat out a large chunk if wood and was once more on the prowl, or should have been… something was wrong, the manticore was not approaching instead it held its ground in a intimidating stance, a fighting stance, not a hunting stance.

“It makes no sense, it has all the advantage and it even injured me, it shouldn’t perceive me as a treat, then why?”

That question answered itself when a serpentine hiss directly behind him got his attention, slowly, not letting the manticore out of his sight he turned to the source of the hiss, apparently his previous leap from danger had brought hum close to a cave from where several pairs of yellow glowing eyes peered out from the depths of the cave, a giant serpentine head emerged from the cave, then another, and another, followed by a lot more. His escape efforts had brought him straight to a nest of giant snakes… no, not a nest, a lair, the difference lay in the actual number of occupants, witch became obvious as the snakes converged in a single body.

“Hydra” yet another mythological beast had appeared awoken by the commotion and the scent of blood, Aioria realized with no lack of urgency that he was now literally between 6 rocks and a hard place, the manticore roared and the Hydra shrieked signaling the beginning of a fight of witch he was the prize.

“Enough running!!” he exclaimed as he decided his next move, caution had backfired so now was the time to take action, as the two great beasts descended on the small wounded pony, the golden lion roared.

“¡¡¡BURN COSMO!!!”

Author's Note

Here we go, this is my first submission ever and it took me forever to get it right.
Since this is my first work all criticism is welcome, you lked or disliked something grammar errors or my writing style, all is fair game as long as it`s constructive.
This will probably be a long project and just thinking of the number of characters i have to include the task seems titanic, but hopefully imm in for the long run.
Also i would like to mention that i am only borrowing the premise of "Soul of Gold", the story is all original and i already know how i want the ending, however i have no earthly idead how imm gonna get there.
I would like to thank shinigamisparda, Bucking Nonsense, Knight Breeze, the whole displaced universe and all the big shots as well es everyone else the contributes to this site for inspiring me to add my grain of sand.
with all said thank you and please comment.

Chapter 2

Sweet Apple Acres, home of the best apples in all of Equestria and current destination of Princess Twilight Sparkle and her friends, as they neared the front door a heated argument could be heard coming from the inside.

-“Ah' tell ya I'm going”. Said the familiar voice of Applejack, the final member of the group.

-“And ah' tell ya it's too dangerous to go alone at night” came the voice of a male that could only be Big Mackintosh, Applejack's brother.

Twilight and company had stopped just outside the door to the farmhouse and we're now eavesdropping on their argument.

“What's going on?”. Asked Rainbow Dash in a hushed voice.

“Uhm, is Applejack planning to go out somewhere?”. Asked Fluttersy with a hint of concern.

-“What? But we need her for the mission, where could she be going at this time of the night?”. Twilight said with impatience written on her face. –“Pinkie! Stop doodling in other ponies faces”. Twilight reprimanded Pinkie Pie while whipping away the marker ink with her magic.

-“Oooh oh oh, maybe it's a slumber party, or even better a awake party at night, because you can’t have fun in a party if everypony's sleepy, why would you even call that a party if there's no streamers or cake or partycannons, WHATKINDOFPARTYDOESENTHAVEPARTYCANNONS!!!?.
Pinky Pie's hyper rant was interrupted when the front door burst open revealing Applejack.

“Ah’m goin' and that's final.” Applejack stormed out of her house but froze in place when she found herself muzzle to muzzle with her five best friends.

“Hiii Aplejack, are you going somewhere?” Twilight asked with a forced smile.

“Uh, hello girls, watcha doin’ here?” Applejack asked nervously.

“Well, we got a mission from the princess and we need you to come with us.” Twilight said as her forced smile grew even larger.

“What!? Ah can't, not right now, ah… ah got important business to do” Applejack said without looking Twilight in the eye, witch would have been difficult given how Twilight's eyes had begun twitching as she said that.

“Applejack dear, are you all right?” Rarity asked concerned for her friend, “If anything is bothering you, you know you can tell us.”

Applejack looked at Rarity and felt her resolve crumble under her gaze. “All right, ah guess ah have to tell you” she said with a defeated sigh. “Applebloom and the girls went missing.”

“WHAT!!?” Rarity was immediately in Applejack's face panicking when she heard the revelation. “Sweetie Bell! Where is Sweetie bell!?”

“Rarity calm down, let her explain” Twilight side restraining Rarity. “Applejack what happened?”

“The girls were havin' a slumber party at their clubhouse,” Applejack explained. “Everything was fine till' the sky lit up and that golden comet thing fell in the Everfree, ah' went to check on the girls after that but they weren't there no more, ah' already checked all over the farm, only other thing ah' can think of is that they went crusadin' to find that thing in the Everfree” Applejack explained with a mortified demeanor.

“THE EVERFREE FOREST!!!?” Rarity let out an earpiercing shriek as she reared on her hindlegs promptly fainting as a familiar couch came racing just in time to catch her.

“Oh dear” Fluttershy went immediately beside Rarity. “Rarity wake up, oh dear.” Fluttershy began fanning Rarity with her wings while Rainbow Dash shook her head in disapproval.

“Drama queen” She said not quite hiding her own concern for the missing fillies.

“Aha! I knew it!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed suddenly occupying the space in front of Applejack. “slumber parties are no fun, if they had a partycannon they wouldn’t have left to look for fun elsewhere.” She finished her statement with a victory pose right out of Rainbow Dash's repertoire of poses.

“Pinkie not now.” Rainbow scolded. “Also you gotta do that pose at an angle, that’ll make it about 20% cooler.” She said adding a demonstration.

“They went looking for the fallen light in the Everfree? That's great!” Twilight said excited.

“Beg yer'pardon.” Said Aplejack with a deadpan expression.

“What I mean is that the mission the princess gave us is to go investigate that same thing.” Twilight explained herself. “We can complete the mission and look for the girls at the same time.”

“Now that sounds like a plan, also I get this big lug off ma' back nagging about how ah' can’t go alone cuz the forest too dangerous to go alone” Applejack then signaled to her brother who had been standing in the doorframe quietly watching the exchange, he tipped his head in acknowledgment but otherwise didn’t say a word.

“What're we waitin' for let’s get a move on.” Applejack jumped to the charge followed swiftly by her friends including a recently revived Rarity.

“I’m coming Sweetie Bell.”

“Oh dear, I hope the girls are all right”

“Don’t worry, we'll catch up to them before you know it.”

“If they had a partycannon they wouldn’t have gone in the first place.”

“Pinkie we’ve talked about this, we're not letting those fillies anywhere close to artillery of any kind.”
Big Mac watched them as they disappeared into the night on their way to the forest, without a word he went back in the house and closed the door.

~~~~~

In the Everfree Forest, three little fillies cantered giddily on their way towards adventure, although three of them wore matching capes identifying them as the Cutie Mark Crusaders, a group dedicated to discovering their special talent and obtaining their Cutie Mark, and if that involved exploring a creepy forest in the middle of the night, then that forest would be explored.

“I can't wait to find that star that fell from the sky, maybe we'll get our star-finding cutie marks, that would be so awesome, I bet Rainbow Dash would love it.” Said the orange filly with a purple mane at the head of the group.

“Stars don't fall from the sky.” The white filly with a light purple mane corrected her friend. “Maybe it was a comet, or a meteor, yeah that’s it, we'll all get meteor cutie marks.”

“Actually, when a meteor enters the atmosphere it burns up due to friction and it breaks up into smaller pieces called meteorites.” The yellow filly with a red bow on her head corrected them both.

“Ugh, enough with the egghead stuff, also “rocks”, who would want a rock cutie mark, that's lame, rocks are lame.”

Over at the Pie rock farm Maude Pie raised her head from her dinner plate and looked out the window towards Ponyville, her neutral expression everpresent in her face, while at the other end of the table Marble and Limestone Pie were frozen stiff eyes fixed on their older sister.

“Uhh, what’s wrong Maude?” Marble dared to ask.

“Nothing.” Was Maude's answer as she finished the last of her rock soup, cleared her plates and left for bed.

“Scary” Whispered Limestone after Maude had left, Marble did not disagree.

Back in the Everfree Forest the crusaders had managed to get themselves completely… where they meant to be, all the crusading activities related to exploration and survivalism, as well as regular treks to visit the resident zebra of the Everfree had made them surprisingly adept at navigating the forest, a clear view if their target as it fell, a good map and some calculations and they managed to reach their goal in a very short time, they could teach new tricks to the filly scouts, there was only one problem.

“ITS EMPTY!” Scootaloo yelled in frustration, thy had managed to find crash site and has galloped up to it with unbridled glee, only to find a hole on the ground.” How can it be empty? What a waste of time.”

“Well something fell here.” Sweetie Bell said posting at the large hole in the ground. “You think somepony took it?”

“Girls over here, ah' found some hoofprints” Applebloom called from the other side of the hole. “Look, sumtin' got damage outta the hole over here, and that's hoofprints all over here, these are all fresh.”

“It's the thief.” Scootaloo said accusingly.

“It wasn’t ours Scoots, nutthin's been stolen” Applebloom cautioned her.

“But we saw it first” Scootaloo complained.

“Hey Applebloom, what about these prints?” Sweetie Bell asked pointing to some other prints in the dirt.

“Oh those are from a manticore” Applebloom said casually.

Silence.

“So.. Those must be pretty old then” Scootaloo said nervously.

“Uhm no, they’re pretty fresh.” Applebloom said as the realization of exactly what they were doing dawned on the three of them, they were alone, at night, in the middle of the most dangerous forest of Equestria.

“Maybe we should go back.” Sweetie Bell suggested as the three fillies nervously came closer to each other scanning the dark forest for signs of danger. “I mean, there's nothing here so there's no point in staying.”

“Yeah, and we better get back before Applejack finds out were gone or she might get worried.” Applebloom said as the three began to sidestep back to the path they came from.

“Yeah, we should do that or she might panic, let's go back.” The three began galloping back but suddenly Applebloom who was at the front stopped in her tracks promoting her friend to bump into her. “Hey, what gives?” Scootaloo protested until she saw the look on Aplebloom's face, one of pure fear, following her line of sight she knew why. Yellow glowing eyes looked at them from the darkness of the forest, all around them at the edge of the clearing yellow eyes watched their every move. A canine howl pierced the wall of silence that had erected itself in the forest soon followed by many others. The girls may have become very good at navigating a forest, but they had failed to take notice of their surroundings, because of that they didn’t notice that they were being stalked by a pack of timberwolves who had stealthily followed the girls to the clearing and preceded to surround them.

The fillies screamed and stepped back as the first timberwolf emerged from the foliage as if a part of the forest itself had taken wolf form with in all honesty was probably true. This repeated itself all around the edge of the clearing, wolf after wolf closed in on the terrified fillies who had retreated to the edge of the crater with nowhere to run, tears ran freely trough their cheeks as they foresaw their inevitable demise. The leading wolf wasted no more time and pounced the little ponies.

Then came the light.

~~~~~

Aioria was having a bad day, the fact that it had all started with the dead Rising from their Graves was testament to how bad it would come to be. Holy war, the world freezing over and death, it all seemed so distant now, as he wandered this new place in this new form. He had made quick work of the beasts, mythical or no they were no match for him once he got serious, however he still had to treat his manticore wound, but could he do such a thing, he was now a horse so he couldn’t treat himself, he was lost in a forest and he didn’t even know if there were humans in this place.

His thoughts were interrupted by the howling of wolves, it seemed to come from the clearing he had awoken in. “And now wolves, what else will this forest throw at me?” His question was answered in the form of screams. Aioria was already racing towards the source before the high pitched streams died out, these weren’t noises made by mindless animals, this would be the first puzzle piece to solving this mystery he just needed to make it in time.

Aioria burst into the clearing at full gallop, the scene before him played in slow motion, a pack of wolves had surrounded its prey and was closing in to deal the killing blow, one wolf was already descending on its defenseless prey witch was obscured to him by the wall of wolves, any other would be powerless to prevent this scene from unfolding but Aioria not willing to let this Chace slip by him Aioria burned his cosmo and unleashed his special technique, an attack from a golden saint that could move at the speed of light.

“Lightning Bolt!!”

The forest was illuminated as a golden lightning bolt tore trough the timberwolves reducing them to kindling, the destructive force reached the edge of the clearing leaving a trail of destruction further into the forest. By the end of the display Aioria had placed himself at the edge of the crater from witch he had initially emerged facing the remaining wolves. “Are you unharmed?” He asked looking back at the bottom of the hole and was legitimately surprised to see three little horses not unlike himself huddled together looking up at him,quivering in fear. A wolf had sized the opportunity and changed him while his head was turned, aiming for his neck.

“Look out!” Came the alarmed warning from the white pony. Aioria quickly turned raising his upper body as the wolf's jaws closed on thin air, from this position he brought down his burning hoof on the wolf's head smashing it again the ground. The three fillies looked slack-jawed at their mysterious savior, he wasn’t even a unicorn and yet he was doing some powerful magic, he glowed in a golden light and had gotten rid of the timberwolves that had almost ate them, clearly he wasn’t a normal pony.

Looking back at the remaining wolves Aioria noticed some things about them, mainly that they were made of wood, these were indeed storage creatures, puppets pulled together and given form by a strange energy, it felt ancient and twisted, they gave the same feeling as the rest of the forest.
Waiting no longer the wolves attacked Aioria from all sides in a concentrated attack, Aioria smirked at them before charging the wolf right in front of him at high speed slamming hi right hoof right in its face, the change in form had taken some getting used to, but fortunately the joints in the shoulders allowed for an ample range of motion making it possible to throw punches, two wolves closed in from each side while a third jumped at him from behind, Aioria raised his backlegs and delivered a shattering buck the wolf at his rear, using sheer strength he jumped using his forelegs evading the other two by a hairs breadth, spinning in the air he slammed his backlegs on the wooden heads of the wolves smashing them as well. Only three wooden wolves remained after his assault showing no signs of fear or doubt.

“Time to finish this, Lightning Bolt!” Aioria launched his attack at the wolves disintegrating them in a shower of splinters. Having eliminated all of the threats Aioria extinguished his cosmo and relaxed his body, the physical effort requires to perform his “lightning bolt” had reopened his wound, he would need to have it looked at.

“THAT WAS AWESOME!” Came a voice from right behind him, turning Aioria could see the three young ponies approaching him excitedly, the little girls immediately began bombarding him with questions.

“How can you do magic without a horn?”

“Are you a superhero?”

“What’s yer' name?”

“Where do you come from?”

“Did'ya fall from the sky?, are you an alien?”

“Can you teach me those moves? They were like “pow” and “whoosh” and “take that”.

During the barrage of questions Aioria noticed some things about these children, the white one had a horn protruding from her forehead, and the lively orange one had wings flapping like a hummingbird as she did her impression of his moves

“A unicorn and a pegasus.” He thought. “The mythological creatures keep appearing, what's next, a combination of the two?” Just as he was thinking this he heard voices calling from the forest, they were approaching.

“Applebloom, where are ya?”

“Sweetie Bell, I'm coming!”

“Scootaloo, get over here!”

“Uh oh” Chorused the little ponies as several grown ponies came into the clearing.

“Applebloom! There ya are!” An orange pony with a cowboy hat said as she angrily approached the little yellow pony. “When I'm done with you yer' gonna have a getting grounded cutie mark.”

"Sweet Bell, oh I was so worried.” A white pony with an elegant purple hairdo said as she hugged the little white unicorn.

“Hey Scoots, disappearing on your own like that is not cool.” A blue pegasus with a mane colored like a rainbow reprimanded the little orange pegasus.

“We're sorry.” They said in unison.

Aioria was observing the situation when his vision turned to pure white with two blue dots in the center. “HI! I’m Pinkie Pie” Said a pink pony right in his face.

“Gahhh!!!” Startled Aioria reared back letting out a very undignified yell, the pony had managed to get right in his face without him even noticing, not even the fastest of the golden saints could do such a thing. Pain shooting across his side quickly reminded Aioria that he had a large bleeding gash to tend to as he grunted in pain.

“Oh dear, you’re hurt.” A yellow pegasus approached him with a look of concern looking over his wounded torso. “We need to bandage it quickly, but I didn’t bring any bandages.” The concerned pony declared as she examined him

“No problemo, I keep first aid kits hidden all over the Everfree in case of “ouchie”related emergencies.” The pink pony said retrieving a white box from a hollow tree and hooffing it over to the yellow pegasus that proceeded to extract some bandages to treat his wound.

“What happened, howd’ya get hurt?” Applejack ask concerned.

“There were timberwolves, and he fought emm off” Applebloom explained.

“Yeah, he blew them all to bits, it was awesome he was like “take that, and that” and he beat them all.” Scootaloo added.

“And he can shoot lightning even though he's an earth pony.” Sweetie Bell chimed Inn

The mares suddenly notices the scattered piles of wood all around the clearing standing as proof to the fillies tale.

“First of all we still need to find whatever it is that fell in the Everfree.” A new voice said entering the conversation, Aioria was stunned, before him stood a purple pony with both wings and horn, remembering his previous toughts he bowed to be more carefully with his rhetoric.

“It's him” Applebloom said. “he’s the one that fell from the sky.”

“Yeah, he was glowing all golden and stuff.” Scootaloo said waving her hooves across her coat to illustrate what she meant.

“And he was close-by, that there is where he landed.” Sweetie Bell pointed at the hole in the ground.

The six mares had trouble wrapping their head around such outlandish declarations, clearly the girls were exaggerating what really happened, it was impossible that this lone earth pony stallion had fallen from the sky, used thunder magic and reduced a whole pack of timberwolves to sawdust all by himself.

Applejack cautiously faced the stranger gauging him for any sign of lies. “Howdy stranger, thank ya' kindly for helpin' mah' sister.” Aioria nodded in acknowledgement. “Did'ja get that there fightin' them timberwolves?” She asked him skeptically.

“No.” Aioria answered her, Applejack saw no lies in his answer, she was somewhat disappointed to hear that.

“A manticore did this to me” Applejack did a doubletake, she still saw no lies in him.

“Ya fought a manticore together with the timberwolves!?” Applejack asked shocked by his statement, the looks that the other mares were giving him mirrored Applejack's.

“No, the wolves came later, i fought the manticore along with a hydra.” Aioria offhandedly commented, all around him were nothing but astonished stares.

“What is going on!!!” Twilight yelled.

Author's Note

Chapter two brought to you by the Cities Magguffin Crusaders.
Honestly I can't get Applejack's county'isms right so pardon that.
Finished this in the middle of the night and should probably get some shut eye so I can more or less function at work tomorrow, anyway, next chapter we get really introduced to the plot, these were just introductions, looking forward to it.
Leave a comment, bye.

Chapter 3

Twilight Sparkle loved mysteries, especially those that challenged her scientific oriented mind, nothing quite felt as good as placing the puzzle pieces all together and solving a good mystery. But a mystery full of illogical, unbelievable and impossible puzzle pieces that did not fit together, Twilight hated those with a burning passion. That's why it was such a doozy when she accepted that she would never quite understand how the Pinkie sense worked, and now, Twilight was faced with another mystery in witch the explanation defied all logic.

After finding the missing fillies in the crash site of their mission objective the fillies quickly began telling stories if how an earth pony stallion had been the fallen object, that he fought off a pack of timberwolves and that he could summon lightning even though he was an earth pony. That made no sense. This. Needed. Investigating.

“Allright everypony we need to clarify what is going on here, first thing first.” Twilight faced the stranger who was standing there with his barrel bandaged by Fluttershy. “I am Princess Twilight Sparkle, Princess of Friendship.” Twilight announced with all the royalty she could gather clearly emulating Princess Celestia. “What is your name noble stallion.”

“Princess of friendship?” Aioria though to himself. “What kind of title is that.” The title somehow felt odd, but he could feel a strong cosmo coming from the purple pony, additionaly since she had both wings and a horn, considering that then her claim of royalty had more weight to it. Nevertheless he needed information, if he wanted to learn more of his situation he needed to ask the locals so he decided to go with the flow.

Aioria gave a respectfully bow an said. “My name is Ai-“

“His name's Lightning Bolt.” Applebloom popped in between them interrupting Aioria mid-sentence.

“Lightning Bolt?” Twilight repeated the name given by the excited filly.

“Lightning bolt?” Aioria echoed confused, why would they think that was his name.

“Yeah.” Scootaloo popped right next to Applebloom. “He was like “I am Lightning Bolt”, and then he was like “You will not harm these damsels.” And then “Wham!”, and “Pow!”, and “Zap!”.” She began jumping around speaking in onomatopoeia and throwing punches and kicks in the air.

“Really?” Twilight questioned.

“Really?” Aioria echoed.

“An' he even has a lightnin' bolt cutie mark.” Sweetie Bell said point ting at something in his rear.

Aioria turned to see what the child was pointing at and saw something that he had not noticed about his new body, a yellow stylized lightning bolt could be seen in his flank, looking closer at the ponies around him he noticed that all the adult ponies had similar markings in the same spot, but the little ponies didn’t, but still he had no idea what any of this meant.

“Hey mister Lightning Bolt, is shooting lightning your special talent?” Sweetie Bell asked him as the fillies crowded to admire his cutie mark.

“Special talent?” Aioria by now was so confused he was only repeating what the ponies asked him.

“Don’t be silly girls, earth ponies can’t do magic.” Twilight said dismissively.

“Magic?” Aioria said hitting the pinnacle of confusion.

“But it’s true, he really did shoot lightning, honest.” Applebloom told twilight.

“Yeah, and he fought off the timberwolves while glowing.” Scootaloo joined in.

“And Applebloom found manticore tracks over there.” Sweetie Bell said pointing at the side of the crater.

“Well I won't believe anything until I see proof.” Twilight said stomping her hoof for emphasis.

“Uhh sugarcube, these really are manticore tracks.” Applejack said from over by the crater.

“What!?” Twilight immediately ran over to where Applejack was and examined the markings in the floor, there were manticore and pony tracks scattered all around. Confronted with the evidence Twilight frowned and stomped her way back to where he fillies and stallion stood. “Well, they only proves that there was a manticore around here, I still won't believe that an earth pony can do magic until I see it.”

The three fillies turned to their rescuer and proceeded to bombard him with the deadliest attack known to ponykind, a triple filly pleading stare. “Mister Lightning Bolt could you please show Twilight your magic?” Sweetie Bell pleaded with teary eyes. “She won't believe us unless you do.”

“Pleeeeease.” The other two fillies chorused.

“That’s not magic, and my name is not-…” Aioria protested but the entire ordeal had left him exhausted and vulnerable to the merciless assault from the children. “Fine, I'll give you a demonstration.” Aioria closed his eyes and summoned his cosmo.

“Hoooooo” A golden light began to emanate from him as his body was strengthened by the power of the stars.
“Whoa nelly'!” Applejack reared back from the stallion that now seemed to be burning in golden flames.

“Awesome!” Rainbow Dash said hovering in the air.

“Goodness.” Rarity gasped while Fluttershy hid behind her.

“Wha-, but, but that’s, that’s.” Twilight stuttered failing to find the exact words.

“Sparkly!” Pinkie Pie said as she poked Aioria with her hoof.

“See, we told ya' he could magic” Applebloom proudly stated.

Twilight was at a loss for words, all the things the fillies said turned out to be true, this stallion fell from the sky into the forest and proceeded to fight off some of the most terrible creatures in the Everfree Forest. Some stray hairs shot out of Twilight’s straight mane as she analyzed this impossibility.

“How in tarnation are ya' doing that?” Applejack asked

“I’ve trained for years in the sanctuary to be able to manifest my cosmo energy” Aioria explained.

“Sanctuary?, Cosmo?” Twilight repeated not understanding what he meant.

“That looks awesome” Rainbow said as she flew around checking the glowing stallion with unrestrained curiosity. “But what about the shooting lightning stuff? Can you really do it?”

The triple death beam once again concentrated it's destructive force upon the defenseless Aioria. “Alright, I'll show you, stand back.” Aioria moved over to the front of the group while cursing his weakness against cute animals and children, cute animal-children was just unfair. Making his way over to the largest three on sight and prepared his attack feeling all eyes on him, judging, expecting, fearfully, skeptical. Taking a deep breath he pushed it all aside as he unleashed his attack.

“Lightning Bolt!”

The lightning bolt struck the tree with a deafening roar tearing it in apart and sending the ponies sprawling to the ground. When the dust settled the tree was split down the middle with each half collapsed at either side of the remaining stump,all the ponies had slaked jaws and pinprick eyes one of witch was twitching.

“That. Was. AWESOME!!!” Rainbow Dash cheered shooting to the air euphoric.

“Landshakes, that was mighty impressive, we'll imm' convinced how ‘bout you Twilight?” Applejack said adjusting her hat. Twilight in the meantime was speechless, it was impossible yet he did it, he conjured a lightningbolt without a horn or even a cloud, it merely shot out of his hoof like it was the most normal thing in Equestria, this was a new type of magic, it had to be, a new unknown type of magic ripe for study. Twilight’s mane seemed to grow even more disheveled by the second, her left eye twitched sporadically and a toothy smile crept on her lips. “A new type of magic.” She thought to herself, this was nothing like the Pinkie sense fiasco, she could study this unravel the mystery and get answers, glorious, scientific answers.

“So, what happens now?” Aioria asked the group of ponies oblivious of the sudden interest that Twilight had in him.

~~~~~

“I had to ask.” Grumbled Aioria who was strapped to a chair with cables stuck all over his body and a weird metal helmet on his head. After the demonstration of his power Twilight had hastily and somewhat aggressively led the group out of the forest, Applejack said her goodbyes and took the fillies back to the farmhouse not without reminding them how much trouble they where in. The rest of the group followed Twilight to her crystal castle where she proceed to attach her guest to every piece of equipment she had on hoof and bombard him with questions that just led to frustration when he didn’t answer in a way she could understand, witch was all the time.

“One more time, how do you conjure lightning without any medium?” Twilight interrogated her prisoner guest in an attempt to understand how he had done it.

“I already told you, I strike at the wind creating a vacuum and then pour a powerful electric current generated by my cosmo into it creating an electric discharge trough the void into the air.” Aioria explained for the umpeth time.

“LIES!” Twilight accused. “Nopony can move at the required speed to leave behind an empty space in the air much less to pour magical energy into it before it collapses, and what is this cosmo you keep mentioning? is it how you call this specific method?, is it how you call magic?, is it an acronym? Tell me! Tell me!!!” By this point Twilight was screaming her lungs out her mane a total mess and scattered notes covering every inch of the floor, Pinkie Pie even made a paper snowpony and paper angels.

Twilight dear, don't you think you’re being rather rude to the gentlestallion? After all he did save the girls in he forest” Rarity intervened on his behalf.

“But Rarity! We have a mission we must find out everything we can about him for science… I mean, for the princess.” Twilight defended herself throwing the princess card.

“Uhm, actually the princess only said investigate what fell into the forest and uhm, we already know that.” The snowpony said.
“Yeah Twilight, have you even sent a letter to the princess yet” Rainbow said throwing a scarf around the snowpony's neck while Pinkie placed a hat on its head and doodled a silly face on it.

“*gasp* The princess!! I completely forgot.” Twilight said in panic running out of the room. “Spiiiiike take a letter!” Came the shout from outside the door as Twilight scrambled for her number one assistant.

“Finally, I thought she would never stop” Said Rarity as she released Aioria from his restraints with her magic. “Please forgive Twilight, she gets a little carried away sometimes.” She said earning a look of disbelief from the stallion. “Why, with all this commotion we didn’t even had time for introductions, my name is Rarity and I must thank you for saving my sister, that was very gallant of you.” Rarity said with dramatic flare.

“And I'm Rainbow Dash, fastest flier in Equestria, and this is Fluttershy” Rainbow said adjusting the knot to the snowpony's scarf, the snowpony just eeped and stood stock still. “Thanks for saving scoots, I can't have my number one fan eaten by timberwolves, by the way can you teach me to shoot lightning like you do, that would be super awesome.”

Before he could answer his vision was filled with pure white with two blue circles in the center. “ HI! I'm Pinkie Pie” said the pink pony that had once again appeared out of nowhere in front of his face.

“I remember.” Said Aioria managing to keep his calm this time.

As soon as you’re feeling better you are officially invited to your surprise “Welcome to Ponyville Lightning Bolt” party, and after that we can have a “thank you for saving the crusaders” party, OH oh and we can also throw a “I fell from space and beat up a bunch of timberwolves” party. Pinkie announced bouncing excitedly across the room spreading confetti and streamers as she bounced off the walls.

“Wait, how can it be a surprise party if you’re inviting me to it? Also my name is not-” Aioria but he was interrupted by the door slamming open revealing a heaving Twilight followed by a purple lizard looking creature.

“Girls, I have Princess Celestia's response.” Twilight levitated a scroll and began reading. “Dear Twilight Sparkle” She began with a genuine smile on her face. “Why didn’t you wait till morning, the Evergreen Forest is dangerous at night.” Her smile faded while Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie tried to hide their snickers, judging by Twilight’s angry stare they did so poorly.

Hearing this Aioria wondered if this Princess Celestia's was some relative of Twilight, after all she had introduced herself as “Princess” Twilight Sparkle.

Twilight continued. “I am glad to hear that found out the source of the commotion, I am sending a chariot in the morning to escort you, your friends and our mystery stallion to Canterlot Castle so we can have an audience with him. Sincerely Princess Celestia.” Twilight put down the scroll and addressed her friends. “Now all we need to do is wait till morning, I'm sure I can get some results by then.” The creepy smile once again began to form on her face.

“Twilight dear, don’t you think you should get some rest first, you don't want to let the princess see you in such a state now do you.” Rarity said floating a mirror to Twilight.

Looking at herself Twilight realized what their little adventure and consequent freak out had done to her appearance and had to concede Rarity's point. “You’re right, it's gotten very late and we should all get some sleep.”

“Why don’t you stay the night, we've got plenty of rooms.” Spike offered helpfully.

“Thank you Spikey-wikey I think I'll do just that.” Spike practically glowed from his deep blush and his eyes transformed into pink hearts just at the sound of Rarity’s voice. The mares began to make their way to claim a room for the night, Fluttershy still had some stray pieces of paper clinging to her mane, Pinkie hopped up and down like she didn’t need any rest at all and Rainbow took a deep yawn as they exited leaving Aioria behind.

“Come with me, I'll show you a room.” Spike called for Aioria to follow as he went put the door.

Following the purple creature Aioria pondered his situation, he hadn’t managed to get any usefully information from the ponies, he hardly even had any conversation with them thanks to the freak out of the purple winged unicorn princess. But that would probably change in the morning as they were scheduled to meet with another princess who seemed to be higher placed than Twilight. Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, those seemed to be normal sounding names around here, no wonder they quickly adopted “Lightning Bolt” as his given name, it would be best to go by this name while on this strange place to blend in, or so he thought.

“Here we are.” Spike led Lightning Bolt to a room occupied by a bed a desk with a lamp and a bookshelf packed with books. “There’s not much stuff in here, we just moved Inn so we haven't furnished most of the castle, anyway you need something just call me.” Spike proudly signaled himself while puffing out his chest.”

“Thank you.” Lightning Bolt said walking into the room, glancing back at his host he asked. “Tell me, what exactly are you?, if you don't mind me asking.”

“Not at all, I'm a dragon.” He declared. “Never seen a dragon before?”

Lightning Bolt thought of Shiryu. “I've met one before.” He told Spike as he entered the room. “Manticore, hydra, timberwolves made of actual timber and now a dragon, I cant wait to see what comes next.”

Author's Note

Chapter up!
OK so last time I said the plot would reveal itself here, but the scene went longer than expected so I thought to upload a shorter chapter instead of dragging it on, so next time comes the plot heavy stuff and don't worry, I'm working on it.

Chapter 5

Princess Celestia never considered herself the strongest in all of Equestria, such a concept went completely over her head given that she always favored peace, in the thousand years of her rule there had been no need for her to resort to violence. Nevertheless when the time came she and her sister always proved to be up to the challenge be it against Discord or King Sombra the power of the alicorns always made a significant difference. Yet now a new foe appeared that had not only received the full brunt of Luna's magic unscathed but he also managed to destroy a shield powered by herself and Twilight throwing them back with nothing more than a flap of his wings, such a thing should not be possible even if most of her power was locked away, then again if this stallion was to be believed it was his master, this “Cronos” who was the cause of this.

And then there was the timing of this attack, just barely after Tirek's attack had left Equestria weakened, just barely after the elements of harmony were returned to the tree and became unusable, just as the defenceless bearers met with the weakened princesses in the still recovering and reorganizing castle. There were far too many coincidences, especially considering nobody ever knew how Tirek managed to escape Tartarus in the first place.

As she recovered from the shock, she saw that the element bearers had moved to shield them and that her newest guest was at the vanguard enveloped in a golden glow, the same glow that she had seen fall from the sky the prior night. Lightning Bolt as he had been introduced by Twilight, a strange stallion that had allegedly fallen from the sky and who had abilities that am earth pony should not naturally possess, said stallion was now using said abilities to defend them.

“Insolent fool, how dare you!” Pride furiously yelled at Aioria who had thwarted his attempt at the lives of the princesses.

“You have gone far enough, if you insist on fighting I will be your opponent.” Aioria stood defiantly blocking Pride's path.

“Who are you? Where did you get those powers?” Pride demanded from Aioria as he regarded him and his cosmo. “That power should be reserved for the servants of Lord Croons.”

“I am a golden saint at the service of the goddess Athena, golden saint of Leo, my name is-“

“Lightning Bolt!” Aioria began to introduce himself but was interrupted as he was giving his name by a chorus of hopeful voices calling him the new nickname that had Stockton him since his first meeting with the ponies, he was about to protest about this when Pride continued talking.

“So, Lightning Bolt is it?” Aioria didn’t answer and only glared at him. “There is only room for one God in this world so if you insist on standing in my way I will remove you as well!” As he spoke he gathered his cosmo and spread his wings in preparation for an attack.

“I won’t allow it! Lightning Bolt!!” Aioria countered striking Pride square in the chest with an explosion of lightning.

As Aioria's cosmo subsided he found himself pressing his hoof against the breastplate of Pride's armor, looking in he could see Pride smiling maniacally at him. “Weak.” Was all Pride said as he flapped his wings directly in Aioria’s. The powerful winds blasted Aioria away making him crash against the ceiling while in the floor the ponies screamed and struggled not to get swept away by the wind.

When the wind subsided Aioria who was being pressed against the ceiling fell heavily against the marble floor much to Pride’s amusement. “Heh, fool this armor called soma is a divine protection granted to me by Lord Croons himself, it is unbreakable, no harm shall ever befall me as long as I am wearing it. “ Pride gloated having regained the upper hoof but his smile turned to a scowl when Aioria rose on unsteady legs and looked at him with eyes that did not concede defeat. “You still pretend to oppose me? Fool! You have witnessed the great powers bestowed onto me by my lord, a mere mud pony like you will never be able to even put a scratch in my armor, why do you even fight me? My actions here are for the betterment of all ponykind?”

Aioria steadied himself once again standing protectively before the terrified ponies and the fallen princesses. “I will never allow tyranny to prevail as long as I draw breath, it is my sacred duty as a saint of Athena.” As Aioria spoke he once again ignited his cosmo to its limits preparing to once again face Pride.

Pride merely scoffed at his determination. “Ah yes, the 'goddess’ Athena” He said condescendingly. “don’t you worry, once Lord Croons had raised Equestria he will expand our empire to beyond the stars and reclaim his place as King of the Gods, I’m sure he will be glad to greet this goddess of yours personally” Pride said oozing malice with every word.

“What!?” Aioria responded in alarm at the declaration, Croons planned to raise an army and use it to extract revenge on the gods, that meant another front would join the Holy war and Athena's forces has nearly been exhausted between Saga's rebellion and the current battle against Hades, he could not let this happen, feeling his determination rise Aioria reached the depths of his being with his enhanced senses awakening his ultimate cosmo.

“I will not allow you to do as you please.” Aioria said as his aura strengthened, the air around him cackled with energy discharging random jolts of golden lightning. Pride took a step back as lightning danced across the room. “You who abuses your power turning it at the defenseless, you who mocks others while gleefully crushing their spirit, You! You will truly know what it means to face a golden saint.” As Aioria spoke a blinding golden light appeared before him forcing Pride to look away, Princess Celestial avatar of the sun focused her eyes into the light, it was like looking into a second sun, within that light she should see something, something had appeared and was shinning blindingly as the sun in front of the brave stallion.

When the light dimmed, what appeared to be a golden statue of a lion stood in front of Aioria, all present stared in astonishment, Celestial could feel a great power as well as a faint pulse coming from it.

“So you came” Aioria said, a warm smile adorning his face, he quickly regained his serious demeanor and called for the statue “LET’S GO, LEO!!!” As if answering his call the statue glowed intensely and broke into pieces, each individual piece finding it’s place on the stallion’s body, front and back legs, breastplate, even a piece covering his back and cutie mark and finally a five pointed headpiece with an aquamarine jewel in the center. The ponies were once again awed into silence at the spectacle

“Lightning Bolt!” Aioria wasted no time and began pelting Pride with consecutive attacks, this time he was being pushed back by the unbending barrage of attacks, he couldn’t see Aioria’s movements and had to resort to defense all while enduring a veritable rain of lightning bolts.”

“ENOUGH!!!” Pride roared in anger creating a sphere of wind forcing Aioria to relent, he glared at the gold clothed stallion across the room. “It’s useless, I already told you, you will never defeat me as long as I am wearing this armor” Pride began to say but suddenly he heard the sound of something breaking, he looked down to see a small crack in the breastplate of his precious armor, pride was gobsmacked as the impossible happened before his very eyes, the crack even began to grow and a few stray shards fell to the floor at his hooves. Confusion led to anger as Pride raised a glare towards Aioria. “You...” He said trembling in rage, his cosmo exploding as if fueled his bloodlust. “Enough with the games! Everypony dies now!” Pride declared as he extended his wings at their full length, Aioria readied himself and the ponies behind him braced themselves for anther wind attack.

“Perfect Storm!!!”

Time seemed to stop for Twilight as she saw the horror that approached, a solid wall of wind raced forward shredding everything in its path to dust, there was nothing to do, no barrier she could make would hold against that and she didn’t even have time to make one, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna tried anyway and were lighting their horns while her precious friends huddled together for protection, but it wouldn’t matter, it would get blown away again, and so would they, and Lightning Bolt, even him with his strange powers and golden armor could do nothing to stop a hurricane Twilight thought in resignation and closed her eyes as a single tear escaped her eyes and ran down her cheeks

“Lightning Plasma!!!”

The throne room exploded into chaos as countless beams of light collided with the approaching wall of death, both forces battled one another fiercely for dominance causing destruction all around, the floor shook and the ceiling crumbled, from behind the princesses shield Twilight saw as Lightning Bolt stood firm against impossible odds as infinite beams of light cut the wind wall that was intended to kill them all.

The two colliding forces eventually waned and stopped leaving two ponies standing glaring at one another. “I am impressed that you could repel my wind, but our battle merely just began, make no mistake about it I will destroy you.” Pride said as he once again spread his blue wings.

“Not good.” Thought Aioria. “His attacks have a very destructive force behind them, I won’t be able to protect the ponies while I fight him in this confined space.” Worry became evident in his face as he adopted a defensive stance as he prayed to Athena for a way, any way for him to protect the ponies, his prayers were immediately answered.

“Atomic Thunderbolt!”

From a large hole in the ceiling came a golden shooting star that proceed to throw a very familiar looking golden lightning attack at Pride but with much more force behind it, Pride managed to dodge it by taking to the air just as the place where he was standing was obliterated by golden lightning.

The shooting star hovered in the air for a second before launching itself and landing next to Aioria, the golden glow faded away revealing a light brown pegasus with a reddish brown mane clad in golden armor much like Aioria, the stallions armor opened at the back to let the pegasus's wings out and his headpiece had wing like decorations at he sides, at his hooves was a golden bow with a matching golden arrow, all in all he looked very similar to Aioria, almost like…

“B, brother?” Aioria asked cautiously, almost fearfully at the he newcomer as he looked at him with a hopeful expression.

“Hey little brother.” Said the pegasus. “Well talk later, right now we've got work to do.” He said fixing his eyes on the hovering Pride. “Hey you, it seems like you’ve been having a lot of fun, but if you insist on continuing I will be your opponent, let me warn you though, this golden arrow pierced The Wailing Wall in the depths of Hades, how do you think you will fare?” The pegasus's golden aura flared to life enveloping his bow and arrow ominously.

Pride remained silent for a moment as of considering his options, the he spoke. “It would seem that some unknown factors have appeared, I must return and report this to Lord Cronos immediately, but don’t be mistaken we will settle this at another time.” Pride hovered in the air just a moment longer glaring at the golden armored ponies before shooting towards the roof trough one of the larger cracks.

“Brother.” Aioria approached his brother Aioros the Golden Saint of Sagittarius who responded with a gallant smile and a heroic pose, with was all for naught when he clumsily dropped his bow and arrow witch rattled to the ground noisily. “Brother… you don’t know how to use that in this form, do you?” Aioros's only response was to look away.

Cantering Castle broke into chaos following the attack, the place had been severely damaged and several guards had been severely wounded, the fact that an intruder had reached the throne room and assaulted the princesses had only fanned the flames. After all the wounded were tended to (including the princesses and the bearers) the princesses held a meeting (despite the protests of the palace guards and the medical staff) with the element bearers and their new saviors, both still wearing their impressive sets of golden armor.

“So, let’s see if I got this right.” Said Twilight after they had given a cursory explanation of their situation. “You two are elite warriors from another world who fight for the peace of the world at the service of Princess Athena.” She summarized, Aioros wanted to point out that Athena was a goddess and not a princess but he kept quiet, apparently the titles were interchangeable in this world. “And you were in the middle of a war against an evil wizard who wanted to block out the sun to rule a world covered in darkness.” Princess Luna looked rather uncomfortable at this part of their story and looked away with a noticeable blush, Aioria wondered why but he didn’t want to interrupt now that they were finally getting somewhere. “And!” Twilight emphasized. “You along with the other ten golden warriors, or “saints” as you call yourselves sacrificed yourselves so others could move on and save the princess.”

“That’s about it.” Aioria nodded at the extremely shortened version of the war against Hades, although some of the details were somewhat inexact that wasn’t important at the moment. “However, instead of dying we were transported to this world and scattered to the winds, isn’t that right brother?” Aioria asked his brother Aioros for his input on the matter.

“Indeed, the explosion resulting from the destruction of the wailing wall should have turned up to dust and scattered our asked to the ends of the universe, but instead we crossed into a completely different universe for reasons I cannot begin to understand, and if we both are here then that means the others probably made it as well.”

“What does thou intend to do next sir Golden Arrow?” Lunar asked the contemplative Aioros.

“Hmm, first we need to… Golden Arrow?” Aioros began to answer when he registered the name he had been addressed as.

“Indeed.” Lunar replied joyously. “We caught thy name whilst thou were boasting about the achievement of bringing down the wall of wailing to the villain Pride.”

“But that’s not my…” Aioros began to protest, but his voice was quickly drowned by the he other ponies as they commented on his “name” approvingly, Aioria quietly approached his brother from behind and placed a hoof on his shoulder and gave him a sympathetic smile.

“Don’t think too much about it brother.” He said knowingly.

“oooh look, it even matches his cutie mark.” Said a female voice on the other side of Aioros where there was certainly no one just a moment ago, startled he turned to see the pink one standing there raising his armor piece that covered his flank just enough to reveal a golden bow and arrow printed on his fur. “See?”

“Madam please.” Said a flustered Aioros. “I don’t believe we have been formally introduced.” Aioros moved away from the mate who had managed to escape hid detention and get her hooves on the goods, the other mares wore a sight blush while Rainbow Dash and Aioria chuckled at his discomfort, but the pink one just smiled oblivious to his discomfort.

“Hi immediately Pinkie Pie and I already know your name so there’s no need for more introductions what’s your favorite cake? I have to know cause when we go back to Ponyville immediately going to make you a “Thank you for flying in and saving the day” party so I need to know to make it just perfect what about cupcakes do you like cupcakes hrmghlbrg” she went into a long winded speech before Applejack covered her mouth with her hoof to make her stop, Aioria and Aioros just looked at them confused.

“Ahem, as I was saying the first thing we should do is look for the others, we will need their strength if we are to go against Chronos.” Aioros quickly got back on the subject.

“Wait.” Intervened princess Celestia. “You know who Chronos is?” She asked.

Aioria and Aioros shared a look and Aioria began to explain. “Chronos is the king of the Titans, the youngest son of Gaia and Uranus, he killed his father and assumed the rule of the world but was later defeated by his son Zeus and imprisoned in Tartarus for all time.” He was expecting questions but wad only met with silence from the two rulers.

“Did, did you say Gaia and Uranus?” Celestia asked with a trembling voice, taken aback by this Aioria nodded, Princess Luna and Princess Celestia shared a meaningful look at the revelation, and then Princess Luna spoke.

“Mother and Father?”

Author's Note

So here's next chapter, after this comes a bit of uncharted territory as I pass the first Ark and go on figuring out what comes next so it'll probably take some time, if you are any suggestions by all means leave a comment, any input is appreciated also leave a like if you will, or leave a dislike, just let me know the reason so I can address it.
So that's it for now, until next time bye.

Chapter 6

In the beginning there was only chaos, then from the chaos emerged Gaia, after Gaia came Uranus her husband, together they gave birth to the twelve Titans. However Uranus was a cruel father and husband so Gaia conspired with her children to punish Uranus, only the youngest, Cronos accepted the task and so he defeated his father and took his place as ruler.

Cronos however became as much as a tyrant as his father, and an ever worse father, being warned by Uranus after his defeat that he would also fall to one of his offspring, Cronos sought to escape this destiny by devouring his children as they were born.

Rhea, Cronos's wife, tired of offering her children hid the youngest from her husband replacing him with a rock with was devoured whole by Cronos, when this child grew he disguised himself as a servant to approach Cronos and gave him a potion that made him vomit out his immortal siblings and subsequently defeated him, he was the god known as Zeus.

After defeating his father and the Titans , Zeus imprisoned him in the deepest part of Tartarus for all time and ruled the world along with his brothers and sisters the Olympians.

“And that is the story Cronos as we know it.” All ponies listened to Aioros's story in silence carefully taking in every detail, none notes than Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, both alicorns remained silent even after Aioros had finished his story, neither the bearers or the two golden saints dared to interrupt their meditations.

“I see.” Princess Celestia finally broke the heavy silence. “Long ago, even before the time of the unification of ponykind, Luna and I lived with our parents, our mother Gaia who gave shape to mountains and valleys like a beautiful painting,and our father Uranus who shaped the skies like a music score, those were, good times.” Twilight desperately resisted the urge to take notes, any information prior to the three pony kingdoms was incredibly rare, but this information was personal, Twilight doubted that the princesses had ever told this to anypony. “Then suddenly one day, they were gone, and we never saw them again.” Celestia's face had gone from nostalgic to saddened as she revealed her past to all present.

“We never knew what had happened to them, until now that is.” Luna continued after her sister. “Poor father, he was strict but I cannot imagine him as a tyrant, and to be defeated by his own offspring.”

“You were always his favorite, you and he are so much alike.” Celestia and Luna shared a warm glance while Aioros and Aioria shared a worried glance, Aioros had been purposefully vague and brief when going about Uranus's defeat, it would be uncomfortable to say the least to give a detailed explanation to his loving daughters.
“Wait a minute.” Rainbow Dash said sparing the brothers further scrutiny. “Didn’t you say this Cronos dude is in Tartarus?” She asked to witch Aioros nodded. “Then what are we waiting for, let’s go kick his butt.” She said enthusiastically.

“it’s not so simple Rainbow Dash.” Princess Celestia cautioned her. “Tartarus is a vast realm, we have been using it as a prison for centuries and still we know very little of it, the news that it was being used as a prison for one of our,“brothers”, only signals how little we know of it.”

“Wait, do you have direct access to Tartarus?” Aioria asked surprised.

Princess Luna promptly answered. “Yes there exist in Equestria a portal that leads to Tartarus, it is located inside a cave in a volcanic mountain and it is guarded at all time by Cerberus the three headed dog, also there exist a spell to open a portal directly, but very few have the knowledge or the power required to use it.”

“I see, the same way our world is connected to Hades your world is connected to Tartarus, then it is possible that our world's may be indirectly connected by way of these two underworlds.” Aioria pondered the possibility while Twilight scribbled madly in a scroll.

“That may be little brother but that is not important right now.” Aioros said. “and in regards to miss Dash's idea, it is most likely we will find nothing even if we search all of Tartarus.”

“How are you so certain?” Celestia asked curious to his certainty.

“From what we’ve learned recently Cronos has always acted from behind the scenes never revealing himself, but today his agent attempted a full frontal assault in order to take control, that means something has changed, I believe he may have already escaped his prison and now plans to aggressively pursue the conquering of this world.” The severity of his words reached all the gathered ponies, even Pinkie Pie looked a little deflated and Fluttershy was holding back tears. “Our best bet would be to strengthen our defenses and wait for the enemy to reveal themselves, then we attack.”

“Well, yeah OK no problem, I'm sure the princesses can take care of this Cronos guy in ten seconds flat.” Rainbow Dash quipped and her friends nodded in agreement, except Twilight.

“I’m afraid we won't be of much use in battle as we would hope to be Rainbow Dash.” Said Celestia.

“Huh? Why not?” Rainbow Dash asked not quite understanding why.

“T'is because most of our magic is being continuously used maintaining the sun and the moon in place at all times.” Lunar explained. “The amount of magic we have at our disposal is insufficient for a long term confrontation, that is why we have relied so heavily on the Elements of Harmony and its bearers.” Princess Luna's statement was met with looks of disbelief from the bearers, after all they all believed that the princesses would always come to the rescue

“Twilight, you know this to be true right?” Princess Celestia addresses her former student who she had previously entrusted her magic before.

“It's true.” Twilight said not raising her eyes to meet her friends. “When I had to raise the sun, it was, difficult, even with the magic of four alicorns it was one of the hardest things I have ever done.”

Princess Celestia smiled kindly yet sadly at her fellow princess. “That is the main reason we hid our magic from Tirek, once he realized the burden we carry he would have immediately cut the link between our magic and the celestial bodies once again leaving then to go aimlessly astray dooming us all, it was fortunate that you could use the power of the Crystal Tree to defeat him before that.” Twilight did not feel relieved at princess Celestia's praise.

This revelation left in its wake a lingering feeling of uncertainty, the princesses were always viewed as the epitome of power, knowing that they would be unable to provide assistance was a great blow for the morale.

“If I may ask, what are the Elements of Harmony?, you’ve mentioned them before.” Aioria asked the Princesses.

“The Elements of Harmony are very powerful magic artifacts that exist in this world, each one represents one of the core virtues that we hold most important in Equestria, we have used them before to defeat various threats to Equestria before, as a matter of fact, Twilight and her friends are the current bearers of the elements.” Princess Celestia explained.

“But we don’t have the elements anymore.” Twilight cut in rather drastically. “We returned them to the crystal tree and now we can’t get them back.” With that final comment the mood had gone completely somber, it was a shame, Aioria thought, such powerfully artifacts might have been useful in this situation, that was probably the reason they were targeted as well.

“But what about that super-duper mane-raising wibblly-wobbly power-up we used to beat that meaney pants Tirek.” Pinkie Pie said while doing weird motions along with her words, Aioria and Aioros felt confused by the pink pony’s antics but the rest of the ponies recovered from their gloomy mood.

“Hey yeah, we can use that.” Rainbow Dash jumped to the air with renewed glee. “I totally forgot we could do that, if any of those clowns show up again all we gotta do is go “rainbow force” on them and *pow*, we win.”

“Wait just a second there shugarcube, who said you could go on 'n just name it “rainbow” sumth'n or another?”

“C'mon AJ, any name I give it is at least 20% cooler than anything anypony can come up with, especially apple whatever.” Applejack shot Rainbow a glare.

“Uhm, I think it sounds nice.” Came a reserved comment from Fluttershy.

“Ohh! I still remember how fabulous my mane looked back then, and my coat was so shiny and glossy why I can already foresee a whole new clothes line based on them.” The amiable chatter went on with the ponies going back and forth generally with comments on how great this “rainbow force” was, only one pony remained skeptical.

“But we don't even know how it works.” Twilight interjected. “We haven't been able to use it again ever since we beat Tirek and we don’t know anything about how or why it works.” Twilight’s pessimistic rant threatened to bring back the gloomy mood to the room, they were all so silent that Fluttershy's voice reached all of them effortlessly.

“Uhmm, what about the castle, there may be clues in there.” She said, at this remark the gears in Twilight's head began turning.

“That's it! The castle was made from the crystal tree, there may be something there we haven't found yet that can help us, Fluttershy you’re a genius.” The butter yellow pegasus blushed and retreated behind her mane at the praise. “We need to go back at once and start searching.” Twilight got on her hooves and galloped straight towards the exit forgetting about everything else.

“Twilight wait!” Princess Celestia called to Twilight in alarm. “It's not safe to go alone, we don't know when the enemy will strike again.” Twilight skidded to a halt remembering her impotence in the attack on the castle just moments earlier.

“Don't worry.” The golden armored pegasus chimed in. “We can assist you if they ever show up again, I believe we are capable of facing this enemy and protect you as well. Aioros said, Aioria who stood at his side smiled an nodded in agreement.

“If we may ask , why dost thou so readily agree to fight for us.?” Princess Luna asked the stallion wearily, the rest of the ponies straightened up curious to what he would answer.

Aioros smiled slightly. “It is the duty of Athena's saints to defend the peace of the world, however I would be lying if I said there wasn't a reason behind it.” He explained. “It was beneficial to us that our enemy was called “Pride” and not “Prudence”, he revealed a great deal of information during his gloating, and from that I can deduce that he plans to raise an army and use said army to get revenge on Zeus and all of the gods, that would of course include Athena.”

Princess Celestia approached the brothers up close towering over them, digging inside their souls with her intense magenta eyes, Aioria relived his first meeting with her and he could see that his brother fared no better being stared down by a goddess. Finally a smile former in her lips and her expression softened. “Brave Knights from a faraway land we humbly accept your assistance in this time of need.” She said giving a courtly bow to both saints. In a panicked haste both kneeled before Princess Celestia who giggled amusedly. “Sir Lightning Bolt, Sir Golden Arrow, Equestrian is in your debt.” Aioria intended to object at being called that pseudonym again but his protest was drowned by a loud detonation followed by a rain of confetti and the cheers from the six mares present in the roroom.

After the meeting Aioria and the bearers returned to Ponyville (this time by train) and headed straight for the castle, it had been agreed that Aioria would protect Princess Twilight and her friends while Aioros stayed in Canterlot to protect princesses Luna and Celestia. Aioria would have preferred to have more time to spend with his brother, but his obligations as a golden saint came first

After hours of searching the castle from top to bottom with nothing to show for their effort they all retreated to the main room to rest, this room had six large chairs marked with the cutie mark for each of its intended occupant arranged in a circle with an emblem of a crystal starburst in the center, and a small chair next to Twilight belonging to Spike, the girls began taking their seats tired from the day's activities, Spike was fast asleep in his mini throne while Aioria stood at Twilight's left.

“So, let's go trough this one more time.” Aioria said trying to assimilate what he had been told about the castle.

“Ughhh! We've been around this like a million times Lightning.” Rainbow said in annoyance. “We found all six keys, defeated Tirek and got this sweet castle, end of story.

“I can't believe we've been up and down the castle all afternoon and we haven't come across anything usefull, all of Equestria is in danger, why would the map want us to sit in a castle in Ponyville, it doesn’t make any sense” Twilight complained in her seat.

“Twilight dear relax, it's only the first day, why we've barely even covered a small part of the castle, I don't think we've ever all sat around this table before today.” Rarity said in an attempt to console her friend.

“She’s right sugarcube, 'sides 'taint like we're gonna stumble on some big magical thingamajjiger on our first try.” Applejack said just as Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie sat at their seats, unbeknownst to them as each one took their seat the emblem on the top and the cutie mark of the respective mare began to glow faintly, as Rainbow and Pinkie sat down the glow intensified finally catching their attention, then from the floor crystals began pooping out from the base of the seats towards the center where they collided with each other piling up and growing even larger.

By the end of this event there was in the center if the room, a round table, and on the table a map, a very vivid and detailed map of all of Equestria. Spike stirred, awaking from his nap looking around at the slack jawed faces of his friends, finally noticing the map he said. “Is that new? I like it.”

Author's Note

All aboard the exposition train, Choo! Choo!
So yeah, this chapter is basically a dump of exposition, took me so long because I was working around making it less tedious, anyway now that that's out of the way we get our plot device "the map" so you already know where the next chapter will be taking place.
What adventures will await our protagonist?
What foes will they face?
Which friends will they encounter?
As always, leave a like and a comment if you please, ohh and keep an eye for mistakes I was too lazy to do a final check ;)

Chapter 7 Author's Note

OK, sorry i'mm late with this, writer'so block I guess, also I planned to make all a single chapter but that just means I get more time to flesh out the fight scenes, as always tell me what you think, give a like, leave a suggestion and see you next time

Chapter 7

In a remote location were time and space were not fixed concepts a dark figure made its way purposefully trough a dimly lit room, several other figures could be seen scattered across the room obscured by shadows, all eyes fixed on the black armored pegasus.

“So, the prideful one returns, and yet the sun and the moon remain on their throne high in the sky.” One shadowy figure spoke in a slow mocking voice.

Pride stopped his advance and shot the speaker a murderous glare. “Silence you!” He spat. “The fake goddesses will fall by my hoof, and so will the elements, make no mistake about that!” Pride declared making no effort to hide the hate in his voice.

“Why yes, you declared so before you parted, and yet now you return to us not victorious but beaten, and broken.” Those last words came out calm and deliberate as the figure shifted his attention at the rather large crack in the ‘unbreakable’ armor worn by Pride.

Pride tsk’ed in annoyance at the remark. “Some unforeseen pests have appeared that may present an obstacle to our plans, now out of my way! I must see Lord Cronos.” He said with finality and resumed his canter.

“Unforeseen pests eh, interesting!” The dark figure said as he brought his hands together in a pensive manner.

Back with our heroes, after the map in the castle had made itself known it had magically signaled a faraway location towards witch the element bearers were currently heading alongside Aioria who was acting as their personal guard and escort, already fully armored and with the addition of a flawless white cape over his shoulders courtesy of Rarity who had insisted that their personal guard absolutely must look 'dashing and heroic', witch had led to a veritable fashion montage featuring all kinds of capes, cloaks and cowls, an ordeal witch Aioria stoically endured.

There was an animated chatter going on, mostly about what they would possibly find once they arrived at their destination, Rainbow Dash suggested that they would find some kind of monster to beat up or maybe even Cronos himself and promptly started bragging about how she would totally beat him up. Pinkie Pie of course was sure that they would run into a super-duper awesome party and have loads of fun. Fluttershy hopefully that they would not find anything scary at all and they would all be fine. Aioria quietly hoped that they would find any of the others.

The train finally reached the end of the line and the ponies descended from the train only to be met with a barren landscape, being left with no choice the ponies walked the rest of the way until they could see a small town in the distance.

“That’s it.” Said Twilight. “ That’s the place on the map.”

“Well, let’s go down there and find the spa” Rarity said as she made way towards the town but Twilight stopped her by teleporting in front of her.

“Wait.” Twilight said. “We don’t know why the map sent us here, we can’t just walk right in, it could be dangerous.” Her worried statement was received with a hoof pump and a “Yess “ from Rainbow Dash.

“I’ll go first, follow me.” Said Aioria taking that as his cue to take the lead, he made his way cautiously towards the town doing good his best to ignore Pinkie who was maneuvering under some rocks (and a Boulder at one point) in a not really stealthy way. When the had gotten close enough they all took cover behind a large rock and took a look at the town.

“Is this really the place the map sent us? It looks like the most orange town in all of Equestria!” Rainbow Dash complained.

The rest of the group began giving their opinions on the town but Aioria looked closer at the residents, there was something odd about them, or so his sixth sense told him, they felt odd as if there was something missing about them, Pinkie Pie seemed of the same opinion as demonstrated when she shot up answer said. “I don’t like it, I don’t like it one bit, I know smiles, and those smiles, they’re just not right.” Just like she pointed out every resident of the village had a large toothy smile on their faces, everywhere you looked the same smile could be seen in everypony.

“Forget about the smiles, look at their cutie marks.” Twilight interjected pointing out that as with the smiles, all the ponies had the same mark on their flanks, that would be naturally impossible, all information Aioria had on the utilities marks posted at the uniqueness of each and every one.

“An entire village with the same cutie mark, how can this be? Twilight asked to no one in particular.

“I think there’s some kind horrific monster behind this.” Rainbow said.

“What makes you say that.” Aioria asked seriously.

“Because fighting some horrific monster would be super awesome.” Rainbow said relishing the idea, Aioria couldn’t stop rolling his eyes at the carelessness of the comment.

“Ah’ reckon we oughtta just head I to town and talk to some locals, figure out what’s going on.” Applejack suggested and the ponies walked into town.

“Those smiles are bad news.” Said Pinkie uncharacteristically grumpy as she followed suit.

As they entered town they were greeted by all the local ponies with a “Welcome” witch was delivered in the creepiest way possible as they all came from ponies with an identical smile and barely any inflection on their voices, they continued forward until late they were intercepted by a stallion wearing a cloak. “Welcome, pardon my forwardness but are you an alicorn?” He asked Twilight who gave him an awkward smile

“That there’s the Princess of Friendship.” Applejack supplemented helpfully.

“Well you’ve certainly come to the right place every for friendship.” The stallion replied placing extra emphasis on that last word.

“What brings you to town?” Asked a white stallion approaching the group.

“We’re not entirely sure.” Twilight said.

“I see, well all are welcome in our little village, my name is Double Diamond and this is Party Favor.” He said signaling at the other stallion.

Applejack responded in kind introducing all of her friends and “Lightning Bolt”, immediately after Double Diamond craned his neck closer to the mares. “And you all have your own cutie marks.” He said creepily as he ogled at their flanks, Aioria found this action atrocious and quickly stepped in to make his presence known.

“Excuse me.” He said quite brashly. “Have you had any ‘trouble’ around here lately?” The heavily armored royal guard stand in inquired.

If Double Diamond felt intimidated he hid it well. “Trouble? Which I don’t think we’ve ever had trouble in our little village.” He said dismissively, Party Favor quickly agreed. “Perhaps you’d care to speak to our founder, Starlight Glimmer.” He turned and began walking towards the edge of town with Party Favor at his side, when they reached the last house in the street they both knocked at the door in unison and promptly entered followed closely by the group.

“Be ready to fight.” Rainbow Dash said to Aioria. “We don’t know what’s gonna come trough that door.” The back door opened and trough the dark frame came, a rather ordinary are looking unicorn mare, she was a light shade of purple with a darker purple mane with a blue highlight on both her mane and tail.

“Welcome, I’m so pleased to have you here.” She said merrily while Rainbow Dash groaned loudly having her hopes for adventure dashed once more, Aioria however studied her closely, for a faint moment before she came out the door he felt as if there actually a horrific monster behind the door, but now he felt no threat whatsoever coming from her, he was focusing on this as the ponies exchanged pleasantries, Starlight Glimmer seemed rather interested in having an alicorn princess as a guest while Pinkie Pie kept frowning at her just as she had frowned at everything in the town so far.

“Were happy to have any pony who want to experience ‘true’ friendship for the first time” Starlight said in a delightfully smug tone, this was not lost to Applejack who deadpanned a response. “Oh indeed, that’s what’s so unique about our village you see, around here we don’t flaunt our special talents, because we don’t have any special talents to flaunt.” She explained.

“Is that why you all have the same cutie mark?” Twilight asked, Aioria paid close attention to what she had to say , ever since arriving he couldn’t shake off the feeling of wrongness that permitted the whole town, maybe now he would get some answers, except, instead of answering Twilight’s question, Starlight began, to , sing… yes, she was indeed singing, she exited her house and began gathering the town ponies to do an improvised musical number, there was even music, a few verses past before Aioria brain reset and remembered he was in magical ponyland in another world.

“What is going on?” He asked expecting a somewhat reasonable answer, he would be disappointed.

“Haven’t you ever seen a spontaneous outburst of harmonic magic?” Twilight said as if he had asked what was a cutie mark, witch he had, repeatedly. “The ambient magic in Equestria often builds up, especially in areas around ponies and from time to time is released in the form of music and dance often affecting large numbers of ponies, the largest known example happened in Neigh Orleans during the festivities of Mare Di Gras witch lasted…” Twilight continued to explain but soon she realized it wasn’t going trough. “It’s one of the most common known magic phenomenon known to pony kind, how could you don’t know about it?” Twilight asked slightly flustered, Aioria merely gave her a deadpan look ‘till it seemed to click on her.

With the half attention Aioria was giving the song he could tell that some of the lyrics seemed to have troublesome connotations, Fluttershy didn’t seem to catch on to this for she was bobbing her head to and from to the beat, that is until Pinkie Pie shot her a glare with her now ever present frown. The whole scene was so bizarre that by the time Aioria cane out of his ‘private little world of denial’ they were all sitting at a table around a plate of muffins, the waitress looked a little jumpy and discretely asked them to meet her inside before disappearing into the store building.

They were discussing how to follow their new lead without arousing suspicion when Applejack came up with something.” Ah’ve got an idea, but ya gotta eat all of them muffins Lightning.” She said.

“What!? Why me?” Aioria responded somewhat alarmed, those cupcakes were rejected by Pinkie Pie and in his short time knowing her he had seen her devour some questionable food choices.

“Darling it is a gentlestallion’s duty to come at the rescue of a maiden in distress and bear their burden, now go along and tackle that burden.” Aioria was suddenly besieged by six smiling mares that looked right at home in this town, begrudgingly he picked up a cupcake and took a bite. Several minutes later he bit down the last piece of “cupcake” while looking at little green in the face.

“Ah can’t belive you ate all our muffins Lightning!” Applejack exclaimed rather loudly, Aioria was not amused. “We’d best go inside and get some more!”

They found themselves going down to the basement in search of anypony. “Hello! Sugarbell, are you there.” Twilight called.

Their mysterious waitress emerged from the shadows with the now familiar town smile. “Thanks for coming.” She said.

“Why did you want us to come early down here?” Twilight asked as she studied the basement.

“So nopony could see what’s about to happen.” Sugarbell said eerily and at one two other ponies materialized from the shadows and approached the group. Aioria dropped into a battle stance but instead of a barrage of attacks they were assaulted by a barrage of questions.

“Are you really the Princess of Friendship?”

“Do you know Princess Celestia?”

“I looove your cutie mark!” so on and so forth, turns out a group of ponies who were not completely sold into the “equality motto of Starlight Glimmer called them down to be a leader to have a chat away from prying eyes witch was exactly what they needed to get some information. From them they learned that Starlight used a magical tool to remove the cutie marks and stored them in a vault hidden in a cave witch they signalled as their next destination.

Shortly after they were being escorted by Starlight to a nearby cave where the vault was presumably located, upon entering they were met with breathtaking scenery, carved from the very wall of the cave was an enormous frame and within it were dozens if not hundreds of cutie marks contained behind a glowing crystal wall. “Behold our cutie mark vault.” Starlight said proudly and then she walked up to a pedestal witch held a wooden staff that split in two at the top much like a turning fork. “And this is the ‘staff of sameness’, this is the tool that allows us to free ourselves from our marks.” Starlight said with reverence grabbing the staff in her magic. “Immanuel curious, how did the subject of the vault come up?”

“Oh some ponies were telling us how much they missed their cutie marks…” Pinkie began saying u till she was shushed by Twilight. “Oops.” She said realizing her error.

“Were they?” Starlight stretched her words in a singsong way. “Well, you seem to inspire all sorts of free thinking, don’t you!?” Her last words were more an accusation than a question as ponies began to close in on them from all sides.

“It’s a trap!” Twilight cried as she teleported a over and began charging up her horn when suddenly Starlight pointed the staff at her enveloping her in a magic field. Aioria moved to help her, but something (or rather a dozen somethings) prevented him from moving quick enough, as the staff did it’s job and Twilight’s cutie mark separated from her flames all seemed lost when Twilight burst into a ball of light blinding email everypony in the cave including Starlight who used the staff to shield her eyes, when the light died down they all looked back at Twilight and balked at what the were seeing, Twilight’s mane and tail had grown considerably larger and now had two extra highlights, her wings had likewise grown larger with a deeper purple shade marking the extra length she had gained, and more notorious of all her cutie mark seemed to have exploded all around her body leaving glowing and pulsing stars scattered all across her body.

Suddenly Aioria was once again in Canterlot Castle as the doors to the throne room opened revealing a goddess in all her terrible let glory.
Starlight in the meanwhile was shocked silent her jaw hanging slack in he air at this deal delopment. “Wha- what is that?” She demanded.

“That’s the Rainbow Force!!” Rainbow cheered. “Kick her flank Twilight!!”

But as soon as it came it disappeared, Twilight glowed faintly and suddenly reverted back to her normal form and promptly fainted dropping to the ground where Aioria was ready to catch her, all her friends closed in to check on Twilight who had passed out probably from exertion.

Starlight looked confused for a moment and then laughed maniacally. “Ha, so much for your “Rainbow Force”, now immediately going to collect all your cutie marks so you cannot all jo8n us in equality!” Starlight declared looming over the defeated ponies.

“Equality means that even everyone is the same and no one is above any other, surely you don’t mean this little cult you have going here.” Said a voice that seemed to come from the cave itself, a mystifying voice like that of a spirit or a sage, a voice that Aioria knew very well.

“Who’s there?” Starlight asked looking frantically around trying in vain to find the source of the unnerving voice. “Show yourself.” As Starlight continued her search for the intruder she kept backtracking looking left to right waving the staff in a threatening manner around her, as she kept doing this she saw movement in the corner of her eye and immediately turned to confront the source, only to see herself in front if her, confused she approached her reflection to see what is wax or where it came from, as she gazed into her own eyes the surface email that was reflecting her image shimmered revealing anther form previously concealed.

“Crystal Wall!”

The reflective surface shimmered for an instant and suddenly exploded outward, Starlight jumped back using the staff to shield herself, once she recovered she looked at where she was before, there, we’re previously there was nothing now stood a stallion in golden armor of witch the most eye catching feature were the large horns protruding from his shoulders, he was a white unicorn with a purple mane and tail, his mane as well as his tail were tied at the end much like Applejack and finally in between his eyes and horn there were two violet dots giving him an air of mysticism. Aioria smiled broadly at the arrival of a new ally, Mu of Aries had arrived.

Chapter 8

The place where Pride was currently at couldn’t really be defined as a ‘room’ as it was not a fixed Pont in space or was it accessible trough a door or by any conventional means, to define the exact nature of this place every in words would be next to impossible, yet if you had to the most simple of definitions would be a “God shaped hole” that existed by pushing the rest of reality outwards, such was the place where Pride sought audience with his lord.

Pride was on his knees trembling in fear, he knew he had failed his mission and in doing so he had lost the element of surprise and alerted the Princesses of their existence , a secret that his master had concealed for millennia and would now be on their guard. His only hope was that his master would consider the information he brought to be valuable enough to compensate for his failure, raising his head, he prepared for he worst.

“My Lord, I bring you news.” Just as the words left his lips a powerfully force slammed him into the ground least I got him partially buried in a crater, a throaty growl was all that escaped his mouth for the force that was falling upon his was so strong he couldn’t even scream, when the assault ended Pride took a deep heaving breath and hastily began making his excuses before he was further punished.

“My Lord I know I have failed you but I bring you a warning, a new threat to your reign has appeared and has sided with Celestia.” When no further attack came Pride took it as a sign to keep talking. “I had successfully overpowered the princesses and the Elements of Harmony and was about to strike them down when an unknown pony rose in rebellion to your divine will, he wore a golden armor and stood at Celestia’s side, and unlike anypony else he managed to stand up to me and put up an actual fight, I was of course winning when a second one such pony interfered to aid the first one leading me to belive that there may be more. I deemed it imperative that you should be informed of such a development.”

For what seemed an eternity and yet might have been fractions of a second all stood still, Pride not feeling in the clear yet ransacked his memories for something, anything hat might shift the focus away from him. “They called themselves “saints” at the service ice of the goddess “Athena”.” That had done it, suddenly the “room” in the shape of a gods shifted and turned into the shape of an enraged God, Pride’s only saving grace was that he had vanished completely from his maters mind.

~~~~~

Mu of Aries had arrived to Equestria much like Aioria had, that is to say plummeting to the ground in a ball of golden fire at supersonic speed, after recovering and coming to terms with his new situation and new form (meditation does wonders to keep away panic attacks) he decided to move on and explore, by the second day of his arrival he had come across a small little town inhabited by ponies much like himself, he was about to enter said town however his finely tuned sixth sense alerted him that there was something wrong with these ponies, very wrong, so using his abilities he infiltrated the town without being detected to investigate further into these ponies, he learned many things about this world and the locals, some of their names, their doctrine of equality and about their cutie marks, or lack thereof for all the town inhabitants bared the same mark on their flanks, an “equal” sign (his own mark he discovered was a blue hammer at mid-strike as well as some star shaped sparks flying out from the strike). From what he had gathered all the ponies had “renounced” their cutie marks in the name of “equality” and also all said cutie marks were kept in a secure vault somewhere.

Seeking more information, Mu had found their leader, a purple unicorn called Starlight Glimmer, when he found her he got an immediate bad feeling about her, she didn’t feel like the rest of the ponies in town, they felt empty somehow, but no her, she felt powerful, not at all like the others, this was certainly worth a closer look.

Later that night while Mu was ~~peeping~~ investigating Starlight, in her room, at night, without her knowledge, he saw her as she really was without anything on as she stepped out of the bath, now all he needed to do was find the vault.

Fortunately for him the very next day the most unexpected visitors came to investigate the town, a group of 7 ponies consisting of 6 females of various shapes and colors, one particularly sporting both wings and a horn as well as a powerful cosmo, and beside them a tiny, quadrupled, furry, fully armored saint of Leo, Mu had to choke down a laugh from how adorable he was, but he would never let him know though, he knew he ranked rather highly in the list of the most handsome/pretty saints and that probably translated into cuteness in pony form, regardless, Mu decided not to reveal himself just yet and shadow them to see what they came here for, he was startled when the pink one nearly pinpointed him several times, but whenever she was about to, something else caught her attention and she would frown at it.

All the secrecy finally bared it’s fruit when they managed to get Starlight to guide them to the vault, the vault itself was a wonder to behold, given the time Mu would have very much liked to study it, and then there was the staff, a powerful tool without but the ominous feeling it gave out took away any desire to fiddle with that one.

Shortly after Starlight sprang an ambush, Mu was surprised when the winged unicorn teleported a short distance, he had seen some rudimentary telekinesis but this was surprising, the purple one had caught his attention.

Starlight caught the purple pony with a beam from the staff, just as Much was about to jump into the fray she underwent a transformation both physical and on her cosmo witch reached Godlike intensity if only for a short moment.

Calmly preparing a strategy Mu discreetly gathered his cosmo and called for an old friend, after all if Aioria was wearing get his golden cloth it stood to reason that he could do the same, behind the cover of Mu’s technique the cloth of Aries materialized in its statue form and promptly enveloped Mu, now armored and unnoticed Mu prepared to even up the playing field.

~~~~~

Starlight Glimmer was not having a good day, firstly her ploy to turn an alicorn princess to her side backfired spectacularly when said princess managed to overpower the staff wielded by her and negate its effect, and now, before she could close in and take a second shot, a second Royal Guard with weird armor appeared and snuck up on her. “Who’s are you!?” She demanded.

“I am the golden saint of Aries, you may call me… Stardust.” Mu said having picked up on the pony name structure and also hearing Aioria’s new pseudonym while eavesdropping earlier, so he decided to follow the trend.

Starlight Glimmer glared at him, Aioria’s companions looked at him with awe, the townsponies looked at him with those creepy smiles and finally Aioria looked at him with an expression that said “Really?”

“It doesn’t matter” Starlight said dismissively at the new arrival. “We still have you surrounded and I have the staff, we have all the advantages.” Starlight regained her confidence and composure.

“Ah! But those are not all the advantages takes you have now are they?” Mu said giving Starlight a knowing get smile.

“What are you talking about?” Starlight asked in mild confusion.

“Well you see, I have been observing your little town for some time now and I have come across something very interesting about you.” Starlight looked shocked, the possibility that somepony could roam around do her town undetected was unthinkable, or else who knows what they could stumble upon, “He must be lying “ she thought.

It was around this time that Twilight woke from her overexertion and began taking in her surroundings, she immediately recognized her friends gathered protectively around her as well as Lightning Bolt in front of the group, then she noticed the new arrival, a white unicorn with a purple mane in a golden armor. “Who’s that?” She tiredly asked.

“Twilight!” Chorused her friends.

“Simmer down shugarcube, ya cain’t go runnin around just yet.” Applejack told her saying she and Fluttershy helped her stand.

“Yeah OK, but who is he?” She repeated he question as she shook off the grogginess off her head.

“That’s Stardust, one of Lightning’s friends and he came to help us kick flank, right Lightning?” Rainbow excitedly explained.

“Err… right” Aioria was still taken aback by Muss appearance and subsequent introduction.

He must be really good at magic Twilight, he made this mirror thingy that made him invisible and I think he’s been following us around but immediately not entirely sure.” Pinkie Pie supplemented.

Twilight couldn’t believe it, to cast an invisibility spell would be difficult enough, but to even h8de from pinker, nopony had ever been able to hide from her.

Starlight got tired of waiting and swung her staff at Mu shooting an unmarking beam at him, but Mu disappeared in a flash letting the beam strike only air.

“Teleportation! But how!?” Twilight yelled in alarm now fully awakened, only very few unicorns were able to teleport, it was a master level spell that required power knowledge and control on great amounts to even think of pulling them off.

“He is the most powerful master of mental abilities among all of Athena’s saints, he could easily teleport to the other side of the world and back if he really wanted to.”

Twilight said jaw hung unhinged, such a scale was unthinkable, maybe the princesses could do it or herself if she gave it her all, she would have to investigate this Stardust, thoroughly.

Starlight Glimmer kept firing unmarking beams left and right at Mu who deftly teleported over and over to avoid every beam, she was growing increasingly frustrated at her inability to hit him as well as his incessant taunting abut her secret, finally reaching her breaking point.

“Enough! What is it!? What do you know about me!?”

“I know your lying” He said as he discretely gathered water from the cave with his telekinesis and used it to splash her hindquarters with it, Starlight jumped in surprise as the cold water made contact with her body and unconsciously turned around to defend against her perceived threat unknowingly showing all ponies present the proof of her deception.

A collective gasp was the first indication she had that something was wrong, turning around quickly she was met a with the incredulous stares of her followers witch were concentrated around her flanks, following heir gazes she looked at herself and promptly entered a state of panic at what she saw.

“Starlight, you have your cutie mark!” Double Diamond, Starlight’s assistant said shocked at what he was seeing, Starlight Glimmer who preached equality trough the rejection of one’s cutie mark had unbeknownst to anypony in fact kept her cutie mark.

“What’s the meaning of this Starlight?”

“Aren’t we all supposed to be equal?

“I want my cutie mark back!”

The rebellious voices began to spread at the revelation that Starlight had kept her cutie mark along with her special talent, in a panic Starlight attempted to calm her ponies. “W-wait, you don’t understand, I need my special talents to spread equality and true friendship to all of Equestria.”

“Equality for example ery pony, except for you.” Twilight accused. “Everypony has unique talent and gifts, and when we share them with-.”

“QUIET!!” Starlight roared interrupting Twilight. “What do you know about friendship, I gave the these ponies true Friendship, without special talents nopony is better than any other, there is no reason to fight, no reason to cry, when every pony is equal there is no need for ENVY!!”

Those last words were laced with a spike on Starlight’s cosmo as if they were a password unlocking something wining her, something powerful, something dangerous.

“Having special talents only leads to misery, broken friendships and loss, so I will remove them, I will take away all cutie marks so they can never take anything away from me again!!” As Starlight kept talking she started emanating a black cosmo witch grew larger by he second quickly enveloping her whole body like a shroud of darkness.

The black cocoon pulsed with energy ,and burst like an oily bubble revealing a black armored pony that once was Starlight Glimmer, her armor was less bulky and more stylized than the one Aioria saw Pride wearing, there were bracers on her four legs and her breastplate seemed too thin to offer any real protection, but he remembered that this was a supposedly unbreakable armor bestowed by a god, the shoulder pads were very elongated angled slightly downwards and the tiara on her head enveloped her horn like a ring. Starlight’s own appearance had suffered a drastic shift as well, her mane was now disheveled and spiky, her highlight now raced across her mane like a lightning bolt, her confident eyes and smug smile were gone now replaced with wild maniac eyes and a face-splitting grin on her lips that promised pain and suffering instead of equality and friendship.

“So this is your true face Starlight, or should I call you Envy?” Aioria said stepping forward as to draw attention to himself and away from his charges. Mu was doing the same approaching from the other side ready for battle.

“That’s right, I am Starlight Glimmer bearer of the vice of Envy, one of the seven Great Vices at the service of Cronos.” Envy introduced herself to the two golden warriors.

“Did she say Cronos?” Mu asked his fellow saint.

“I’ll explain later, first we must deal with his.” Aioria said as he fell into a battle stance.

Chapter 9

Something has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.

Chapter 10

As the dust settled, nopony dared to move, they had all seen what happened and were all now shellshocked not knowing what to do, the silence was broken by Aioria who trotted up to Mu. "Mu, did you...?" The implication was left unsaid.

"No." Mu shook his head. "She teleported away at the last possoble moment." Twilight released a breath she didn't know she was holding at the statement, she knew they were soldiers, she knew the enemy was serious, she just hadn't made the transetion fron tought to reality.

Far away, in the frozen barren a flash of light disturbed the uniform whiteness of the snow, and from it emerged the battered embodiment of envy, while she had indeed made out with her life it was apparent that she had recived the runt of the attack, she fell to her knees her breath haggard and raspy, the titanic effort of a rushed long distance teleport taking its toll on her body, as she recovered she raised her head revealing her eyes full of mad fury. "Youll pay for this... YOULL PAY FOR THIS!!!" Starlight's cry of vengeance echoed trough the mountains as she once again flashed away towards no one knows where.

Shortly after restoring some semblance of order to the town, our heroes returned by train straight to Canterlot in order to report back to princess Celestia, during the trip the mares had taken to storming Mu with questions about him, his party preferences, fashion sense and in Twilight's case a detailed interrogation on the scope of his powers, much to Aioria's amusement. Finally arriving they proceeded to the throne room witch had been completely restored after the botched assasination attempt, as the group made its way Mu caught his first glance at the goddess of the sun standing regally before her elevated throne in all her magesty and at the foot of said throne stood a vaguely familiar pegasus sporting a very familiar armor.

"Ah! It's goos to see you in good health after so long." He said recognizing the ponified saint of Sagittarius.

A smile formed on the face of the pegasus in question. "Likewise M..."

"Stardust." Interripted Mu. "I belive it be more fitting wouldnt you agree...? Golden Arrow? Mu said with a sly grin on his face, while Aioros just gaped in shock wondering how it had come to this, the mistery solved itself when his dearest brother 'Lightning Bolt' failed to keep a straight face and let out a chuckle witch he tried to cover up faking a cough, unamused 'Golden Arrow' shot his brother a mild glare.

"Greetings my little pony." Came celestia's greeting focusing attention to herself once more, wether she was aware of the little joke beingh shared at Aioros' expense she gave no indication.

"It is a privilege to finally meet you Princess Celestia, i have heard many things about you from your student." Mu said as he courteously bowed before the goddess of the sun.

"Rise my little pony, now i trust that you have been made aware of the great menace that looms over our land."

"Indeed, i have been briefed on the way here, and also we faced one such foe before coming here." Princess Celestia was startled at this revelation, since Twilight had left Spike to tend to the castle she had not been able to send a letter so she had just assumed that their little adventure hadn't involved any danger, now however she felt anxious, so the next thing she did was not so subtly request a full report from Twilight.

"I see, well that's quite the adventure you all had." As the report ended, witch included a very entertainig sock puppet performance by Pinkie, Celestia sighed in relief, things had actually turned very well for them they exposed an enemy ploy to undermine her citizens, repeled an enemy agent and succesfully retrieved one of the ten missing saints, and speaking of said saint, she had not yer heard his opinion on the matter. "Sir Stardust." Mu perked at the mention if his 'name'. "You have now heard everything about our situatipn, what do you intend to do from now on?"

Mu took a moment to consider this and promptly gave his answer under the inquiring gazes of all present. "We saints are sworn defenders of the innocent, even if this is not our own world this remains unchanged, i will aid you in your time of need." Thecend of his declaration was highlighted by a loud boom and a rain of confetti courtesy of Pinkie Pie acompanied by the cheers of her friends.

It was then decided that 'Stardust' would join 'Lightning Bolt' in the frienship castle to aid in the protection of the bearers as well as the search for the remaining saints while 'Golden Arrow' would serve as personal bodyguard of the princesses untill there were more hooves available to go around.

After a good night's sleep Twilight and the gang went back to Ponyville where they would prepare for whatever came their way.

Author's Note

And another one down, short but does the job, ill skip slice of life episodes for now if only because i have no idea what to do with them, maybe later when the cast expands, anyway our next stop is gonna be Aaaaaaaapleoosa!!! Care to guess who we will encounter there?
Till next time

Chapter 11

A few days after returning to the castle of friendship, things started to fall onto something of a routine, Pinkie Pie would routinely invite both saints to a "Welcometoponyvillethankyouforsavingusihopeyoufindallyourfriens" party, witch they politely turned down, Rarity would routinely use them as models for her new creations, Twilight and Stardust would routinely try to one up each other in a magical playground rivalry witch Stardust reveled in while Twilight inched ever closer to a mental breakdon judging by the intensity of her eye twitch, this would in turn result in Stardust being strapped to a chair wearing a now very familiar metal hat, now a lifetime in the sanctuary had prepared him for many things, a demigoddess acting full mad scientist was not one of them, so when Applejack had come forth with her intention to go to some place called Appleoosa to compete in some sort of rodeo Lightning Bolt promptly volounteered to escort her there at least untill things mellowed down in the "friendship" castle.

"Arent' ya gladd y'all came with me to see Applejack compete in the Appleoosa rodeo" Applebloom exclaimed to her friends Sweetie Bell and Scootaloo, the three fillies were nearly extatic to be out doing something, their little escapade earlier on had landed each one a hefty punishment witch had been lifted just on time to include themselves on Applejack's trip to fill in for cousin Breaeburn at the rodeo, needles to say the three fillies were just about to burst like firecrackers with all that uspent energy.

"Don't run off girls, stay where i can see you." Lightning Bolt cautioned the girls as they got off the train before they could run into town.

"Aww c'mon Bolty, it's Appleoosa." Aplebloom complained.

"Yeah, it's like the safest most boring place in all of Equestria." Scootaloo chimed inn

"Yeah!! Except for the desert, and the desert critters, and bandits, and then there's the tense relations with the buffalo..." Sweetie Bell helpfully added before being swiftly silenced by her two friends, the deadpan look on Lightning Bolt's perfectly represented how not convinced he was.

"Simmer down Lightning." Applejack who was last off the train said. "This 'ere town is perfectttly safe, thers no harm in letting the girls run around and have fun." and just as Applejack said Apleoosa was the very pictuure of an idilic peacefull frontier town, there were pony drawn carriaged, drawn pony drawn carriages, wild west dancing, mild west dancing, and of course the main event of the season the rodeo, where ever you looked you couldn't help but see ponies practicing for some rodeo event or another and Apllejack was obvously pumped up and ready to showdown.

"We can't let our guard down, who knows when the enemy could attack, and we have to be vigilant in case any of the other saints are near." Lightning Bolt argued.

"Ohh shush you, the map hasn't shown anything so none of them varmints are causing any trouble anywhere near. She said dismissively. "And besides, what are the chancess of us just comming across one of your friends way out here." she said tempting fate yey again, and yet againg fate didn't dissapoint.

"GRREEEEAAAAAAAATTT HOOOORRRRNNN!!!" A loud rumble acompanied by a loud bellow shoock the whole town just as the words left Applejack's lips, the deadpan look on Lightning Bolt's face spoke volumes, he allowed himself to mantain it just long enough to savor the victory before galloping towards the source of the commotion.

Applejack and Lightning Bolt made their way to a crowded corral where a large gathering of ponies blocked their view of what was going on, uppon further inspection Applejack caught sight of her cousin Braeburn who had his foreleg bandaged and in a sling after hurting himself training for the rodeo.

"Braeburn!!" Applejack called catching her cousins attention.

"Applejack! Welcone to Aaaaaaappplllleeeee......!!!" Applejack put a hoof on Braeburn's muzzle just as he was doing some flamboyant western greeting.

"Now's not the time fer that braeburn, what in tarnation is going on over there? Is everypony okay? Are being attacked?" Applejack asked in quick succesion at her flabbergasted cousin, Braeburn in turn shook of his confusion and took to explainig to Applejack.

"Oh no, nutthin like that, thet there's just our new resident doing some practice rounds for the upcomming rodeo, he just tends to be overenthisiastic about it sometimes." confusion coloring her face now Applejack turned once more to the source of the commotion and this time noticed over the heads of the crowding ponies a towering pile of haystacks taller than any building around, just then another loud crash signaled a new haystack flying trough the air and landing hard but true on the top og the growing tower of hay. "You'll be going up against him in the haystacking competition, i actually hurt myself trying get anywhere close to that, but imm confident that if anypony can beat him it's gotta be you cuz'.

Having listened to the conversation Lightning Bolt made his way to the front of the crowd certain to what he would find on the other side, after shouldering his wey trough he checked his bearings snd true enough there in the middle of the corral stood the largest pony he had yet to see including Applejack's brother Mackintosh by a couple inched and a few pound of muscle, the earth pony was an imposing sight with a chocolate brown coat a short black mane and tail and a confident smirk framed by a couple of thick black eyebrows, there was no mistacking that look anywhwere, the cutie mark of a set of bull horns whith the right side broken was only the ribbon on the package.

"Wow! Hes really big!" Avoice from below Lightning Bolt's legs broke his focus and he looked down to see thet the three fillies had made their way trough and were standing below and around his legs.

"Pshhh! Applejack c'n take 'em no problem" Aplebloom announced defending her sister's honor.

"I don't know Applebloom, that haypile's really big, and hes only practicing." Sweetie Bell said timidly,

Lightning Bolt tore his attention from the now arguing fillies below him and back to the stallion before him, he was sure who he was so there was only the matter of making sure so he dislodged himself from the crowd and aproached the large pony.

"Aldebaran!" he called, to his great relief the large pony reacted to his call and turned to him.

"Hmm? Hwo are you? How do you know that name?" Aldebaran of Taurus stepped in front of the little pony towering over him like an ursa. All around them ponies held heir breath and swallowed nervosly as the two ponies stared each other down, the large pony scrutinized the pony before him with a severe glare hard enough to crack stone but Lightning Bolt just held his gaze without a care in the world.

The first to brake the standstill was the large earth pony, a glint of recognition entered his eyes before he ler out a loud bellow and rearing back on his hindlegs to the height of a minotaur before descending onto Lightning Bolt with all his being.

Panic erupted in the crowd, ponies started running around in a panic, some mares fainted and the rodeo clowns tripped and tumbled all around the place, Applejack took out her trusty lasso ready to help her friend when.

"AIORIA!!! IMM SO GLAD TO SEE YOU!!!" Everypony was suddenly stunlocked in place and the whole town seemed to shake
as Aldebaran gave a very accurate demonstration of the Royal Canterlot Voice. Shaking the shock off Applejack took a second look at the situation and with a chuckle determined that her friend was in no real danger, except, judging by the flailing limbs of a back injury from the bonecrushng hug he was reciving, something an Apple could appreciate.

"All right! all right! Whats going on here!" the situation slowly unwound as ther sheriff and his deputies made their way to the corral.

"Ah sheriff, sorry about the commotion, one of my friends came to town so i got a little excited." Lightning Bolt would have made a snyde comment about his definition of "a bit", that is of course if his spine wasn't currently bent over backwards.

"So, you finally found one of yer friends eh? now that there's good news." the sheriff said cheerfully, by thet time the crowd had dispersed and everything was buisness as usual allowing Applejack and Braeburn to get closer without a fuss, Lightning Bilt was just again recovering feeling in his limbs and was just able to stand on all fours.

"Lemme introduce you, this here's ..."

"Lightning Bolt! Is this here one of the saint fellers like youi?" Applejack interrupted just as Aldebarans was about to pronounce his name and as if adding injury to insult hoofed him right in the middle of the back unleashing a new symphony of pain on the poor pony, ah he recovered he caught Aldebaran doing a terrible job of containig his amused laughter.

"Howdy there miss Applejack, this 'ere pony with you?" the sheriff asked.

"Thats right sheriff, this here's mah personal bodyguard." Applejack said dismissively.

"Bodyguard!!" Braeburn said alarmed, "Since when do you need a bodyguard?"

"Oh calm dowm Braeburn, it's just some extra precaution from the princesses."

"Bodyguard ehh," the sheriff mused, "Well that makes sense, we first met Great Horn here lost in the dessert, no idea where he was or how he got there, said something about talcking animals, must have been the heat, anyways he came at the rescue of a caravan being attacked by bandits, fended 'em off too, so the caravan brought him here and he's been with us ever since." As the sheriff ended his tale Aioria looked over at Aldebaran and mouthed "Great Horn?", Aldebaran just shot him a winning smile."

"Hey mister, so you're friends with Lightning Bolt?"

"Are you a superhero too?"

"Can you shoot lightning, or can you fly or can you breathe fire or, or, or..."

Great Horn loocked around confused searching unsuccessfully for the source of the quickfire barrage of questions aimed at him. "Down here." When he looked down he was confronted by three adorable fillies with starws in their eyes.

"Well hello there little ladies, whats this i hear about a superhero?" Great Horn asked flashing a smile to the fillies.

"Yeah, like Lightning over there, you know with the glow and doung magic even tough you're an earth pony, oh, oh, and the armor, it's totally awesome."

"Armor!?" Great Horn said intrigued. "You have your armor with you?" He asked his comarade.

"The armor answers our call when we are in need, surely you can also... LOOK OUT!!!" just as he was once again joining the conversation, Lightning Bolt noticed that the giant hay bale tower just behind them tilted dramatically and began to fall apart right over their heads, not missing a breath Lightning Bolt quickly turned and took hold of Applejack and Braeburn before leaping out of the way of the crumbling tower of hay as random hay bales rained from the sky all over them.

"Applebloom!!!" Applejack callend in panic fron over Lightning Bolt's shoulder as soon as he reachd relative safety concerned for her sister.

"Over here!" Came the squeaky and shaken voice of Applebloom, turning hopefully she saw Great Horn emerge from behind a large pile of hay with three little fillies clingigng to his back.

"Don't worry Applejack, "Great Horn"... may be the biggest of us all but hes not the slowest, not by a longshot." Lightning Bolt told Applejack reassuringly.

"What happened? that stack was too steady to collapse like that, i should know, i stacked it." Great Horn said still carrying the fillies on his back who were now enjoyin the ride on top of the massive stallion mush to the chagrin of Applejack who wanted nothing more than to hold her sister close after such a scare.

"This was no accident." The shreiff anounced inspecting the wreackage.

"You think it's that outlaw again sheriff?" Breaburn asked visibly shaken.

"Yes." The sheriff answered as he removed a hay shack from the ground revealing a hoofprint with a distinct horseshoe imprint on it. "It's Trouble Shoes!"

Author's Note

Alright, here's the next installment, i already have the full cast of the seven deadly sins why dont you try guessing, not all are cannon and not all are so obvious but the heavy hitters are there, also the saints are divided i 3 groups of 4, that is unicorns pegasi and earth ponies care to guess as well?

that's it for now, stay tuned for next chapter.

Chapter 12

The next day started early, too early if you asked Aioria. Apparently Applejack's work ethics, witch were already quite Spartan, were eclipsed by her training ethics hence why he was dragged out of bed at the crack of dawn as Applejack began her training for the Aplleoosa rodeo. He wouldn’t complain of course, he was a warrior an all too used to unusual schedules, however, he was still rather upset by the current situation.

Last night after the big scare the ponies retreated to the saloon in order to get Aldebaran acquainted with their current situation, Applejack had been nervous at the thought of recruiting the large pony to what amounted to a war, she needen't be as he of course accepted to help with a large grin on his face.

So far everything was going smoothly, however once he announced his intentions to return immediately to the castle to rejoin the others he was surprised to be promptly shot down by both Aldebaran and Applejack, apparently the Aplleoosa rodeo was setting up to be the biggest event on this side of Equestria and Aldebaran was to compete on the main event alongside Applejack and neither was willing to drop out of the event, Aldebaran didn’t want to disappoint the locals and “an Apple never breaks a promise”, whatever that means.

The very worst part was that Applejack and “Great Horn” had begun some sort of rivalry once it was clear they we’re competing with each other, as if it weren’t enough with Mu and Twilight with their magic shenanigans, all in all he was not having the best of times.

He was interrupted from his musings when he heard a commotion close by, when he approached he found the sheriff addressing his deputy's, curious he approached to see what was all the commotion about.

“Alright everypony listen up!” he yelled “We need a big presence in this here rodeo so make youselves plenty seen.” And just why would that be? He thought to himself. “I want that lowdown varmint to know we mean business.” Now this seemed serious, he thought as he decided to ask the sheriff for more information, as he approached he noticed Applebloom and her friends scamper off onto the rodeo grounds.

“Excuse me Sheriff, can I have a word with you?”

“Hmm?” the Sheriff replied as he turned to see who called to him. “Well, aren’t you that royal guard that came in with miss Applejack?” He asked.

The royal guard routine had served him well since he arrived to Equestria, ponies all around seemed to equate his golden armor to the ones used by the actual royal guard, the obvious differences not withstanding, and intrinsically trusted and cooperated with him because of that, also since he was acting on Celestia's behalf it wasn’t technically lying.

“Yes that’s right, I wanted to ask what were you discussing just now?”

“Ah, ya heard that?” Aioria resisted the urge to roll his eyes, half the town could hear him yell out orders. “Well, I guess it’s better to have you in than not, thing is there’s this outlaw running around called Trouble Shoes.” The moment the Sheriff mentioned the outlaw's name was punctuated by a tune taken right out of a spaghetti Western film, Aioria promptly turned to look at the rodeo clown playing the harmonica right beside them. “That no good varmint has been spotted causing trouble in rodeo’s from here to Vanhoover.”

That caught his attention. “I hear that this rodeo is particularly important, is this related to that?”

The sheriff’s face turned serious and he looked Aioria straight in the eye. “It’s way more serious than that kid, rodeo’s all over Equestria have been sabotaged, the whole Appleoosa rodeo circuit is in danger of being shut down,

Author's Note

Recovering from author's block, I scrapped the saloon scene for the sake of my sanity, the chapter is unfinished but I'm publishing it lest it gets erased for the umpenth time, I'll update shortly and hopefully pick up the pace, as always comment and give a like

Chapter 4

Chapter four

The next morning came in relative calm, Aioria woke up and joined the ponies for breakfast, a daffodil sandwich was a new experience, but when in Rome do as the Romans, it was surprisingly good, Spike was apparently a very good cook. Applejack showed up early after leaving the fillies in their respective homes, just in time too as two pegasi pulled chariots descended from the sky, both pegasi were white and clad in golden armor that had a romantic feel to it, blue hairs sprung from the Crest of the helmets as well as their tails, the sight of a golden armor brought a nostalgic feel to his heart. The note had said that they would send chariots, but this was unexpected, flying chariots pulled by pegasi still Aioria didn’t question it and hopped in, on second thought it would be natural to have a flying chariot if you had flying horses, or ponies in this case.

Little progress had been made in the field of communication save for some small talk and pleasantries, perhaps the ponies were expecting that everything would be revealed once Princess Celestia came into play, in a way Aioria expected the same.

Shortly after having taken flight a great mountain came into view and atop of it a white castle that seemed to sprout out of the mountain like it was carved out of the mountain itself, the sanctuary was a sight to behold but this was breathtaking. “What is that?” He asked in amazement.

“That is Canterlot Castle.” Twilight informed him. “That’s where we’re going to meet the princess.” A good night sleep had done wonders to improve Twilight’s mood, her mane was perfectly straight and she had a calm demeanor unlike anything she showed the previous night.

The chariots landed on a large platform apparently designed for chariot traffic and the ponies stepped out and walked into the castle guided by a pair of unicorn guards who wore similar armor to their winged counterparts, they were led through a gorgeously decorated corridor befitting a castle until they stopped in front of a couple of large ornate doors witch led directly to the throne room. Throughout the entire walk Aioria felt as if the air became charged with energy, with each step he could clearly feel a great power in the castle and they were walking right to it, an ever increasing sense of dread crept into his mind as they approached their destination and the other ponies didn’t seem the slightest bothered by it, behind these doors there was a being of immense power, a kind of power that he had sensed before and that he never expected to feel in this place.

As the doors open the powerful cosmo washed over the ponies and almost sent Aioria to the ground, there wasn't further denying it, slowly raising his eyes Aioria saw her, there sitting in a throne atop a flight of stairs, white as a cloud in a summer day with a ethereal mane that danced in a inexistent wind, clad in golden regalia and with eyes that spoke of ages past. This was a goddess.

Suddenly all of the questions that he planned to ask the ruler of the land became mute, his mind went blank as he followed the group of ponies to the foot of the stairs more out of reflex than out of conscious decision, then, the goddess spoke.

“Ahh Twilight I’m so glad you and the rest could make it, I hope you didn't go through much trouble on that little errand I gave you.” The ponies gave a courteous bow but Aioria was frozen in place. “Rise my little ponies, there is no need for you to do that.” the goddess was talking in a kind and familiar tone similar to Athena but with a motherly undertone, Aioria was beginning to relax when the goddess’s bright magenta eyes locked on him. “And you must be Lightning Bolt, Twilight wrote to me about your, unusual abilities. There are some questions I would like to ask you.” Aioria froze in fear, this goddess's eyes scrutinized and studied his every movement, it was as if she could see deep inside his soul, as if he was being measured and found wanting.

Gathering his courage Aioria stood firm, raised his head and prepared to stand tall in the presence of the goddess, doing otherwise would bring shame to the name of Athena's golden saints, and so he steeled his resolve and prepared himself to face the judgement of a goddess. That is until a sudden burst of light announced the arrival of a second goddess.

Aioria fell to his knees due to the sudden apparition of the goddess and the crushing cosmo that accompanied her, it had caught him by surprise, he had come to meet a princess but instead he was now facing not one, but two goddesses.

“Luna, what have I told you about teleporting in the throne room?” Princess Celestia scolded her sister.

“Apologies sister, we deemed it the quickest way of reaching here in time to greet our guests.” Aioria chanced a look at the second goddess, while Princess Celestia was twice the height of any pony he had come across, the second goddess, “Luna” was a head shorter than her, and had a completely opposite feel to Celestia, she was a deep side of blue and her mane seemed to mirror the night sky complete with twinkling stars.

Remembering the whole “cutie mark” peculiarity of these ponies, Aioria glanced at the flanks of the goddesses, Celestia had a yellow sun while Luna bared a dark spot with the image of a moon in it. Sun and moon, day and night, light and dark. Gods usually were associated with a specific motif, it was apparent that these goddesses followed the same pattern.

Divine eyes once again fell upon Aioria. “Art thou the one responsible for disturbing our night sky, we demand an explanation!” Luna's voice boomed with the force of a storm and slammed into Aioria's kneeling form.

“Luna, you’re doing it again.” Said Celestia in a kind but admonishing tone.

Luna looked at her sister and then again at the prostrated pony before her. “We- I apologize, I didn’t mean to frighten you, please rise.” Luna apologized meekly witch was odd, in Aioria's experience gods were prideful and authoritarian, even Athena as kind as she was, was raised as a high society lady and never showed any weakness, to see a goddess giggling mirthfully and another apologizing profusely was the wierdest thing he had seen in this world yet.

While this was happening in the throne room a chariot pulled by a pair of black pegasi landed in the same platform where Aioria and the ponies had landed moments earlier, a single figure descended from the chariot as the palace guards approached. “Halt! You cannot land a chariot in the Princess's private wing unannounced! Identify yourself!” Then the wind began to blow.

Regaining strength in his legs Aioria stood and cautiously regarded the goddesses before him. “Please forgive Luna, she sometimes goes back to using the Royal Canterlot Voice” Princess Celestia said adding a mirthful giggle. Aioria was astounded by their odd behavior. “Now as you all may know last night several glowing objects appeared in the sky and fell all over Equestria, Twilight has informed me that you are somehow related to this incident, if you would be so kind I’d like you tell us what you know about it.” Princess Celestia politely asked

This new information caught Aioria's attention. “Did you say several? That mean that the others-.” But before he could finish his statement a loud crash drew their attention outside of the throne room, the guards immediately leaped into action heading for the doors when suddenly they where blown off their hinges in a explosion of wind and dust blasting off the guards near the doors, the scene beyond the vacant door arch was obscured by a heavy cloud of dust where a lone pony stood covered by the veil of dust.

For what seemed an eternity there was no movement, no sound, no nothing all the ponies were frozen in place stunned by the destructive spectacle except for Fluttershy who had quickly hid behind one of her friends. The sound of armored hooves broke the spell of silence as the pony slowly walked over the broken doors ignoring the fallen guards and approached the group of ponies.

A pegasus clad head to hoof in ornate black armor stood defiantly in the throne room, he had a blue coat with his factions obscured by a large helmet, his mane and tail were concealed as well by his helmet and a white cape billowing in the wind. “Halt!” Two unicorn guards rushed to apprehend the intruder who merely extended a wing in front of him and flapped it in a backhand motion, this simple movement created a strong air current that swept the guards away and sent them crashing against the walls.

“What is the meaning of this!?” Princes Celestia rose from her throne and swiftly moved to defend Twilight and the rest of the ponies followed immediately by Luna.

“Vile fiend, thou dare destroy our palace and assault our guards, name thyself you cur!!”

For a moment the black pony stood still like a statue, and then he let out a depreciating laugh. “He he he, very well, I shall give you the courtesy. You may call me Pride I am an envoy of the True ruler of Equestria.” The black clad pony declared in a high and mighty tone that left Princess Luna's Royal Canterlot Voice sounding humble.

The ponies gasped in disbelief to his statement, Princess Celestial looked shocked and Princess Luna glared at the insolent stallion with cold intensity. “Impertinent fool, we are the rightful rulers of Equestria, who dares dismiss our right to the crown and declare themselves rightful ruler.” The Royal Canterlot Voice rightfully empathized Luna’s outrage at such a declaration.

“Who you ask?” He said with an amused smirk. “My master is a being of such power that you almighty alicorns seem as newborn foals in comparison.” His haughty tone did nothing to mask his sense of superiority, 'Pride' seemed to be an appropriate moniker.

“Impossible!” Twilight shouted as she stepped forward standing horn to horn alongside the princesses. “Alicorn magic is the strongest force in all of Equestria, there is nothing that can ever compare to it and I know that firsthoof.” Celestia gave an approving smile and Luna's gaze gained more steel to it ad the trio of alicorns lit their horns in chorus.

The black pony was unfazed even tough he faced the horns of three of the four existing alicorns, he merely chuckled. “There are forces beyond this world that ate powerful beyond your wildest dreams, Lord Cronos stands above all, and he shall assume control of this world and lead us to our true destiny.”

“It can’t be.” Aioria said in a barely audible whisper.

“Who is this Cronos you speek of? I have never heard of the name.” Celestia asked the invader.

The black pony merely chuckled at Celestia`s question. “You say you never heard of the name, yet he has had a hoof in every major event in Equestria since before there was an Equestria, why he is the reason you raise the sun and the moon every day, why the pegasi must make the weather and the reason ponies have to bring about the change of seasons, did you never question the order of the world? Did you never wonder why? The reason for this is very simple really.”

The ponies listened to his words, none more intently as Twilight, she knew everything there was to know about how the princesses raised the sun and the moon, about weather production and about helping with the seasonal cycle with citywide events like winter wrap up and the running of the leaves, she knew everything there was to know, everything that is except for “why”. “What is the reason” Twilight asked with both dreading and expecting the answer.

“It is very simple really.” Pride said smugly. “This world is broken, and the one who broke it was Lord Cronos himself.” Various emotions ran across the faces of the ponies ranging from terror to disbelief, Twilight looked at her mentor for support, or denial, or whatever but Princess Celestias expression was unreadable. “When Lord Cronos discovered us ponies ages ago he discovered that we were blessed with the divine power of the gods, outraged he orchestrated our demise by breaking the cycle of the seasons, devastating the natural weather and even knocking the sun out of its celestial course. But ponies impossibly overcame this trial by tapping into their divine gifts taming the weather, ordering the seasons and restoring the sun to its place in the sky. ” Prides speech was comparable to that of a mad prophet heralding the end of the world, Twilight noted that such a statement was probably quite accurate. Pride continued. “Having been thwarted Lord Cronos unleashed the Windigoes onto the ponies hoping to destroy them from the inside with internal strife, but once again the divine gifts of the ponies helped them prevail.”

“This is preposterous” Princess Luna cut into Pride`s narrative. “If such a monster does exist it should be purged from this land not seated at the throne.”

Pride shifted his attention at Princess Luna “I wholeheartedly agree Nightmare Moon” he said simply. Luna recoiled as if she had been slapped, then with an enraged roar unleashed a beam of raw magic at the insolent stallion, the beam hit true and a great explosion shook the trone room, the ponies screamed and rushed for cover while Twilight and Celestia raised a protective shield around all present.

Princess Luna panted heavily due to the magical exertion. “Luna.” Princess Celectia called her sister full of concern, realizing what she had done Luna looked around her and saw the frightened looks of the element bearers and the concerned look of Celestia, lowering her head in shame she was just about to utter an apology when another voice interrupted her.

“I am not done talking.” All eyes were immediately on Pride as he emerged unscathed from the dissipating cloud of dust. “really now, it is rude to interrupt a pony while he`s talking.” Pride acted as if nothing had happened to the astonishment of everypony, his armor was unscratched and he was unharmed, the only proof that anything ever happened was the destroyed floor where he stood. “ Now where was I, ah yes, after the windigoes Lord Cronos acknowledged us ponies as worthy bearers of his power and decided to rule us instead of destroying us, unfortunately before he could assert himself as our god you impostors seized the throne.” He pointed an accusing hoof at the princesses. “And now it is my great privilege to rid the land of you and deliver the world to my Lord.” As he spoke a black aura enveloped his body, it was not a magical aura, it was nothing that any of them had ever seen or felt, except once.

“That´s…” Twilight recognized the aura having seen it just the previous day but before she could say anything Pride flapped both his wings as a terribly strong wind raced towards the princesses ripping the debris to dust in its wake, Celestia and Twilight once again raised a shield just in time as the wind current crashed against it, both Alicorns strained at the effort it took to maintain the shield, suddenly a crack appeared on the shield like a spider web growing bigger and bigger before the terrified eyes if Twilight and Celestia, the shield broke and the torrential winds crashed violently against all three princesses sending them sprawling to the ground.

“To be able to kill the princesses, such an honor.” Pride said as he stepped closer to the fallen mares, as he approached five figures rushed to block his path, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Rarity, Pinkie Pie and even Fluttershy shielded the princesses and Twilight defiantly. “Ah yes, and as an added honor I get to kill the Elements of Harmony, today is such a good day.” Pride said as he raised his hoof enveloped in black aura and without hesitating launched himself like only a pegasus can and attacked the mares.
Time seemed to slow to a crawl as the burning hoof flew towards the mares a confident grin in Pride`s face, a grin that vanished when a golden hoof impacted his face throwing him back as he crashed violently against the floor. “Who’s there!!?” Pride asked quickly getting back on his hooves.

A brown stallion stood in front of the princesses and the element bearers, his hoof burning in a golden flame. “I will not allow you to continue doing as you please, I will be your opponent.” The Golden Saint of Leo stood there ready to fight.

Author's Note

OK this chapter was a nightmare, my mobile version of word refused to save changes because of some bug and that cost me like a week time of editting untill i managed to fix it, anyway, it`s up so tell me if you see any mistakes or typos.
next chapter the hooves start flying.

Chapter 13

"The entire rodeo community is in jeopardy!? How is that possible?" He had heard there were some accidents and sabotage, but to threaten the whole indistry, it would seem he was underestimating the seriousness of the issue.

"That's right Sonny, Rodeos all over Equestria have been breaking down an' falling apart completely, if things keep going on like that soon there'll be no more Rodeos to lift the spirits of all these settler ponies."

"Lift their spirits." He mused to himself. "Could it be possible that this was another ploy to break the spirit of the ponies? Better investigate more."

"And you say this all tracks to one single per-pony?

"RIGHT!!" The sheriff flared up his booming voice shaking the nearby building. Aioria stepped back at such display. " That rotten no good two bit scallywag outlaw, Trouble Shoes." The mere mention of his name was highlighted by the dramatic strumming of a guitar, Aioria turned back to the rodeo clown from before and yes, he had now picked up a guitar.

"Are you certain he did all that himself? He inquired.

"You've seen his mark." He declared, and indeed, he had seen that large hoofprint in the ground near the haystack collapse, whoever made that was a large individual, possibly the agent of Cronos. "He's left the same mark at every rodeo that he's ever vandalized an' now he's here, but don't you worry son he won't be ruining this rodeo, not on my watch!" The sheriff said ending his statement by slamming his good on the ground.

"Very well, thank you for everything sheriff, I wish you luck." He said as he walked away unaware that a shadowy figure watched him from nearby.

This new information was troubling, if it indeed was a ploy from Cronos he'd have to be vigilant. "It would be best to tell Aldebran."

Author's Note

Short but simple now to plan next scene.