Ferocious waves surrounded all the sides of his small ship, their non stop attacks trying to shake him of his balance as he tried to guide his ship through the waves. All of the sudden he felt the underside of his ship ram into something, making him lurch forward. A sharp flare of pain echoed across his forehead as his head hit the ship's mast. The last thing he saw before the world faded into black were the tall peaks of a mountain range.

He felt useless. He stood there and watched as the man he considered as his father stood before him laced with stab wounds, bullet holes, and many other grievous injuries. Yet, all he could do was stand there like a child, tears flowing down the sides of his face as he heard his father's last words.

“One Piece … DOES EXIST!”

His voice shook the heavens yet all he could hear was silence. All his senses were lost to him due to the insufferable pain of losing the man that was the closest to his heart. The one who had taken him. The one who had given him a family.

The one who had called him son.

Was dead.

Marco’s eyes fluttered open and immediately closed them again due to the blinding rays of the sun. His breathing was erratic and he felt his heart pounding a mile a minute inside his chest. ‘It was that dream-no memory-again,’ he thought as he tried to control his breathing, trying to calm his racing heart and ease his splitting headache. Once his breathing normalized and the pain in his head subsided he took in his surroundings for the first time since waking up. The first thing he noticed was that he was on an icy beach with the remnants of his ship surrounding him. Slowly he began to pick himself off of the icy floor grunting as he did so. Once he was standing he let his flames loose. The sensation of his flames’ healing ability spread to all of the injuries he could feel. In a matter of seconds Marco felt as good as new, well all except for his stomach, nothing his flames could do about hunger. His eyes wandered across the small cove he found himself in, the most prominent feature being the icy peaks of the tall mountains that encompassed the outer ridge of the cove. Deciding that there was no other way to go besides going over the mountains Marco engulfed his arms in his signature bright yellow and blue flames and rocketed towards the mountain range.

~●~●~●~●~●~●~●~●~

In the Crystal Empire

“Shhhh, shhhhhh. It's ok Flurry, Daddy’s here. Daddy’s here sweetie,” begged a white unicorn with a mane that had varying streaks of blue running through it. Shining Armor, Prince of the Crystal Empire, a stallion who could face every evil head on, was never able to calm down his filly every time she got into one of these fits. “Honey could you please come here help me with Flurry?” pleaded the stallion to his wife. Princess Cadence, a pink alicorn with a long mane of yellow, pink, and purple streaks just smiled back at her husband trying her best not to burst out laughing at the scene before her. “Bring her here Shiny,” she replied with a giggle. The moment Flurry was in Cadence’s grasp the alicorn filly began to calm down. Immediately Flurry’s eyelids began to grow heavy and with a small yawn, she was fast asleep. Cadence then levitated her daughter into her crib as she walked over to her husband.

Shining Armor’s left eye twitched as he looked at his wife and then daughter in disbelief. “How do you always do that?” he asked in a pouting tone.

“A magician never gives away her secrets,” Cadence replied with a wink and brought his muzzle to hers for a small kiss.

Their little moment of peace was ruined by the sound of terrified screams coming from the center of the city. At that moment Flurry Heart began to wail from her nap being disturbed. They both pulled away from their brief moment of peace with a look of annoyance.

“And I had just put her to sleep too,” Cadence said with a sigh. Chuckling Shining Armor nuzzled his wife and replied, “Don't worry, I'm pretty sure this magician will pull off her wonderful trick again.”

Rolling her eyes at his response Cadence pulled Flurry out from her crib, comforting her in a way only a mother could.

“I’ll go see what's happening out there,” Shining told his wife as he put on his armor. “Hopefully it isn't something too big.”

“Be safe out there,” Cadence said in a concerned voice giving him a kiss on the cheek before he headed out.

~●~●~●~●~●~

Fifteen minutes earlier...

As Marco flew over the first mountain he something had caught the gleam of the sun. Picking up his pace he flew towards the glimmer of light. As he got closer to his destination he was surprised to see a large city made entirely of what appeared to crystal with a towering castle in the middle of the it. The way the city shone with such splendor reminded him of the lost city of Jaya before it was stripped of all of its gold. He sighed at the thought. The Whitebeard Pirates had visited Jaya when it was just him, Oyaji and the first fourteen commanders. He shook his head free of those memories and continued to press forward towards the gleaming city.

He landed himself in what appeared to be a large market with what appeared to be hundreds of small glimmering horses bustling around . Yet as soon as the horses laid their eyes on him the entire market became dead quiet. Everyone of them had stopped in their tracks, none of them moving a muscle except for a few shocked whispers here and there. ‘I can actually understand what they’re saying, how weird. Maybe they’re a type of mink?,’ Marco pondered as he raised an eyebrow at their behavior as he turned to the nearest horse in order to ask where he was exactly.

“Hi, I was wonder-” As soon as he said that the entire marketplace was thrown into chaos with the horses running around in a panicked fashion with quite a few screaming their lungs out.

‘All I said was hi,’ he thought to himself. ‘Hopefully one of them will calm down so they can help me understand what the hell is going on around here.’ At that moment Marco spied something out of the corner of his eye. A white horse was approaching him, yet as the creature came closer he noticed that it wasn't an ordinary horse, it was instead a white unicorn wearing purple armor with several horses that appeared to be guards flanking him .

Seeing that this was the only creature that wasn't frantically running around Marco pointed towards the creature. “You-yoi, ” he said catching the white unicorn's attention. “Where am I and why can you horses speak? Are you some sort of mink?”

“Huh? Mink? What's that? And for your information I’m a pony, not a horse and I've always been able to speak,” answered the white unicorn confused. “And currently you're in the Crystal Empire."

"Crystal Empire? Never heard of it," Marco said with a hint of confusion in his voice.

"Well we are kind of new, but you've definitely heard of Canterlot. Right?"

"What's that?"

"Cloudsdale?"

"Huh?"

"Appleoosa?"

"Is that some sort of dessert?"

Sighing in frustration the white unicorn proposed a suggestion to Marco. "Let's just go back to the castle, we have a detailed map there and maybe then you can show me where you're from or see if you recognize any places."

Looking at the mess around him Marco turned back to the hor-no pony- nodding in agreement. “You got any sake or food? I’ve been starving ever since I landed on this island.”

“Sake? I have no idea what that is, but we do have plenty of food.,” The unicorn answered as he motioned the hairless ape to follow him towards a towering castle.

‘And here I thought that I would be able to drink all this weird shit away.’ Marco thought begrudgingly as he nonchalantly walked through the mess of screaming ponies trying his hardest to not lose the white unicorn in the chaos.

Author's Note

So I fixed up some stuff in the introduction of the story, hopefully this is better? If any of you find grammar mistakes please point them out, it would be very much appreciated.