Chapter 2. First encounter. (Edited by Haloboy11721)
I was holding in all my laughter with as much might as I could, and didn’t fail. ‘Oh my lord! Their faces! They're full of pure fright and terror, and I didn’t even show myself yet! He-he, evil voice does its thing. This is going to be great.’ I started slowly floating from the shadows of the church in the light of the moon. The moment I floated out of the shadows they jumped almost five meters away from the entrance. I could feel their fear, their stressed heartbeats. I could see the drops of a cold sweat on their faces. But then Twilight pulled herself together, more or less. and took a pose of a unicorn warrior pointing her horn at the enemy. ‘Oh-ho! This is going to be interesting.’ I thought as she started to speak.
“By the names of the rulers of Equestria, I, Princess Twilight Sparkle order you to s-state your name, and your business in this country!” she says with a serious look charging her horn.
‘Oho-ho! She uses her royal status more than she does in a show! Ha-ha, bossy Twilight.’ I thought while looking deep into her eyes. And she looked away! For just a second, but she looked away. Purple-butt was still terrified of me.
“I̧ ḱno̶w̸ who͢ you a͟re.̕ ͜El̕e͘m͡ent͡ ͝of ͡m͢agi͟c.̢ I̕ ̀knǫw al̶l͜ about y͠ou͡.” I say without moving my mouth with my sinister voice. They all flinched at that. I think I overdi) it a little. Fluttershy was on the edge of crying, Pinkie`s mane was flat, but she looked determined, Rainbow Dash, Applejack and Twilight took protective poses, Rarity almost fainted, but caught herself and magically pulled an enchanted hairpin from her mane, that then turned into... rapier!? ‘I like this Equestria more and more.’
“Oh y-yeah?! And w-what do you can possibly know about us?” snarled at me Rainbow Dash.
“F̕or e̕x̧amp̵l̛è,̕ ͘Ĺoya͜lty͜, I ḱnow t̴h̶a̸t ̶ýou s̕e̷c̨ret̵ly̧ ̡c͝h́an̨ged͟ you͠r͘ numbe͡r̶ wit͞h̡ ̸a br͟own̶ ͡s̢t͟al̨li͟on on ͏t̕h̴e Yo͢un͡g̢ Fli͜er͞ Comp̕etiti̷ơn.͞ Yo̵u̕ ̨di͏d̵ ͟it ̸out o̢f fear ͠t̕hat͟ yo̴u c̛a͝ņ ̀n͞ot p̡er̵form ͝a̢ ͞So͟ni͝c ̕Rài͘nboo̶m.” I said slowly pointing at her. Her friends looked at her with quizzical expressions. ‘AHAHAHAHAHA. They didn’t know! She didn’t tell them!’ I thought and almost snickered. By Dash`s nervous laugh, everyo- pony, understood that I was saying the truth. That scared them even more.
“By the na-“ started Twilight, but I sharply turned my head in her direction, silencing her.
“I ám͡ ̀a͜n ̀ent̕it͡y̵ ̷tha̛t̴ c͡al͘l̸e͘d Çh̨urc͠h Gri͝m̕,͏ a spi̕r͠i̶t͠ ͏th͘at̡ ̀gu̷ar͞d͞s͢ ̀thè ͢c̢hu͞rćh f̴r͠om ţh͟ie͞ve̛s̨ ̛and ̷dis̸a͏s͠t͠ér̸s̶.” I said motioning my hand towards the building. “̀Bu͏t ͏for so̡me r͠éas̷on I h̸a͟ve ̢b͟e̸en a̡w̧o͡k̡e̸n͟ ͝o̧n͜ly no͘w̵.͞” I said slowly moving to the group, but they immediately jumped backward keeping the same distance with me.
“C-could y-y-you please s-speak with less c-creep-p-py voice, p-p-p-please.” whispered Fluttershy. I turned at her direction, maybe a bit too sharply. She ‘eep’ed and dived behind her friends.
I cough a little, then proceeded to speak in a deep voice with a hint of wisdom, similar to the one, storytellers have. “Yes, Kindness. I believe I can.” This time I was moving my mouth. 'I think I went a little too far, with the whole "Scary looking entity." thing. Fluttershy almost in tears…’ I was starting to feel bad for them.
“Th-thank you.” I heard her whisper.
I allowed a little smirk to appear on my muzzle.
“W-wait, if you were awoken only now, how could you know about all of us?” said Twilight titling her head a little.
My little smile disappeared immediately. ‘Oh crap. Oh, crap! How did I even forget about this? Wait. I know!’ I thought, and then said “I have a power of vision. I can see the past and future, Magic.” and then thought. ‘At least I didn`t lie to them.’
“You can see the future?!” cried out Pinkie with her mane puffed to its original size. “Oh can you see what I get on my next birthday, or what Gummy will get, or will there be any-“
“It does not work this way, the future is not constant, it`s ever-changing because of decisions you make.” I raised a finger, “But! I can see a passes that the stream of time may take.” All I got in return was five quizzical expressions. But I think Twilight understood what I meant.
“So, basically the time is like a river? And different decisions is similar to canals and turns it my take?” she says as I nod. “So… What are you in it?”
“I am a leaf, that follows the river.” I say closing my eyes for a moment.
“Thats all mighty interestin, but the map called us ere for a reason. So, forgive me for mah blunt question, but are ya evil?” I turn to Applejack with a raised eyebrow, but before I could answer she goes, “Now dont get me wrong, the last time the map called us all in the one place we lost our cutie-marks and got captured by brainwashed cultists.” Everypony visibly winced on that sentence, ‘Huh, in this Equestria they were not just locked in a room for 24 hours, something happened.’ I thought as farm pony continued, “But now, the map leads us into Everfree forest, ta meet some scary looking spirit with some weird powers, ya know how it looks for us?” she stepped closer, I nod. “So, are ya evil or are ya not?”
“I am not, as you say, evil, Honesty. But I’m not good either.” I said bluntly. ‘Oh, they all tensed up again.’ I thought as Twilight flared her horn with what I assumed was a battle spell, and every pony else taken their fighting poses, the only exception is Fluttershy. ‘I need to get them relaxed a little, or I will become a pigeon toilet.’ “But to ease your feelings, I do not plan on taking over the world any time soon.” I finished my sentence.
We stayed like this for what felt like an hour, and then Twilight stopped her spell.
“Twi, what are you doing!?” Rainbow Dash hisses through her teeth.
“We need to ask the Princesses about this one girls. They got more experience with this than I do.” answers Sparkle. “We need to take him with us to my castle, and wait for the Princesses there.”
“Darling, can you tell us how are you going to bring him there, without any chance that he will try something?” asked Rarity, pointing her rapier at me.
Purple princess flared up her horn. “Simple.” she said, and teleported us all away.
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After the bright pinkish violet flash, the village fell into the dead silence once again. Rotten remains of the church were once more filled with darkness. But this was no ordinary darkness. It was somehow blacker, scarier… Even deadlier. And it filled the building fully, it began to spread, like oil slick on the surface of the ocean. It spread further and further, until the whole ruins were black, and then… Hundreds of white glowing eyes opened in this darkness.
Then a single word echoed in the forest breeze.
“Hunger….”
Author's Note
This one is a bit short, but I can assure you, that the next will be two or maybe even 3 times as long.
~The Author
(Thank you again Haloboy11721, for editing)
Chapter 1. The forgotten key. (Edited by Haloboy11721)
Ah... I love Comic Con. Wonderful place to spend your time and money. But this one was special. This time I had a costume. And for the record it was an amazing costume, I spend almost Two hundred dollars making it. Sure it’s not that much for a good costume, but every dollar I put into the mask, coat and heart was earned with some hard work at MacDonald’s. Oh! I almost forgot to tell you what costume I made! It was a costume of the Church Grim from a game called 'Year Walk.' And that game is god damn beautiful and scary. A Masterpiece of indie-horror, it uses dark and scary creatures from Swedish folklore. That game has a special place in my heart. That’s why I decided to cosplay the main “spirit” of that game.
But let`s go back to the topic of Comic Con. The funny thing was that only 10 or so people recognized my character. But many others took a photo with me anyways. Maybe it was like that because the game came out almost 5 years ago.
When I got tired of walking between the stands of big games and comic companies, I began to move towards merchandise stands, my inner fan of Doctor Who asked about a sonic screwdriver, while the other part of me, a fan of My Little Pony was wondering about a figure of Starlight Glimmer. One stand, In particular, captured my gaze with its big variety. There was a gravity gun from Half-Life 2 with changing between blue and orange lighting, Amnesias lighter, Necronomicon right out of H. P. Lovecrafts novels, Jotaros cap straight from JoJos Bizarre Adventure, Applejacks hat from My Little Pony, Rivers journal, Indianas whip, Star Tracks badge and ma-a-any other stuff. Even the merchant was dressed as the merchant from Resident Evil.
As I got closer, the merchant said. ”Come here stranger. What`re ya boin?” perfectly copying voice from the game.
That got a little chuckle out of me. “You have some talent dude.” Giving him a thumbs up I was still wearing the mask, so no one could really see my emotions.
“Why thank you mister! So, how can I help you?” He said motioning his hands to the merchandise.
I think a minute, and then see something sparkling in the light of the stand decorations. It was a Church Key. The key from the Year Walk.
“How much for the Church Key?” I asked pointing at metal looking key.
The merchant looked at the object I was pointing out. “Ah! This little thing. Well it a handwork bronze key with a silver chain so… I think itll be something around 40 dollars. But, just because you have an awesome costume of Church Grim, I'll sell it to you half-price. Hows about that?” He said showing me the key a bit closer, so I could look at the details.
‘Whoa. That’s pretty cheap.’ I thought looking closer as he presented it to me, the bronze key, which its handle looked like a goats head without facial features, and small horn`s. ‘Yeah. It’s a great deal. Why not?’ I thought picking my wallet out of the inner pocket. “Yes please.” I said excitedly giving him twenty dollars, and taking the key from him, and instantly put it on.
The moment the key touched my chest, the world around me began cracking like framed picture glass. As cracks filled the space of the building where Comic Con was held some pieces of our dimension started to fall into the white void filled with black stars and almost invisible white clouds. Being in a state of shock, I dare not to move a centimeter from where I stand.
As the void grew, continuing to absorb my plane of existence, stars started to form figures of some weird constellations I didn`t recognize. As I became alerted by weirdness and coolness of things that were happening, the last pieces of the floor I was standing on fell into the white nothingness and I lost my consciousness.
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Twilight Sparkle was sitting in her Friendship castle, specifically at the throne room alongside with her pony friends: Fluttershy, Rarity, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Spike the Dragon that was the only one that wasnt a pony and Starlight Glimmer. Together they were discussing yesterday’s party in honor of Starlights victory over the changeling race. Of course it wasn`t her sol victory, it was also a victory of newly crowned king of reformed changeling race -- Thorax, newly popular traveling magician -- Trixie Lulamoon and last but not least newly redeemed and regained trust Spirit of Chaos -- Discord.
Laughing and friendly chatting was filling the big blue and purple crystal room. The early evening sun was filling the room with warm orange light. Everything was wonderful, everything was right and good. But then… Something happened.
With a black spark the Cutie-Map turned on shattering the happy conversation. The colors of the map were dull, and the cutie marks of the main six ponies started floating over a black dot, in the depths of the Everfree forest.
The Butter colored pegasus with a pink mane ‘eeped’ and dived behind her throne. Everypony else was in shock looking at the map with terrified expressions.
The grave silence enveloped the room for what seemed like an hour. Until Princess Twilight audibly gulped and said.
“W-well, I think this m-mission can wait until t-tomorr-row morning.”
Everypony agreed with her and began to depart to their homes.
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‘Damn. What did I drink last night? That hangover I didn’t bear since 4th semester at university…’ that was my first thought when my mind awoke. I tried to open my eyes, but almost immediately regretted it, as harsh orange light blinded me. Another regretful thing I did, was moving my hand to block the light. Because of genial soreness of my body, even slightly moving was painful.
Cursing under my breath, I began sitting upright on something that felt like a cold stone floor. Only when I was sitting, my eyes slowly started opening.
I was inside of some very old ruins, which looked like some big church hall. All benches were covered in plants and mold, half of them were broken and rotten. Stone floors were cracked, and in some places trough, it grew grass and even some trees. Half of the ceiling was also on the floor looking like small hillock with all the grass. I was sitting under an altar, it was under a hole in the wall that, some time ago, was a circular window. Then I looked to the church entrance where there wasn’t even any rubble from where the wall was. Outside I saw a scary looking stone walls that once were houses, behind them was a forest, it was looking like a green sea of leaves. Then my gaze focused on a mountain. With…
“…what?” I almost silently croaked with my dried throat. Looking on the side of the faraway mountain. “Impossible…” I said with my voice sounding a little better.
I was looking at Canterlot Castle and a city beside it. I couldn’t believe it, here it was. I was sitting here staring at it. For hours. Then, after I accepted the fact I was transported into equestrian by a fucking key, I found out that it was daytime. Mid-morning to be precise.
“Well. At least I`m in the middle of nowhere during daytime, and not night.” I said extending my hand to scratch the back of my head. “Wha-AAAAAHH!!!” I cried out as I touched a horn on my head. Then I began to grope my facial features little by little. I had a muzzle, some floppy goat ears, and two small horns. Then after a little pause, I opened my black cloak to see…
“Oh fuck no…” There was a beating heart. In the hole of my chest was a beating heart. “Oh shit!” I said loudly as I closed my cloak.
“Im a fuckin Church Grim. But not folklore version, oh no… Im the game version, that means…” I say as I starting to move my hand in the air and with a black spark, a mirror appeared in my hand, that for some reason had four fingers instead of usual five. ”Oh great, so I definitely am a spirit with a cosmic power.” I say, slowly turning the mirror around, to see my reflection. The snow-white goat with pearl white eyes were looking at me from the mirror. “Yep. Definitely a goat with cosmic power.”
I stand up straight. “Okay, I'm definitely going to meet some famous ponies. That’s the first. Second, I need to prepare myself to not freak out by it. Third, with this cosmic power, I could concur the world, or I could help ponies. I guess I will help them, because I don’t want to end up in stone. Fourth… Hmmm. I need a believable backstory, just not to tell everyone… everypony, that I`m a human. And finally fifth, make some friends.” As I thought up (the plan of my new life here, I was floating circles inside the church.
After a little meditation, I scanned the surroundings with my 4th dimension vision, to see the history of this small church centered village. It was built by unicorn pilgrims, that came here when the wendigos ruled the land. The main building was the church of sun and moon. And yes, they did sacrifice the goat and the earth pony while they were building the church, apparently, they had a legend about Church Grim spirit. Then wendigos came, then they died, then the forest came, and only then was the unicorn village abounded. That was before Canterlot was even built. ‘This place must be thousands of years old. Huh’ I stopped in midair. Then thought for a little while.
“A-ha!” I yelled as a brilliant idea of my origin came up. ”This is going to be foolproof. Now to my image!” I said pointing up and then teleported into the church.
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“Maybe… Hmmm. I think I should go with the mysterious dark entity. My looks are really appealing to this personality. So yeah why not.” I said smiling. “Oh.. It’s already evening.” My gaze fell to the sky. There I saw something heading my way.
“Huh. Looks like I’ve got my first visitors.” I say disappearing in the shadows of the ruins.
“RAINBOW DASH DON’T FLY OFF AGAIN!” yelled frustrated purple alicorn princess. “Why does she fly off all the time.” She grumbled under her breath.
“I'M NOT FLYING OFF, I'M JUST LOOKING AROUND US!” cried the cyan rainbow-maned pegasus. Then she stopped in midair and then harshly dived back down to the group, covering everyone in dust. ”Girls! From the sky, I saw some ancient ruins, that way!” she pointed her foreleg (towards the left of the group.
“Why the map sent us to this dreadful, horrid place, is beyond me, and for what? to find some dusty stone ruins?” said the white unicorn with a dark violet mane.
“Stop complaining, will ya Rarity? By the look of the map, Ah could easily tell, that somethinevil woke up inere. And ya' know very well, that we can deal with that.” Said the orange mare with a blonde mane and wearing the stetson.
“Im sorry Applejack, darling, but that forests atmosphere of despair is putting me under unbearable pressure!” said Rarity, putting one of her front legs on her forehead in a dramatic manner.
“Me too…” quietly noted Fluttershy.
“Aren’t we all?” said Twilight, giving Fluttershy a comforting pat on her back.
“Not all of us! I'm enjoying our adventure so far!” Pinkie cheered excitedly, bouncing in the front of the group.
“Okay, Maybe not ALL of us.” said Twilight, smiling gently.
Then they entered a clearing, where they immediately saw smoothed with the time old stone ruins of what once was a village. They walked in awe between verdurous stone walls of what some time ago were houses. Then Twilight figuratively exploded.
“All of these ruins have the delayed aging spell of pre-alicorn era! This village is at least a two and a half thousands years old!” she said bouncing excitedly, as the group moved to the main building. “And look at this! Church of Sun and Moon! I can’t believe it! From buildings like this unicorns moved the sun and the moon! Starswirl hasn’t been even born yet! Everfree forest hadn't even grown! This is amazing! I need to document every single rune I find in here!” Twilight practically yelled and hurried inside, but was stopped by a powerful tug by her tail.
“Twilight, Ah hate ta break it ta ya, but don’t ya remember why are we `ere?” said the farm pony looking the princess in the eyes.
“Sorry Applejack, but this is just an amazing archaeological finding! Not many things are known about that time period, and with these buildings right here, we can fill in the gaps in recorded history! But. I guess you right, for now we should focus on our mission here.” said the alicorn, while getting up.
“…why do you think the map send us here girls, what do you think?” said shy pegasus looking from behind her mane, as the last sunlight went out with the setting sun.
“T̢o͞ m͘eet̶ ́m̷e̷, ͢I ͢s̶upp͡ose.̀” said the dark voice from inside of the building as two white glowing eyes came to life in the darkness of the church.
End of part one.
Author's Note
So. Um, hello readers! (if I will have any)
Here’s the thing. English is not my native language, i started to learn it from 3rd class in school, so if you find some stupid mistakes dont hesitate to point them out! (but you dont need to be harsh while doing it)
I hope you`ll like the thing I come up with.
P.S. Great Thanks to Haloboy11721 for editing.
