Dungeons 2: A Game of Windigoes

Meanwhile, on the border of the Crystal Empire, two crystal guards stood on the outer wall looking out at the frozen expanse.

“Hey,”

“Yeah?”

“You ever wonder why we’re here?”

Alright we’re going to move on from the obvious joke that’s become a meme at this point and get back to the story.

On their watch they saw something in the distance, something radiating an evil presence that had begun to twist the land it walked upon. What they didn’t know, however, was that the creatures approaching were in fact the infecting zombies created by the Contagious Evil.

As you will know from the previous chapter, The Scholarly Evil had acquired a new research option which allowed Zombies to infect the living with a single bite. The Opportunistic Evil immediately took advantage of this new path and set the zombies he had accumulated loose to turn the entirety of the Crystal Empire into a horde of mindless brain-munchers.

Except, of course, for the royal couple who looked over the empire. The Forward-Thinking Evil had a plan for them after he had placed Sombra back on the throne and corrupted the Crystal Heart to his own desires, one that could not be enacted if Shining Armor and Cadence ended up becoming more of the Mindless Undead.

That plan? Oh you’ll see it soon enough, however we should return to The Corrupting Evil’s Undead, which at this point have reached the walls.

“What are those things!?” one of the guards screamed.

“WHO BUCKING CARES JUST SHOOT THEM!” another replied as they began to fire beams of magic from their horns.

Unfortunately being a peaceful race for 1000 years can backfire in many situations, such as when your enemy is a zombie, they have no nerves nor true cognitive thought, meaning any and all spells that the soldiers would know, being all non-lethal, would only serve as a minor inconvenience. On the other hand if they had been more prepared and had more fatal ways of firing at them they would have slowed the Undead Tide significantly. While it would not stop them given how they can get back up from something any living creature would die from, it would’ve been more than enough time for them to alert the city.

“WHY AREN’T THEY STOPPING!”

“OH CELESTIA THEY’VE GOTTEN UP THE WALL!”

“KEEP IT TOGETHER!”

“OH SHIT!”

“STEEL!? STEEL WHAT’S GOING ON!?”

“BRAAAAAIIINNZZZ!!!”

“AAAAAAAA-”

However, it seems that The Corrupting Evil could safely lie his astral projected self back onto his bed-stone and chuckle sinisterly as the now bolstered ranks of the Zombie Swarm marched into the Crystal Empire that was blissfully unaware of what had entered their city.

-------Hour 1-------

In the Crystal Palace, the three royals, Shining, Cadence and their daughter, Flurry Heart rested in the Throne Room, when suddenly a guard entered. “Your majesties, I come with urgent news.”

“What is it Emerald Sight?” the Princess of Love asked of the guard.

“One hour ago, the south-western lookout went dark, no reports or alerts of any kind… two minutes ago, the entire corner of the city closest to the point went quiet as well.”

“This is distressing, send guards out with communication mirrors, and make sure they stay in at least groups of four.” the Prince declared. “We need to undermine what is happening quickly before the city erupts into panic.”

They knew what dangers would arise if the Crystal Ponies lost their happiness, so instead of warning the populace, they moved to keep them ignorant. In any other case this would’ve been seen as tactical suicide, but in the case of the Crystal Empire it was a strategic necessity. So long as the shield remained in place, both the cold and The Corrupting Evil’s reach on the land would be kept at bay. If the ponies no longer supplied the heart with joy, the shield would end up collapsing, meaning the soldiers would not only have to fight through the cold, but also through whatever powerful creatures The Corrupting Evil had at their disposal that currently could not pass through the barrier, such as Sombra.

-------Hour 2-------

It has gotten worse for the Crystal Ponies, they finally learned what had entered their city but by the time they had over half of their land was infested, and with every new convert the infection just sped along quicker and quicker.

The two royals were distraught at the news, it took almost no time for the civilians to hear and promptly panic, meaning outside was no longer safe, the only true shelter was within their homes and the palace. Shining Armor and Cadence had managed to bring in as many survivors as possible, but unfortunately the only living ponies outside now were those in small pockets hidden in their homes which were one by one being snuffed out, it wouldn’t be long before the undead closed in on the final bastion of ponies.

-------Hour 3-------

Outside the palace, Nightmare Moon Walked to the Crystal Pillar, the Heart was still, unable to form a slight shimmer without the happiness of the ponies fueling it.

“And to think, this artifact was something that evil creatures would fear… and all we had to do was send something too stupid to understand such concepts of good and evil… well at least in our grasp it will be put to greater use.”

And so The Extremely-Proud Evil’s Daughter, Nightmare Moon, launched out her darkest corruptive magics, twisting and forming it into a much more evil version of itself, the Heart was now under The Corrupting Evil’s command, and with his first act he…

...reactivates the barrier, pushing back the winter front and making the plants regrow!?

Okay! I could clearly see evil in all of this, even working on making it so zombies weren’t mindless!

“Wait what was tha-”

But pushing back winter?! Making it so the land is lush and green?! How is that Evil!?

“... Because the way evil has been is inefficient and stereotypical…”

...come again?

“For a long, long time evil has been a constant force meant to battle good, using darkness in opposition to their light, but every time good triumphs because of one simple fault.”

The heroes have a goddess or god of sorts backing them up-

“NO! The problem is we focus too inwardly as well, Evil does not need to conform to what Good thinks of us! In fact doing so is self-destructive! Harming and torturing minions when they have done nothing to warrant it is not evil, it’s detrimental. I am The Evil now, and I say just because we oppose the good, doesn’t mean we have to have opposing ideals… besides it’s easier to gather an army when that army knows you won’t be a dick to them.”

So… your concept of Evil is that you use dark magic and lack morality and mercy for your enemies… but you treat your own followers fairly?

“It works for demon lords and their cultists.”

I… well now that you mention it yeah, Demons are respectful with their followers, the problem is the followers become fanatics and ritualistically kill themselves at the end of it.

“And I’m The Corrupting Evil, a fragment of The Absolute Evil, doing something a Demon lord does would be child’s play, plus it puts me at an advantage when Ultimate and Chaotic come into play.”

And how is that?

“I’ll tell you later, we should move onto the final part of this chapter, get to Cadence and Shining!”

Hm? Oh! Right! *ahem* now that the barrier had been jump-started, everyone in the palace began to feel warmer, which in a twist of luck, made the ponies drop their guard.

“Oh good, the heart's active again, that means we’ve won!” Shining concluded, causing the survivors to cheer and begin taking down the barricades.

Of course The Corrupting Evil took advantage of their stupidity and swarmed them with undead before they could seal up the hole in there defenses.

“AAAAH! THEY’RE GONNA EAT US!”

Unfortunately for the panicking maid, that wasn’t going to be the case, you see at hour 2 of the invasion The Mana-Hungry Evil had finally found some Mana Crystals to make a Mana Tomb, originally he had planned to simply raise up some Frights from the graves but then he thought ‘hey, there’s plenty of servants in the palace, why not give them a change in profession?’ and so with the Crystal Heart’s power, all except for the royal couple and their child had their souls horrifically pulled out and made into ghosts.

Now it was just the three, unable to teleport away due to the barrier, unable to fly out because of the sealed windows, and unable to run through the tide of brain-munchers, it seemed all over for them as they held each other tight and declared their love for each other for what seemed like the final time.

This was when Nightmare Moon walked in, ready to take advantage of their hopelessness as per her father’s wishes.

“Well, it seemed my father’s plan worked better than he expected.”

The stallion was the first to shout out in their surprise. “Nightmare Moon!? But you’re-”

“Dead? Oh please, Shining Armor, you should’ve expected that family would help each other out, and I’ve gotten a new lease on life, I’ve gone out more, seen the sights, met some friends…”

“Very old friends…” Sombra spoke in his sinister voice before materialising in the room.

“King Sombra…” Cadence whispered in terror, holding Flurry Heart tighter.

“Now do not worry, we have no intent to harm you… in fact we want to make a deal with you.”

“A… deal?” Shining asked.

[VICTORY!]