Imperial Hunter

The pair entered back into Zecora’s hut and returned to their previous seats, the empty tray still in between the two. It was easy to tell that the Zebra was excited, as she was fidgeting in her seat in a way that was distinctly unlike a shaman. Before he said anything, he reached up and pulled the slipknot that held his blank runestone pouch and detached it from his armor. He opened it and pulled out two of the six stones that were in the pouch. Seeing what he was doing, Zecora leaned forward, ready to begin her lesson on creating runestones.

“First and foremost, what kind of effect are you looking for?” Dragon asked as he looked back up to her.

“A rune to scare away predators that may try to eat me.” She said. “Many of the Everfree monsters are simply beastly.”

“A Fear rune.” Dragon said. “There’s two main ways that can be made. The first is a simple Fear rune, which will fill the nearest living creature with sheer terror once it’s active. That will cause most animals to run away and not return, even after the effect fades. The second way is a Fear Time rune, also called a Deter rune. While active- around three hours- the rune will emit an aura of terror that will prevent most animals from entering the affected area. Unlike the normal Fear rune, you will be able to feel the effects of a Deter rune even if you aren’t the closest one to it.”

“How powerful is the fear if I were to hold it near?”

“A Deter rune?” Dragon asked. When Zecora nodded, he continued. “Well, if you’re expecting it, easily manageable. It’s closer to walking through an abandoned home at night on a new moon. A little creepy but nothing more. If you aren’t expecting it, it’ll be like cold terror itself is gripping your heart.”

“A Deter rune seems most useful if I were to be entirely truthful.”

“You’ll need scarlet and blue dye. Scarlet is the color of fear and blue is the color of time.” Dragon told her. She nodded and stood, quickly walking through the curtain to her storage area and grabbing two small jars that Dragon could only see the shape of. She returned and set the two cylinders down, setting two small brushes between them.

Pulling out one of his own Fear runes, he set it down on the simple wood table between them. “Fear, being entirely abstract and emotional rather than physical, has an abstract symbol. See how the three lines curve around the fourth, as if circling it. That is the symbol our ancient Elders have discovered correlates to Fear. Draw this on one side of a blank runestone. It doesn’t need to be perfect, but the closer it is the more powerful the effect.”

Dragon watched as Zecora reached for the Fear rune, likely intending to bring it closer so she could see it better. As soon as her hoof made contact with the charged rune, her eyes widened as a jolt of pure fear shot through her. Her fur stood on end and she leaped backward, flipping over the back of her chair and taking it down with her. Dragon walked around the table and helped her back up and stood the chair up for her, then helped the shuddering mare back into her seat.

“What was that unholy fear I felt? It felt like death itself was truly dealt!” Zecora exclaimed, slowly calming her shivering.

“Certain runes, when touched, will give a feeling of what they do.” Dragon explained. “Fire runes are warm, shock runes are tingly, and a fear runes causes fear. Because you weren’t expecting it, you felt it full strength. Touch it again.”

Though Zecora was clearly nervous about doing so, she tentatively reached out and tapped the rune, sighing in relief when she felt only mildly nervous rather than horrifically terrified. “Go ahead and get started on painting the fear rune. Keep your hoof steady and make sure you’re using scarlet, or something close to it.”

Zecora nodded and set to work. The Fear rune was a rather simply one to paint, even if the symbol was rather abstract. In the center there was a single hollow circle that was left open by a small gap. A little distance away from that was three more lines, circling around the inner circle and leaving three gaps. The best that the Elders could describe it was three predators circling their prey. It only took the shaman a few short moments to paint the lines before she finished, set her brush down, and looked up at him.

Dragon nodded. “Flip the rune over and paint the Time rune. This is done with cyan dye. Now, I don’t have any Time runes to show you, so I’m going to have to tell it to you. Actually, do you have a sheet of paper or parchment?”

Zecora nodded and quickly retrieved a piece of parchment from a nightstand near her bed and brought it over. She hoofed it to him and slid the cyan dye across the table and he nodded his thanks. Manipulating the brush with his hooves, he quickly painted the Time rune on the parchment and slid it to her. Looking it over, her brow furrowed in mild confusion. “I would expect the rune of Time to be harder.”

Dragon shook his head. “Most runes are very simple to paint and, for some reason, they often correlate with things we have created. Take the Time rune for example. The twelve large notches and twelve small notches are suspiciously similar to the hour and half-hour marks on the clocks we make to tell time.”

“Do your Elders believe why this is so? It is something I would like to know.” Zecora asked curiously.

“There’s quite a number of theories.” Dragon said. “The most prevalent one is that our knowledge affects the meaning of the runes. By that logic, if somepony who didn’t know what a clock was tried to draw, charge, and use this rune, it wouldn’t work because they have no connection between a clock and time. Another theory is that the symbol for time was always this and that we, subconsciously, knew that and made our clocks around it.”

“Both are made by those who believe in fate.” Zecora said. “What about those who think as such with hate?”

“You mean what about other theories?” Dragon asked. After a moment, Zecora nodded. “Of course, there’s a theory that it’s just coincidence and nothing more. I personally don’t believe that. I think there’s an explanation for it, even if we don’t know what it is yet.”

Nodding, Zecora grabbed the brush and began painting the small dashes onto the empty side of the runestone. Seeing that she had begun, Dragon started speaking. “Make sure to be careful. The most common mistake is accidentally messing up the pattern of short and long lines. Go slowly.”

Zecora nodded again. Once more, it only took her a few short moments to paint all the lines. When she did and had set the brush down, the Hunter continued. “The next step is charging the runestone. Hold it in your forehooves- both of them. Focus on your latent energy and begin to direct it into the runestone. It’s the exact same process a shaman uses to imbue their potions with magic.”

Zecora nodded and grabbed the uncharged Deter rune. She cradled it in her forehooves and focused intently on it. Zecora held it for several long moments, taking around ten minutes to charge it. There was no outward sign of magic being transferred into the rune and the rune itself was neither glowing, pulsing, or showing any sign of being charged. That didn’t bother Dragon, though, as he knew only the one charging it could sense the energy. After a while, she set the rune down and looked up.

“It is fully charged with fear magic. If it does not work, it will be most tragic.”

Dragon tapped the rune and nodded, satisfied at the nervousness he felt while in contact with it. “Good job. You successfully charged a rune, though I expect most shamans have the ability. Between shamans and enchanters, they make up about eighty percent of all ponies who can use rune magic.”

“Out of all the world, that is not even a percent.” Zecora said, not bothering to rhyme a single line.

“Which is why it’s rather rare.” Dragon said in reply. “Less than a percent of the world can use rune magic and I found you, one Zebra who can.”

“It seems too good to be true. Perhaps there is a clue?”

Dragon shrugged. “Maybe fate? I don’t know why I happened to find one who can learn rune magic but I did. I’m not going to complain. In any case, be careful with the Deter rune. As I said, it’s even more brittle than before. Just dropping it can cause it to crack or outright shatter. With the Deter rune painted and charged, what’s the second rune you want?”

“Something to heal the wounds of the flesh, I think would be most best.”

“Cutting it close with that rhyme.” Dragon commented with a smile, receiving one in return. “A Heal rune is a bit complex. Too complex for the runestones we have now. They’re three part runes; Flesh, Mend, and Time. We could do a Flesh and Mend rune but it’s dangerous to heal the body instantly. Most of the times, it causes the victim to go into shock as the body is healed but the mind says its not.”

Zecora nodded in understanding. “Something to refill weakened energy?”

“An Energy and Merge rune.” Dragon said simply. “Simply called a Stamina rune. A simple Energy rune would end up being an explosion, so we use the Merge rune to signify that the energy of the rune must be added to the energy of the nearest creature. Be sure to hold it when it cracks or else the energy might go to your enemy.”

Zecora nodded, prompting him to continue. “You’ll need teal and light gray.”

While she moved to gather the two dyes, he continued. “The teal will be used to paint the Energy rune. It is, by far, one of the most difficulty to paint because it’s an entirely abstract collection of flowing lines, representing the waves of energy. There’s are sixteen lines in total, all flowing haphazardly.”

Taking the brush and teal paint jar when she offered it to him, he drew the sixteen lines on the parchment, to the side of the Time rune. Being careful, he may sure to draw it to scale and to place all the lines in the proper position. Once he was done, he slid it to Zecora who began to carefully copy it onto the second blank runestone. “Because this is a Energy rune, the second rune is incredibly important. With this, you can do a lot. If you were to put the symbol for Fire on the other side, it would release pure thermal energy. If you were to put the symbol for Magic, it would release pure thaumic energy. The same goes for all other forms of energy.”

The shaman was clearly listening closely while being sure to paint the lines properly. She was glancing back and forth between the sheet of parchment and her rune, ensuring she was getting the lengths and thicknesses correct. After a moment, she pushed the rune to him and set the brush down. Looking over it quickly, he nodded. It seemed right. “The next one is Merge, which is a simple one. Two lines, intertwining around each other for a moment before coming together and making one line. You’ll need light grey dye for this.”

Quickly drawing the rune onto the parchment, he pushed it over to Zecora. “That’s the Merge rune.”

As Dragon had told her, the rune started as two lines that wrapped around each other thrice, then pulled outward. A mere fraction of an inch later, they moved together and combined into one line that continued to the top edge of the rune. All in all, it showed two lines merging together, which made sense to her. It was also much easier to draw. She set the brush and picked the rune up, looking at him curiously. Dragon smiled. “Charge it.”

Zecora nodded and began to charge the rune, quickly filling it up and setting it down on table. As before, there was no outward or visible sign of the energy within the rune, so he tapped it lightly. The Hunter smiled at the small jolt of energy that went through him, refreshing his mind and shoving away any vestige of sleep. “You did well, Zecora. You correctly charged both runes.”

“I would have thought it would be harder.” Zecora told him.

“Charging a rune is easy unless you don’t have the ability. The difficulty is memorizing the different rune shapes and colors, how they interact with each other, and properly making a rune combination.” Dragon explained. “Though you learned that well as well. I’m impressed.”

Glancing out the nearby window, he frowned at the dying light. “Though I suppose I should return to my home. It’s late and I’ll need to restart my fire.”

Zecora nodded with a small smile. She stood up and quickly moved to grab a strange saddlebag, one that hung on only one side of his body. Opening it, she quickly packed several colors of dye; white, dark grey, light grey, blue, red, scarlet, lime green, magenta, teal, and orange. Once the jars were inside the bag, she sealed it shut and walked to the door, where he had gone to and put his pack back on. She helped him put it on and followed him outside. “Thank you for teaching me your art, I will be sure to do my part. I can easily gather the dyes, but to find the stone you must use your eyes.”

“Thank you, Zecora. Have a good night.” Dragon said with a smile before turning around and beginning the trek back toward his home. The next few days were going to be busy.

***

The next couple of weeks was spent building his home. Dragon woke up early the next morning. The sun was shining down on the clearing and he could hear the river nearby, though it was quiet as always. He quickly ate breakfast before getting to work. Retrieving the jars of paint he had been given, he started to make two Bone Weld runes. Using the white and dark grey paints, he quickly drew up both runes and charged them before returning the newly made runes to his enchanted pouch. After that, he left into the Everfree and, after two hours, caught up to a manticore he had followed. A single arrow through the eye was all it took.

Dragging the carcass back to his camp was easier than finding the manticore, even if it took longer. After returning to his home, he began to take apart the predator. The bones would be welded together with the runes, forming a simple framework that he would place into the ground over the next few days. The hide would be dried and preserved to make leather which would become the floor and door of his home, as well as window coverings. The meat would feed him for quite a while, though he would have to be sure to not let it rot. He could use his current home as a drying shack once his new one was complete enough to live in. The blood was spread around the clearing, showing to other predators that a manticore had been slain in the area. The scent would also ward off scavengers as they realized something was strong enough to kill a manticore, though Dragon expected a few to investigate anyway. He also painted a Freeze rune, made from Cold and Time, and placed it and the meat in his shelter, keeping the raw meat at a low temperature to slow the rotting.

The second day was spent preparing the frames and walls of his home. He began by hanging up the hide to let it dry, already having scraped off any attached flesh to prevent it from rotting and becoming useless. Once he had it hanging from the trees, he got to work creating the framework for his home. Taking one Bone Weld rune, he began welding the manticore skeleton together to create the supports of his home. The gaps between the bones would be filled by notched wooden walls that would provide protection and insulation. By noon, he had used all the bones from the Manticore and made roughly half of what he needed. Thus, he tracked down another and began the process anew.

By the fourth day, he had completely made the framework after using both Bone Weld runes, making another, and using it as well. Thus he had a single blank runestone left. The Hunter spent the rest of the fourth day digging into the ground to bury large bone spikes he had welded to the bottom. The bones would be fully buried two meters underground where they would act as anchors for the walls, preventing them from just tipping over during a storm. He finished setting the frame of the house up by the sixth day.

The seventh day was spent in Ponyville, gathering supplies. He bought a saw, nails, a hammer, a sewing kit, and was lucky enough to find a seven kilogram, or fifteen pound, chunk of shatter rock inside Ponyville’s only geology store, though he didn’t really understand why they had one. Thankfully, Pinkie didn’t learn he was in town, or at least he managed to avoid her. Once home, he got to work making another blank runestone. Without the proper tools- which were still on their way from the Empire, he ended up wasting about a kilogram of rock but managed to make several dozen blank stones, two of which he painted as Freeze runes to keep the meat frozen.

For the next six days, he focused entirely on making the walls to his house. Dragon gathered wood from the Everfree and used his axe and recently acquired saw to shape the raw logs into useable planks. Dragon carefully carved notches into the bones of the framework, then nailed the planks together and cut them to the correct size to fit inside the various gaps between the bone frame. He made sure to leave small pieces of wood that correlated to the notches in the bone, so that he wouldn’t have to nail the walls to the bones, which could crack them. Instead, he was able to fit the wood protrusions into the bone indentions, making gravity and friction hold the walls in place rather than nails. After that, he shaped covers for the exposed bones and fitted them over the bones, nailing them to the planks walls in such a way that the exterior of the home looked like the walls were solid wood, rather than wood with a bone lattice inside. He repeated the process on the inside as well, ensuring the bones were completely protected and would not break.

The fourteenth day was spent sewing the now-preserved leather together to form the cover for the door and the two windows he had accounted for, then nailing them to the wooden walls of his home. The remaining manticore leather was spent on forming the roof, which he stretched taunt and nailed onto the roof. It was a simple process, if a little boring. Dragon started the fifteenth day by replacing the Freeze rune in the, currently, storage building, and spent the rest of it collecting leafy branches to cover his roof with, providing protection to the leather and further insulation.

By the sixteenth day, he was almost finished with his home. He had enough pelt left over that he was able to make a simple bed on the floor, though he wouldn’t need a blanket to keep warm. He dug a fire pit inside, lined it with stones he took from the riverbed, and made a gap in the leather roof to vent the smoke. He returned to Ponyville and bought rope, taking note of his funds running low, and used it to create lines by the fire where he could dry meat to preserve it. Then he built a spit where he could cook meat and hang a pot should he decide to make a stew.

On the seventeenth day, Dragon Arrow examined his home once again and knew he was done, that he had finished his home. It wasn’t incredibly large, but he had room he could use to expand whenever he felt he should. It was twenty five meters long, fifteen wide, and four tall. Inside was enough room for him, his equipment, and at least eight others. Of course, he knew he would continue to add shelves, furniture, and even more rooms as time went on. This was just the first room, but he was satisfied. It would be more than enough for the time being.

That night, he treated himself to a stew rather than the bland meat he had been eating for the last two weeks, proud of his accomplishment. Building a home, alone, in just over two weeks was a feat. Then again, he had diverted all of his time to it. Dragon had received no distractions; no visitors, no storms, no animals, just two weeks of work. After eating his fill, Dragon curled up on the pelts that served as his bed and drifted off to sleep.