Equestria; Western Equestria, White Tail Woods; 7:00pm

Nightmare or in this case, Seth was – and if he was correct – in Equestria, but as to where and when in particular was the real question. Since he could remember a little of what the Merchant said, he mentioned that he wouldn’t be alone meaning the others were transformed and in this world too… but he wouldn’t be lucky enough that they were close, and wouldn’t be surprised if they were several kilometers away from his location… all of them.

It didn’t help that he other than Ben, knew the basic stuff about the current situation and about the whole idea of being Displaced. Since he was the calmer of the four in any kind of situation compared to the others, he planned ahead about what he needed to do; he needed to look for the others, find out where he was right now on Equestria and… well he’ll wing the rest out.

“Okay, I’m in some kind of forest… doesn’t look like the Everfree, maybe White Tail... and my voice is damn different now,” said Nightmare.

Guessing by the hair I’m Nightmare from Soulcalibur 2, though I’m surprised I’m in control and not Soul Edge.

“That is because I have no need to, master.”

Nightmare stood up immediately, still gripping Soul Edge as he looked around his surroundings to find the source of the voice. “Who said that, show yourself!?” shouted Nightmare.

“Why it is I master, Inferno or should I say Soul Edge,” said Soul.

“Wait it was you, and why are you calling me master?”

“You are different than any previous entity that has dared to wield me… and you know more than you look. I wish to see what choices you make and how far you’ll go.”

This is interesting, not only is Soul Edge calling me master, but I won’t have any problems, with… “it” trying to do anything… hopefully. “And what exactly do you find so interesting about me?”

“Unlike previous wielders, you seem to recognize this world we are in… that and unlike previous wielders you don’t have a reason to wield me… that you are simply here and do whatever you want – the purest form of chaos, the act of doing something without reason or care!”

Or maybe he thinks I’m going to do something evil.

“Well whatever, let’s get outta of this forest and find some civilization,” said Nightmare. “And by the way, my name is Seth, if we’re going to be working together I might as well give you my name… what should I call you?”

“...A name… You may either call me Inferno or Soul, which ever works with you.”

“Great, let’s get going now.”

“Lead the way.”

Central Equestria, Everfree Castle; 7:30pm

Luna was up as usual at this time of the day, her sister resting at this hour, the lunar princess wandered the halls of her home for the last couple of centuries since Equestria’s founding. While it was built in one of the most dangerous places, it was also an important strategic location to be built back during the more chaotic times in the past.

Heading to her own personal office room that was just a few halls near her bed chambers, Luna approached the room that had two Lunar Guards guarding on both sides of the door. Entering inside, she headed to her desk and looked through what problems she had to deal with today.

Its been fifty years since Tirek’s invasion and his brother Scorpan joining our side to stop his brother. We are still repairing the damages that occurred during his invasion, but repairs are steadily continuing. Reports from Filly Delphia, Baltimare, Manehattan, Tall Tale, Vanhoover, and Luna Bay show things are doing well, Canterlot is doing well and more troops are being recruited and trained properly for future incursions. Even though we managed to defeat Tirek, remnants of his forces still remain, we know a large contingency of them are coming from further south but my sister and I have placed several outposts to make sure of any… further signs show up.

Putting down the reports, she looked through economical reports and requests from several towns and settlements about things that may or may not be accepted, depending what it was and who it came from.

“I guess it’s another night of more paperwork, I don’t understand why we need to do this and instead just make the decisions whenever we like. By the time we go through this strenuous crap, the situation has either been solved or gotten worse, in most cases it being the latter,” said Luna, grumbling.

Luna sighed and gazed outdoors through the room’s window to look at her night, the moon out and at its fullest and stars littering the skies. A knock came to her door, and entering inside was the captain of the guards in the Everfree Castle. “Captain Breaker, what brings you to my door?” asked Luna.

“I’m sorry to interrupt you during your busy work, your highness” said Breaker, bowing.

“No no, this interruption is something I needed for this ‘work’ of mine, is there something you wish to tell me?”

Breaker entered inside wearing the signature armor of the Royal Guard, it being a silver color that covered his body except around the back end, keeping the legs unarmored for better mobility, but wearing armored hoof-shoes. Captain Breaker, a notable unicorn noble – one of the rare few respectable ones – was in charge of the day-time guard while Captain Shade was responsible with the night-time guard at the Everfree, but both captains are used to working in either hours.

“Well, I came here because the magi have received several reports of different anomalies,” said Breaker.

“Anomalies, what kind of anomalies are we talking about here and where?”

“Well they’re not certain, but two of these anomalies are somewhere around western and north-eastern Equestria, the other two anomalies being outside Equestria’s borders. Should I send some scouts to check what these anomalies are?”

After some thought Luna decided that she would tell her sister this personally in the morning and that she and Luna would check these anomalies themselves. “Do not worry, my sister and I will check them ourselves, for now simply report any odd behavior from those directions and find the location of those other anomalies.”

With that Breaker nodded, leaving Luna to continue with her previous work. Anomalies… finally something interesting for me to do.

Western Equestria, White Tail Woods; 8:00pm

“How long have I been in this forest?” asked Nightmare.

“Only for half an hour, though it has been awhile and I expected to have reached the edge of the forest by now… I have an idea.”

“What do you got up your metaphorical sleeves?”

“Since you are unlike any wielder I’ve met before, do you know something called the ‘malfestation’?”

“Yeah… why?”

“Ah good good, my idea was to use a shard of myself and send it to a nearby animal, particularly one that may fly,” said Soul, a devious edge in his voice.

So he wants me to get a Watcher… but where the heck am I going to find an animal this close by? At that moment however, something flew straight down toward Nightmare… or in this case crashed down near Nightmare. Falling right before Nightmare was an injured black hawk, that had a bolt torn into one of it’s wings; the odd part about this hawk was that it appeared to be wearing a leather packet on it’s back. Well that’s convenient, but what is that on it’s back?

Taking a closer look, Nightmare found that the hawk was some kind of messenger bird, but as from who was a mystery. The bird was bleeding and didn’t look that well and would possibly die from the wound caused by the bolt; kneeling down, the hawk tries to scramble away from Nightmare, but the armored entity gently scooped up the injured hawk, examining it’s wound. “Hey, I won’t hurt you, let me just take this arrow out of you.”

Gripping the arrow he ripped it out, the flow of blood spurting out of the wing, causing the hawk to spasm and caw weakly in pain. Looking around for something to wrap the wound with, an object suddenly collided with Nightmare’s helm, creating a loud clang as he lost focus and dropped the hawk onto the ground.

Coming out of the forest at the direction that Nightmare was looking at was a pair of minotaurs, both armed with one wielding a crossbow. “The heck is that thing!?”

“I don’t know but it has the messenger hawk, we should kill it and get whatever intel is on that bird!”

Nightmare gazed down at the fallen bird, seeing it motionless as it’s head fell onto a stone, cracking the poor hawk’s skull. Those piece of shits…

“Are dead,” said Nightmare, gripping Soul Edge tightly.

“Yeeeeees, rage, wrath, kill them, kill these two insolent fools that dare cross your path.”

Before the two minotaurs could react, Nightmare unleashed a terrifying roar then charging straight toward the minotaurs with murderous intent in his eyes. The one with the crossbow fired a bolt which did nothing but bounce off the armor; seeing who attacked first, he swung his weapon overhead and smashed it into the minotaur’s pitiful body, turning what remained into paste. The other minotaur fell to his knees in terror, but before he could utter a scream his head was cleaved off with a swipe of Nightmare’s three-pronged claw, gripping the head before crushing it into a bloody ooze.

After his raging high passed, Nightmare gazed around at the bloody mess he left behind before turning to face the now dead hawk. “Bastards, attacking a defenseless animal… I guess I won’t be getting a companion now.”

“I wouldn’t give up too soon, point me at the body, and let me handle the rest.” Unsure what Soul was going to do, Nightmare followed and pointed him at the hawk’s body. Soon an eerie glow came from the eye on Soul Edge before it shot through the blade and into the hawk; at first nothing happened but then the body began to convulse and shake, the wound repairing itself and the sounds of bones going back into its proper places. After the transformation, the hawk stood on both talons and gazed upward at Nightmare, letting loose a powerful caw. “Voila, back from the dead.”

How in the heck, he can bring the dead back to the living?

“Now you are thinking right now, ‘He can bring the dead back’, and no I can’t… well not in the way you think; I need a body that at least has a shard of me inside, so I sent said shard and revived the hawk with it. From now on, this hawk will stay loyal to you for the ends of your days… So what you wanna name him?”

After listening, Nightmare extending his mutated arm out which the hawk flew up and perched itself on one of his prong-like claws, gazing back with red-glowing eyes. What indeed shall I call you?

“...Nightwing or Night for short,” said Nightmare, satisfied with the name.

“Odd choice, but whatever is to your liking.”

The hawk cawed, eager to please its new master; Nightmare began examining the two dead minotaurs and their equipment, when some new thoughts came to him now. That one minotaur mentioned they were trying to get whatever this hawk was carrying in that pouch of his. “Uhm Night, can I have whatever you have in that pouch of yours?”

Instead of saying no, the hawk nodded and moving its head into the pouch, slipping the beak inside and pulling out what appear to be a scroll of some kind. Night the hawk gave the scroll to Nightmare, which opening was some trouble due to his large hands, but after he did open it inside was some indecipherable language… which he could somehow read. “Uhhhh, how can I read this?”

“That be me; having been dragged across the world, also means having to listen to various languages… let’s say at some point I gained the ability to auto-translate what others say.”

Uhhhh, that… makes a whole lot of sense now. Focusing back on the scroll, Nightmare began to read diligently of what was written on the notes.

M11 D26 Y310;

It has been two weeks since we managed to escape from the minotaur lands, as a coup had happened between their king and his brother the general of their army. Now we are being chased by the bastards and are currently hiding in one of the Equestrian towns called Tall Tale; I’m sending this messenger hawk to the capital city of Canterlot in hopes to receive help from their leaders. I have also sent another messenger hawk back to Griffonstone to warn them of what’s happened.

From, First Lieutenant Sharphook

“So these minotaurs work for this general dude that betrayed his brother who was the king, and I’m assuming these two minotaurs were sent to retrieve this intelligence. Hey Night, can you lead us back to this Tall Tale place?”

The hawk nodded, readying to fly off to the sky, Nightmare watched which direction it went but instead… felt a presence; unsure what it was he was feeling, he realized it was the hawk and that he knew where it was and could see what it sees. Now knowing which direction it flew toward, Nightmare went to said direction with an unseen grin under his helm.

“Seems things only got interesting, let’s see what this world’s civilization is like,” said Nightmare, walking through the forest.

Western Equestria, Tall Tale; 8:15pm

Sharphook gazed down below from a deluxe room in one of the castle-like buildings in the town of Tall Tale, which consisted of tower-like buildings. The town had a high population of pegasi and griffons, with occasional earth ponies and unicorns mingling down below, though the only ones out tonight were the Lunar Guard and night-hour workers.

Sharphook heard noise behind him but knew who it was, so without even turning he addressed the fellow griffon behind him. “Sergeant Major Light Feather; how is the princess, is she resting well?” asked Sharphook.

“She’s resting well and I managed to calm her down, sir,” said Feather.

“Now now, there’s no need for formalities Feather, you can talk to me normally.”

“Sorry… its just we’ve been on the run for two weeks with barely any rest or proper food and I know you and I been through the training to deal with such conditions… I’m worried about her highness, especially since she saw Corporal Thunder Hawk get executed during our escape.”

“We knew the risks when she asked to come along, but this coup has brought all of us on the edge; I’m glad we are back in civilization but we’re still not in the clear. I sent two messenger hawks, one to Canterlot to ask the leaders of Equestria for assistance, and one back to Griffonstone to warn them of what’s happened back in the minotaur lands.”

The two heard a door open and found Princess Soft Beak rubbing one of her eyes, yawning sleepily as she wandered into the room before bumping into a sofa chair. Muttering to herself, she moved to a bucket of water, splashing the cold water into her face, waking up immediately.

“Princess, what are you doing up at this hour?” asked Feather. “You need your rest.”

“Can’t… been having nightmares ever since we came here… very vivid ones, I’d rather stay awake than deal with another nightmarish figure. What have you two been talking about?”

“Nothing much princess, we were talking about what we should do next.” Soft gave a suspicious look, but gave up and went to get a drink of water, sitting down on the sofa chair she bumped into earlier. While the princess relaxed, the two griffon soldiers gazed down below at the various lights sprinkled around this town, at this current moment of peace and quiet… that would soon be shattered.

Elsewhere some distance from Tall Tale – Western Equestria, Unicorn Range; 8:20pm

Somewhere amongst the mountains at Unicorn Range… was a military camp, but not an Equestrian one as this one was hastily set-up a few days ago, for this was a minotaur military camp. The two-legged beings move down the lane of tents like ants, but one particular minotaur who had a scar around his right eye and walked down the lane with an ominous feeling around him toward a larger tent stationed at the center of the tents.

Entering inside, the scarred minotaur placed his weapon down and knelt one leg down before the figure in the shadows. “General Iron Tusk, the scouts sent to retrieve the intel from that messenger hawk haven’t come back yet, should we send somebody to search for them?”

“...No Lieutenant General Black Hoof, we’ll proceed with the plan, tell the troops… we march for Tall Tale; tonight the Minos Empire will take over Equestria, then the Griffon Lands… and the world, for tonight will be the night the minotaur race will be the supreme ones!” shouted Black, grinning.

Nodding, Tusk went off to give off orders to the fellow army officers and prepare the soldiers to invade what would be the beginning of any international incident to come… but sometimes… things don’t always go as planned.

Author's Note

The first arc of the story - Small Beginnings - with Seth's perspective first as the Azure Knight himself; Nightmare.

Soul Edge/Inferno is the one with italics in his dialogue due to him speaking telepathically with Seth or anyone else nearby. The reason why Seth understands them minotaurs is due to Soul having been wielded by various users from different cultures, meaning he's gain a natural talent to auto-translate any language (as well as other abilities).

Nightwing the Hawk is basically a fusion of a Guardian and Watcher - Watchers are animal malfested while Guardians are beings who have a shard of Soul Edge in them for clarification to those who don't know what they are.