PONEST DUNGEON

Arc 1: The Recombinant Rictus

Chapter 1: A Mysterious Missive

Week 0, Day 2, Morning—?

Blueblood slammed his hooves down, cracking the surface of the antique wooden table that had hosted countless councils before—but none with the gravity of the gathering at hoof. “Chancellor Neighsay, would you truly drag us all down this mad path of inaction? You'd insist on following peacetime protocol, demanding that we waste time forming committees and endlessly debating semantics, when there is a clear and present crisis at hoof?”

The Chancellor met his gaze with an imperious nod. “Aye. It would be rash to follow the course of action you've suggested without all due analysis.”

“Analysis.” Blueblood pressed a hoof to his forehead in response to a sudden disbelief-induced headache. “The clocks have struck ten already, and yet the only illumination in this kingdom is from that accursed comet!” His hoof gestured out the window towards the baleful green glow, which seemed almost alive in the night sky. Its owner had appeared in the early hours; the arrival was as mysterious as it was foreboding. “We have had neither contact directly from Celestia, nor from anypony who can confirm her status. If she is indisposed, your plan will take precious time we do not have; whereas my plan will have the sun up within the hour. We can put your committees together after the immediate crisis—”

“At what cost, Prince?” Neighsay interjected. “Raising the Sun via Starswirl’s ancient method would permanently drain four unicorns of their magic!”

“Yes, it would,” Blueblood said, his tone even. “But if we wait a week for your committees to form, and longer for them to accomplish anything, our crops will die, the land will freeze—”

“And if Celestia is just late in raising the sun today—” Neighsay harrumphed. “We all know she’s been unreliable these past several months. If we do this, that’s four unicorns who will have made the ultimate sacrifice for naught. And the backlash from the public will be tremendous!”

Blueblood chuckled darkly, then lit his horn as he rose from his seat. A long and finely-balanced sword levitated out from its scabbard beneath his chair. His eyes flicked from pony to pony as he trotted from the front of the gathered council toward the desk where Neighsay sat, leading the way with the blade. The change in atmosphere was immediate; the stench of fear—the council’s uncertainty—was palpable. “Tell me, Chancellor: are you more interested in your political career than in the safety of Equestria?”

“I—” Neighsay flinched as Blueblood drew nearer. His eyes flicked around the room, searching in vain for somepony to come to his aid. “What are you doing?! You can’t threaten a—hrrkk!”

There was a collective gasp from the council as Blueblood brought his muzzle close to the Chancellor's, leaning over the hilt of the sword he'd freshly sheathed in Neighsay’s throat. He locked eyes with the dying pony, and thought that what he saw was surprise and fear.

Blueblood whispered, so that only the Chancellor could hear: “My only regret is that, in killing you, I cannot make sure that you are one of the first four.”

The frantic quality in Neighsay’s expression began to abate as his lifeblood cascaded down his chest and forelegs, pooling at his hooves. Soon the light in his eyes faded entirely, and Blueblood withdrew the sword, allowing Neighsay’s body to slump forward upon his desk.

“Look well upon this traitor,” Blueblood shouted over the growing chorus of protest. “Consider if you, too, would dare place your own interests first, delaying action, when there is only one clear course!”

Week 0, Day 2, Evening

With Blueblood’s resolve made clear to all, the council had moved swiftly; the logistics were straightforward to plan out, and messengers were immediately sent to implement them.

The entire council, Blueblood included, had shared a collective sigh of relief when they saw the sun finally begin to rise above the horizon, just as the castle clocks struck noon. Their cautious optimism had climbed in tandem with the sun as it began its arc through the sky.

But that had been ten hours ago.

The sun, now a giant red wound on the horizon, was setting much later than normal, despite having provided several hours less sunlight than was customary for this time of year.

Blueblood grunted in partial relief as he lowered himself onto a lavish cushion in his private quarters. He rubbed his hooves, which ached from hours of standing in council, against his temples. Yet his efforts to dispel the troubling thoughts that dwelled there were in vain, and only exacerbated his headache. He hoped, with only the barest of expectations for success, that the edicts he had enacted earlier in the day would keep the kingdom from collapsing overnight.

Blueblood shook his head from side to side, hoping it would clear. Despite his great exhaustion, he suspected he would need a hefty nightcap to help bring him into the comforting embrace of unconsciousness.

So he grunted with the effort of standing again, walked over to the table where he kept his assorted liquors, lit his horn, and used his magic to remove one of the darker bottles. Another tiny surge of magic and the cork popped free, allowing him to pour a generous measure of the maroon liquid into a crystal cup. He recorked the bottle, but opted to carry it with him as he walked back to his cushion. The hovering glass followed close behind.

He took a sip of the heady liquid and felt the built-up tension of the day begin to melt away as the fiery warmth of the drink spread through his chest. Soon two brimming glasses of a wine that cost more than what most ponies made in a month had vanished down his gullet. Yet it didn’t fully dull the edge of the day’s events.

“Where are you, Auntie?” he slurred to the vacant quarters as he tilted the bottle to refill his emptied glass yet again.

He almost spilled his drink in surprise at the sudden and furious rapping at his chamber door, almost as if it had come in cryptic response to his query.

After taking another swig of the wine, Blueblood barked his answer. “What?”

“Message for you, Sir.” The voice was barely audible through the thick door that separated his room from the hall, but it clearly contained a distressing note of urgency that chilled Blueblood to the bone.

Standing on shaky legs, Blueblood staggered towards the door. “Come in.”

The door opened inward, revealing Ditzy Doo, the wall-eyed pegasus who had served as Celestia’s personal chauffeur for the last several years. Blueblood’s gaze was not drawn to the mare’s haggard appearance—which probably rivalled his own—but to the crumpled envelope she bore on an extended wing.

Ditzy’s presence alone filled him with a creeping sense of dread. If she’s here, then where in Tartarus is Celestia?

As Blueblood reached out for the parchment, he saw that his entire foreleg was visibly shaking, despite the alcohol coursing through his veins. The uncontrollable tremors in his own limb gave him pause; he downed another glass of wine to try and steady his nerves further, then poured himself what remained from the bottle. Only then did he grasp the envelope in his magic. A quick look revealed that his name was hastily scrawled across the front, and that the back was affixed with—

“Aunt Celestia’s royal seal…”

Blueblood felt a confusing mixture of anticipation, anxiety, and mounting terror. He looked up to press Ditzy for questions and startled when he saw that the mare had somehow vanished from the room. If not for the muddy hoofprints which now marred his imported Saddle Arabian rug, it would be as if she had never been there.

Returning his attention to the folded parchment, Blueblood broke the seal, opened the envelope, and pulled the letter from within. As his eyes perused the document, they widened. The glass of wine fell, forgotten, its red liquid spilling across the carpet in a pattern that would later remind him too much of the blood that had crept down Neighsay’s fur earlier in the day.

He finished reading as the last bleeding rays of sun fell below the horizon, painting Blueblood’s entire room in shades of crimson. And soon the fading radiance of the sun slowly gave way to an unearthly green glow.

Glancing out his window and towards the sky, Blueblood saw the comet he’d noticed earlier in the day. It sat there, blazing away, mocking his senses with its unnatural color and inexplicable appearance in the absence of the sun.

“Ruin,” he whispered, looking at the letter again.

Dear Nephew,

Ruin has come to our little ponies.

You remember the Castle of the Two Sisters, palatial and majestic, sitting impassively above the river that stretches, surreptitiously snake-like, through the surrounding forest of Everfree?

My sister and I lived all our early years in that archaic ruin, contenting ourselves with the whimsical and fantastic pastimes of our youths. And yet, amid such seeming happiness, my sister began to tire of her role in the diarchy, pursuing forbidden lore and——sinister rites.

Upon her banishment, while searching through her chambers for some sensible reason for her descent into darkness, I came across peculiar records she had gathered, which suggested that the castle itself was a conduit for some ancient, wondrous, and yet unidentifiable force.

Utilizing the curios and ceremonies recovered from my sister's personal effects, I resolved my every effort towards the discovery and exhumation of those ancient interred mysteries, dwindling the crown’s supposedly neigh inexhaustible fortune on——stalwart stallions——and steady spadework.

At long last, in the umbral darkness under the oldest hoof-carved stones of the lowest levels of the castle, we disinterred that Tartarus-damned gateway of prehistoric malignancy.

Each of our hoofsteps disturbed the primordial terrain, for we were in a festering TOMB of INSANITY. When all of the others had perished, I alone retreated through those stygian galleries of time immemorial——

Until merciful oblivion claimed my senses——

You remember the Castle of the Two Sisters, palatial and majestic?

IT IS A CANCEROUS ANATHEMA!

I BEG you, return to the Everfree, embrace your heritage, and deliver our little ponies from the insatiable grasping darkness——

of the Ponest Dungeon.