Rise of Terror

Applejacks senses started coming back. The darkness which had surrounded her since her defeat finally disappeared as she opened her eyes. Her vision was a still a bit blurry. She blinked with her eyelids a few times until it came back fully. Then she started getting up. The first thing she noticed was that her hooves were chained together by blue magical chains. The next thing she noticed was that she was in a cage. It was by no means a small one but it wasn’t too big either. She looked around. She was in a cave. Her friends were all right next to her, each one in a cage on their own and each one slowly coming to themself as well. Spike had a muzzle in front of his mouth while Raritys and Starlights horns were ‘infested‘ by Sombras crystals similar to Shining Armors horn after his fight with Sombra way back when Sombra first returned after a thousand years. Further, there were extra chains binding Fluttershys and Rainbow Dashs wings to their bodies. She continued to look around. Their cages were placed in a crescent-moon-formation. In front of them, there was a large circle on the ground. In its middle, there was a small circle. Further, there were four pyramid-esque crystal structures each in a smaller circle at the outer rim of the large circle. They were positioned in an ‘x‘-formation. Behind them in the distance, Applejack could see something glowing. It looked like the trunk of the Treehouse of Harmony.

„Finally awakend, I see?“, Discorns voice asked from behind them.

Applejack turned around.

„Yeah. Though I would’ve loved to sleep a bit longer if it meant not seeing ya face.“, she said.

Her friends giggled. But Discorn didn‘t seem to be bothered even slightly by her insult. Instead, he simply continued:

„Alright then. Then let me continue with my monolgue. A bit cliché, I know, but it can’t be helped. We are currently beneath the Castle of the Two Sisters. I used a ritual to shield all of us from that annoying tree further ahead and that arrogant lord-of-chaos-wannabe. After I handed your flanks to you, I brought you here so you could witness the beginning of the end for Equestria. But, spoilers: You are not going to live long enough to see the ending of said end. Now let me tell you my story: After you stole my Chaos Magic, I was left in a precarious position. Luckily, I wasn’t defensless as I was smart enough to study the magic Shadowcorn brought with him long ago when he entered the Void. But I’m sure you’ve figured out that part on your own by now. After I escaped Mount Olympus, I first got used to not having Chaos Magic before I got started on planning my revenge. But this time, I had two world I wanted to take my revenge on. So I thought to myself: What is the best way to do so. Then it came to me: By having both of you do the hard part for me by going to war. So I used a disguise-ritual and went into the capital. Claiming to have important information, I managed to get an audience with the son of the throne-thief. I told him I saw Shadowcorn on the other side knowing he would immediately rush out with his army to capture him.“

The captives were shocked.

„So…it was you. You are the reason Prostatis and Motus came to us. You are the reason Fortis almost invaded! You are the reason Shadowcorn sacrificed himself denying him the peaceful, happy life he deserved!“, Starlight yelled angrily.

„Haha! Exactly. I knew this would get your blood boiling! Prizeless! But all fun aside, that wasn‘t at all to my original plan. I wanted Fortis and his army to invade Equestria and start a war. Meanwhile, I would have destroyed the portal trapping him with you and taking back my kingdom. But unfortunatly, Shadowcorns siblings convinced Fortis to not do that and let them try to bring him back peacefully instead. I won’t go into that part since you were there. I will only say that I stuck around the portal hoping my plan would still work. This allowed me to witness your arrival in my world and later shoot you down when you were running away hoping this would allow the army of the Alicorn Empire to catch up to you so that at least some part of my plan would succeed. Unfortunatly, as you know, that was not the case.“

„Do you know what happened to Shadowcorn then?“, Fluttershy asked.

„Yes and no. I did not stay until the very end. But the parts I did see made me almost glad my plan didn’t work. Not having to look out for you or his boys really helped him. He led lose like never before. He used his earth magic to block the hail of magical blasts raining down on him and then proceeded to show his full power utterly decimating the army of the Alicorn Empire until only he, Fortis and his siblings were left standing. Then he fought, and defeated, both of his siblings. Though I think they actually held back knowing that if he would be captured, he would be executed. That left only Fortis and Shadowcorn. And it. Was. Epic. Words could never do it justice. Fortis proofed to be worthy of his position at least in terms of skill and power proving to be a match for Shadowcorn. Neither of them managed to gain an adventage over the other. At least not for as long as I was watching. At first I thought about staying and finishing everyone off once the winner was decided knowing neither would be strong enough to put up much of a fight afterwards. But when a stray shot almost literally blew my cover, I decided it was time for me to put as much distance between them as possible. After that I unfortunatly didn’t meet anyone who could tell me the outcome. So, unfortunatly, my guess about what exactly happened to Shadowcorn is as good as yours. Though there was this one time where I thought I saw him in a group with three weird-looking alicorns and two weird-looking medium-sized dragons. But after further investigation, it turned out that it wasn’t him. In fact, I don’t even think this group was from our world in the first place… Anyways, after my plan failed, I decided to look into a way to go back to this world since it has much more ancient artifacts and creatures I could use for my revenge. After much searching, I found one last portal in a secret cave. It seemed to have been a secret hideout of the original Shadowcorn. Unfortunatly, I had to piece back together his portal first which took a while. I also made sure to close off the entrance to the cave. Just in case Shadowcorn escaped and was looking for one as well. I successfully entered this world and began some research on what to use for my next plan of revenge. During said research, I stumbled upon something by accident which, after further research, I concluded was exactly what I was looking for. Then I made the first version of my plan. For my plan to succeed, I need four alicorns. At first, I wanted to use Shadowcorns boys. But I couldn’t find them anywhere. So here’s my question to you: What happened to them?“

„Why would we ever tell you?“, Rainbow Dash asked.

„Don’t overestimate your position. Me asking you is a mere courtesy. I could simply rip the information out of your minds, leaving it shattered for a long time.“, Discorn threatened.

„Alright, alright. After Shadowcorn sacrificed himself, they went to look for a way back into the Alicorn Empire in hopes of savin‘ him. We haven’t heard from ‘em since.“, Applejack said.

„To be honest, I already expected something like that. Anyways, unfortunatly, soon after deciding on your four alicorns, I had to rework my plan after I learned about Chrysalis humiliating defeat. You see, originally, I wanted to unite all your enemies and the dragons into a giant army with Chrysalis‘ changelings as its backbone. Then I wanted to wage war against you and ponynap all four alicorns on the battlefield. But since that wasn’t a possibility anymore, I decided to wait for Chrysalis inevitable capture. Then, I resurrected Sombra and the Storm King using a new kind of dark magic I learned during my studies in this world called ‘Necromancy‘, freed your other three enemies and forced them to work for me and now, here we are. Ready to enact the final phase of my plan.“

Discorn turned around. Tirek, Chrysalis, Cozy Glow, the Storm King and Sombra came out of the shadows. The Storm King carried a little box sealed by four seals in his hands while the other four had a crown with a big crystal on their heads. He put the box in the middle of the small circle in the middle of the large circle. Then, Sombra made the four structures disappear revealing the princesses. They were still asleep. Almost their entire bodies were encased in a dark crystal each making them unable to move. The Storm King positioned himself behind the cages. Meanwhile, Chrysalis took position behind Cadance, Tirek behind Celestia, Cozy behind Twilight and Sombra behind Luna. Finally, Discorn landed on the side of the big circle opposite to the cages.

„Waky, waky.“, he said letting emitting four spheres of light from his horn.

Each of the spheres entered the head of one of the alicorns. Afterwards, they started opening their eyes again.

„Oh…What happened…Where am…Discorn?!“, Twilight called out in shock.

„Sorry. I already told the story of the how and the why and I don’t feel like telling it again.“

Celestia and Luna were shocked as well. But they didn’t look at Discorn. They looked at the box.

„No…Impossible…Where did you get that?“, Celestia asked frightend.

„It wasn’t easy. But luckily, I had time. But enough talking. Time to end this.“, Discorn said.

He shot four beams simultaneously at the four crystals on the heads of the villains.

„NO! DON’T DO IT, YOU FOOLS! IF THAT THING OPENS, WE ARE ALL GOING TO-“, Luna shouted.

But then, as the crystals reflected the beams onto their heads, she, alongside the other three alicorns, started screaming in terrible pain. Black veins crawled down their bodies and up their horns.

„Yes! It’s working! Now: Force them to use the spell I taught you!“, Discorn ordered his minions.

„With pleasure.“, Chrysalis said with a wicked smile.

Each of the four closed their eyes. Suddendly, the horns of the princesses started glowing. Each of them started to emit a continuous beam at the box. Slowly, one by one, the seals began to unlock.

„Yes! YES!“, Discorn shouted.

His eyes were opened wide and he had a crazy look on his face.

„N-no. Pl-please. S-stop…“, Celestia begged with much effort.

But Discorn only laughed.

„Haha! Why should we stop this close to victory? Soon, Terror will be released, and then-“

Suddendly, there was a flash of light. The ritual had been interrupted. One seal remained closed. Everyone looked at Tirek and Chrysalis, the ones who interrupted it. Both of them looked at Discorn. They were both absolutely furious.

„ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?! No matter what happens, no matter how vengful you are, no matter what your situation is, you should NEVER, EVER even CONSIDER releasing Terror!“, Tirek shouted at Discorn.

„What do you mean? Who is Terror?“, Cozy asked.

„Of course YOU wouldn’t know who that is.“, Chrysalis said scoffingly.

„We actually don’t know who that is, either…“, Starlight said and the Mane Six, Spike and Cadance agreed.

Tirek sighed. Then he explained:

„Terror is a being so ancient, he is at least as old as Discord, if not even older. His power is beyond compare. He is so powerful, he simply can’t be beaten in battle. In fact, I highly doubt that even the ‘magic of friendship‘ would do anything against him. He is considered the single most powerful being in all of existence. He is more destructive than all natural disaster combined. In fact, he is so destructive, those who know him consider him the enemy of life itself. If he ever gets freed, we, meaning everyone here and everything in existence, are all going to not just die but be completely erased.“

„Wow. Is he really that powerful?“, Cozy asked.

„Indeed. I witnessed it first-hoove.“, Chrysalis said.

„You see, when I was a child, there were hundreds of Changeling-hives on the land my former hive stands on, each with millions of changelings in it. But one day, Terror entered our realm. And when he left at the end of that same day, only I and a pile a brood were all that remained of our species. Honestly, to this day, I can’t believe I managed to hide from him successfully. Due to this event, we changelings consider Terror our number 1 enemy. And I refuse to partake in anything that is going to aid him.“

„Same here.“, Tirek said firmly.

Everyone looked at Discorn.

„Bah! You two worry too much. If he gets out of hand, we’ll simply banish him again.“

„You are making a grave misjudgment, Discorn. Unless he trusts you, Terror won’t give you the chance to betray him. The moment you let him free is the moment you die. So I beg of you: Do with us whatever you like. Just don’t release him.“, Celestia begged.

„ENOUGH!“, Discorn yelled.

„YOU are prisoners. You don’t have a say in the matter. And YOU“, he turned to Tirek and Chrysalis, „are going to follow my orders. Or do you want to return to stone?“

Tirek and Chrysalis exchanged looks. Then they looked at Discorn defiantly and, to the shock of everyone present, ripped off their amulets and threw them onto the ground in front of his hooves. The force Discorn warned them about immediatly took effect. Chrysalis and Tirek, who continued to look at Discorn defiantly, as well as Cozy Glow, who was begging Discorn to spare her saying she’d follow his plan, were dragged back together and slowly turned back to stone. It wasn’t until they were fully turned that an invisible force moved their bodies, arms, legs and faces back to the positions they had before they were freed. Discorn, still in shock and disbelieve, looked at them first. Then he looked at the amulets in front of his hooves. Then he shook his head and led out an angry scream.

„COWARDS! I guess, if you want something done right, you just have to do it yourself! Sombra and I should be enough for the last seal.“

Both he and Sombra used the spell to break the seal. But shortly before the beams hit the box, a shield appeared around the box. The two breams bounced off. One hit Sombra, the other the Storm King. Both looked at Discorn for a moment before shattering like glass and disappearing.

„What?! NO! WHO DID THAT?!“, Discorn yelled angrily.

A glowing sphere formed above the chest. There was a flash of light. Suddendly, Discord stood above it.

„That would be me, copycat. I’m sorry, but I simply can’t allow that box to be opened.“, Discord said.

„What?! No! You can’t be here! Not this soon! I haven’t even mastered it yet!“, Discorn yelled out.

„Well, tough luck, I’d say.“, Discord said with a shrug.

He snapped his fingers freeing the prisoners.

„Discord! How did you find us?“, Fluttershy asked.

„I visit the place Celestia, Luna and I hid that box once in a while. My last visit was only a few minutes ago. But since it wasn’t there, I created a shield around it in case anyone tried to open it before teleporting here. I must say, this cheap knock-off of me is slightly above average. Whatever spell he used to shield himself from me, it worked.“

„Thanks, Discord. Now, what should we do with him?“, Twilight asked.

Everyone turned to Discorn. But he was already gone.

„Huh. Someone actually doing something while everyone else is distracted by exposition. Well that’s new.“, Discord commented.

„Can’t you track him?“, Applejack asked.

„He’s still shielded from me. I can’t detect him. Besides, he has no more allies, no more minions and no more options. Let’s track him down another time. It’s late and I’ve already made enough sense for today.“, Discord said.

Everyone more or less agreed with him and he teleported everyone away.

The sun was rising. The box still stood in the cave. Suddendly, it rumbled. Once. Twice. Then suddendly, the last seal broke. The box snapped open. A red, clawed hand rose out of it, followed by a very dark laugh.