That Time I conquered Equestria... As A Colt

The day after the battle with the dragons took place, four foals and two changelings found themselves wandering the Everfree Forest, yet again. They had taken a longer route through the south, to ensure that potential scouts sent after them by Shining Armor wouldn’t see them breaking their promise, before turning west and then north again, just before reaching the Badlands.

“But don’t you think it’s still risky, considering that Shining Armor should be in Ponyville right now?” Sweetie Belle asked as she walked alongside Frosty.

“Possibly, yes. However, there is one thing that I need to retrieve before we make our next step” Frosty answered.

The group had wandered northward for a few hours, until they had found the trail that they had originally taken to get to the dragon lands and were now following it back to where their house once stood.

“Ah still dunno why ya didn’t jus’ let us eat his life. Ah mean, why bother keepin’ him alive when killin’ him woulda been much safer?” Applebloom asked, still sounding a bit disappointed that she didn’t get to taste pony life force yet.

“Ah yes, while it might look a bit like that would’ve been easier, it would’ve actually caused far more trouble than I think it’s worth.” Frosty said. “Consider this: you are Princess Celestia…”

The three fillies gagged at that.

“… and you send none other than the Captain of your Guard - THE Captain of your guard – to investigate an incident at the dragon border. You expect him to report back sometime, but he doesn’t and the following battlegroup you send finds a pile of dead dragons and guardsponies, the captain among them. It would likely immediately stick out to you that you haven`t heard about any dragon attacks, other than that one, but the amount of corpses definitely comes up to a whole dragon army – not to mention that the dragon king himself was among the bodies. Don’t you think that would raise some red flags?” Frosty concluded.

“In that case, we could’ve just drained their bodies like we’ve done this time!” Scootaloo pointed out.

“Maybe. However, I’d say that nothing but a pile of small mounds and one big one is even more suspicious in this case, than just a pile of corpses.” Frosty explained. He chuckled briefly and smiled down at the fillies, who were still giving him curious looks.

These curious looks were one of the many reasons why he had come to love them so much.

“That and there is actually quite a lot of use in keeping him alive. You see: while Celestia is the universally accepted ruler and patron of Equestria, I don’t have that luxury. It would likely be an easy task to get into the palace and take the crown by force, however in all likelihood, that would make the ponies pretty mad and they would eventually defect. The best way to keep them from doing so is to keep certain ponies and institutions in place and get them on our side. The military is one of them.”

The fillies ‘aaah’-d together and seemed satisfied with the answer. Of course, Frosty greatly oversimplified things in his explanation, but if it was enough for the fillies, he was fine with it.

They reached the location of their former hut and its charred remains. Applebloom had to fight back tears when she saw it, but held strong. Frosty almost felt sorry for coming back here, but there was actually a reason for this.

While Sweetie and Scoots were comforting Applebloom, Frosty was walking away, behind the ruins, where a barely noticeable hole in the earth caught his attention. He widened it and looked down to where several enchantments protected a small, glowing rock far below ground. Frosty looked at it for a moment and smiled, when he recalled that this had originally been a gift he had gotten by the fillies.

Shining Armor and the remainders of his regiment reached Ponyville a few hours after they had buried their fallen comrades and left the outpost. Of course, the Ponyvillians were initially a bit confused about their presence. However, beyond taking a look or two at them, most ponies ignored them and went about their day. After all, Ponyville has become known for a plethora of oddities in recent history, so the Royal Guard showing up was actually just a minor event.

Shining Armor didn’t really care about the Ponyvillians either, as he currently had a few things to do: first, he went to knock at his sister’s door and got no answer at first. However, just when Shining was about to kick the door in, Spike opened it.

“Oh, hey Shining. Decided to stop by for a visit, eh?” Spike greeted.

“Hey, Spike. Yeah, kinda did. Is Twilight here? I need to ask her something.” Shining asked.

“Uhh, sorry, but she’s left the day before yesterday. Said she had to follow Frosty and… actually I don’t know. She was already running by that point, so I only caught a few snippets that don’t really make sense.” Spike recalled, making Shining chuckle a little.

“Yeah, that sounds like Twily… wait, ‘Frosty’? Who’s that supposed to be?” Shining Armor noticed, asking though he already had a good guess to who this might be.

“Umm, yeah, so this is the part that you won’t like…” Spike stalled. The drake shifted uncomfortably in his place and repeatedly poked his clawtips together.

“Let me guess: This ‘Frosty’ is the Necromancer, Frozen Blood.” Shining said indifferently, making Spike wince slightly.

“Uhh, yeah... that’s… kinda the case.” Spike said hesitantly.

“Ah, okay then. At least that validates part of his story.” Shining noted, before taking a look around.

“Wait, does that mean you’ve talked to him? How?! I mean isn’t he in exile or something?” Spike asked, slightly confused over what his Brother was saying.

Shining was still looking around while answering. It seemed that something about the ponies around him didn’t match up with him.

“Uh, yeah, he still is. It’s just that we had an incident at the dragon border a few hours ago and this Frozen Blood saved our flanks. He’s actually the reason why we’re here.” He answered in a slightly mumbled tone. He then turned back around to his brother and briefly changed the subject.

“Say, what’s going on with these ponies? Normally, when I would say Frozen Blood’s name anywhere else in Equestria, all eyes would immediately be on me. However, here in Ponyville, they all seem… indifferent to it.” Shining noted.

“Yeah, that’s because the ponies here view Frosty a lot differently than the rest of Equestria. You see: we all know Frosty since before all that Necromancer… stuff. Before all that, Frosty has actually been a very well-respected colt down here. Heck, I’d even go as far as calling him a Town Hero.” Spike recalled.

Shining Armor nodded to himself. Thus far, what Frosty’s told him seemed to be right. “Ah, ok. And may I ask what he has done to earn such high credit?” Shining inquired further.

“Well, for one, he saved the Town from an Ursa a while ago. Then he saved Rainbow during the best young flyers and THEN, the Crusaders were kidnapped and he saved them.” Spike recounted, counting Frosty’s deeds off on his claws.

“Oh really? What happened during the Best Young Flyers? This is the first time I hear that there was an incident.” Shining wondered.

“Uh, well… okay, let’s start from the beginning: We all came to encourage Rainbow during the Best Young Flyers Competition, but since we normally can’t walk on clouds, Twilight wanted to give all of us magical wings, but after she cast them on Rarity, she noticed that the Mana drain was too much to cast it on all of us. Luckily, she remembered that cloudwalking spell she had lying around, so she cast that one instead. We then all flew up there in the hot air balloon that we originally used to fly down here from Canterlot.

So, well, fast forward an hour or so, we sit in the cloudoseum (heheh) and wait for Rainbow’s turn, when Rarity suddenly flies up and shows off her magical wings. However, since they were made from magic and vapour, they quickly disintegrated once she went too high and left her to fall all the way down. The wonderbolts tried to save her, but she uhh… kinda kicked them all unconscious in her panic. Anyways, Rainbow came after them next and did that Rainboom-thing. However, just when she came back up and dropped them off, her wings cramped up and she fell herself. Frosty immediately dove after her and somehow managed to get her back up using magic, but he himself fell completely down.” Spike recounted.

“What, really?!” Shining exclaimed in awe. “How did he survive that?”

“Yeah, that’s where it gets weird. You see: when we found him down there, he was completely unharmed. He told us that he had barely managed to use a parachute spell to slow his fall and the treetops then did the rest, however he would’ve taken severe injuries from that. From what I heard from Twilight, Necromancers can restore their entire body, as long as they have energy left. That would mean that the most likely scenario we have is, that he actually died back there and only came back, because he is a Necromancer. Thing is, in all honesty I think that him jumping to his death to save Rainbow makes it a lot more heroic and I guess most of Ponyville thinks that too.” Spike concluded.

“Wow, that sounds… quite amazing, actually.” Shining said in awe.

“Heh, damn right, it does! Wait until Rainbow comes here and tells you the whole story. Actually…” Spike looked behind him at a clock and when he had confirmed the time, he nodded to himself and held up three claws. “Alright, you might want to step aside for a moment.

2 claws.

Shining Armor raised an eyebrow at his younger brother. “Eh… why?”

1 claw.

“You’ll see.” Spike said.

“Ok—”

Just when Spike lowered his last claw, Shining heard a female voice above him call out.

“WATCH OUT DOWN THERE!!!”

Only a few moments later, he felt how the wind got knocked out of him and he got thrown off his hooves and skidded along the ground in front of the library.

When they had finally stopped, Shining Armor groggily opened his eyes and saw a cyan Pegasus mare with a rainbow-coloured mane lie atop him. She groaned and groggily rubbed her head.

“Uhh, sorry about that, I uhh…” She then opened her eyes as well and looked at him.

When she laid eyes upon him, her expression turned to surprise and then to a seductive smirk.

“Hey handsome, you come here often?” She asked seductively, still lying atop Shining.

“Uh, no, not really. I’m actually just here to visit my sister. I assume, you would be Rainbow Dash, then?” Shining answered calmly. When they got together, Cadence had made sure that he would never be drawn to any mare other than her.

“Heh, the one and only. Seems like I’m already quite famous in… euh, wherever you come from.” She said.

“Uhh, actually my brother and I were just talking about you.” Shining said, pointing to the library door.

“Your brother?” Rainbow asked and turned around, likely hoping to see another handsome colt. Instead, she just saw Spike standing behind her and waving at her.

“Hi, Rainbow.” He greeted indifferently.

“Heya, Spike… wait, Spike’s your brother?” Rainbow suddenly realized, jerking back around to the stallion beneath her.

“Yes. Now, if you’d please get off me, that would be quite helpful.” Shining said.

Rainbow immediately jumped off of the stallion and looked at Shining rather warily.

“So, that makes you her brother as well, huh?” She asked rhetorically.

“If with ‘her’, you’re referring to my sister, then you are correct, yes.” Shining confirmed.

Rainbow looked Shining over a few times, of course immediately noticing the armour and rank insignia.

“You’re a guard, huh? Didn’t know Twilight had family in such high positions.” Rainbow noted coldly.

“That sounded like you have a problem with the guard. Is there anything you’re hiding, miss Dash?”

“Eh, don’t take it too badly. She had a little bit of a falling-out with Twilight over Frosty. Twilight is the only one in all of Ponyville who actually believes the princess that he is a threat.” Spike said a bit disappointedly.

“Wait, so she is currently going after him? That’s why she’s away?”

“I don’t know. Like I said, I only caught snippets of what she said when she left.” Spike pointed out.

“Yeah, she’s off to find Frosty. I’ve heard the judges speak about Celestia turning up after her trial and I bet she told her something that killing him is the only way or something.” Rainbow said.

“And you’d say that that’s wrong?” Shining Armor asked Rainbow, waiting for her reaction.

“Heck yeah I would! That colt is a hero AND a saint! He is almost as awesome as I am and that’s almost impossible!” Rainbow exclaimed. “That colt even saved my life in exchange for his own, for crying out loud!”

“Alright, that confirms Frozen Blood’s story at least for the most part. Still, I’ll probably need some more.” Shining assessed, after making some mental notes about the similarities in their stories. No disparities thus far, so if it wasn’t rehearsed or something, it was likely the truth.

“Wait, what? Frozen Blood’s story? You’ve met Frosty?” Rainbow asked in astonishment.

“Yep. He helped us out on the dragon border, when they attack and almost wiped us out. He told me to come here, if I wanted more information and more information I certainly got.” Shining said. Rainbow’s mouth gaped open for a moment, not sure if she should cheer or be concerned, that somepony outside of Ponyville finally believed them, that Frosty wasn’t a villain.

“However, I’d very much like to see all sides of this. We should probably hear what the other elements have to say on this as well.” Shining stated.

“Hey, no problem, I can just go fetch them! You’ll see, they’re gonna be here in ten seconds flat!” Rainbow said quickly, suddenly full of enthusiasm. She had apparently decided that having somepony from outside who believed them was first and foremost a good thing.

“Yes, that would be very helpful.” Shining said, just before Rainbow zoomed off. He doubted the mare had even heard what he had said. It seemingly was enough that he had said anything at all.

“Okay… yeah, we better get everything set up while she’s gone. Spike, go fetch a quill and some parchment, there’s probably gonna be a lot to write down.”

Spike saluted quickly and slipped back inside to prepare. Shining followed him, setting foot into Twilight`s Library for the first time. However, he did not take the time to look around, as he knew he had a lot of work ahead of him. So many questions that needed to be answered:

How could somepony be born with Necromancy?

Why was Celestia so obsessed with destroying Frosty?

What does Twilight have to do with this? After all, Celestia could likely just go after Frosty herself.

In short: What in the world was going on?