The Equestrian Manhunt

by Shadic Midnight Blitzer

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Author's Note

Warning: The following chapter contains some disturbing scenes. It is advised to understand that while Manhunts are written in a fun and exciting way from Dream's perspective, there's more than one side to the story. The final scene is designed to depict a moment of terror and fear. Because unlike Dream or the Hunters, who view everything here as a game, and to us who view this as a fictional story, everything that occurs here to the 'third-party' is real.

And thus, the final scene is meant to show what this 'third-party' thinks whenever something like this occurs. An acknowledgment of their point of view. Such a scene may or may not occur again, though an attempt will be made to make sure it occurs as little as possible should it be the case.

This scene was a byproduct of trying to pack as much emotional charge into the story, as you can see from the numbers. During any video, Dream adds on music to create an atmosphere, and today I'll be attempting to do the same. Every single time a number appears, it's recommended to press/click the number in the Authors Notes to create the atmosphere. It's not necessary (and when it comes to the final scene it makes things more scarier), but it's helpful to know what the atmosphere is. If it says 'pause', pause the video where it is and jump right back to it when it says 'resume'. 'Commence' and 'End' are self-explanatory.

This is an experimental test to see if adding music to the story is a good idea or ends up being a lengthy process. So comment down below if this works, though I'm expecting PC users to have an easier time as they could open the links in other tabs. I tried to time beat drops and endings of songs to the text, but it also depends on how slow/fast a reader can read, so I'm interested to hear the results.

I'm sorry if this chapter causes discomfort. This story is meant for 13+ audiences, unlike MLP's 6+ audiences. But then yet again, if you think about it, if somebody were to set eternal night and you knew that it would cause famines that would ultimately kill everyone on the planet, you'd be full of fear. The same thought process of realism will take place in the final scene.

So take a seat. This story, just like Manhunt, is a Thriller. So don't be surprised if you find yourself on a rollercoaster of emotions.

Thrillers are characterized and defined by the moods they elicit, giving viewers heightened feelings of suspense, excitement, surprise, anticipation and anxiety.

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Chapter 3: The Murder

“Oh Dream~...”

“C’mon we just want to talk.”

“LEAVE ME ALONE!”

The sound of heavy footsteps echoed through the forest as Dream continued to run through the dense vegetation of the Everfree Forest. Close on his tail was George, Sapnap, Bad, and Ant, also known as the Hunters, who showed no signs of stopping the chase.

“We just wanna talk Dream,” Sapnap said as he was the closest behind the green-hooded person. Ducking under a branch, Dream immediately pulled it back before letting it go, causing Sapnap to slide on the ground to dodge it. George though, who was behind Sapnap, did not see the branch coming and thus felt it slamming against him.

“OW! My face!” George yelled as he collapsed onto the ground, momentarily dazed. Ant, who was behind George, immediately tripped over George’s leg, causing the anthropomorphic cat to take a hit and roll onto the ground. Bad managed to jump over the two and continue the chase along with Sapnap.

“Dream! You’re making this much more difficult than it needs to be! We just need to kill you and we’ll return home!” The demon-like creatures yelled as he dodged another branch that had been pulled by Dream.

“No! Leave me alone!” Dream yelled with desperation, turning his frightened gaze at them for just a second. This turned out to be a mistake as when they went into a clearing, Dream turned around and saw that he had only a few feet left before he would fall into a massive gorge, which contained a toxic goo pit at the bottom. He was running too fast to slow down, not that he could with the hunters chasing him. Luckily there seemed to be some stone platforms ahead to jump on, however they seemed incredibly unstable. Taking a deep breath and an incredible risk, Dream leaped forward onto the first stone platform, and like expected it began to fall downwards due to the sudden change in balance.

“He’s getting away!” Sapnap yelled as he tried to follow Dream, only for Bad to pull him back just in time, as the platform that the fire-shirted hunter had targeted soon collapsed into the toxic pit.

“We’re going to have to take the long route.” Bad muttered, before turning his gaze to Ant and George who were slowly arriving. Bad smiled at each of his companions as he formulated a plan. “Hey Ant! You get us some resources while me, Sapnap, and George pin him down ok?” The black-hooded figure asked. Ant nodded as he walked towards the nearest tree.

“Alright!” The anthropomorphic cat said before blinking in realization. “Wait… this is going to hurt me ri-”

“Just do it already Ant!” George yelled at the furry figure, causing Ant to let out a sigh of resignation before pulling his hand back.

“This is going to hurt.” He muttered to himself, and against his better judgment, punched the tree.

“Oh dear…” Bad silently said to himself as they all heard the earth-shattering scream. “Ugh. Should’ve told him that in RLCraft you can’t punch trees.” The demon figure said as he and Sapnap took the long route, with George following behind them. Sapnap simply raised an eyebrow at Bad after hearing his muttering.

“Seriously Bad?”

“What? I thought we’d still be able to punch trees like in Minecraft!” Bad protested, trying to defend himself from Sapnap who simply rolled his eyes as they continued to run.

“You just said a while ago that the cockatrice came from RLCraft which implies that things here are going to be much more realistic than in Minecraft. Speaking of Minecraft, I don’t know how we’re going to open up our interface to craft and swap tools.” Sapnap stated.

“Pin Dream first, worry about getting wood, crafting, and whatnot later. We usually end up finding a village anyways, and if getting wood is impossible at this point, then all we have to do is find a village with a blacksmith and then kill Dream after he runs out of hunger. Speaking of him, where did he go?” Bad asked as they looked at the gorge and falling stone pillars, only to see Dream barely hanging onto one. The scream had disoriented Dream long enough to cause him to trip, and now he was holding on for dear life on a very unstable platform, with the toxic pit below him.

“Yes! Die Dream die!” Sapnap yelled as he and Bad stopped running to focus on seeing Dream struggling to get back up. George, who was right behind them, smiled as he saw their target slowly losing his grip.

“Yes yes yes yes! Sapnap! Throw a pebble at him or something!” George yelled, causing Sapnap to grin as the light-blue-shirted figure handed him some stones that were on the ground.

“One pebble coming right up!” Sapnap yelled as he pulled his arm back before throwing the pebble high into the sky. As it began to fall in an arc, it hit the platform Dream was hanging onto, the force and extra weight from the small stone being enough to cause the unstable platform to fall forward, bringing Dream down with it.

“YES!” The hunters yelled as they heard Dream’s desperate cries as he fell with the platform until he eventually disappeared.

“Welp. That was easy.” Sapnap said as George began to compliment on his throwing skills. Ant soon came up crawling towards them, his hand swollen from punching the tree.

“Ow… ow ow ow ow… Ow…” The anthropomorphic cat continued to let out painful sighs before completely collapsing onto his stomach. “I-I think my scream distracted him enough to fall towards his death right?” Ant asked hopefully, smiling when he saw the hunters nod at him. “Good. I-I’m going to sleep now.” The brown cat said before falling into a deep sleep. The hunters began to celebrate their quick victory, except for Bad, who felt something was off.

“Wait… why didn’t the game end already? Is there a way to read chat?” The demon-like figure asked, to which Sapnap and George responded with a shrug. “Then how do we know that Dream isn’t-”

Before Bad could finish his sentence, a massive pop sound shook the air as they saw a green-hooded figure being shot high into the air. Looking over the edge, they saw the remnants of an air bubble condense back into the toxic pit, which could only mean one thing.

“Dang it! Of course, he was lucky enough to land on one of those bubbles and get shot right back into the air!” Bad yelled out as he and the hunters looked back up into the air to try and find where Dream was. While they couldn’t see where their target was, they certainly could see the tips of some buildings nearby. “Wait, guys! There’s a village there! He’s going to go to that village! We have to get there first!” Bad yelled as he and the other two hunters picked themselves and ran towards the general direction of the buildings, leaving Ant alone to rest.

High in the air, the Speedrunner looked around its surroundings as the force that had propelled it upwards continued to push him higher and higher. Suddenly realizing that he’ll need to find a safe area to drop to or he’ll die of fall damage, Dream looked around and was surprised to see a village nearby. But tools and armor would be pointless if he died, and thus it was to his relief when he saw that the roof of the village was coated with hay. Taking his chances, Dream extended his body just when the propelling force below him was turned down, and soon he began to fall towards the ground. Barely gliding over the forests, fear overtook him as he was now above the town. Would it be enough to break his fall? Taking a deep breath, he prepared himself by positioning himself feet-first above a building, closing his eyes as he prepared for the possible shock he’ll receive due to the extreme pain he’ll go through.

The moment his feet touched the ceiling it immediately caved in, causing Dream to continue falling into the building. By sheer luck though, the building turned out to be where the town kept its wheat, and the green-hooded figure soon fell into the piles of hay. That didn’t mean that he was free of pain though. His legs suddenly felt numb as did the rest of his body. A wave of pain signals swept through his system, causing him to release a cry that was drastically reduced as his body soon went into shock. Barely pulling himself out of the piles of hay, he began to crawl towards the door. He was unaware of the fact that if he had been shot into the sky a second longer, his legs would’ve completely shattered, which would have resulted in his death. But just because he was spared of such fate didn’t mean that he was in a better position. Though his mind was now being clouded by the shock, Dream knew that he was in pain, tremendous amounts. If he was going to have any chance of surviving against the hunters, he would have to find something to beat them back.

Using a nearby hay bale to prop him up, Dream slowly opened the door, giving himself time to reposition himself so that he wouldn’t fall. Taking a look at his surroundings, Dream noticed several things. For starters, there was the shadow of a massive city hanging on a mountainside far in the distance. Next was a barn, which overlooked the town he was in by being positioned on a nearby hill. Both options seemed great to potentially go into, however they were also far away, which meant they were out of the question for the nearly crippled person that he was.

“Where can I go… where can I go?” Dream thought to himself as he looked around, only to find a massive castle made out of pure crystal, with a banner extending high into the sky. A crystal star was positioned upwards from the castle as well, and many of its non-crystal features were made out of gold or were coated with it at least. And it was very close, as the house that Dream crashed into just so happened to be the closest one to the castle. But even so, Dream knew that with his nearly crippled legs the journey might take forever. But he also knew that if he didn’t go now, the hunters might arrive first, and while they might not find him at first, they’ll definitely check the castle and all the potential loot inside.

“Better get in that castle and loot it before they do…” Dream thought to himself as he began to use the wall to slide himself closer to the castle. When the edge he was sliding against was finished, he took a deep breath before falling on all fours, slowly crawling himself towards the castle. It easily took 10 minutes to reach the door, but by the time he reached the gates, he was pleased with himself. A few steps more and he’ll be inside.

“Wait! I think I see Dream! And he looks pretty injured!” A voice yelled out. Dream spun around and to his horror, he saw three figures coming right at him. Even though they were pretty far away, he could tell that they were most likely Sapnap, George, and Bad. They were still hunting him, and they wanted to kill him. Limping away, Dream opened the door. Barely fitting inside, Dream slammed the door shut and locked, just when one of the hunters slammed themselves into the door.

“OW! My shoulder!” Bad yelled in pain, holding himself in pain.

“Don’t worry, he’s limping, he must be low on health. Let’s try to find an entrance to this place.” Sapnap said as he looked up to one of the nearby windows. “You think what I’m thinking George?” The fire-shirted person asked with a grin. George simply smiled.

“Let’s get in through that window!” The blue-shirted figure said as he, Sapnap, and Bad began to work together to try to reach and break the nearby window.

Meanwhile, Dream was slowly limping through the castle grounds, looking for anything that could be of use. Food, Weapons, Armor, just about anything could be useful, but the castle was much bigger on the inside than outside. Even after searching for various minutes, each one being another moment where the hunters could break-in, things didn’t seem to improve.

For a moment Dream thought about giving up. There were just no other options. He was at his limit, his entire body was aching from pain, and upon hearing the sound of glass cracking, he only knew he was delaying the inevitable.

“Just one more door… if this fails… then I’m screwed…” Dream thought as he limped towards another door. Its contents would decide his entire fate and whether or not he would survive. Closing his eyes, Dream pushed the door open just when he heard the glass shatter.

“Oh Dream~! We’re coming to get you~!” The sound of George’s taunts echoed through the castle, only to be muted the moment Dream closed the door behind him, his eyes still closed. Taking a deep breath, he opened them, only to have the most happiest shock in his life.

“YES! YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!” Dream cried out in pure happiness as he just examined what his eyes were seeing. It didn’t matter if the hunters heard him anymore, they were already screwed before they knew it. In front of him was an armor set made out of pure diamonds, along with various tools out of similar quality. Opening up various chests he found was tons of food, iron, diamonds, gold, and a few healing potions scattered around. The only logical answer as to why there was so much stuff here was that this was the armory and it specifically held all the loot in this castle. Immediately grabbing the chest plate, a familiar GUI appeared in front of him, with nine empty slots. The moment he slipped the chest plate on him, another GUI appeared, this time with his inventory slot, 2x2 crafting area, and his armor slots, one of them being occupied by the diamond chest plate. Pulling a potion from one of the chests, he was able to identify it as a Regeneration II potion, which he immediately drank. His health bar flicked for a moment before fading away, which kind of made sense given that he’s not supposed to normally know how much damage he received, the only indicator being the actual pain.

“Oh dear, Dream found some stuff, should we go in?” George asked from the other side of the door.

“Even if he got armor, it’ll be pointless considering he probably took a lot of fall damage. Let’s go get him!” Bad yelled as he slammed himself into the door, only to yelp in pain. “ACK! Now my other shoulder hurts!”

“Leave it to the professionals Bad,” Sapnap said as he cracked his knuckles and neck, before pulling his arm back. With a firm punch, the door came down, but so did their hopes as they saw Dream, clothed with a full set of diamond gear, looking perfectly healthy, and with a diamond sword in his grip.

“Oh guys~! Come out to play~!” Dream said with a soft but menacing voice. The hunters could take it and they immediately began to run away, jumping out of the window they broke into, not caring about the soft pain they felt upon falling onto the ground. Their top priority right now was to run away.

Past a long bridge over a small lake stood the gigantic building known as the School of Friendship. While today was the day off with the teachers being absent, that didn’t mean that it was empty. In front of the school grounds was a peculiar group of six students who were currently eating their lunch.

“So it’s been like a year I believe since we’ve quote on quote ‘graduated’ from The School of Friendship, am I right?” A blue griffon with yellow feather tips asked, laughing as he knew what he said was untrue.

“Well, Twilight did say that one semester wasn’t enough. Not that I’m complaining considering we’ll be with each other for a few more years.” A light green earth pony remarked, chuckling at the griffon’s rhetorical question.

“Even if we did graduate after saving Equestria from Cozy Glow, I bet we’d still stay together, just with more time being spent talking with each other rather than studying.” An orange female dragon with purple spikes said.

“Yonna agree. School of Friendship is very nice. Would not leave it nor Yona’s friends!” A brown yak with two pink bows said, stomping her feet on the ground.

“The School of Friendship will always be my favorite place! There are stairs! Straws! Stairs! Friends! Did I say stairs already?” A pink hippogriff asked, much to her friends’ amusement.

“Yes, you did Silverstream.” A cyan changeling said before pulling up a rather large book. “Anyways, who’s ready for the upcoming semester test. Gallus?”

“Sort of.” The griffon said, waving his claw around. “Honestly I find it a bit hilarious when you guys were rather surprised when I quote Chapter 12 from Twilight’s class all those years ago. Close second to that day was when we tried to skip class. Right Sandbar?” Gallus asked as he turned to the green pony.

“Yeah. I think when Ocellus turned into Rarity and did an impression of her was my highlight of the day.” Sandbar said as he pointed to the changeling, causing her to blush a bit from the compliment.

“Well, changelings are good at mimicking other creatures in terms of appearances, but it kind of gets harder if you don’t know how your target acts.” Ocellus noted before turning to the orange dragon. “How about you Smolder? Are you ready for the test?”

“Same level of preparedness as Gallus I guess,” Smolder said, stretching her wings from time to time. “How about you two?” The dragon asked Yona and Silverstream.

“Yona always prepared to smash the test!”

“Same level as Yona I guess!” The hippogriff squealed in delight. “So what do you want to do?” Silverstream asked in excitement.

“I guess we could go to Sugarcube Corner to get some cupcakes.” Gallus offered. “How does that sound?”

“Nice!”

“Great!”

“Yona likes cupcakes!”

“Yay! Cupcakes!”

“Alright!” The other five said. There was no denying that the sweets in that pastry were one of the best. While they wouldn’t deny that their food from their cultures was good, nothing could beat the food served in that store.

“Welp it’s a deal! Cupcakes here we come!” Gallus exclaimed as the six students began to walk towards the main center of Ponyville, only to hear some disturbing sounds of laughter, screams, and things clanging against each other. “Uh… what’s that noise?” The griffon asked. The rest simply shrugged as they hid in the corner of a nearby house and peered around it.

“Oh come here, guys!”

To the six student’s shock, they saw a green-hooded figure with diamond armor running through the streets with a diamond sword in hand. They could also three see figures ahead of the chaser who were screaming and running in fear and terror.

“Please… Please! Leave us alone!” One of the figures yelled as he tripped over a crate, destroying it and spilling its contents. Apples scattered around the floor, but it didn’t deter the diamond-geared maniac from chasing them.

An orange suddenly flew through the skies and hit the armored figure straight in the face, causing him to turn around while putting up a mask, which deflected the second incoming orange.

“You got nowhere to run~!” The masked figure said with a malicious voice, causing a black-hooded person to drop the third orange he held and turn away into a sprint. Seeing that they were getting out of their view, the Student Six moved to the corner of a different house to see what was occurring.

“Why are we doing nothing guys? Shouldn’t we, IDK, report this to the princess?” Sandbar asked, to which Smoulder shrugged.

“This is kind of normal for me, considering how chaotic things are in the Dragon Lands. Though I agree that something needs to be done.” The dragon replied before turning to Silverstream, Ocellus, and Yona. “You three can go ahead to warn the professors. Me and Gallus can stay behind. We’ve seen these types of events frequently in our lands. Right Gallus?”

“Yep. Griffonstone isn’t the best place around, and you usually see many street fights occur there. This is normal to me, even though I do admit this is kind of disturbing. But we have to stay to know what’s going to happen here and where that masked figure is going. If he’s a threat we’ll likely need to know his positioning once he… deals with those three… so we’ll have to stay.” Gallus said, before turning to Sandbar. “Your choice if you want to stay or not.”

“I… I think I’ll be staying here in case he decides to attack you guys. Even though you two are already strong by yourself, your attacks are based on slashes, which I doubt would work effectively against an armored person. Yona would’ve been the best in the case of brute force, but…” Sandbar turned around only to see that Yona, Silverstream, and Ocellus had already gone to report to the authorities. “... well she already left, and I wouldn’t want to put her in danger, so I guess I will have to do.” The earth pony said.

“Well, just warning you that things might become bloody soon,” Gallus said as he, Smoulder, and Sandbar proceeded to move to a different house to spy on what was occurring.

“You got nowhere to hide!” The green-hooded figure yelled as he slashed his sword, slicing one of the figure’s arms and causing it to bleed. With pain being the only thing on its mind, the figure yelped as he soon fell onto the ground, crying in pain.

“I think you’ll have to look away, Sandbar,” Smolder said, no longer able to hold up a poker face. Now she had become extremely worried, and the sight only filled her with guilt. “I think we should’ve gone ahead to save them… but I think this… thing… far exceeds our capabilities… perhaps all of us staying together would’ve been the best choice.”

“Yeah, and blast this thing with the Elements of Harmony. But even if we could theoretically take him on ourselves, I don’t think we’d make a dent in his armor.” Gallus said while making a fist with his claw. They should’ve just all stayed around, but he also didn’t want to have his other friends see what he'd seen so many times. It just felt wrong to him, but now it seemed it was going to be a terrible mistake. He turned around and saw Sandbar looking extremely nervous, looking away from the scene. “Cover your ears to bud. Cause you’ll be hearing-”

Before the blue griffon could even finish his sentence, they heard an air-shattering scream, which shook everyone to their core as they heard the pain and agony transferred within it. Smoulder and Gallus looked aghast as they saw that the masked figure had done it. A sword was embedded deep into his prey, and out of the corner of his mask, the two could see a sickening grin as the armored figure began to twist the sword inside. By the time his other two prey arrived in the fallen one’s defense, they could see that he was already dead.

“He’s dead!” One of them panicked out loud, before gasping in fear, as he saw an arrow pointed straight towards him. “Uhm… look here! We can talk this out-” He never got a chance to finish as an arrow was suddenly embedded into his chest, killing him on the spot and causing his corpse to fall backward.

“So are you.” The masked person said, looking at the final standing figure. A tense moment passed, before the last one suddenly clutched his chest, which had been sliced, blood already leaking out. A gust of wind suddenly formed, and it was clear that the armored person had swiftly struck the last target so fast that it went unperceived until it was too late. The final figure began to trip backward, before falling onto the ground, and in an instant, their bodies suddenly turned into dust.

“Oh… my…” The two students couldn’t believe their eyes. He had… done it… he had killed them in cold blood… No… they needed to run! If he had no mercy on these three and easily struck them down, what would occur if he spotted the-

Their sudden movement to back away from the hooded figure suddenly caused him to spin around, sword in hand and barely poking Gallus’s neck. The griffon’s eyes teared up from the pressure of the sword on his neck. Would this be it? Would this be the way he’ll go?

“GET AWAY FROM HIM!”

The armored figure suddenly began to trip backward when Sandbar, out of sheer desperation and anger from seeing Gallus being threatened, kicked the armored figure straight in the stomach, and while the armor protected him, his kick still caused a tremendous amount of knockback. Seeing an opportunity, Smoulder flew up to the figure and shot out flame after flame of fireballs from her mouth, many of them missing but still causing the figure to back away. Eventually, though, their energy was rapidly exhausted, causing them to pant and become tired. Would this be their final moments?

The sound of grass being disturbed got closer, and they nearly felt a gaze looking down at them. They all closed their eyes. If they were to go, well, at least they’ll be going together. Then suddenly there was nothing. They heard nothing. They felt nothing. They saw nothing. Somehow, they knew that they were still alive, as they were still breathing, and their hearts still pounding. But the only thing that they began to hear, was this:

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