An Otherworldly Adventure

Chapters

Prologue: Events Being Unfolded
Chapter 1: The Adventure of Weirdness Begins
Chapter 2: Discoveries and Surprises
Chapter 3: Recollection
Chapter 4: Minimal Answers Given But Safety Assured
Chapter 5: Secrets of the Past Revealed Pt. 1
Chapter 6: Lyra's Off to Canterlot
Chapter 7: Lyra Finally Meet's Her First Human
Chapter 8: Secrets of the Past Revealed Pt. 2
Chapter 9: the Challenges Ahead
Chapter 10: A Day of Discovery
Chapter 11: Plans Evolving & Changing

Prologue: Events Being Unfolded

Pone-Hedge, this ancient site is shrouded in mystery. No pony, or any creature in general know who, or what built it, or why it’s one of the most centralized points of Equestria with the highest magical fluxes. Many of scholars and archaeologists have tried to study the site, looking for anything that could tell them what Pone-Hedge is, from studying the simple stone structures, to examining the very few ancient written Ponish text scattered about, none of them still know next to nothing about the strange, deserted site. But there is one thing that the few scholars have noticed when studying Pone-Hedge, and that it is where powerful spells are performed, spells that are on par with alicorns and spirits like Discord. It is even said that this ancient site of power is where Starswirl the Beareded, and the other pillars of Light made their final stand against the Pony of Shadows, trapping him within the realm of Limbo. And it is at this site that something strange is happening.

The six pillars of rocks that circle around the central point of the of Pone-Hedge were crackling with electricity, arcing, and crackling with power as winds started to pick up, bellowing across the land as clouds start to form around the general location of the ancient monument.

Then from said forming clouds bolts of lightning came crashing down into each pillar, causing the already forming electricity to grow more intensely, and arcing all over the place. As the winds and thunder continued to rage on, causing trees, rocks, and everything around Pone-Hedge to shift and wobble, a ball of pure electrical energy was forming on the central rock bed of Pone-Hedge and started abording the arcing electricity from the six surrounding pillars. After the orb has absorbed enough lightning from the pillars, it started to glow and shine with an intense light, then after a very brief moment of silence the orb erupted in a resounding BOOM that echoed across the land. The boom explosion was so forceful that the very ground of Pone-Hedge, and its surrounding landscaped shuttered under the might of the explosive force, followed by the orb scattering bolts of energy across the ancient site, singeing the land and any foliage around it.

But the explosion not only released a thundering roar, or arcing bolts of static furry, but several dozens of smaller balls of light also emerged from the sphere. Scattering in all directions, screaming as they whizz through the skies, causing any who saw them to look upon them with wonder, awe, and trepidation.

After the shattering of the energy orb, and the scattering of the small balls of light, the storm residing above Pone-Hedge started to slowly subside, and the land starts returning to its once peaceful, and quite state. But the pillars of Pone-Hedge continues to arc with electricity, but that wasn’t all that there was to the site, now there was something else in the midst of the ancient structure. Laying on the flat stony surface center piece, body laying limp as the dying winds waft over the comatose creature, it’s clothes and the five objects scattered around it crackling with energy. The body remains limb and unresponsive the worlds sensations, even as the nights cold breeze continues to waft over it.

But after five minutes of just lying there, the body finally starts to show signs of movement, in the form of the figures right hand twitching, the fingers jittering before calming uncurling. and an exhausted groan leaves its mouth, along with a puff of heated air meeting the cold atmosphere.

~~Canterlot~~

In the city of Canterlot, the capital of the nation of Equestria, ponies were enjoying the night by means of parties or late night get togethers watched as several glowing yellow orbs just streak across the sky, leaving behind faint sparks of lightning. Up in the castle of Canterlot Luna and her sister, Celestia who was about to head off to bed, also witnessed the unusual sight of the orbs of light soaring through the air. And quite frankly, neither sister knew what these lights entail. But they were both hoping that whatever they were they did not signify another impeding threat, the ponies of Equestria were still recovering from their ordeal with Discords return, which was thankfully put to an end before too much damage could’ve been to the nation.

“Do you suppose this could be a latent effect from Discord’s magic?” Luna asked as she and Celestia continued to watch the flying spheres.

“I’m not sure Luna, with Discord you can never know what he’ll do, or leave behind.” Celestia said as she turned to look at her sister.

“But when Twilight and her friends re-sealed him, the Elements of Harmony should’ve undone everything that Discord has done to Equestria.”

The sisters conversation was halted when they both heard screams coming from the city below them, and the two alicorns turned to face where the screams were generally coming from, they both saw something glowed intensely in the city. Before it flickered and died out. Both curious and worried for their subjects, both sisters lept from the balcony they were on, and flew down to where the light came from, and when they reached their destination, the sisters found a small crowd of ponies gathered around what looks like a small crater. Touching down the two alicorns approached the small hole in the street, making the crowd separate and allowing the two sisters trot pass them, and when they reached the crater they found something in it.

“What is that?” Luna said as Celestia cautiously picks the item up with her magic.

“It looks like some kind of, dragon-shaped kite?” the elder sister remarked as she slowly turns the kite around in the air, looking it all over and examining it.

“It doesn’t appear to be dangerous, but—” the white alicorn narrowed her eyes slightly as she looked more intently at the kite.

“It has some kind of magical energy flowing through it.” the princess then turned to face the crowd as she gives them all a curious look.

“Did any pony see where these came from? “ one of the ponies, a cream colored unicorn with a rosy mane and tail, stepped forth before speaking.

“It came from the sky your majesty; it was one of those flying orbs before it came soaring down to the street.” The unicorn said as she articulated the events that occurred when the kite came down to Canterlot.

Just then another glowing orb came flying over Canterlot, a bit lower than the others, and this one was on a crash course with the castle. A resounding ‘BOOM’ echoed throughout the city when the orb crashed, scarring the ponies in the street, even the princesses were startled by the crash. but both alicorns were able to get a handle on the situation, recovering from their own shock of the event, before addressing their subjects.

“Everypony calm yourselves!” Luna bellowed as flared her wings, getting every ponies attention almost immediately upon her announcement.

“Now fret not, your princesses will investigate this matter, but for the time being return to your homes to avoid any injuries.”

The ponies did as the night princess said, rushing out of the streets and into any nearby buildings. With the cities occupants heading into the buildings for shelter, Celestia and Luna took to the air and flew back to the castle. When the two reached the structure they could see the royal guards scrambling around, moving the rubble that feel from the large hole made in the castle wall, and pegasi scanning the hole to make sure no more of it will fall. Flying through the opening the pair found themselves in Bluebloods room, with the bed, rug, and some of the decorations of the room scattered about, or just out right ruined. Same with the door that has a hole in it as well, and the left one was hanging on by one of its hinges. It’s a good thing that Blueblood was in Manehatten, otherwise the princesses, heck, all of Canterlot would be victims of the spoiled prince’s whining for days till his room was ‘perfect’ again.

Trotting pass the destroyed doors of the pampered prince’s room, the princesses followed the trail of shattered vases, and knocked over podiums until the reach the end of the hallway. Where the two of them found some lodged into the wall, with a small group of maids, butlers, and guards looking up at the object. Which looked like a coiling black serpent of some kind. Again with her magic, Celestia took hold of the object and tried to remove it from the wall, although it was certainly pretty stuck in the wall, but with a little effort the solar princess was able to dislodged it. once the bauble was free both princesses examined it, and they both noticed that it has the same magical energies coursing through it. however there was, something else flowing through it, they couldn’t exactly describe it, but they knew that something about this object was different from the dragon kite.

“Just where in the world did these things came from?” Luna asked as she and her sister left the group of castle staff and guards, who were cleaning up the debris around the crater in the wall, and were trotting down a hallway.

“Your guess is as good as mine Luna.” Celestia replied as the two rounded a corner. “But for the time being we should store these in the treasury, and send out search parties for where the other orbs flew off to.”

“Agreed. Until we know what these things are, it’s best to keep them in a secure place until we can uncover what they are.”

Celestia silently nodded as the sisters continued on their way to the treasury. Several minutes later and two alicorns had arrived at their destination, a set of large iron doors, each with a special lock that bares either sisters cutie mark. Celestia and Luna then started to pour just a little bit of their magic into each lock, Celestia unlocking the left one, while Luna unlocks the right one.

After the hefty locks were undone, the doors to the treasury slowly creaked open, a testament to how rarely they open and are upkept by the staff. the doors opened just enough for the alicorns to slip right through them, entering the large chamber filled with bags, piles, chests and crates of bits and other valuables. But the princesses didn’t linger to long within the treasury, as they just cleared a single table near the back of the vault of the bags of bits, before placing the two objects they were carrying on it. leaving and closing the doors to the treasury, the sisters started to look around the castle for the captain of the guard, and after a few minutes they found the stallion checking up on the hole in Bluebloods room.

“There you are Captain Shining Armor.” Celestia said as she, and Luna, approached the stallion. As well as the pink alicorn standing by his side. “And Cadence, this is a rare sight to see you up this late.”

“Kind of hard to go back to sleep after something busted through the castle wall, and causing the castle to shake slightly.” The smaller pink mare retorted to the elder alicorn.

“Speaking of which, did you find what caused this?” Cadence asked as she gestured to hole, and the mess made in the room with her wings.

“Yes, and that is why we sought out Captain Shining Armor.” Luna said as she looked at the stallion, who stood at attention after being addressed.

“How may I be of service princesses?” the stallion asked as he looked at the two rulers.

“We need you to assemble a team to try and track down those spheres of light, and if you discover any strange artifact looking objects bring them to the castle so that we can store them in the treasury vault.” The stallion saluted to the royal sisters before leaving the three alicorns in the room.

“So aunty what do you think those lights were?” Cadence asked as she, and her two aunts, left Bluebloods room to get the out of the castles staff, and guards way of repairing the wall. And cleaning up the room.

“We don’t know, but once the sun rises tomorrow we will launch into a more, thorough investigation.” Celestia said as she raises a hoof to cover her mouth, as a yawn escapes her.

Giving her sister and niece a farewell Celestia bid her fellow alicorns a goodnight, before trotting down a separate hallway that leads to her room. Cadence also bid Luna a goodnight as a tired yawn escapes her own mouth. With her sister and niece heading off to bed, Luna made her way to the throne room, where a bunch of nobles and other ponies were standing in front of the door, and as soon as they saw her they immediately hounded Luna. Which the midnight alicorn was not at all pleased with, but such is the life of a princess after all.

~~Ponyville~~

Ponyville has certainly been put through the ringer this year, what with Nightmare Moon returning, followed by her being reformed back into the princess of the night, and then a month after that the spirit of chaos makes a return. And put not only the town, but all of Equestria through the loop. It was complete and udder night mare for the poor towns ponies. But now the spirit is re-sealed in his stone prison where he belongs, and it’s all thanks to Twilight Sparkle, and her band of friends. once Discord was dealt with the whole town had a big party, curtesy of Pinkie Pie, and celebrated for such a victory over the whimsical yet disturbed spirit. However when night fell, and ponies were about to head home and rest up for tomorrow, the ponies saw something incredible.

Flying through the sky from the far east, ponies could see several dozen of glowing yellow orbs streak across the sky, their bright yellow coloring contrasting against the night sky. while the towns pony were all just marveling at this sight of soaring yellow orbs, Twilight Sparkle and her circle of friends were more worried, and concerned as they continued to watch the strange light show that is happening.

“Oh! Now that is one pretty light show!” Pinkie babbled as she was marveling at the sight more so than her friends, or the rest of the towns ponies.

“Yeah it’s pretty, but this doesn’t seem to be a good thing.” Applejack responded to Pinkie’s fascination with the lights, before turning to look at her lavender unicorn friend. “Do you think this is something that Discord came up with?”

“No way. We beaten him and the elements changed everything back.” Rainbow Dash interrupted as she hovered by her friends.

“Well that’s what should’ve happen, but I’m not sure if this is due to Discord’s shenanigans.” Twilight said as she kept looking at the lights, especially the once that were soaring over Canterlot, and even spotting two crashing into the capital.

“I just hope it is just a harmless light show, the last thing we need is that horrid Discord rearing his head up again, and causing more trouble.” Rarity bemoaned as she looked at her friend with a worried look.

“Wait a minute.” Fluttershy said as she pointed at the sky, getting all of her friends attention. “Something seems different with that light, there!”

In the midst of their sky watching, both the heroines of the day and the towns ponies saw what the butterscotch pegasus was gesturing towards, and that is one of the orbs of light making its down to the town itself. Straight towards the crowd of ponies! Screams of panic ensued as ponies ran around, and ducking into cover, same goes for Twilight and her friends as all six of them ducked into the nearest building with seven other ponies. A few seconds later and everypony heard a ‘KA-BOOM’ wrack the air, while the ground beneath their hooves rumbled slightly, although Pinkie’s jiggling around like jelly would say otherwise. Once the shaking had stopped, and the ponies staying inside for a few more minutes incase another ball of light came crashing into town, the ponies left the safety of their hiding holes and slowly crept their way to the new crater in middle of the square.

“What in the world is that?” Applejack asked as she, her friends, and the few brave towns ponies who left their hiding places, looked at the small object in the center of the crater.

Twilight carefully reached out with her magic, and plucked the object from its spot on the ground. the item now being suspended in the air looked like a statuette of an eagle, made out of what looks to be bronze, perched on a small pedestal. And despite the rough, and quite forceful impact of its crash, the statuette looked to be in perfect condition, with not a dent nor crack to be found. Not even a spec of dirt was on it.

“Wh-what do you think it is?” Fluttershy asked nervously, as the avian raptor gave the mare, and the other ponies, a rather unnerving feeling.

“I’m not sure, but if this is what came from that orb of light…” Twilight said as she looked skyward, and saw that there were no more soaring orbs of light in the night sky. “Then there might be more of these.”

“But what are they?” Rainbow asked as she poked the statuette, which Twilight pulled it away from the pegasus before something happened.

“I don’t know, we’ll just have to wait until tomorrow when Celestia is awake to see if she knows.”

With that Twilight started to make her way to the Golden Oaks library, while the other ponies dispersed and went home for the night, some still talking about what had just happened. When the unicorn made it to her home, she climbed the stairs up to the living quarters where she could hear a familiar snoring sound, which brought a small smile to her muzzle. and when she made it up to her room, Twilight indeed found Spike fully passed out in his basket, snoring, and twitching away as he muttered something about Rarity in his dream. Placing the statuette on her dresser Twilight covered her mouth as a yawn escaped her as he laid down on her bed, but before she went to sleep she looked out her bedroom window and up to the sky.

“I really do hope this isn’t another sign of trouble.” The unicorn then turned away from looking at the window, and start to make herself comfortable under blanket. But while she started to drift off to sleep, the object she brought home with her pulsated with a shadowy mist, before settling down to its normal blank state.

Chapter 1: The Adventure of Weirdness Begins

The sound of a chorus of birds resounded around the site of Pone-Hedge, accompanied by the rustling of leaves and grasses from the foliage around the ancient site. And at its center, the figure that appeared during the previous night, due to a wonderous display of raw magic and electrical display, was still passed out and laying on the stone surface of the central platform. But after a few minutes have gone by, and a few birds have landed on the figure, it started to sluggishly start to move around. Causing the birds roosting on it to fly away. The figure then started to left itself up from its prone state, but it only managed to get up to a sitting position, revealing the figures very tired expression. In fact, the figure looked like he was having the worst hang over ever, after a night of drinking and partying.

“What the hell just happened?” the figure slurred as he sounded not fully awake. The figure tried to lift himself up to his feet, but only ending up falling back onto his butt, the hard surface sending a small jolt of pain to shoot up his spine.

“Ah damn!” the figure gargled as he rubbed his butt, and the base of his back.

“Hey, Charlotte, can you help me up, I think, I think my legs are fully asleep.” however there was no response to the young man’s request, well, at the one he was expecting. What he got instead was the rustling with leaves, and the sound of birds chirping.

After not getting the response from the person he was otherwise thinking off, the figure finally opened his fully and the widen with surprise and shock at what he saw. The young man started to swerve his body around, his head spinning and twisting around to get a better look of the area around him, and to say that he was visibly startled by what he saw would be a great understanding. He even passed out from the shock due to his still exhausted and tired state, that he fell back over onto his bed and just, laid there. Around twenty to twenty four minutes go by, and the young man was once again awake, only this time he wasn’t as tired and exhausted as he was before. Once he was more stable and not as drowsy, the young man gave his surroundings another once over, examining the site in its entirety while also trying to wrap his mind around what he was seeing, which was proving to be more difficult than expected.

“Okay…seriously…what in the hell is going on here?!” the young man muttered under his breath as he tries to stand, his legs were still wobbly, but he was able to stand up and make his way over to one of the pillars. Sitting down on the leveled round stone rock pile part of the column.

“How did I go from being in my friend’s house…to being stranded in the middle of freaking nowhere?” that’s when the young man suddenly had a thought cross his mind. “Wait a minute.” He then jumped to his feet, nearly tripping, but managed to stand up straight.

“Charlotte, Kevin, are you guys here! Is this some kind of joke your trying to pull on me!” the young man shouted as loud as he could, his voice echoing but getting no response.

“Fine you got me. Haha, you got old Adam good this time guys. Now come on out, and lets go home.” the young man waited for his two friends to show up, and after a minute or two of waiting, his annoyance started to show.

“Alright fine if you won’t come out—” he then reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone.

“Then I’ll just have to flush you—what the?!” Adam’s rantings were cut-off when he noted that his phone wasn’t getting a connection.

“No connection. How’s that possible this thing should at least have one bar. Maybe if I move around, and try to get a signal.” So Adam started to walk around and try to get a signal, except that little venture was cut short when he tripped on something, causing him to fall flat on his face. and cause his phone to bounce about a few times.

“Son of a bitch! The heck did I trip over?” the young man grumbled to himself as he rubbed his face, and when he looked to see what it was he tripped over he once again looked shocked, and baffled.

Silently reaching over to the object the young man un-tangled the rope around his foot, before bringing the object to his face. the object was a diamond-shaped pendent, with some small crescent moons on the sides and bottom, with a fairly big ruby in its center. The back of the pendent was smooth and uninteresting, as it had no other features. Turning it back to the front Adam tapped the ruby with a finger, testing out to see if the ruby was real or not, and from the feel of it he just knew that it wasn’t plastic. It felt like an actual mineral based object. After testing to see if the ruby was real, Adam just continued to look at the pendent with a scrutinizing stare, wandering why this particular pendent was even here in the first place.

“There’s no way this is actually what I think it is.” The adolescent said as he just looked at the pendent. And yet, something in the back of his, a childish glee, egged him on to try something. Outstretching his right arm, and pointing the side of the pendent with the ruby on it up towards the sky.

“I can’t believe I’m actually going to do this.” Adam muttered before looking up to the sky.

“Eye of Dashi!” The moment that Adam said those three words, a volley of lightning came shooting out of the pendent, their reverberating shrills wracking the air and scaring not only Adam but the animals around the site. Only a second of firing lightning into the air, Adam drops the pendent causing it to clatter against the ground, while one last bolt of lightning fires off.

“HOLY SHIT! I-It—it’s fucking real!” Adam exclaimed as just stared at the pendent but then slowly reaching down to pick it back up. with the pendent back in his hand, and giving it another once over then aiming it back up to the sky.

“Eye of Dashi?”

Like before another barrage of lightning bolts shrilled from the ruby in the pendent, wracking the air once more. And this continue on for a few more seconds before the bolts of electricity tapered off. Adam repeated firing barrages of lighting, testing the pendent out. but on the fifth time he thought about keeping the barrage going on for about a minute, see if he can keep the lightning bolts flying for more than just a few seconds. And surprisingly it worked. Several minutes go by of Adam just firing off lightning, and each consecutive usage Adam seemed to be able to gauge how much lightning he fires, but also be able stop the barrage at any point, all by focusing hard on the action.

Finally after the twelve use of the pendent Adam stopped his lightning discharges, and just marveled in silence that something from his childhood was right there, in his hand, and functioned as it’s supposed to be. Although, his state of wonder didn’t last too long, as a wave of concern then washed over him. the fact that he’s waken up in the middle of nowhere, and has an item from a TV show from his child, that works, and he has no recollection on how he found himself in this situation. He was starting to feel incredibly worried, especially the fact that what has happened to him seemed virtually impossible. But, it is happening to him, even if his mind is telling him that it’s not possible. Adam has truly become a victim of—

“Did I seriously just get isakied into the Xiaolin Showdown universe!” Adam all but blurted as he sat down on the center rock platform, placing the pendent beside him as he flops down onto his back.

“It is, isn’t? I somehow got isakied…well this is a load bullshit if ever there was!” Adam proclaimed as he shot back up.

“The last thing I need to be is stuck in a TV show from when I was ten years old! I gotta find a way back to Earth, and soon! I don’t want to go home and find out that my apartment gets sold, and my stuff gets dumped into the trash, and I get fired from my work, all because I disappeared from the face of the Earth!”

Adam then stood up from the platform as he crosses his arms, and starts drumming his fingers against his arms, while thinking how to handle this situation he finds himself in.

“But where do I even start? I don’t even know where the hell I am, and since I have no reception I can’t look up where I am, and try to find out where the Temple is.” That’s when another thought came to the young man.

“Actually, how do I even explain this! I can’t just waltz up to the Temple and the gang, and go: Hey guys, how’s it going. Now I know you don’t know me, but I have a problem that needs fixing, and it’s that I’m from a different version of Earth kind.”

Adam then crouches down as he claps his hands against his head, trying to figure out what his next move should be, how he should go about this situation, and try and figure out how to get the people he’s thinking to believe him. and even help him find a way home, all within a timely manner, before things in his real life get screwed over. He continued to try and think of multiple, and plausible ways of how to go about this little, adventure of his. But nothing was forth coming, and whatever idea he did come up with, just didn’t seem feasible. Or even doable as he has limited resources he can draw on at the moment. Sighing in defeat for the time being, Adam drops and dangles his arms on his knees as he remains in a crouched pose.

“Well one thing is for certain, I won’t get anywhere from just staying put. I gotta go find someplace and find help. But first…”

The young man glanced around and noticed that it wasn’t just the Eye of Dashi cluttering the site, but a few other objects he remembers, as well as his backpack. Standing back up Adam went around and gathered up the other three items scattered about, his backpack, and a familiar looking scroll and a belt harness that seem to have a satchel, and strap, to hold the items he just gathered up. after gathering up the other shen gong wu, Adam couldn’t help himself in testing them out, again out of childish glee and excitement.

The Denshi Bunny was probably the most difficult one to use, as it turned Adam into a surge of pure electrical energy. And this state was rather hard to control, as he was crashing into everything within the ancient site, but once he was back to normal he had a strange sense of vertigo that coursed throughout his body. After the sense of vertigo ended, Adam tested out the next shen gong wu which was the Thorn of Thunderbolt, and it was rather easy. It was basically a wand that he just pointed and shoot, and fired pulsing waves of thunderous energy, but it wasn’t just blasts of concussive thunderous energy, but the wand was able to send out slicing arc pulses of the same energy. Or just a standard beam. The last shen gong wu, the Shard of Lightning, was also fairly easy, but seeing the world developed a red tint and move around at light speed for a brief moment was a little weird. But it was not too difficult.

“So not only do I have the actual Eye of Dashi, but I also have the real Thorn of Thunderbolt, Shard of Lightning, and the Denshi Bunny, along with the scroll of the Shen Gong Wu.” Adam noted as he strapped the belt harness to his waist, and place two of the shen gong wu into the harnesses straps. And even place the rabbit shen gong wu onto the latch of the harness.

“I better stash this in my pack.” Adam muttered as he unzips his backpack, and stuff the scroll into it. luckily, and suspiciously, it was empty so there wasn’t much to move around. With the scroll now packed, and the backpack slung across his back, Adam then placed the Eye of Dashi around his neck.

“Alright. Now, time to go and explore the unknown.” Adam rubbed the back of his neck as he then muttered something else under his breath.

“This is going to be a real pain in the ass, I just know it.”

With that Adam ventured out into the world he found himself in, setting off on a journey that could be either quite an amazing tale, or just a crazy cross-dimensional trip that will be more of a nuisance than anything else. One thing is for certain, the young man was quite happy that he has some of his favorite shen gong wu from his child hood. But even with that childish glee swelling up just a little bit, Adam was still unsure on about this whole situation, and hopes that once this is all over nothing else on this magnitude will ever happen to him.

“I really do hope that I have no other surprises in store for me, there’s only so much craziness that I can handle.”

Chapter 2: Discoveries and Surprises

It’s been a few days since that strange night of the flying orbs of light, and since then, Twilight has found no information about the strange statuette that crashed down in Ponyville. the unicorn has looked through every book in the Golden Oaks library that references artifacts, she was hoping that the statuette was some kind of lost trinket, or misplaced item of ancient civilizations. But there was nothing, none of the twenty three books that she looked through had nothing about the bird statue.

She even visited the main library in Canterlot to see if any of the books there had anything referred about the statue, but not only did she not find any inform she was looking for, she also found out that two of the orbs from that night also crashed into Canterlot. one in the city, and one at the castle. After learning about this Twilight headed for the castle to see what has happened, and if there was any other strange artifacts found. And this is where we find the studious unicorn today. At the castle, and in the castle treasury vault with both princess Celestia and Luna, looking at the two artifacts that were discovered in the capital. As well as the latest one that was discovered by the search team sent out find more artifacts, even if it was by sheer luck of the guards stumbling onto it, finding being used by a farmer and his wife as a scarecrows hat.

“—so not even you two know anything about these artifacts, or where they came from?” Twilight said to the pair of princesses after examining the bizarrely shaped helmet, and placing it on the table with the other two, and the one that Twilight brought.

“Correct Twilight Sparkle. Both my sister and I have looked for anything in the archive that references these artifacts, or the phenomenon that occurred a few days ago. But we couldn’t find anything.” Luna explained to the small unicorn.

“The only thing we are sure of is that these items have magic flowing within them, but I cannot tell exactly what type of magic they have.” Celestia says as she examines the bird statuette that Twilight brought, her eyes narrowing as she stares into the birds eyes.

“So we have no information on what these are, or even where they come from.” Twilight says mostly to herself, but received a nod from both sisters regardless.

“We’ve tried to locate the point of origin of where the spheres came from, but we couldn’t even do that.” Twilight gave Celestia a surprised look as the alicorn placed the statue down.

“We assume that whatever caused the strange event quickly vanished, or dissipated after it happened. Leaving us no trace to track down.”

“…do you think that this has something to do with Discord?” both princesses stood in silence as they both developed a thoughtful expression.

“We’re not sure, but there is a distinctive possibility, after all, Discord’s magic is hard if not impossible to predict.” Celestia says as she makes her way to the treasuries entrance, followed by her sister and student.

“But shouldn’t the Elements of Harmony reverse, or simply cancel out Discord’s magic?” Twilight asked her teacher as the trio of mares started to walk down the hallway, while the vault door to the treasury starts to close behind them, closing with a deep sounding thud.

“Yes, but like I said Discord’s magic in unpredictable.” Celestia retorted to her student’s question. “But for the time being we’ll just assume that this is un-related to Discord, and that it’s something else entirely.”

As the three ponies were trotting down the hallway, they continued to talk amongst themselves, mostly trying to figure out where these artifacts could’ve come from, and if they are a danger to Equestria. When the trio made their way into the main section of the castle that gets a lot of hoof traffic, from visiting delegates, nobles, guards, and other castle staff, they all noticed that Shining Armor was talking with princess Cadence. While a few guards were trotting up to Celestia, Luna and Twilight, with the one unicorn of the group holding something in his magic. and as the stallion got closer to the trio, they got a good look at what he was carrying, and it looked like staff with a wooden monkey on its head.

“Is this another artifact Lieutenant Stargaze?” Celestia asked as the group of guards stood before the two princesses and Twilight.

“Yes ma’am. We found it in a gift shop of all places, apparently the owners founding in the towns local windmill…that got busted down when it crashed into it.” the stallion said as he presented the staff to the alicorns.

“Take it to the treasury and store it with the others.”

The stallion saluted before trotting off to the treasury, while the rest of the group trotted past the princesses and Twilight to head to who knows where. Probably towards the barracks, or the mess hall. As the guards trotted off to their desired destinations, and the one unicorn heading towards the treasury, Twilight and the two princesses made their way over to where Shining Armor and Cadence were standing. And as they got closer the trio were able to catch a little discussion being held between the two, and from the sound of it they were trying to reach an agreement on something. But to what neither of the three mares knew.

“Hello there, Shining Armor and Cadence, how are you two doing today?” Twilight asked as she and the two alicorns reached the pair.

“We were just discussing a few things about, something.” Cadence giggled as she gives Shining Armor a sideways glance. The other two alicorns gave each other a knowing look as they tried to hide their own giggling, while Twilight only gave the four ponies a confused look.

A few more minutes go by as the five ponies talked with each other, mostly in where Shining Armor and his search team should go and look for more of the artifacts, Twilight eventually bid her brother and the three alicorns a farewell as she left the castle. But as the unicorn left the castle, she didn’t head straight for the train station, instead Twilight decided to visit some of her old favorite places. First stop was Donut Joe’s, the best place in all of Equestria to get the best donuts, at least that’s what Twilight believes. Pinkie and the cakes may be able to make a good batch of donuts, but no pony makes them as good as Joe. After grabbing two bags worth of donuts, the unicorn made a quick stop to the cities library, again, to check out books instead of just perusing through them for information about the artifacts.

Once the mare has her bags of donuts, and saddlebags—which she conjured up—full of books, she made one last stop in her home town. And that was her family home. It’s actually been a good four years since Twilight has been home, let alone see her parents. Ever since she became princess Celestia’s protégé the only member of her family that she has frequent contact with was her brother, she rarely got to see her mom and dad as her studies took all of her time, although it wasn’t just because of the books and studies that prevented the mare from seeing her parents. Since Twilight was a protégé to a princess, she instilled in herself a sense of duty to uphold herself to a standard befitting a princesses student. In which she takes her studies serious, and never allowed herself to, goof off, which included not mingling or visiting other ponies.

But now Twilight has an opportunity to make up for lost times, and hope that her parents aren’t to disheartened in her for not visiting, or not staying in contact.

~~Ponyville~~

Back in Ponyville Spike was having a nice quite day at the library, spending a peaceful afternoon laying in his basket, a bowl of gems and cookies beside him, and a stack of comics on the other side. With one said comic open in his claws. It was rare for the little dragon to have such a day like this, and while he does like to be of assistance to Twilight, and help her whenever she needed it, Spike does admit that his sister-figure/caretaker can be a little bit of a slave driver. Having him clean the library, when it wasn’t even dirty. Insist on re-organizing the library’s inventory every. Other. day! Seriously, the things that Twilight asks, or even makes Spike do are often ridiculous, or just unwarranted needs from the unicorns strange sense of self-perfection. But Spike doesn’t have to worry about any of that today, for today the dragonling gets to enjoy his alone time.

“Now this is the life.” Spike said as he stretches before going back to reading his comic. “I can’t help but hope that Twilight stays in Canterlot for the rest of the day, so I can live it up like this for a while longer.”

Just as Spike rejoiced in his sense of freedom, the dragonling heard something knocking at the door down stairs. Thanks to his keen sense of hearing. Closing his comic, and hopping out of his basket, Spike then started to waddle down the libraries stairs into the main lobby. After reaching the door Spike opened the door, and found a very excitable Pinkie Pie just bouncing in front of the door.

“Hey Pinkie.”

“Hi Spiky guess what time it is!” the mare said in a very excitable tone as she ceased her bouncing and looked directly into Spike’s eyes, by basically pushing her own face into the dragon’s.

“Huh…party time?” Spike guessed, sounding a little unsure, but a little sure as anything that involves Pinkie always end up with a party. And by the large grin on the ponies muzzle, Spike guessed right. then again, Pinkie is rarely seen without a smile so it’s a little hard for the dragon to see if he was actually right or not.

“Correctamundo!” Pinkie rolled off her tongue as she jumped back a few feet before landing, and then jumping into the air with a blast of confetti, and party favors sounding off.

“But whose the part for?” Spike asked as looked at the bounding pink mare.

“I’m not sure yet, but my Pinkie-sense is telling that there’s going to be a new pony coming to town, and it’s going to be soon! And then I thought ‘Hey! Spike is home alone, and might be lonely, so why not ask him to help me out and get a sneak preview of the party to come’ so what do you say?!” Spike stood in silence as he tried to process everything that Pinkie had just said in such turbulent speed, but after a minute of processing everything that the bubbly mare had just said Spike was finally able to respond.

“Uh, sure, but don’t you usually—”

“It’ll be fine, and fun! So let’s get a move on!”

With that Pinkie snatched up Spike in her hooves, deposited him onto her back, and then started to bound her way towards Sugarcube Corner, with the dragonling bouncing with each hop. Accepting his fate, as its nearly impossible to escape the towns peppy pink party pony, Spike just held onto the mare as they bound through town. Getting a few odd, yet knowing glances from other ponies. After a few minutes of bouncing through town the duo eventually made it to Sugarcube Corner, however the moment that Pinkie reached for the door, her body started to convulse and spasm, so much so that Spike got bucked off the mare’s back.

“Pinkie? Are you alright?”

“Whoa! Now that was a dozzy.” The pink mare said before she started to convulse and spasm again. “Whoa!”

“Don’t you normally get those from when something, big or unexpected happens?” Spike asked as Pinkie seemed to finally stop jittering around, but still looking dizzy from all of the body shaking.

“Yeah. And whatever is causing this, it feels like it’s really—”

“AGGGGGHHHHHH!”

Pinkie was cut-off as duo of very destressed cry of fear just erupted from above them, before followed by a loud crash! Which was then accompanied by the cry of Miss. and Mr. Cake from inside the bakery. Both Pinkie and Spike rushed inside the building, where a few customers stood and looked just as surprised, and worried, as they did. Moving past the customers and heading to where the Cakes were, Pinkie and Spike found the married couple on one side of the kitchen looking at something, and when the pair looked to where they were looking they both developed the same looks of shock and fear as the Cakes. On the other side of the kitchen, where pots and pans were scattered about, and bowls of ingredients were tossed about, Spike and Pinkie found Rainbow Dash laying on her back on the counter, body smoking and covered in minor burns. While all four of them were worried for Rainbow Dash’s well-being, she wasn’t what was making the four occupants of the bakery’s kitchen fearful.

On the other side of the counter, slowly getting up and trying to regain balance, was a really tall bipedal creature. It’s body was covered in some really tattered up clothes, like it’s been in a few fights, and baring some scars. The newest one being a big cut on its forehead, bleeding, and oozing blood down its face, obscuring its small eyes. Eyes that looked incredibly dazed. The creature raised a claw towards the group, but it fell backwards, hitting the back of its head on the stove and falling to the floor, causing whatever kitchenware that was around it clattering away.

Leaving Pinkie’s side Spike slowly and cautiously approached the counter, followed by the three ponies, while the customers from the main room peeked through the door to see what was going on. Approaching the edge of the counter Spike looked around the corner, and his eyes widen in fear as he saw more blood start oozing from the large cut, and some other places around its arms and left leg. Rushing over to the toppled creature, Spike ran over to the biped and started to look over its wounds.

“Quick somepony go get a doctor or something, this thing is bleeding all over the place!”

“I—I’m on it!” Mr. Cake said as he rushed out of the kitchen.

“I’ll grab some towels and bandages!” Miss. Cake said as she leaves the kitchen, and rushes to a different part of the building.

“Pinkie help me get the both of them into a better position.”

“Right!”

And so the little dragonling and the pink mare worked on getting Rainbow Dash, and the large biped into a comfortable state. Hopefully when Rainbow, or the creature wake up, and have them explain what happened. That is if the creature knows how to speak Ponish.

Chapter 3: Recollection

Rainbow felt like a bucking train wreck! Her body felt like it was used as a boxing bag, being hit by giant sledge hammers made out of boulders. In all honesty, the cyan pegasus has never felt this bad, not even after some of her worst crashes. At least those she can walk away from.

Slowly opening her eyes as she starts to regain her consciousness, the mare only had them open for a second before she had to close them, as the light from her surroundings stung them. like having an electric shock course through her whole body. A few seconds later and the mare opened her eyes and managed to keep them open, and found that she was laying on a bed in the hospital, with various parts of her body covered in bandages. As she looked around she caught a quick glance out the nearby window, and saw that it was still very bright out.

“What happened?” the mare groggily asked no pony in particular as she turned away from the window, and just laid there on the bed.

“Oh good you finally woke up.” Rainbow heard a peppy soft voice say from her left, and when she turned to look at who said that she found nurse Red Heart standing by her bed with a clipboard.

“Red Heart? What’s going on? How did I end up in the hospital?” the pegasus asked in confusion, to which the nurse gave the mare a quirked brow as if she was uncertain how to respond to such a simple question.

“You don’t remember anything prior to now?” the nurse asked as she placed the clipboard on a nearby nightstand.

“Well, I remember that I was practicing my flying maneuvers on the outskirts of town since this morning, but then I saw—” that’s when a sudden sense of revelation came over the pegasus as her eyes widen.

“There was a creature! A, ugh, I don’t know what it is, it can shoot lightning, and teleport!” Nurse Red Heart trotted to the other side of the bed where a curtain was fully extended, and when the nurse pulled the curtain back, Rainbow’s eyes widen even larger.

“Is this the creature your thinking of?” Red Heart said as she gestured to the big biped creature laid out on a larger bed, it to covered in bandages, only more so than the pegasus. and most of them were tainted red, especially its left leg, forehead, and right forearm.

“Yeah that’s the creature.” Rainbow said as she pointed at the creature, but ended up wincing in pain as she placed a hoof on her side.

“I’d advise you not move around so much Rainbow. You got some fractured ribs, and some pretty bad burns.” Red Heart said as she trotted up to Rainbow Dash.

“Not only that but you may have also developed a busted back. you did after all fall through Sugarcube Corner’s roof, breaking the roof and the first floor.” The pegasus could only groan in pain as she starts to remember the encounter she had with the creature, and having bot her and it, fall and crash into the bakery.

“Both of you were lucky to survive the fall, but whatever this creature is, it ended up in worse condition than you.” the nurse said in a worried tone as she pulled out a clipboard from the foot of the bed. “Not only does it have a few cuts and bruises, but its also got some fractured bones as well, plus the huge gash in its forehead.”

“Red it came from the Everfree Forest, it’s a monster. You don’t need to treat it like it’s a patient.” Rainbow grumbled as she looked over to the creature, seeing its chest rise and fall with its very slow and shallow breathing.

Before Red Heart could say anything to counter Rainbow Dash’s claim, the door to the room suddenly received a few knocks from the other side. When Red Heart went over to go and see who it was, she immediately stood off to the side as Pinkie and Spike came trotting in, along with the rest of their friends, even with Twilight and princess Celestia following behind them. Rainbow wasn’t surprised to see her friends stop by, they always do whenever she gets hurt and sent to the hospital, but the pegasus was a little surprise that Celestia was here to check up on her. Or at least, that’s what Rainbow thought. As the pegasus’s friends gather around her and start to fuss, and worry about her, the princess trots over to the other bed, and just looked at the creature with a worried expression.

“Rainbow how do you feel sugarcube?” Applejack asked worriedly as she stood to close to the head of the bed.

“Are you in any pain?! You didn’t break anything did you?!” Fluttershy asked sounding equally worried and very panicked.

“Guys I’m fine, just a little bruised up is all.” Rainbow bluffed as she tried to show that she wasn’t in to much pain, mostly to make her friends not worry so much about her. but the pained hiss when she tried to move around to much kind of spoiled her act.

“It certainly doesn’t look like your alright dear.” Rarity commented as she gently pats Rainbow’s head, making sure not to cause her friend any further pain.

“Yeah Rainbow, you don’t need to act all tough, I mean you were literally smoking when you and, whatever the hay that thing is, came crashing through the Cakes roof.” Spike said as he gently hopped up onto the bed.

Speaking of said creature, when the group turned to get a good look at it they saw a, odd sight. At least off to them. When they all looked over to the bed the six adolescent mare’s, plus Spike and Red Heart, saw that princess Celestia was slightly bent down, bowing her head, and placing the tip of her horn on the creatures forehead, while the alicorn’s horn glowed softly with magic. all of the occupants of the room just stood, and watched as the princess started gently pour her magic into the creature, bathing it in her golden aura and seemingly aiding in its recovery.

“Princess, what are you doing?” Twilight asked as she watches the princess continue to pour magic into the creature, healing its wounds, albeit at a slow pace, but healing it all the same.

“I’m trying to close, and heal his wounds.” Celestia said as she continued her healing ministration, eyes closed as she focused on the task.

“Wait. How do you know that it’s a, he, princess?” Twilight asked curiously as she stepped towards the bed, looking between the princess and the creature, who was actually looking better every second.

“I’ll explain all of this later, but for the time being.” The princess stopped her treatment and looked over to Red Heart, whose been standing by the door. “Is there a vacant room we can place him in? once he wakes up he’ll be disoriented, and I want him to be as calm as possible.”

“Of course princess. I’ll get somepony to help move the cre—I mean, him to a nearby room.”

With that Red Heart was about to leave the room to go get somepony to help move the creature, but the princess carefully lifted him off the bed, and escorted him out. Leaving the six mare’s and dragonling perplexed as to why the princess has an interest in the creature, and what she knows about it as she seems familiar, and certain, with its gender. Once the princess, nurse, and creature were gone, Rainbow’s friends all returned their attention towards her. most having curious and bewildered looks upon their faces.

“Say Rainbow, how did you and that creature even get into this situation?” Pinkie Pie asked as she looked at her beat up friend incredulously, same with the rest of the group.

“Well…”

~~Earlier that day~~

Out in the fields on the outskirts of Ponyville Rainbow Dash was zooming, and zipping around clouds and performing tricks and maneuvers to keep her skills sharp, as well as ready herself for a competition that would be coming up in a few days. Aside from her basic training routine, the pegasus was also trying to get some of her more flashier moves polished, as she really wanted to wow the crowds when the competition she’s preparing for came around.

Especially since the Wonderbolts themselves will be there, acting as judges, and to present the prize to whoever is the winner. Making the pegasus squeal in fan girly joy, not that she would do that around other ponies, Rainbow tries to keep a ‘cool and awesome’ appearance amongst the residence of Ponyville. Instead of a tough girl with a soft spot for cute things, and squeals in joy when she sees or hears something that she likes, and admits to it.

“Alright RD time to bust out the Buccaneer Blitz! That will really wow the…what the?” Rainbow stopped in midst of psyching herself up when she saw a flash of light come from the direction of the Everfree, accompanied by a distant echoing clap of lightning.

“What the heck?”

The pegasus then speeds off towards the forest to see what was going on. Since Rainbow likes to train outside of town, and amongst the wide-open fields, she gets to be the first one to see any dangers approaching town, which she can then warn the towns ponies to take shelter and hide. She’s essentially an early warning system for the town, which was fine for Rainbow as she likes playing the hero. Reaching the border that separates the Everfree from the town, Rainbow scanned the area for anything that could’ve been the source of the light, and the clap of lightning, but she couldn’t see anything.

A few minutes of patrolling, and not seeing any threats, Rainbow was about to head on back to her training until a resounding ‘ZAP’ sound echoed from the forest, and when she turned to see what was the cause of the sound her eyes widen with surprise. When the pegasus turned to look at the main entrance to the forest she saw what looked like pulsing rings of electrical energy, bursting forth from the trees in a straight line, tearing through any brush in its way, even scraping bark and branches of any trees it brushes pasts. A moment later the cyan mare saw a tall upright walking creature come stumbling out of the forest, placing one of its claws on a tree, as it placed something in its other claw into a slip on the belt it was wearing, breathing heavily as if it just finished a physically tiring task.

With her keen eyesight Rainbow was able to see some details of the creature while remaining a safe distance. For one thing its face seems rather flat when compared to a ponies, and its eyes were pretty small, and the clothes it wore were all wrinkled and covered in dirt and some red patches, which could’ve been blood stains. The creature was also holding something in its left hand, which when Rainbow narrowed her eyes to look at it, appeared to be…she couldn’t really tell what it was. Whatever it was it looked like a foals toy to her, so she shifted her sights back onto the creature. The creature seemed to be catching its breath, probably because it was running around in the forest doing, whatever it was doing in the dense cluster of gnarly trees. That’s when the cyan pony saw the creature look squarely in the direction of town, and looked to be in a really happy mood, like the jump in the air and hoof punch the air kind of happy.

“Oh HAY no!” Rainbow said out loud as she thought she knew why the creature looked so happy.

“Ain’t no way some monster from the Everfree is going to town, just to wreck shop!” the pegasus then bolted down to the ground as the creature took a few steps away from the forest. and when she landed on the ground, she arched her back, flared her wings, and gave the creature the meanest look she could make to scare the creature away with. And it seemed to have worked as the creature skid to a stop when it laid eyes on her.

“Alright you…you…whatever you are, I’m only going to tell you this once: turn around and walk away, or get a nice flank kicking until your butt is red as an apple!”

To emphasize her threat Rainbow hopped onto her back hooves, and made a few shadow boxing punches before looking back at the creature. But instead of a look of fear and being intimidated on its face, the only look it had was a flat deadpan expression. The creature then slumped a little, its head hanging low as it said, something, Rainbow couldn’t exactly understand what it said but from how its acting she thought it was insulting her. snorting in annoyance Rainbow stomped her hooves onto the ground, and readying herself to charge at the creature.

“Alright monster I gave you a fair warning, but now I’m going to make you go back into your forest home.” and with that the pegasus launched herself at the creature, but before she was a foot from it, it quickly grumbled or growled something, before the thing held in its other claw flashed a bright light, and making the same lightning clap sound while the creature just, vanished!

“What the?! Where did it go?” just as Rainbow finished asking herself that question, the same flash, and sound cue appeared, but this time from behind her. twisting her body in mid-air Rainbow saw the creature reappear after dim glow of light faded from it, before seeing it running towards the town.

“Oh no you don’t!”

Rainbow quickly changed her flight path and bolted towards the creature, and in no time the pegasus came crashing into the creature knocking it to the ground, while she tries to pin it to the ground. emphasis on trying, as she was barely half this creatures height. But the creature proved to be stronger than it looked, and managed to squirm most of its body out of Rainbow’s grasp, and managed to turn to face the pegasus, and punch her squarely in the face! the cyan mare reeled back as she brought her hooves to her face, as the creature actually delivered a hard punch, feeling like it broke her nose. The creature then used the opportunity to shove Rainbow off itself, allowing it to get to its feet and continue to make its way towards the town.

But Rainbow was anything but a pushover, and again charged at the creature, and then time instead of simply try and restrain it, the pegasus decided to knock it out and drag it back to the forest. When she reached the creature she spun in mid-air, sweeping her left leg, and striking the creature in the side of the head. and while the attack did stagger the monster, it didn’t drop. Instead it stumbled for a few seconds before turning to look at Rainbow, give her an equally menacing glare—which seemed more effective when it did it—and wrapped its arms around the mare’s body, and head. it was as if it was trying to strangle her. But with Rainbow kicking around, and even biting onto one of its exposed arms, the creature was having a hard time in trying to strangle her. yet it was still able to keep its hold on her.

Feeling a little scared that she was trapped by a pretty tough monster, Rainbow’s instincts to fly away kicked in actually caused the mare to lift the both of them up into the air, albeit at a slow pace as the creature weighed as much as a stallion. At least two of them.

With the creature still firmly holding onto Rainbow Dash, the cyan pegasus starts to fly about the area in trying to flail the creature off her, but this thing just wouldn’t let go. And amidst the flailing about Rainbow hadn’t really noticed that she had flown into town, and was just above the buildings. In one final attempt to get the creature off of her Rainbow again bit down on the arm in front of her face as hard as she could, while also kicking her legs into the stomach of the creature, and then…

~~Present~~

“…that’s when I felt like I was struck by lightning.” Rainbow said as she reached the end of her pretty long telling of how she came in contact with the creature. “After that I guess I blacked out, and now, well, I’m here in the hospital.”

“Dang Rainbow, that’s one heck of a tale.” Applejack said as she tipped her hat back.

“But did you have to try and pick a fight with the creature?” Fluttershy piped up, looking a little baffled after hearing the story. “I mean, it just sounded like the poor thing was exhausted, and happy to see a place where it could rest.”

“Well, I…ugh…I d-didn’t exactly have time to try and figure it out, it could’ve been a dangerous monster. So I decided to take action.”

“I understand that Rainbow, but maybe you should’ve thought about the situation a bit more, before deciding to take action.” Rarity added on to the conversation. “I mean look at how both you, and that poor creature ended up.” Rainbow just groaned as she slumped more into her bed.

“Okay, okay I get it. I’ll think first before thinking I can handle something on my own.”

Rainbow grumbled to her friend’s worry. She knows that her friends were just looking out for her, but most times it comes across like their scolding her to not to do something foolish that ends up with her being hurt. But she knew better than that. As Rainbow and the other continued to talk, mostly on how long Rainbow was going to be in the hospital, and the speedster asking Pinkie how the Cakes were doing, and if there was a way she could make up for busting their roof, Rainbow noticed something. During the whole time she was telling her story, the pegasus noticed that Twilight was standing off to the side of the group, and looks to be in some kind of deep thought. As if she’s trying to sort something out.

“Hey Twi, what are you thinking of over there?” the group turned to look at Twilight, while the unicorn continued to have a puzzled look on her face.

“I was just running everything through my head.” Twilight simply said as she turned to trot over to her friends, before explaining what it is that she has been thinking.

“We defeated Discord a couple of days ago, then that night we had that weird light show, which I learned coincides with strange artifacts being found where they crashed in Equestria. And now, we have a creature never before seen, and yet Celestia seems to know what it is.” As Twilight points out the strange events that has happened in the past few days, and how close they all appear to be, the rest of the group all looked at each other with varying degrees of uncertainty.

“I can’t put my hoof on it, but I feel like something even stranger is about to happen.” The room was dead silent as the group all took in what Twilight had just said, and after thinking about what has happened after Discord’s defeat, now all six mare’s plus Spike were now very worried for the future, and what else would be unfolded.

Author's Note

Well it looks like things are about to get strange in Equestria. but what do you, my readers think? what do you personally think is going on? is this somehow Discord's doing? or is it something else, and why does Celestia seem so familiar with our human protagonist.

Chapter 4: Minimal Answers Given But Safety Assured

The sense of pain was starting to become a prominent sensation in Adam’s life. From feeling sore and aching from when he woke up in that strange stone hedge location, and then having to trek over some difficult terrain, and then having to find some place to sleep. And each spot was far from comfortable, or could even pass as a sleeping spot, as every time he woke up his body was roughed up and tendered, with knots forming in his back. sleep wasn’t the only issue that Adam has to deal with, food was also an issue, as he had nothing in his pack to snack on. As for scavenging for food, Adam wasn’t going to risk eating anything that could upset his stomach.

But those aches and pains from sleeping on hard surface, and stomach aches and cramps, were nothing compared to the following day, from when he entered a dark and dank forest, and had to literally run for his life when he came across rabid monsters!

From a crocodile made out of rock. Giant dragonflies that actually spewed out fire! And the kicker was a chase from pack of wooden wolves, which seem to just pop out of the thick foliage all around him. even with the help of his shen gong wu, those wooden wolves were such a pain to deal with, not impossible, just, greatly annoying. But the icing on the cake to Adam’s terrible luck came when he exited out of the forest. upon exiting the forest, after narrowing escaping from the latest attempt on his life from the pack of wooden wolves, when he came across something that nearly made him faint. Not from exhaustion of the chase, or from horrible terror, just something so ridiculous that Adam couldn’t process that it nearly made him go brain dead. And that was seeing a bright blue tiny horse, with a mane with a rainbow pattern, glaring at him, or at least it looked like it was, but Adam couldn’t take it seriously.

In fact the moment he saw the pegasus, the young man hung his head, and muttered ‘You cannot be serious!’ under his breath as he tries to re-boot his brain.

But as he was in the process of re-booting his brain, that’s when the horse charged at him, showing that it was a pegasus, instead of a normal horse. Then again being so small, cutely rounded, and brightly colored, this horse was far from normal. But as the pegasus was charging straight at him, Adam was able to use his Shard of Lightning to travel at light speed. Easily dodging the attack and just strolling past the horse.

However after the effects of the Shard of Lightning had subsided, Adam was knocked to the ground as the pegasus tried to choke hold him, luckily the horse’s limbs—which seemed to bend like a humans instead of a normal equines—were too small to fully take hold of him. and because of this, Adam tried everything to squirm out of this horses hold, but it was surprisingly strong, and at the moment Adam didn’t had a chance to use any of shen gong wu. But he didn’t have to, as he managed to get free after slamming the back of his head into the horses face, allowing him to finally get free and make a break for the town he saw before the flying horse attacked him. however the damn winged equine didn’t give up! it once again charged at Adam, and instead of tackling him, it instead kicked him on the side of his head! it stung like a bitch for sure, as it felt like getting punched by a pretty adept boxer, thankfully Adam has had a good five years of self-defense classes to withstand the pain.

However since he was already feeling greatly irritated, and a little bit angered about his current situation, as well as being attack by a small blue colored winged equine, Adam spun around and just let his frustration take hold of him. which resulted in him tackling the small horse, and tried to choke it, again not trying to kill it, but knock it out. Except there was a slight mis-calculation in his attack, and that was that this small horse was able to lift him off the ground. now Adam wasn’t exactly paying attention how far off the ground he was, or even that the pegasus was taking him away from the fields, all he was concerned with was knocking this horse out. But since it wasn’t doing so with his choke hold, Adam resorted to a more, harsher method, and that was using the Denshi Bunny to shock it till it passed out.

Which may have worked a little too well.

~~~~~

Adam started to grumble and groan as he starts to stir from his state of unconsciousness, his mind starting register the pain his body was in. but it wasn’t the simple aches and pains he already had, no, now he was feeling like his limbs were broken, his back snapped in half.

Every inch of his body was just wracked with pain, that Adam’s little groans and moans started to turn into more painful grunts and guttural growls. Managing to open his eyes Adam was assaulted with the blinding brightness of the world, didn’t help that the place he found himself in was such a sterile white color. once his eyes were no longer stinging from the immense brightness, which has lessened so that he doesn’t have to squint, Adam started to turn his head around, which only made him grunt in pain more as the joints felt like a vice was clasping onto them. but he managed to at least see enough, to tell himself that he was in hospital, and that he was mostly covered in bandages. So at least he knows that is in good hands, and maybe able to finally get some help.

Just then Adam’s ears heard a nearby door open up, which was followed by various voices and bodies shuffling around, before the door closed again and only hearing a few people shuffling about in the room now. That’s when he heard whoever was in the room speak, but they weren’t speaking any language he knows off. in fact, whoever was in the room wasn’t even speaking any dialect whatsoever, instead what Adam was hearing was what sounded like gentle sounding grunts, whinnies, and snorts with some faint breathing. Then there was the sound of something hard tapping the ground, not in a hard fashion, but enough to make a soft clop sound.

‘Just what the hell is going on here? Who the hell is in here with me?!’

Adam mentally questioned as his mouth felt too stiff to even move to speak. But that’s when his brain just had a sudden thought about who, or exactly what was in the room with him. and when he saw the two figures come into his field of view, his mind and body snapped to attention as he saw what was in the room with him.

The two figures were again horse, one being of the same stature as the pegasus, but had a white coat, a pink mane and tail, and wearing a little nurse cap. The other figure was tall, probably around his height—maybe a foot taller—and looked to be a winged unicorn with an aurora borealis for both a mane and tail, and was wearing golden accessories from a crown, collar, and from the sound of metal tapping onto the ground was probably golden hoof shoes as well.

‘Oh for fucks sake’s there’s more of them!’

Adam gasped internally as his eyes widen as much as they could, and stared directly at the pair. The tall one mostly, as Adam couldn’t really lower his head enough to fully see the smaller horse. Or pony would be the proper term, considering the winged unicorn was as tall as a normal horse. Speaking of said winged unicorn, its singular eye that wasn’t covered by its mane noticed that Adam was looking at it, and showed a startled expression on its small, rounded face. the winged unicorn then looked down to the pony, and snorted then clicked its tongue, which made the pony look up at the taller equine with a slightly confused look but then left the room. after the pony trotted off, opened the door, and left the room, the winged unicorn then turned its attention towards Adam, where its horn started to emit a golden light. All of which caused Adam to squirm in place, but his body only coursed with pain causing him to cry out in pain.

But through his growls and grunts, Adam heard something else…and that was a soft female voice…coming from the winged equine in the room.

“Please don’t move, you’ll only cause yourself more pain.” Adam immediately stopped his struggling and just looked up to the winged equine as it, she, gave him a peaceful and gentle smile. And spoke in a fairly rough common English dialect.

“I know that you are probably having a hard time comprehending the situation you’re in right now, but you have to trust me, you are in good hands.”

“I’m going to pour some magic into your body, it will then start to heal you, repairing any damage that you have sustained from your crash. You might feel some discomfort, but if you don’t want me to do so, blink once. But if you want me to help, blink twice.” The equine, or mare actually, said as she slowly lowers her head till her horn was a foot or so from Adam’s forehead while she looked into his eyes with a reassuring look.

Adam only laid there, unable to do anything, as a strange, winged unicorn talks to him. and is offering to heal him right up. already Adam’s mind was rushing to that, whatever this mare is, she was up to something. But whether it was her peaceful expression, or soothing tone, or that friendly look in her eyes Adam felt a sense of peace wash over him. so probably against his better judgment of the situation he’s in, Adam blinked once, signaling to the mare to proceed with her, treatment. The winged equine then gently placed the very tip of her horn onto Adam’s forehead, and the moment she did Adam felt a strange sense of warmth wash over him, like he was being eased into a tub of nice hot water and his body started to feel so, at ease. His muscles and bones started to slowly feel less stressed, less in pain as if being twisted, and started feel to loosen up and being messaged with a gentle warmth. Even his neck and back started to feel better, less pain spiking every time he took a breath, which was easier to make now that his jaw wasn’t so tensed up, and felt like it was in a brace.

“How do you feel right now?” the equine asked as she lifted her head.

Adam very carefully, as to make sure he was indeed healed, and not just given a pleasurable sensation, moved his head and neck about. Allowing him to fully see his surroundings with no sense of pain. He then raises his right hand and started to clutch and open it a few times, before looking at the equine and speaking.

“I feel, great. what…what did you do to me?” he asked, still a bit skeptical about who this strange equine was, but she just gave him a small grin before answering.

“Just some healing magic. you’re lucky that I’m well acquainted with the human body to do this, otherwise you’d be stuck in bed for months, if not years till your able to move again.” The very not amused look on Adam’s face showed the equine that he was not exactly, ecstatic to hear such a thing. but his expression showed that he was still unsure about, her, overall.

“I know you have questions, so allow me to get the obvious ones out of the way.” The equine said before taking in a deep breath.

“My name is Celestia, and I am a alicorn not a winged unicorn. And I’m a pony, not a horse, and yes there is a difference. And you are currently in a hospital in a country called Equestria, and yes the equine puns are unavoidable. And you are most defiantly not hallucinating.” Adam was actually surprised that this mare, pony, named Celestia has answered some of his questions without even saying anything.

“And before you asked, no, I can’t read minds. Mental magic on that caliber and subject, are forbidden.”

“…your good.” Was all Adam could say. After all, he’s not wrong.

“I think I should be. I have been dealing with humans over the past, thousand or so years of my life.” Celestia commented, before quickly bounding into another response. “And yes, I am that old. Just one of the traits for being an alicorn.”

“Okay now your just making it weird.” Adam remarked as having his questions, even ones he hadn’t even thought of yet answered before they even left his mouth.

“Sorry. It’s just, after you hear the same line of questions repeatedly, you tend to predict them and answer them before things get out of hand.”

“…that’s…fair. I think.” Adam said as he slowly drags his body up to a sitting position, still making sure that his aches, pains, and everything else didn’t pulse with pain. “So if you have all the answers to whatever it is I’ll probably ask, maybe you can explain a few things. Or at least help clarify.”

“I’d love to, but first you’d must be hungry.” The mare said as she looked at a corner of the room, which where Adam looked over and saw his clothes, and shen gong wu laying neatly on a table. “Given the condition of your clothes, you seemed to had it rough for some time.” Adam just nodded his head.

“I’ve been wandering around aimlessly for the past few days, and most of that time was finding a place to sleep, rest, and not dying from rabid monsters.”

“I see.” Celestia said as she ignited her horn.

“In that case, give me about, five or so minutes, and I’ll be right back with some food. And no, not grass, hay, or oats.” The mare said with a cheeky smile.

“Okay now your just being a show off.”

The mare didn’t say anything except for giving the young man a chortle, before lighting her horn up in light again. And then just, popping, out of existence. Adam didn’t question, as everything within the past few days just boggled him so much that he’s forgo questioning anything. So until Celestia came back, Adam just laid back into the bed he was laying in and just waited.

As promised five minutes, or so, later and Celestia reappeared in the room with a plate held in the same golden light. The mare then levitated the plate over to the young man, where he found what is unmistakably a classic, two fully loaded BLT sandwiches! with a generous helping of actual potato cut fries on the side, cooked to a nice golden crisp brown! Again, Adam didn’t really question why a plant eating creature, made a sandwich with meat in it and brought to him. the only thing that concerned him right there and then, was just grab the plate, and scarf the food down. Which he did with no hesitation. And as for the alicorn who brought the food, she was just standing off to the side of the bed, and just watched as the young man was eating his food.

“It’s been awhile since I’ve cooked any human food, this was all the meat I had in stasis storage. Did I cook it, and made the fries alright?”

“Yeah!” Adam said after swallowing the latest bite of sandwich. “the bacon is a little on the crispy side, but other than that, you did great.” the mare smiled as her tail—

‘Wait, is her tail actually wagging?!’

“I’m glad to hear that I haven’t lost my touch.” Celestia says in a cheerful manner. “Tell me, what is your name?”

“Since you went through the trouble of not just feeding me, but also go through all the effort to patch me up, I owe my time.” Adam stated as he finishes the last bit of his sandwich, and fries. “Names Adam Johnson.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you Adam.” Celestia says as pulled a stool over to her and sat down next to the bed. “So Adam, do you have any questions for me, I promise to not predict them and then answer.”

“I only have one, or at least one main question.” Adam said as he places the plate on the nearby nightstand, before looking at Celestia with very curious look, yet also concerned look. “How do you know what I am, and why are you so calm around me?” the mare gives a very small sigh as she looks up to Adam.

“That’s a long story to tell Adam, and I have something that will help tell that story, but I want to save it till your well enough to actually walk around. And used to being in my world.” Celestia says in a calm and motherly tone.

“But to give you something to work with, the reason why I know your race is that over the past thousand years, I’ve meet twelve other humans. and its by those humans that I know of your race, a lot of your social mannerisms, and habits.” Adam fixes a somewhat suspicious glare onto Celestia, who in turn didn’t flinch, or even look like she was faltering under the scrutinizing gaze.

“I know your suspicious about my response, but trust me Adam you are safe here. And as long as your under my protection, nothing and no one will even try to harm you. and none of my subjects will enter this room, unless I permit it.”

“Wait. Subjects? Are you…”

“Oh! right i haven't explained that part about me yet." the alicorn said as she started to gently tap the side of her head with a hoof.

"Way to go Celestia, that’s the third time you forgot to mention this to a human.” the alicorn said more to herself than Adam, who just gave the mare a quirked brow. “Your hunch is correct Adam, I am royalty. A princess to be exact.”

“…pony royalty…well that’s defiantly a new concept for me.” Adam said as he runs a hand through his hair.

“Well in any case I guess I’ll just have to trust your word, princess, and wait till I’m better to see this explanation in its fullest.”

“Trust me Adam, a picture and a complementing story, is worth more than a thousand words.”

“I don’t think that’s how that saying goes.”

“I know. it’s a modified one from one of the other humans who proceeded you.” Celestia replied while a smile comes across her muzzle. “But trust me Adam, it’ll be worth the wait.”

Adam decided to take Celestia at her word, as she seemed trustworthy and appears to be genuinely concerned for him. the two continued to talk with one another for a bit longer, mostly asking some non-personal questions, mostly just Adam asking the princess the specifics on where he is, and what her subjects are like.

afterwards the princess excused herself as she had to get back to her duties, but assured Adam that she’ll return tomorrow at the same time to continue with his treatment, and just ensuring that he is doing okay. When she left Adam was just completely stun-locked by everything that has happened to him, and the prospect of learning why a princess of an alien planet knows about humans, was just mind boggling. It was so intriguing that Adam was actually, considering delaying his return home, so he could study this world and figure out why other humans were brought to this place. But until then, he’ll just have to rest up, and get better. Hopefully, he’ll be fully healed soon, so he can start finding the answers to the questions that are piling up within the recesses of his mind.

Chapter 5: Secrets of the Past Revealed Pt. 1

Three days have gone by since rumors, and actually witnesses, of a strange creature crashing through the roof of Sugarcube Corner. And since then many ponies who saw it be taken to the hospital, whisper, and gossip about what it could be, and if it was a danger to the town. Especially after some ponies who saw it crash through the bakery’s roof saw Rainbow be taken to the hospital, while being in just as worst shape as the creature. But the ones that were probably the most curious about the creature that Rainbow Dash tangled with, was the cyan pegasus herself, and her circle of friends. and their curiosity of the creature only grew when princess Celestia herself came to the hospital, and seems to be very familiar with the creature, to where she even knows its gender. How does the princess know about this creatures gender, and how does she seem so familiar with the creature? These questions, and others, keep popping up into the six ponies heads.

Now over the course of the three following days after the creature was brought to the hospital, Twilight has visited the hospital to see if she could study the creature, and maybe learn about where it even came from. or more importantly why it’s here.

But the hospital staff have denied her every time, and when she asked the first time the staff only said that no pony was able to see it, unless they are the designated staff assigned to the creature. As well as the princess herself. Twilight was able to catch Celestia the second day, and asked her mentor if she could possibly see the creature, but the princess just firmly told her student that she’ll just have to wait for another time to meet the creature. And when the little unicorn heard that, she genuinely felt, hurt. The princess has never been so forthcoming with any of Twilight’s request, not even when she was studying obscured topics, or subject not meant for other ponies.

So now Twilight was just, lounging around the Golden Oak library, looking through journals, field guides, culture books, anything that might show the mare something about the strange creature. Maybe get an idea on what it is, but none of the books told her, anything! There are no mentions anywhere in the dozens of books that she has scoured through that has even an inkling of what the creature was, aside from one or two strange old pictures of a tall bipedal creature, but they were either lanky toothy monsters, or had some strange imagery associated with it. and the bipeds in those pictures didn’t look like anything that was at the hospital.

“RAGH!” Twilight roared as she dropped the latest book she was readying, while her head drops to the face of her desk, causing a dull thud to sound out. Followed by a quick grunt as the mare lifted her head.

“Ow! Oh mu nose.” The unicorn muffled as she covered, then gently rubbed her muzzle. The door to the little study on the second floor of the library opened, where Spike stuck his head through the door.

“Twi? Are You okay in here?”

“Yeah Spike I’m fine. Just, bumped my nose is all.” Twilight fibbed as she removed her hoof, and seeing her nose starting to develop a slight tinge of red.

“Are you sure?” the little dragonling asked in concern as he steps into the room. “Cause for the last few days you’ve been in a real, grouchy mood.” Twilight gave a defeated sigh as she turned to face Spike.

“I’m not grouchy. I’m just…irritated.”

“Irritated? Why?” Spike asked as he sat down in front of Twilight, curious as to what’s bothering her.

“I’m irritated because it seems that Celestia isn’t allowing me to see the creature, it feels like she doesn’t trust me to be around it.” Twilight grumbles as she curls in on herself.

“Does she think I can’t be trusted to be around it?”

“Twilight I’m sure it’s nothing like that.” Spike said as he give his caretaker a pat on the head, trying to subdue her anxiety before it really starts to get out of hoof.

“The princess always has things that she takes cares of, just so no pony else gets hurt. I mean this creature really did a number on Rainbow Dash, who knows what it would do to other ponies, so the princess is more than likely keeping it under tight security to protect ponies.” A look of sudden realization over comes Twilight face, which upon seeing it, caused Spike to immediately developed a deadpan expression.

“…Twilight…did you really not think that is why the princess is not letting any pony, including you, to see the creature?”

“N-no!” Twilight snapped back almost instantaneously, trying to deny that she did not just think that this was an actual possibility. Spike however didn’t seem convinced in the slightest.

“Well whatever is the case, just don’t think the princess has no faith in you about this. Okay.” Spike said as he stands up, gives Twilight a pat on the head again, although this time in more ‘try to remain calm’ fashion than a comforting one, before leaving the room. as Spike left the room Twilight grumbled to herself as she goes about laying on her back, and just stares up at the roof of her study, and just lays there.

“Maybe Spike’s right. I’m probably blowing this out of proportions.” The unicorn muttered to herself as she looks out of a different window, and just watches the clouds passer her by. “But still…just what is this weird creature…and where did it come from…”

~~Canterlot~~

Canterlot castle, a truly marvelous building of architectural beauty and wonderment, sharing its regal majesty with a sense of whimsical charm. and it’s within these halls that guards stand resolute, or patrol to ensure the castle is kept safe, but mostly it is more of a theatrical routine than anything. As Equestria hasn’t been under peril since, will the most recent would be the return of Nightmare Moon, but that incident was dealt with within the span of an hour upon her return. The last major threat that assailed Canterlot was well over three-hundred years ago. Since then the city and castle have both recovered, and not many ponies actually remember the event, or wish to.

Within the halls of the castle, specifically the farthest wing on the northern side of the castle, which has very few guards patrol its halls, a flash of golden suddenly appeared. Followed by the distinct pop of a teleportation spell just being used. Now standing in the mostly abandon wing of the castle stood Celestia, calm and regal as ever. Her fellow passenger however, looked less than, stellar. The moment that both the alicorn and the human appeared in the northern wing of the castle, Adam looked as if he had swallowed something sour, while also smelling something pungent and revolting. In fact he looked like he was about to throw up the meal that he had earlier today, complements of Celestia, but he managed to regain his composure and not vomit a breakfast of pancakes, scrambled eggs, and other breakfast items all over the clean marble floors.

“I don’t think teleporting is meant for me.” Adam grumbled as he held his stomach.

“I did warn you that teleporting can cause nausea, especially if the passenger isn’t used to such methods of travel.” Celestia reiterated to the young man, as she did foreworn of the side effects of the teleportation.

“Fair enough, next time, we’ll just take the train.”

Adam said as the sickening sensation finally started to leave him, and he was starting to feel normal. once he was feeling better he started to look around the wide expanse of the hallway he and Celestia was in, and his face went from normal standby to amazement.

“Wow~” he simply said as his eyes wandered about and examining the expansive corridor he & Celestia were in, all the while the alicorn watched with amusement.

“I never get tired of seeing that astonished look on you humans faces when they see the inside of the castle for the first time.” Celestia teased as she trotted up to Adam’s side as the young man looked at her, still having a look of astonishment on his face.

“Can you blame me; this place looks like its big enough to hold a giant. But—”

“Yes, yes, a little too big for comfort and practicality, and for security measures.” Celestia said as she starts to trot off down the hall.

“I’ve actually been meaning to renovate the castle, make it less, gaudy. but it keeps slipping my mind.” As Celestia rambled on as she continues to trot down the hall Adam stopped his gawking, and caught up to the princess and just followed behind her.

While the duo traversed down the halls of the castle, Adam continued to scan and observe the castle, taking its fairly bright colors, adornments, and just its overall grandeur in. All the while Celestia continues to guide the human along their chosen route, occasionally taking a glance at the young man and just smiling at seeing his bewildered expressions, as he looks around. But as the alicorn watches the human, a more nostalgic look started to come over her. as memories from the past start to surface, bring a small smile to her face, but was quickly changed to a slightly skeptical look.

The pair continued to travel down hallway after hallway, avoiding any that have guards posted or are patrolling. Adam seemed unsure why Celestia was avoiding any places that had other ponies, but he was certain that there was a reason for it, and just continued to follow the mare. Five or so minutes of traversing through the hallways of the castle, the pair made it to a less decorated section of the castle wing, and seem to be void of any guards as they stopped changing hallways and corridors then before. Eventually the pair seemed to have reached their destination, which was a set of wood double doors. The doors were dark brown in color, with steel rimming and ornamentation in the form of thorn covered vines, but at the center of each door was what looked like roses blooming made out of the same metalwork. While the doors seemed ornately beautiful, Adam thought that they didn’t seem to belong. The darker and somewhat, somber look of the doors, seem completely out of place being in a big and brightly colored castle.

Celestia then approached the door, and with a quick pop of her golden light, which Adam learned yesterday was magic, the doors slowly opened. Squeaking as if they are rarely opened. Once the doors were open the alicorn entered the room, with Adam following a second later as he felt a little bit of his still present uncertainty rear up in his head, but eventually he followed Celestia and walked through the doors. And when he did the doors started to close in behind him. but Adam wasn’t focused on them. instead he was drawn to the interior of the rather sizable chamber he, and Celestia, were now standing in. The room was quite large in size, and was spherical in shape, and has a somber yet, soothing or even sentimental atmosphere about it.

now as to the rooms overall esthetics, there wasn’t much in the form of decor other than a rather big chandelier, a few vases with flowers, small candles on little coasters. But that’s when Adam took notice of the rooms main feature, and it was the twelve statues of different humans lining the walls!

Upon seeing the statues Adam was now greatly curious as to why they were here, and started to examine each full body statue one by one, while Celestia stood in the center and just watched the human. each statue was perfectly sculpted, to where someone can see the pores of the person the statue was modeled after, not only that, but there was something major that Adam noticed about the statues. All of them seemed to be wearing various clothing style, from middle ages attire to traditional clothing, and then even to modern wear. Not only that, but upon closer inspection Adam could see that each statue actually had a small flag hung behind them, showing their nationality. Some were from the United States, some were from the United Kingdoms, Greece, Japan, Mexico, Germany, and so on. After giving the statues a once over he turned to look over to Celestia, who was just standing in the middle of the room, looking at the statues herself with a mild relief smile on her face.

“So this is how you know about humans, and how to predict certain questions?” Adam said as he looks at the princess, who turned to look back at him and gave a small nod.

“As you can see Adam, before you, there were twelve other humans that came to Equestria at various points in time.” Celestia said as she trotted up to the statue of teenage boy, wearing what looked like modern street wear, and holding a backpack in his right hand.

“I’m not sure how or why it happens, but for the past one thousand years a human would be brought to Equestria every one hundred years, give or take, and they all would come from different regions of your world.” the mare then looks squarely at Adam with a more serious expression. “And different times.”

“Wait!” Adam says as he gives the princess a curious look. “What do you mean by different times?”

“What I mean is that each of these humans come from different time periods of your worlds history.” Celestia retorted as she looked back at the statue she was standing in front of.

“For example, this was the first human I met, and when he was brought to Equestria when it was the 1990’s.” the mare the turned to look at the next statue, and gestured towards it with a wing. “and the next human who was brought to Equestria came from when it was 1750.”

“Wait what?!”

Adam said as he looked from the statue and gave the princes a shocked look, which Celestia seemed to find humorous. But Adam suddenly looked back at all of the other statues within the room, and noticing at their base had the humans name, birth, and death dates. As well as a time stamp on when they arrived in Equestria from their time period, till when they passed away. When he looked back up to the statues themselves, and really started to look at them instead of giving them a quick once over.

“So, all of these people came from different time periods.” Celestia nodded her head before trotting over to the next statue, which was a large imposing rotund Japanese man.

“Yes. Each of them came from different times, and each one have shared their culture, history, and life with me. and even helped in influencing Equestria’s overall culture, and even helped it grow as a nation. For example, this statue is in remembrance of a man named Takanashi Oda, he was warrior called a sumo wrestler back on earth, and is the reason why Equestria has an established peaceful relationship with the minotaur’s of Minos.”

“A sumo wrestler as a peace negotiator, to a nation of minotaur’s.” Adam echoed as he rubbed the back of his neck while looking up at the statue. “Well, that is certainly something you don’t hear every day.”

“So all of these other humans played some role in your nations development?” Celestia again nodded.

“Quite so. Each one of them held a spot in Equestria’s overall growth, from culture, to how we view things, even to the clothing trends that ponies have now adays.”

“Wait! Why would ponies need to wear clothes?”

“Its mostly for the rich, and the nobility, as a way to flaunt their wealth. Honestly, those ponies spend more bits on clothing than anything else. Also, it’s fun to change ones appearance every now and then, right?” Celestia says as she gives a coy smile to Adam, who just chuckled and shrugged.

As Adam goes back to examining the statues he then noticed another thing about the sculptures, or at least a few of them. looking to the right side of the room Adam noticed that four of the statuettes were separated. Moving away from the larger group, he made his way over to the four isolated ones, and noticed that they weren’t as taken care of like the others. They easily had a lot of dust on them, and they didn’t have vases of flower, or candles, they were just standing in a dark corner.

“How come these four are separated from the others?” Adam asked the princess, who looked…hurt. Aa shaky breath then left her as she looked over to Adam and spoke, her motherly voice losing some of its warmth.

“Unlike these humans, those, ones taught me something important.”

“…and that is?” Adam asked as he felt a tinge of anger, and sorrow coming from the mare as she spoke.

“Never assume that a stranger has nothing but good intentions, and that they are your friends.” Adam seemed to catch on what Celestia means, and gives a sagely nod.

“That’s the thing about humans princess, you can never tell which ones are the good ones…and which ones are the bad one—”

“And always be cautious and judge them based on their actions.” Celestia finished as she trots over to Adam, and the four unkempt statues. “One of the other humans said those very words, and yet, I failed to heed those words…four separate times.”

“…is that why your limiting my interaction with other ponies? You want to see if I’m a good guy, or bad guy whose good at pretending to be good?” Celestia gives a curt nod as she faces the young man.

“My intuition tells me that you are a good person Adam. And despite my personal experience with humans, especially with those who showed to be some of my greatest friends, there’s a part of me that is telling me to be weary. And make sure that you are indeed not evil, and is not covering up your intentions. So that’s why I want to keep you in the castle for a certain amount of time, so I can evaluate you.”

“Smart move.” Adam simply said as he places a hand on the handle of the Thorn of Thunderbolt, which caused Celestia to glance down to the shen gong wu, then back up to Adam.

“You can’t really tell if a person is bad or not until they prove you right, or wrong. So to help show that I’m not up to something.” Adam them removed the belt that had three out of the four shen gong wu on it, and held it, and the Eye of Dashi out for Celestia to take.

“I’m giving you these to hold onto until you trust that I am worth trusting.” Celestia gave a small appreciative smile as she took the items in her magical aura.

“Thank you Adam, and I will say that this is certainly helping your case.” The mare then started to look over the four items she now held in her aura. “I’ve been meaning to ask you this, but I keep forgetting until now. What are these?”

“There called shen gong wu, magical artifacts created by monk to stop an evil witch.”

“So are these artifacts part of your power?” that comment made Adam look to the princess with a surprised look.

“Wait. My power? what do you mean by that?”

“Well you see Adam, out of the twelve humans that came before you, five of them also had powers.”

“That’s strange.” Adam said as started to tap his foot, while crossing his arms. “So I’m not only one who have something abnormal about them.”

“That is correct.” Celestia said as she lowered the items. “The other five humans were uncertain on how they obtained their own powers, or why they even have them.”

“Hmmmm. That is strange. We’ve must’ve picked up our powers while being, transported to Equestria…however that that even worked.” Adam suddenly had a thought rush to him. “Princess is there—” the princess raised a hoof as she shook her head.

“No Adam…I’m afraid I can’t send you home.” Adam was about to say something, but the princess quickly spoke up before he could so.

“Ever since the first human, bless his heart, came to Equestria I spent the time he was with me, and then the past four hundred years searching for a way to send a human back to their home. but I could never find a way to do so.” The princess genuinely looked hurt while she admitted this, as if she felt ashamed in her inability to help those past humans in finding a way home.

“I, see.” Adam said slowly as he ran a hand through his hair.

“Well. No use over crying over something that’s out of my hands.” The princess places a hoof on his shoulder an offered a reassuring smile to the young man.

“Don’t worry Adam. So long as your in Equestria, you’ll always have a friend here, in me.” the young man gave a small chuckle as he patted the mare’s hoof.

“Assuming that I’m not a bad guy that is.” The mare chortled back as they both shared a small jovial moment. After the little happy moment Celestia once again looked at the items still held in her aura, and gave them a curious look before something seemed to have crossed her mind.

“Adam, how many artifacts like these are there?”

“I’m not entirely sure, but I do know that there’s a lot. Why do you ask?”

“Because I may have more of these stashed away in the royal treasury.” Celestia said before taking a few steps back. “I’ll be right back; I’ll bring the artifacts stashed away so that you can verify.”

“And you want me to stay in here?”

“Don’t worry, no pony comes to this section of the castle, or even know about this room. so long as you stay in here, you’ll be fine.” Celestia says as the aura around her horn glowed brighter.

“I’ll be back in a moment.”

Celestia then disappeared with a pop, and a flash of light, leaving Adam alone with the sculptures of humans long since passed. While he waited for the princess to make her return, Adam turned back to the four lone statues, and just stood there and looked up at them. even if these four were supposably the bad bunch of the crops of humans that came to this world, Adam thought about how Celestia still erected something in memory of them. whether for good or bad, showed to Adam that even if these four were bad, Celestia must’ve still valued her time with them. at least that’s what he thought. A moment later and Adam was pulled from his train of thought when her heard something, the doors to the room opening. Before he could move, Adam saw another alicorn enter the room, and was simply just looking around, however when her eyes fell on Adam the curious expression quickly turned to one of, anger. The mare whined and knickered angerly, and even snorted as her horn lit up with blue magic.

“Whoa now, easy there! easy now miss, I’m—”

The young man was cut off as the mare whined loudly, before a beam of magic shot from her horn, and rammed straight into Adam’s chest! And blasting him to the far side of the room, crashing into the wall, before dropping to the floor, his body making a dull thud sound as it made contact with the floor. As he quickly started to loose consciousness, not before hearing the sound of something popping, and then angered whinnies. And then silence, and darkness.

Chapter 6: Lyra's Off to Canterlot

At the train station in Ponyville the towns local candy maker, Bonbon, was sitting on a nearby bench and just patiently waiting for the train to arrive. Today the candy maker was waiting for her housemate, Lyra Heartstrings, to arrive and return from her week long overdue vacation with her family. And it was really overdo! The unicorn has been so busy as of late, with auditions for musicals she was scouted for, and being part of small bands and performances, and fancy parties that need calm and quite music. Then there was the Grand Galloping Gala, which ended in disaster, but Lyra still performed to the best of abilities. But that wasn’t all of it. Lyra has also helped at Bonbon’s candy store, wither it was working the register, helping with shipments of supplies, or even making candies.

The unicorn has been doing nothing but work for the past few months, and rarely gets a chance to visit her parents in Canterlot due to their own hepatic schedules. So Bonbon was happy when Lyra won the raffle to a paid vacation to Baltimare at a luxury hotel.

The distant ‘screech’ of the trains whistle caused the mare to look up, and saw the train rolling down the tracks, coming towards the station. The cream coated earth pony slid off her spot on the bench, stood up and waited for the train to come to a stop. And once it did, the mare watched as the car doors opened, and ponies to trot out, and trot in. after looking through small crowd of ponies Bonbon found her friend. Lyra was just casually strolling out of her train car, saddlebags, and a new pack perched on back, and book held in her golden magical aura.

“Lyra!” Bonbon said as she approached the mare, who looked away from her book and gave the candy maker a big smile.

“Bonbon!” the unicorn pranced over to earth pony, and two of them nuzzled up to each other as they greeted each other.

“So how was your vacation with your parents?” Bonbon asked as the two broke their hug, and started to trot towards town.

“It was amazing! Baltimare is such a lovely city, mom especially loved this play we managed to score tickets to.”

As the two continued to trot into the town, Lyra regaled Bonbon with her time in Baltimare with her parents. And the candy pony listened intently. She did wished she could’ve gone with Lyra and her parents, but she withheld her desire to also go on this little trip, and just listened to what her friend has experienced. And from all the praise, and details that the unicorn was giving her, Lyra seemed to have a great time. But as the pair walked and talked, Bonbon’s attention was switching between Lyra and the book that is subtly waved around, whenever the unicorn’s magic fluxed.

The book was fairly old looking. It’s covering a very dull and withered red color, and its binding has definitely seen better days. Ever since Bonbon and Lyra started living together, she noticed that Lyra has a collection of books that look similar to the she’s currently holding, all worn out and looking as if they were ready to be thrown away. And yet, Bonbon has noticed that Lyra always keep them in the best condition she could have them in, and is never seen with her muzzle buried in one while she relaxes around the house. Now Bonbon has always wondered what those books the unicorn reads contained, as Lyra always seemed so fascinated by the contents of those books, oppose to whenever the unicorn reads anything other than her own personal collection.

“So Bonbon how was your week without me? anything interesting happen in Ponyville while I was gone?” Lyra said to the candy mare, re-focusing the ponies attention on the pony next to her, instead of the floating book.

“Actually yes, a few things have happened while you were gone.”

“Really? What happened.”

“Well this one night a few days ago, this weird lightshow just, appeared out of nowhere.” Bonbon said and immediately getting Lyra’s full attention.

“All of these golden glowing orbs were just, flying across the sky.”

“Wait! So you saw those to?” Lyra’s remark caused Bonbon to look at the unicorn with astonishment.

“So you saw them as well?”

“Yes.” Lyra said as she carefully stuffed the book into her saddlebags, and then started to rummage around the pack on the back with her magic, before something was pulled out.

“My dad took a picture at those weird lights. Look!” Lyra showed her friend the picture, and true to her word, Bonbon can see the lights soaring through the night air. Or at least blurred pictures, but they were definitely the same lights that occurred over Ponyville.

“Does any pony know what those lights were?” Lyra asked as she stuffed the picture back into her pack.

“So far no pony knows where they came from.” Bonbon replied. “And those light weren’t the only thing that happened in town.”

“What else happened?” Lyra asked, her curiosity peaked after hearing about the lights.

“A few days after those lights showed, Rainbow and a strange creature came falling out the sky, and crashing into Sugarcube Corner!”

“What kind of creature did Rainbow get into a fight with?” Lyra asker her friend.

“I…honestly don’t know. no pony who wasn’t at Sugarcube Corner does, but supposedly its big, was wearing some really tattered clothes—” as Bonbon started to talk about the creature, she saw her friend’s face shift, as if she just remembered something.

“Hey Bonbon, do you mind if we head on over to Sugarcube Corner really quick? I wanna ask the Cakes what the creature looks like.”

“Uh, sure? We can do that.”

The moment that Bonbon even said, sure, Lyra was already galloping down the street towards the Market Square. Quickly following after her friend, Bonbon chased after Lyra as she was genuinely confused, and intrigued on why Lyra seems so, excited. After darting through the crowd of ponies in the market, Bonbon and Lyra were on the homestretch towards the bakery, and the moment that it came in sight Lyra picked up speed. The two mare’s skidded to stop as they closed in the door, just barely not crashing into Derpy as she took off with a basket of muffins in her mouth. The pair apologized to the wall-eyed mare, who just giggled, forgave the both of them, and hoofed each one a muffin before flying off. after the near crashed happened, the two mares entered the shop and the unicorn immediately trotted up to the front counter, where Miss. Cake was standing.

“Hello Lyra, how was your vacation to Baltimare?” the plump blue mare asked the unicorn.

“It was great. But Miss. Cake, I need to ask you something!”

“Oh? And what’s that?” the blue earth pony asked as she gave the mint green unicorn a puzzled looked, which was shared by the creamed coated candy maker. Lyra dug through her saddle bag, pulling out the book she was holding earlier, while asking Miss. Cake a question.

“Bonbon told me that Rainbow Dash came crashing through your roof, with a strange creature?” the pudgy mare nodded as she sighed out.

“Yes she did. And those holes were certainly not easy to fix up, or cheap.” Miss. Cake bemoaned. That’s when Bonbon and Miss. Cake watched Lyra flip through the book she held, before holding it up to the baker.

“Did the creature that crashed through your roof look like, this?!” As Lyra presented the book to the motherly mare, Bonbon tipped-hoofed around her friend, and craned her neck to get a look at what Lyra was asking. The picture that she was assuming Lyra was talking about, depicted of a tall, rather lean built looking creature, standing upright, and wearing very dashing gentle stallion’s clothing.

“Well cinnamon sugar on toast! That is what the creature looked like, minus this style of clothing, and the mustache, but it’s a nearly identical match.” Miss. Cake replied which caused Lyra to snap the book shut, and start muttering to herself, and even trot about in a circle, all in a rather excitable fashion.

“Um, Lyra? Are you, okay?” Bonbon asked hesitantly, not really sure how to act or process what’s going on with her housemate. But instead of answering the cany maker, the unicorn snapped out of her little train of rambling, and looked squarely at Miss. Cake. who flinched at the sudden stare down.

“Miss. Cake do you know where the creature is?”

“Well, huh, last I’ve heard it was at the hospital. But—” Miss. Cake said as she tapped her chin as a thought seemed to have come across her mind. “From rumors going about, especially from those of the hospital staff that come in to get treats, I think it was taken to Canterlot by princess Celestia.”

“Thank you Miss. Cake!”

Almost instantly as if she used a teleportation spell, Lyra vanished out of the bakery with surprising speed. She left so fast that Bonbon was surprised that her friend could hustle that fast. Bidding the confectioner goodbye, Bonbon chased after her friend, who was more than half-way down the street, but thanks to her earth pony strength and speed she was able to catch up with Lyra. Who looked as if she had won the raffle to the paid vacation all over again.

“Lyra what’s going on? Why are you so hyped up on this creature?” Bonbon asked her friend, feeling a little worried, more so out of being out of a loop that Lyra was clearly in.

“I’ll tell you later Bonbon, but first I need to go to Canterlot.”

“Canterlot!” Bonbon echoed while also nearly tripping over her own hooves. “Why do you need to go there?”

“If the princess indeed took this creature to Canterlot, then that’s where I’ll find it.”

Lyra all but increased her speed, and raced through the market, and back towards the station. Even if she doesn’t know why her friend is acting up like this, Bonbon was greatly concerned for her friend. But also, she was genuinely curious about what is going on, and why her friend seemed so dead set on finding this creature. At least this time she will be on a mini-adventure with her friend, and discovering, whatever it is that Lyra is hoping to find.

~~Canterlot~~

A painful groan left Adam’s mouth as he started to stir, his chest throbbing and aching with such pain, it was as if he was struck by a wrecking ball. Aside from his groaning, and the creaks he could hear from his own ribs, the young man heard various knickers, whines, and even loud snorts going about. And as he opened his eyes he was greeted with a familiar sight, the roof of a hospital, and being laid out on a bed. the veritable equine noises stopped before the sound of hooves started clicking against the ground, and when the young man turned his head to look who was coming towards him, he saw Celestia quickly trotting up to him with a extremely worried look etched onto her face. there were a few other ponies in the room aside the princess, including the dark blue alicorn that attacked him.

“Adam! Are you alright?!” the worried looking princess asked as she stood by the bedside, blocking Adam’s view of the other ponies.

Adam tried to say something, but it felt like his voice was caught in his throat. So instead, he gestured to his throat that something was wrong. The princess then turned to look behind her, and gave a few whinnies and a snort, before stepping to the side and allowing one of the smaller white unicorns to trot up to the bed. the mare then ignited her horn, and produced a faint light and slowly swept it across Adam’s body, and when it reached his chest the light stopped. The pony then developed a very deep pondering expression, before turning to look up to the princess, where she knickered and clicked her tongue, and the princess developed and even greater worried look. That’s when Adam felt like he was trouble breathing, and started to gasp for air, but seemed unable to do so. But then a warm sensation quickly wafted over him, easing his tension and growing fear, then with one loud gasp Adam was able to finally get a breath a fresh air. Which was followed by a series of coughs.

“Adam can you breath properly now!” Celestia quickly asked.

“Y-yeah.” Adam staggered as he tried to steady his breathing. “I…I think I c-can breath now.” The unicorn again swept her light spell over Adam, stopping at his chest, and developing the same deep concentrated look. Before easing to a more relaxed expression. The mare then spoke to Celestia who developed a small smile.

“Doctor Hindsight says your chest cavity is no longer compacted, thanks to the healing spell I just used.”

“Oh, good, then I won’t suffocate then.” Adam half-hardly joked.

“I swear, I’ll never understand how you humans can act like this, even when you are in such a state.” Celestia said as she shook her head. Adam chuckled as he imagined the other humans giving her the same, or close enough, response if they were in the same state he was in. but his little moment of sarcastic mirth ended when he saw the blue alicorn come close to the bed.

“Oh no! you missy—” Adam growled as he pointed at the mare, who looked startled at the sudden gesture. “You stay the fuck away from me! you nearly caved in my chest, so you go back to your little corner over there! go on, get!”

The mare didn’t budge from her position and just looked confused, that is until Celestia turned to her and spoke in equine to her, which caused the other winged unicorn to look greatly ashamed. She then looked at Adam and started to speak, but Adam just waved a hand.

“Nah-uh, I don’t care what you’re going to try and say missy, you could’ve blown a hole through me.”

“Adam I know what she did was greatly uncalled for, and I’ve already scolded her, greatly, for that.” Celestia said as she glanced over to the smaller alicorn, who just looked to the side with a guilty look on her face. “She wants to make amends and apologize probably for what she has done.” Adam tried to find, or think of something to say, but the still aching throb in his chest, and through out his entire body, stopped him from arguing.

“Fine! I’ll let it slide, BUT just this ONCE! If she tries something like that again—”

“I understand Adam, and thank you.” Celestia said graciously to the young man as she bowed her head, before turning towards the other alicorn and again speaking in equine. The blue mare looked over to Adam, and gave a small smile and a thankful look, while also whinnying quietly.

“Now Adam I must leave you as I have to get back to my duties, but don’t worry doctor Hindsight and her assistant will be here to continue healing you. but first.”

Celestia then started to generate magic around her horn, before a sphere of magic with what looked like rings of letter started to swarm around it, formed near the tip of the alicorn’s horn. The alicorn then gently tapped the sphere with her horn, causing the sphere to float over to Adam. The sensation of the sphere encapsulating around his head caused a rather itchy, yet also pleasing sensation that pulsed around his head, even causing his nose to twitch, and nearly having him sneeze. Once the sphere was placed around the young man’s head, it started to disappear till it looked like it wasn’t even there.

“Ugh Celestia, what did you just do?” Adam asked as he looked at the mare with a confused look. Not noticing that the other ponies in the room were also having the same confused, yet baffled looks they have on their faces.

“I placed a translation matrix enchantment on you Adam, now will be able to understand Ponish, and any pony will be understand English.” Celestia explained to Adam as the magic around her horn dimmed out.

“I should’ve done this sooner, but I was more focused on your treatment, and ensure that you were okay with your situation that it slipped my mind.”

“Well, that could’ve been handy earlier.” Adam joked as he rested back into his bed. “At least I can avoid more misunderstandings that end up with me in the hospital.”

Celestia agreed as she bid the young man a goodbye for now, and gestured to the smaller alicorn to follow her. who did so after glancing over to Adam. Once the two alicorns left the room, the doctor, who was a little nervous now that the alicorns weren’t in the room was a little skittish. But a few comforting remarks from Adam, and the unicorn calmed her own rattled nerves, and continued with Adam’s treatment.

~~Unknown~~

In some part of the city of Canterlot, in a dark alleyway, a figure was skulking through the shadows. The figure continued to move about the shadows of the building, staying out of the line of sight of the main street.

Eventually the shadowy being reached the edge of the city that was directly out front of the castle, and as their eyes scanned the area to ensure that no pony was looking, the figure quickly darted to the walls of the castle, and followed it to the southern end of the structure. Where a door down a short flight of stairs stood, with a sign saying “Catacombs” above its entrance. The figure then entered the catacombs, and started to venture through its corridors, mapping out every nook, cranny, and pathway. After spending an hour or so within the catacombs, the figure found a large cavern down in the old crystal mines of the city, one that was covered in crystals.

“This place should do for a make-shift cage.” The figure muttered to herself as her eyes scanned the cavern.

“But the real question is, how am I going to be able to switch places with that little snooty princess?” the figure then left the cavern and started to trot about the mines, making her way back into the catacombs, and back to the surface. “The preparations for the wedding will be taking place soon, if I don’t find a way to capture Cadence, and take her place, then this plan of mine would be for not.”

The figure continued to trot about through the dank underground network, before eventually returning to the surface. Arching up just a little bit of her head, the figure scanned the area, and her eyes nearly popped out of her head. the individual of her desire, the focal point of her entire plan was just trotting about a few feet from her position.

“Looks like Shinning Armor is going to be late again.” Cadence said to herself as she gives a small sigh.

“Well, with the preparations, and getting everything set up, I can’t blame him.” the figure quickly developed a devilish smile before their body was engulfed in sparks of green fire, and their form had changed to that of the Royal Guards captain. Stepping up from the catacombs entrance the disguised induvial trotted up to Cadence, who upon seeing the figure smiled widely.

“Shinning! It’s about time you showed up, I thought I’d be waiting for an hour.” The pink alicorn mused as she nuzzled up to the disguised figure, who nuzzled back.”

“Yeah sorry about that Cadence, but don’t worry…” the stallion said as a smirk graced his muzzle, and his eyes flashed green for a brief moment. “I’m all yours for the rest of the day.”

Chapter 7: Lyra Finally Meet's Her First Human

It’s been about hour or so minutes since both Lyra and Bonbon boarded a train, and were now on course to Canterlot, where Lyra hopes to find the creature that appeared in Ponyville. as for Bonbon, she was just curious as to why her friend is so adamant on finding this creature, the candy maker is also curious on why the creature was also depicted in the book that Lyra was holding. In fact, Bonbon has been wondering about said book that the unicorn was holding, and is currently reading with an excited look on her face, the candy mare was starting to wander just what kind of books they are. Especially since the one that Lyra is muzzle deep in at the moment, has a picture of the creature that the two of them are going to try and find.

“So Lyra, can I ask you a question?” Bonbon said, breaking the silence of the car that the two mares were occupying.

“Sure.” Lyra replied quickly as she dogged-ear the page she was reading, before closing the book. “What is it that you want to know Bonbon?”

“Well its mostly revolved around this creature that we’re going to try and see.” Bonbon stated as the train entered the tunnel that passes through the mountain. “You know what this thing is don’t you?” Lyra nodded her head slightly as she lifted the book up.

“The creature that Miss. Cake said that looked like the one in my book is what called a human. a creature that is so rare, and mysterious, that there are only a hoof full of books that even describes what they are, what their culture is like. and thanks to my dad working in the royal archives, I have the only six books that are written about them.” Lyra then gave a little chortle as she places the book in her lap.

“Honestly, I just thought that humans were just made up, creatures from myth and legends. But now there is an actual human in Equestria!” Lyra said very excitedly. “If I can meet it then I can have all the questions about humans I’ve had for years, finally be answered!”

“But Lyra how are you going to see the creature?” Bonbon questioned. “I mean, surely the princess has something as rare, and largely unknown to common ponies locked away. Right?”

“Probably. But I should be able to get into the castle easily, after all my dad does work in the castles archive. So a lot of the guards already know me.”

“I suppose that could work, but still. I’m sure princess Celestia has the human under lock and key.”

“…yeah, that could be a problem…” Lyra then developed a very thoughtful look, seemingly thinking of a plan to figure out how to see the creature.

“Lyra whatever it is your thinking of doing, please don’t try to do anything illegal, or get you in trouble.”

“Don’t worry Bonbon I won’t. you know, if your so worried about all of this, then I didn’t stay in Ponyville?”

“Well for one I am worried that you could get in a little over your head, especially when you get excited about something. Also, I’m also kind of curious about what this human is like.”

Lyra seemed very happy that her friend was showing signs of interest in humans. probably not as strongly as her fascination with the mysterious species, but it was good to see her friend genuinely interested. As Lyra was still trying to figure out how to actually see the human, Bonbon asked if she could read the book that Lyra had, just so she can get some idea on what humans are like, the train finally left the tunnel. Once the train was out of the tunnel both mares saw that they were now very close to Canterlot, and as the train got closer and closer to the capital city, Lyra and Bonbon couldn’t wait to see this mysterious creature of legend. And see what it is like.

~~Canterlot Castle~~

“Miss I told you I’m fine in scrubbing myself down.”

Adam argued for the sixth time with the doctor pony, Hindsight, who after finishing treating the humans chest so that it was back to normal, decided to give the human a quick little wash down. Which Adam at first was all for it, as he hasn’t had a bath or shower in four days, so getting somewhat cleaned was a going to be a godsend to the young man, that is until the unicorn insisted that she washed Adam down. Now if it was just going to be his back, chest and arms, Adam would’ve had no problem, however the Hindsight said she was going to give the young man a, full body wash. Naturally, Adam wasn’t keen on letting others see him in a, compromising manner, specially since he was naked in the bed he was laying in. when Adam noticed that he was naked he asked where his clothes were, the doctor informed him that his clothes were removed by the princess, and sent to a reliable tailor to have them fixed and cleaned.

“And as I told you Mr. Adam, as your doctor it’s my responsibility to look after you. princess Celestia instructed me to make sure that your taken care of.” Hindsight said as she parked the trolly cart with the large bowl of hot looking water, and a few towels, and a small clear bottle of something.

“I don’t think washing me down personally is what the princess had in mind.” Adam retorted as he quickly snatched the towel out of the unicorns magical grasp. Or at least that’s what he planned, but the doctor had a pretty tight grasp on that towel.

“Mr. Adam if your worried about any misconduct on my part, you needn’t worry. I take my position as a castle physician very seriously.”

The mare said in a confident tone as she started to get the towel wet, ringing it off any excess water before raising it towards the human. Seeing no way out of this situation, and coming to the conclusion that the unicorn was probably not going to budge in her, duties, the young man conceded. And sat straight in the bed, keeping the sheet over his lower section, sitting crossed legged, and allowed the mare to trot up behind him and start to wash him down. While he was getting washed, and scrubbed down, Adam started to wonder on what his next move should be. Since Celestia said that there is no way home, or even to where, or when in Earth’s time line he was suddenly plucked from, and was stuck in alternate reality of talking ponies.

But as he thought about what he should do next, Adam gave out a bemoaning sigh as he slouched slightly. Thinking on how his apartment was going to be sold off, not to mention the hundreds of dollars of his personal items. Like his flatscreen, his entire computer set-up, gaming consoles, bed, couch, and everything else that he bought with his own cold hard cash. That’s when his thoughts jumped to his work place! He’s spent three years working hard at his job, and he even just gotten a raise! And now that he was in this other world, he was undoubtedly going to be fired. But that was pretty much water under the bridge now, as he can’t really do anything about his current situation. He was also starting to feel a little depressed. If he was truly stuck in this world, his family will undoubtedly think that he just, upped up and died.

“Mr. Adam?” the voice of Hindsight caused Adam to snap out of his little train of thought, and when he looked to where the mare was, which was by his left, he saw that she looked somewhat concerned.

“Are you alright, you seem distraught about something.” Adam gave a small sigh as he nodded his head.

“I just realized that I’m not going to be able to go home. and just realized that, my family, friends, won’t even know what happened to me.” Adam then leaned back a bit, keeping himself propped up with his arms.

“Twenty four years of my life is basically swept away, and now I basically have to start from square one in this world.” the doctor placed a hoof on Adam’s thigh and gave it a comforting pat, while giving the young man a reassuring smile.

“I know that things may be rocky at first, but I’m sure that once you get used to how things in Equestria work, you’ll find your place in it.” Adam gave the mare a thankful smile as he sat back up.

“Thanks doc.”

The mare continued to give the human a smile as she nodded before going back to her washing duty. However the mare was stopped when her hoof accidently dragged the sheet off of Adam’s leg, and revealing the young man’s genitals to the mare for brief moment, before Adam quickly grabbed the sheet and pulled it back up. looking towards the doctor Adam saw that the unicorn had a small blush on her muzzle, but the look of shock on her face showed that she was, definitely not expecting to see that. And yet, Adam could see the vaguest look of, intrigue, or was it more like curiosity, in the mare’s eyes.

“Sorry.” Both said at the same time.

“I didn’t mean to drag the sheet off Mr. Adam. Honest!” Hindsight said quickly.

“I know!” Adam said as he started to tie the sheet around his waist. “This is pretty much why I wanted to wash myself, so that I can spare us this awkward moment.”

“I see your point.” The mare said as she tried to get the blush off her muzzle. “I just wasn’t expecting to see you, semi-erect.”

“Wait? Erect?” Adam said in confusion. “What do you mean by erect?”

“Well…your, member, was out of its sheath.” That’s when Adam seemed to have realized what the mare meant, and quickly went about correcting and misunderstanding.

“Whoa now there’s something I should explain Hindsight. Human’s like me don’t have sheath’s for our, member. There always out and about, that’s why we keep our bodies covered up with clothes.” Adam said to the mare, who finally got rid of her blush, and seemed to have gained some form of understanding.

“Oh, I see. So its not due to some form of, arousal?”

“No. so if you don’t mind, can I please wash the rest of myself down, just so we don’t have any more of these accidents.”

Hindsight nodded her head and offered the towel to Adam, she then explained that the bottle next to the bowl of still hot water was soap, and showed that all Adam had to do was add a little to the towel to keep it’s cleansing properties. After taking the towel, Adam started to rub down his face, chest, arms, and eventually his lower body. After he watched Hindsight leave the room. lasting thing he wanted to do was expose the mare to his backward facing moon, and make the situation even more awkward.

~~~~~

Bonbon was just following Lyra as the both of them were wandering through the halls of Canterlot Castle. But as she was following her friend, the cany maker was just looking around at the interior of the castle, virtually awestruck by the sheer beauty and wonder that the castle has. When the pair made it to the city, they immediately made their way to the castle, and just like Lyra said on the train the guards simply allowed the mare and Bonbon entrance. Allowing the two of them to simply walk in, and just start wandering around the castle, one of the guards even told them that there is supposedly some strange creature in the castle’s medical wing. Word of its appearance has quickly spread through the castle when it was brought to the wing, but none of the guards actually know what it actually looks like. but Lyra and Bonbon already knew, and they were currently making their way towards the medical wing.

“I’m actually surprised that the guards are just letting us walk around.” Bonbon remarked as she continued to follow her friend, a little confused as to why the guards are so, lenient.

“You’ll be surprised how much the guards are totally chill, and laid back.” Lyra said as the two mares starting climbing a small flight of stairs.

“Whenever the princess, nobles, or ponies of great importance aren’t around, they are very laid back and not as stoic as we saw when Celestia came to town for that little tea party.”

“Huh. I guess I was expecting them to be more, harden. Or more resolute.” Bonbon said.

“From what I know the captain does make sure the guard is in tip-top form, but he doesn’t seem to really crack down on the guard. He just let’s them do whatever they want, and expects them to act like guards when they are sent out on missions.”

“I see.”

“We’re here!” Lyra exclaimed as she and Bonbon saw the little medical cross sign on the wings archway.

“So now what? Are we just going to go in.”

“…I…honestly, I don’t know.” Lyra said in a nervous fashion, trotting in place like a scared filly. “I was just so excited to actually get to meet and see a human, that I…I’m not sure how to approach it!” Bonbon quickly placed a hoof onto Lyra’s shoulder, trying to calm her friend down before she freaks out even more.

“Easy Lyra, calm down.” Bonbon said in a calming manner. “Take in a deep breath, and breath.” The unicorn did as her friend suggested and started to take in slow, and steady breathes.

“Thanks Bonbon.”

“No problem Lyra.”

“Oh, hello there.” a sudden voice caught the two mares off guard, and caused the both of them to jump a little. After getting a little scare the two friends turned to look behind them, and the two friends instantly dropped to the ground to bow before princess Celestia.

“Forgive us princess we didn’t know we were in your way!” Lyra said as she kept her head bowed.

“Nonsense my little ponies, you two are not blocking my path, now please rise.” Both earth pony and unicorn did as the princess told them, and when they were both standing up, and looking up towards the princess, the alicorn looked down at the two of them with a small smile.

“So, what brings the two of you here today? Especially you Miss. Heartstrings, is there a concert that the orchestra is performing that I’m not aware of?”

“N-no your majesty. I’m here for a personal reason, and my friend here is accompanying.” Lyra clarified as she looks up to the alicorn.

“If I may ask, what is this personal reason of yours.”

“Of course not your majesty. The reason we’re here is to, well…we, or more accurately I wanted to see the human that was spotted in Ponyville. and when I heard it was brought to the castle, I sort of just came here, and well…” the unicorn trailed off as she looked behind her towards the medical wings entrance. But when she looked back to the princess, Lyra noticed that princess Celestia was looking at her with a little bit of curiosity.

“Miss. Heartstring, how do you know of humans?” the princess asked the smaller pony.

“No pony in this day in age should know about them.” to answer the princess’s question Lyra pulled the book she was carrying from her saddlebag, and presented it to the alicorn. Who actually looked shocked.

“So that’s where the old books my old friends went.” Celestia said as she looked from the book to Lyra. “It was your father, Scripture that gave them to you.” Lyra nodded her head.

“He gave them to me when I was just a filly. He said that he found them in an old crate, and that they were probably going to be destroyed by his predecessor. So he just gave them to me, thinking that they were just old fairy tales.”

“I see.” A small thankful smile then graced the princesses lips. “At least the records of my old friends have not been fully lost. Or unappreciated.” The alicorn then trotted around the two smaller mares, heading towards the entrance to the medical wing, but stopped and turned to look at Lyra and Bonbon.

“Well Miss. Lyra, and Miss. …”

“Bonbon! Your majesty!”

“Bonbon. How would you two like to meet the latest human to arrive in Equestria?”

Both mares looked at each with giddy smiles, like little fillies about to get their Hearths Warming present early. Both ponies trotted up to princess, and then followed her into the medical wing, however after the three ponies even took a step in the wing Lyra and Bonbon’s vision was obscured by the princess’s wing. Which was followed by a started ‘eep’ from the princess, and a rather loud yelp from somewhere in the room.

“Sorry Adam we didn’t mean to come in while you were—” the unicorn and earth pony heard the princess say before clearing her throat. “Cleaning yourself.”

“Well I guess that’s to be expected, since I’m naked, and don’t have access to an actual shower.” a male voice said while the sound of something ruffling could be heard alongside it.

“Alright you can look now I’ve made myself, well, as decent as a sheet can be used.” The princess retracted her wing, and what Lyra and Bonbon saw the human near the end of the room, with a bed sheet wrapped around its body. “I feel like I’m wearing a toga. I can’t wait to get my actual clothes back.”

“Actually that is why I’m here.” The princess said, causing the two ponies—and the human—to look over to the princess and noticed the package she was carrying. “Fancy Pants was able to get them washed, and fixed rather quickly.”

“Oh thank god!”

The human said as he literally jumped over the bed, which surprised both Lyra and Bonbon in his dexterity, and jogged over to the princess. Who just levitated the package to the human, while carrying an amused expression on her face. just as the human took hold of the package, both Lyra’s and Bonbon’s vision was once again obscured by the princess’s wing. Before they could question why the princess is doing this, they both heard rushed, and even frantic movements going on. As well as some hushed grunting.

“That feels so much better.” The voice of the human said, which seemed to signal the princess to retract her wing again. And once it was, both Lyra and Bonbon now saw that the human was fully clothed, and seemed to be wiping, rubbing, and straightening any creases out of his clothes.

“I’m glad to see that your happy Adam.” Princess Celestia said before gesturing down to the two mares off to her side.

“And I have some ponies that wish to meet you.” the human looked down to the two ponies and gave them a rather normal smile. Nothing substantial, or special, just a pleasant smile. But it was enough to make a big smile grow across Lyra’s face, while Bonbon just developed an amazed look.

“Hi.” The human, Adam as the princess addressed him, said as he turned to fully face the two ponies. Which Lyra quickly stepped up to the human, hopped up onto her back legs and outstretched her right foreleg, all the while looking up to the human with sparkles in her eyes.

“Hi there! my name is Lyra Heartstrings, and it’s a pleasure to finally meet a human in person!” the human just smiled back and took her hoof into his hand before shaking it.

"Well Lyra, it's nice to meet you as well."

Author's Note

Well. looks like Lyra finally get's to meet the first human in her life, hopefully Adam isn't driven mad by her. or has to issue some kind of warrant.

Chapter 8: Secrets of the Past Revealed Pt. 2

Twilight Sparkle and her friends were all currently making their way towards Canterlot castle, where they were on their way to meet up with princess Celestia. Earlier today Twilight received a letter from the princess, which was rather short and not overlay clear on what was going on. The only thing that the note specified was that Twilight bring her friends to Canterlot, so that she could discuss and explain somethings that only she knows. So the unicorn did as her mentor instructed, and went about to gather all of her friends and boarded the next train to Canterlot.

“So Twilight, any idea why the princess wanted to meet with us so urgently?” Applejack asked her violet friend as she, and the other five mares trotted past the front gates of the castle, and started to enter the main lobby.

“I have a strong hunch it’s about the creature she brought to the castle.” Twilight replied to her farmer friend, which was followed quickly by a scoff. The group in unison turned to look at the source of the scoff, and found the cyan pegasus of the group, Rainbow Dash, still having frown on her face as trudges behind the group.

“Rainbow Dash don’t tell me your still upset about that tussle you and that, creature, had and how you lost.” Rarity said to the mare, which quickly got a rebuke from the pegasus in a defensive manner.

“I didn’t lose!” Rainbow growled as she looked up from the ground and towards her white coated friend.

“It just pulled a trick on me, and forced a draw.”

“Oh for Pete’s sake RD! Get. Over. It!” Applejack grunted in annoyance as she looked over to her friend, stopping the groups advancement into the castle.

“Ever since you got out of that dang hospital, you’ve been bellyaching on how you could’ve beaten that thing, and how you could’ve done so, if it didn’t do whatever it did!” the farmer said in a clearly annoyed tone as the pegasus’s attitude was weighing on her.

“The princess even said that it’s not dangerous.”

“And how do we know for sure.” Rainbow retorted as she hovered over to Applejack, and actually started to question with the princess was right about her notion of the creature.

“What if it’s just playing, nice, so it can lull us into a false sense of security, and then spring on us when we least expect it!” the pegasus emphasized as she leapt into the air. “After all we don’t even know what this thing is.”

“Rainbow I’m sure the princess has everything under control, and I doubt its much of a threat to her, or Luna.”

“Twilight is right. besides, I don’t think that thing is dangerous, who knows it could be a good pony!” Pinkie said with a level of optimism as she bounces in the center of the group.

Twilight nodded to Pinkie’s optimism, and continued trotting through the halls of the castle, up a flight of stairs, and making the last lengthy stretch of hall that leads to the throne room. with Rainbow Dash still pouting and grumbling as she flies above the others. Upon reaching the large doors the mares greeted the guards who stood watch, the duo then used their magic to open the door so the group could trot in, thanking the guards the six ponies made their way into the throne room. upon entering the room the group found the princess, with Luna sitting by her side in her own throne, talking with a dapper looking noble pony wearing a fancy red suit. They seem to be in the midst of an important talk, but Twilight noticed that Celestia spotted her and her friends, and when the violet unicorn waved to her teacher, Celestia gave a small wave back but then quickly gestured for the six ponies to wait off to the side until the meeting was over. The six ponies did so and patiently sat down near the door till the meeting was over.

“—As I was saying your majesty, I think it would be best to renovate the southern district of Prince’s Ward, that way we can make way for new businesses which will increase Canterlot’s trade ventures with other cities, and nations across the world.” the stallion said as he looked up to the two royals.

“While that does sound like a promising idea Mr. Tulip, the southern district of Prince’s Ward is a community district. Where the more less fortunate ponies reside. If we renovate that district then we would be evicting hundreds of families.” Celestia then rolled up the document that she was levitating in front of her, and floated back over to the noble stallion.

“I’m afraid I can’t sanction this proposal.”

“I, understand your majesty.” The stallion said in a somewhat disappointed tone as he took the document, and placed it under his wing.

“I will relay your decision to my fellow members of the Traders Guild.”

The pegasus bowed his head before turning around and leaving the throne room, while muttering something to himself that Twilight, nor none of her friends could quite hear. But by the look of mild frustration on his face, it probably wasn’t anything nice. As the stallion left the room Twilight and the others approached the two thrones, where they could hear the two princesses talking to each other.

“Lately sister it seems that some of the noble factions are getting more concerned with their own coin purses, and expanding their influence than the well-being of their fellow Equestrians, regardless of status and class.” The group heard Luna say with a bit of a saddened and disappointed tone.

“Yes. It would appear that way.” Celestia said as she used a wing to rub her brow. She then turned to look at Twilight and her friends, a small smile appearing on her muzzle as she looks at the group.

“I’m glad you all could make it.”

“Of course princess, but we’re all a little confused on why you asked us to come here. Your letter didn’t give an exact answer.” Twilight said to the princess who got up from her throne, and made her way down to the group with Luna following behind her.

“The reason why I have called you all here, is to shine some light on the creature that came to Ponyville.”

The six ponies muttered to themselves as the princesses trot past them and made their way to the door. The six mares quickly trotted after the two alicorns, who upon leaving the throne room started to make their way down a side corridor. The group relatively traveled in silence, mostly because each of the ponies were wondering what is it that they were going to learn, especially Twilight. The unicorn was extremely excited about finally learning about what this thing is, and have all the questions she’s been holding onto finally be answered. And who knows, maybe answers to questions that she hasn’t even thought of. Fifteen minutes of trotting later, the group have made their way to the guest quarters. They continued to trot down the hallway until they reached the mid-way of the hall, where they stopped as Celestia knocked on the door they all stood in front of.

“Doors open!”

A voice, like a young stallion, called out from the other side of the door. With permission granted to the group they all entered the room, Celestia going first with Twilight and her friends following afterwards, and when the group trotted into the room they were surprised at what they found. In the room near the back where the bed was, the six ponies found the strange hairless creature doing push-ups, but as it does so the group could hear faint wincing sounds, as if the creature was in some kind of pain. That’s when they all remembered .

“Fifty!” the creature said as he gives himself a big push up, and landing on his backside. The creature then wiped his forehead before turning to look at the group, an inquisitive expression on its face.

“Celestia I thought you wanted to limit my interaction with others until your certain that you can trust me.”

“Oh don’t worry Adam I am. However these six ponies will be an exception to the rule.”

Celestia informed the creature as she made her way to the front of the group, and started to introduce Twilight and her friends. but when the princess got to introducing Rainbow Dash, both the pegasus and the creature just glared at each other, which the princess was able to notice immediately and went to lessen hostilities before someone said or did something regrettable.

“I know that you two didn’t meet under the best of circumstance, but I ask you both to forgive one another and try to get along.” Rainbow Dash’s response just a small snort to the princess’s request, while the creature just gives a half-hearted sigh before answer.

“Fine. I’ll play nice, so long as no one tries to attack me for no reason.” Again, Rainbow Dash just snorted at the creature, but this time flaring her wings before to spoke up.

“As long as you don’t try anything that will hurt my friends.” Even if the conversation between the two was anything but pleasant, the princess was happy to hear that they came to some kind of agreement.

“Well now that introductions are over, Adam I would like for you to join us.”

“Join you for what?” the creature, Adam as he was called, asked the alicorn as he got up from his sitting position, and showing Twilight and her friends just how tall he was! Clearly showing that he was the same height as the princess.

“I’ll be explaining on who and what you are to not only my sister, but to my student and her friends, and show them a bit of forgotten history.”

Adam shrugged his shoulders and complied with following the group to wherever it is Celestia planned to take them. after the creature had placed some socks and shoes on his feet, which Twilight found odd, the group left the room and began making their way down a hall. While the group walked about and followed Celestia and Luna, Twilight would occasionally glance over at the creature and taking the opportunity to give it a once over, but as she does so she noticed that the creature was giving her a questioning look.

“You need something little lady?” the creature asked.

“Oh, ugh no, I was—I was just wandering just what you are. It’s just that I’ve never seen or read anything that looks just like you.”

“Don’t worry Twilight you’ll get an answer to your questions soon.”

Celestia said as the group makes their way up a small flight of stairs, and continued to make their way through another hallway. But this venture was shorter than the previous one, as the group reached a pair of double doors that look rather old, like they are rarely used. Celestia then opened the doors with her magic, the hinges creaking with a rustic ‘creak’ as they slowly open up. once the doors were open the group then entered the room, and when they did Twilight was surprised at seeing marble statues of creatures that look somewhat like Adam, but they had their distinct features and own clothing styles.

“Princess. What is this?” Fluttershy asked as she trots about and looks at the statues.

“This is my Room of Remembrance. Here, this is where monuments of old friends and companions of mine, from another world are memorialized.”

“So there were more of these creatures?” Rarity asked as she looked towards the princess who nodded and then trotted over to Adam who stood by one of the statues.

“Correct Rarity. For the duration of Luna’s banishment each of these creatures, which are called humans, have been coming to Equestria by unknown means every hundred or so years.”

“But why?” Applejack questioned.

“I unfortunately don’t know. and none of the humans, including Adam here, know why they were being brought to our world.” Celestia said in a somber tone as she looks to the statues.

“But despite how they came to our world, these humans have helped me not only make Equestria in what it is today, as well as help me through my hard times.”

“So they were your friends.” Pinkie asked as she hopped about, clearly enjoying the sentimental vibes in the room.

“Indeed Pinkie, some were more than friends.” Celestia said as she looks between some of the statues with a clear expression of love. And the group seemed to catch on what the princess had just implied, and some of them were actually surprised. Luna and Adam most of all.

“But princess if these humans were so close to you as you say, then why aren’t they more well known.” Twilight questioned as she looked away from the statues and towards her mentor.

“I’m afraid the reason why the humans are not known, is because everything that they each accomplished were re-written by ponies to make it seem like it was a pony who did their deeds. Instead of them.” Celestia said with dismay in her voice, as well as a little disappointment. “Like how the legends say that a mare named Ebony Rouge was the first great designer of fashion in Canterlot.”

“I know here!” Rarity spoke up. “Ebony Rouge was the forerunner and the one who created the modern day fashion industry.”

“Indeed that is how modern ponies think is fact, but in reality, its because of her.” Celestia gestured to a statue that Luna was standing in front of, which the whole group looked over to. “Her name was Abigail Inglehart, and she spent a lot of time studying what ponies back then considered fashion, and how she could incorporate her worlds own styles of clothing for ponies and vice versa. And she went by an alias known as…Ebony Rouge to make it more marketable to ponies.”

“B-but…there were pictures of Ebony—”

“A stand in. A pony that was Abigail’s assistant, who took her name and ideas when Abigail died of cancer.” The room went silent after learning this, and it seemed to have hit Rarity really hard.

“Each of these humans had a pony took their place of their accomplishments, mostly ponies in Canterlot as they lived in the castle with me, and after only a decade of so when they did pass…no pony even remembered them. Or that they even existed.” The princess sounded really heart broken about this fact and visibly slouched but her sister quickly comforted her by nuzzle up to her, trying to lift the older alicorns spirit.

“After the fourth human had arrived in Equestria, I commissioned scribes to write down all of the deeds and achievements, so that once they passed the real owners of the advancements in Equestrian society would be remembered and praised for what they did, instead of being imposture or erased. But even then the scribes could only write down so many books that none were rarely taken.” As the princess spoke Rainbow Dash noticed four other statues on the other side of the room, and when she went over to inspect them, they were not as well taken care of than the others.

“What about these ones princess.” The pegasus asked as she directed everyone’s attention to the neglected statues.

“…those…are the ones that took my kindness, and affection, and used it to blindside me to their evil deeds.” The princess said as she gives them a not so menacing glare.

“The Storm King. The Black Dragon of Hate. The Usurper. And finally the Necroshade. These four humans abused their connection towards me, and the power they acquired when they came to Equestria, and nearly brought the nation to its knees several times.”

“Wait a minute!” Twilight said as she looked towards the princess, a terrorfied expression written on her face. “T-These are the names of some of Equestria’s most dangerous villains! One of them was recorded to have almost killed you in the history books!”

“WHAT!”

the group as a whole said in unison, Luna’s cry more boisterous because of the royal Canterlot voice. Celestia only nodded to what Twilight had just said. The princess then used her magic to remove her gilded neck piece, and once it was removed the ponies plus Adam saw a huge scar across the base of her neck! Twilight has never known about this scar, even the stories she’s read about these evil forces never shed light on this. Celestia then put her neck piece back on, adjusting it so that it fitted comfortably.

“And so my little ponies that is a little bit of lost history, and look into these humans that were brought to Equestria.”

“So what will happen to Adam now?” Pinkie asked as she looked at the human who had made his way to the princess, and was giving her a pat on the back.

“For the time being he will live here in the castle, where I will help him adjust to life and the ways of Equestria.” Celestia said before she developed a look of realization.

“By the way Adam I just remembered about having you look over some artifacts recently found.”

“You mean those strange objects that we, and the guards have found?” Twilight asked the princess who nodded.

“That’s right. you wanted me to look them over, and see if they were like the ones I had on me.”

“That’s right, give me a moment I’ll be right back.”

The princess then vanished from the room in a flash of light, but the alicorn was not gone for to long as she returned to the chamber a minute later. And with her she had the four artifacts that the ponies had so far discovered.

“These are the other artifacts that I was talking about Adam, are they like the ones you own?”

“That’s the Monkey Staff! and the Helmet of Jong. And this is the Longi Kite”

“So you do know what these are?” Luna asked as she, and the other mares gathered around.

“Yeah. They are all like my own shen gong wu.”

“Seriously. This thing is simply called the Monkey Staff?” Rainbow Dash snickered. “Not exactly the most unique name.”

“Rainbow!” Rarity said to her friend who just shrugged her shoulders.

“So what do these uh, shing ong uu, do?” Fluttershy asked as she looked at the artifact.

“Shen gong wu. And these are tools that a monk created in order to stop a powerful witch of dark magic, who tried to turn the entire world in her image.” Adam said as he held the staff in his hand.

“And each of these tools has its own magical ability.”

“And what does the Monkey Staff do?” Twilight asked the human.

“Watch.”

Adam then took a step back from the group, and after simply saying the staff’s name, the ponies watched as his ears and facial features changed into a more monkey like appearance! They then watches the humans hands and feet changed to look like a monkey’s, and his posture becomes almost like one. And the final touch was long furry tail coiling out from behind him. once the semi-transformation was over, Adam then started to flip around the ponies, demonstrating an incredible skill in athletic agility and gymnastics. All of the ponies were surprised to see the human just effortlessly flip around them, and swing around the statues before landing back where he started but was using the staff to support his entire body.

“As you can see, by invoking the power of the Monkey Staff anyone can acquire the physical capabilities of a monkey, so long as they hold the staff.”

the ponies then gathered around him and started to ask various questions about the other facts, and what they were capable of. To demonstrate the other artifacts Adam showed that when he put the dragon kite on, he was able to fly around like a pegasus. when he finished with the kite he then placed the helmet on, but it was placed on backwards however Adam said that is how it was supposed to be put on, then he then showed that the helmet allowed the wearer to see things behind him. by acting as a second pair of eyes.

“So any pony can use these things just by saying their names?” Rainbow Dash asked as she held the Monkey Staff in her forelegs.

“That’s right, which is why the monk and his order try to keep them out of the hands of those who would misuse them.” Adam said to the group of ponies.

“Hey Adam, what do these ones do?” Pinkie Pie asked she gestures to the bird statue, and the black snake thing. the human then walked over to the two other shen gong wu’s and then grabbed then, one in each hand before speaking.

“This—” the human said as he presented the bird statue. “Is called the Shadow of Fear, with this shen gong wu you can either look into the mind of someone and see what their greatest fear is, or bring said fear out into the real world.” the ponies all looked rather unsettled by this fact, and started to dread on seeing their own greatest fear, or even have it be brought into real life. The human then held the other shen gong wu out for the ponies.

“And this one. NEVER say its name ever, or even wipe away the black soot covering it.”

“Wait the black stuff is just soot?” Twilight asked as she looked up to the human with a confused look.

“Yes, and trust me, NEVER speak or even touch this shen gong wu.”

“Why?” Luna asked the human.

“Because…this is one of the most dangerous shen gong wu ever, and it’s almost impossible to stop it unless you know its weakness.”

After going over the shen gong wu, and giving explicit warning about the last un-named one, the ponies wanted to give the three ‘safe’ artifacts a try and all of them like them. Pinkie Pie especially loved the one called the Longi Kite, as she was able to zip around and prove to be quite an adapt flyer. Once the ponies had a chance to give the shen gong wu a try, Celestia teleported back to the treasury vault, before coming back to the group where they Celestia and Adam then started to answer questions that Luna, and the other ponies had about the humans that came before.

But among the questions Adam asked if they are any more shen gong wu that the ponies have found, unfortunately the princesses and the ponies said no but the guards and hired treasure hunters have been sent out to find them as they seemed to be connected to glowing spheres of light. The group continued to talk for a bit longer in the chamber, however the discussions and questions were halted when some of the ponies plus Adam’s stomachs started to grumble. So the group decided to end the talks for now, and went about to go and get something to eat and get to know the human better.

Chapter 9: the Challenges Ahead

A few days have gone by since Adam has meet Twilight and her friends, and for most of that time the young man has spent a lot of time in the castles library so he could study up on Equestria, mostly its history, and basic information about the world and the ponies in general. And with a list made by the princess Adam was able to find the morse helpful books for him to read, another lucky thing that Adam was told was that the translation spell placed on him, also helps in reading non-human languages. But as for today though Adam was taking a break from his studies, as he thinks he has the majority of what to expect of this world already committed to memory. Although he still has the books in his room in case he does need to read up on some things.

At the moment Adam was with princess Celestia and a few of the royal guards, plus a pegasus mare that was supposedly a world famous treasure hunter named Daring Doo. But he cocky attitude, and just general rude behavior towards Adam. Especially when she called him a hairless monkey. But that was beside the point, the reason why Adam and Celestia was meeting the guards and the pegasus mare, was that all of them had a new artifacts which turned out to be new shen gong wu.

“Well done everypony.” Celestia praised as she stood before the four ponies, who looked proud in being able to please their princess.

“You all managed to find four new shen gong wu.”

“Shen what?” one of the guards, a young looking unicorn said with confusion.

“The artifacts that I’ve sent you out to look for are known shen gong wu, ancient tools created to fight back against evil.” Celestia said before looking over to Adam.

“Would you be kind enough Adam to identify the new artifacts.”

The young man nodded and started with the earth pony mare on the far right, and took the small shield looking thing and started to study it. a moment later a smile graced his face before he gave the shield a small shake, which caused a pair of large metallic wings to spread out, surprising ponies as they marveled at the artifact.

“Looks like you found the Wings of Tinabi.”

“And what do these ‘wings’ do?” Daring Do asked as she looked very intrigued as she continues to stare at the artifact.

“Basically with these wings you can fly.”

To demonstrate this Adam announced the artifacts name, then a second later the young man was floating above the ground, before he took of flying through the large chamber the group was in. And as he flew around a rainbow trail followed in behind him. While Adam flew around the room, all of the ponies were honestly really surprised to see what was going on in front of them. Eventually Adam landed after a solid minute of flying around, Adam then offered the mare the artifact to give it a try, and while the earth pony was hesitant at first she took the wings and seemed to love the ability to fly around. Once the mare was done with flying around she landed back down, and gave the shen gong wu to Celestia, while Adam continued to identify the other artifacts.

The next artifact that the young man check was held by an older pegasus stallion, and was just a simple golden coin with some red markings. The young man quickly identified the coin as something called, the Mantis Flip Coin, which could make whoever holds it to make incredible jumps. Now to the ponies had to see what this artifact does, and Adam seemed more than happy to demonstrate, although when he used the shen gong wu he nearly smacked right into the ceiling of the chamber they were in. and it was over 300ft from the ground, and yet Adam managed to only dodge becoming a full-body splat on the ceiling, but also landed back down on the ground with seemingly no repercussions.

The third artifact, which the unicorn guard found in a communal bathhouse, again just looked like a plain ordinary item. A shirt in this case, which was colored dusty brown and bronze, but the ponies have grown to know that these shen gong wu are more than they appear. And when Adam was asked to show what this artifact did, instead of wearing it as the ponies thought he would do, the young man instead just laid it out across the ground. then when he said the artifacts name to activate it, which was Two Tone Tunic, the ponies watched as the simple shirt turn into giant, bulky, and clearly metallic armored chest piece. Adam then said that artifact is primarily used as a defensive shield, but since it weighs so much its mostly used as a more stationary bulwark. Unless the wearer of the artifact was strong enough to move around with an extra 2 pounds of weigh added to them.

“I gotta say, I’m impressed that all of you managed to find this many sheng gong wu.” Adam said as he handed the un-transformed Two Tone Tunic back to the unicorn.

“Honestly I can’t wait to find more, so we can see what they can do!” the earth pony guard said as she seemed to really want to go for another round of flying.

“Same. But first we still gotta take a look at my artifact.” Daring Do said as she held her artifact out, which looked like black ring with blue gems embedded in it, with four pronged spires sticking upward.

“That’s the Fountain of Hui.” Adam said as he took the object in his hands.

“And what does this thing do? Make an endless amount of water since it’s a fountain?”

“Nope.” Adam simply said as he looks the shen gong wu over. “This shen gong wu allows to gain knowledge of the universe. Basically makes you the smartest being there is by having all the information there is.”

“Really! That’s incredible.” Celestia said as she looked at the artifact.

“Unfortunately without its sister wu if you use the fountain, you’ll just get your brain scrambled for a few days and rattle off random useless information.” Adam informed the princess as he looked at her.

“Sister wu?” all of the ponies said in unison. “What’s a sister wu?”

“Well you see some shen gong wu can’t really operate properly, or be used correctly without having a designated other shen gong wu to help them.” Adam explained as he held the artifact out.

“And for the Fountain of Hui, we’ll need a shen gong wu called the Eagles Scope to help focus the information the fountain produces.”

“So this thing is basically useless without this other artifact.” Daring Do commented as she looked less than interested than she did a moment ago.

“Basically.”

“Well in any case, we should take these shen gong wu to the treasury vault.” Celestia suggested to the group, who fell in line and followed the princess through the castle until they reached the vault.

Upon reaching the vault Adam gazed upon the large circular golden door with astonishment, and a little bit a strange sense of realization. Mostly in how the vault door looked like something from Duck Tales, or some other colorful cartoon with a rich character. And the inside of the vault was just as astonishing as the door. The inside of the vault was truly massive in size, as it looked like it could house several 2 or 3 story buildings, and still have room left over. As for the contents of the vault itself it was nothing but carefully stacked mounds of gold coins, each mount separated by dividing panels. There was also a section of the vault that housed precious gems and other jewelry like objects, there were even a few pure gold statues of what looked like prominent figures, of course there was one that looked like Celestia. The group continued to make their way through the vault till they reached probably the most vacant spot in the vault, with only the shen gong wu that the ponies have already found, and Adam’s own shen gong wu.

“There we go, safe and secure.” Celestia said as she placed the last of the new artifacts on one of the many vacant shelves.

“I’m still surprised you were able to make such a massive shelving area in one day.” Adam commented as he looked at the nearly two-hundred shelves.

“Unicorn magic is very handy.” Celestia simply stated before she turned to the rest of the ponies.

“Before you all go back out and look for more artifacts, take some time to recover and rest up.” the ponies nodded their heads before making their way to the exit of the vault, Adam was about to join them but stopped when he noticed Celestia was still standing in front of the artifact.

“Something wrong Celestia?”

“No, nothing is wrong. Just wondering about something.”

“Like what?” Adam asked as he walked up to the princess’s side.

“I’ve just been wandering on the variety of powers that some of my previous human visitors have had, all radically different from the other.” the alicorn commented as she looked from one artifacts to another.

“What kind of powers did they have?”

“One was able to manipulate the weather. Another was able to make a perfect double of herself, and telepathically communicate with it. then there were the four in the hall.”

“The ones that showed you that not all humans are trustworthy.” Adam remarked to which the alicorn nodded. “And judging by the titles, they had I assume their powers are self-explanatory.” Celestia nodded as a depressed expression quickly took over her face, followed by a few tears swelling in her eyes.

“I still feel like such a fool to be tricked like that four times, especially when…” the princess visibly tensed up as she spoke, her wings ruffling uncomfortably while her hind leg’s clenched tight against each other. Adam reached over to the princess and started to give her a comfortable pat on the back, trying to ease the alicorn down from her clearly pained state.

“I’m sorry Adam. It’s just—”

“You don’t need to say anything princess. You don’t need to explain anything especially if it’s a bad experience.” Adam quickly said before the princess could really say anything, after of which the princess gave the young man a thankful smile.

“Thank you Adam.” After giving the princess another comforting pat on the back, and a small smile, Adam and Celestia finally started to make their way out of the vault.

~~~~~

After the identifying of the new shen gong wu, and having a nice early lunch with Celestia before she had to get back to work, Adam was now just wandering around the castle trying to figure out what else he should do. Reading about this world is all fun and good, and getting a chance to look around a castle, there really wasn’t much that Adam could see that would occupy his time. Then again, it’s only been a few days, when he wasn’t running around in the wilds or being hospitalized, that he remembers that he’s in another world. so he just hasn’t gotten a chance to really find anything that could occupy his time. The situation could’ve been better if he had someone to at least hang out with, it could make his time in the castle go by better. sure Celestia is probably his first actual friend, there isn’t anyone else that Adam is close with.

The only other pony, or ponies, that Adam was somewhat close with was that unicorn named Lyra, and her friend Bonbon. Ever since they came to the castle the day before Twilight’s group did the following day, they were quiet a charming pair. Lyra was a bit much as she was really, excited and overjoyed to finally meet someone like Adam, especially when she went into the couple oh hours asking questions. Questions that came from a book she conjured up with her magic, which had facts from other nations, religions, and many other factors of humans and earths history depending on the human that recently came before him.

While Lyra was a really energetic, and sometimes overzealous pony to be around, she was still plenty nice to be around. As for Bonbon she wasn’t as enthused about meeting Adam as her friend, but the earth pony was still a really nice girl to be around. Aside from those two, there wasn’t anyone else that Adam could think of trying to befriend, in fact, he was unsure how to just outright walk up to a pony and try to be friends with them. sure Celestia said that ponies are generally a trusting, and kind hearted people that were fairly easy to make friends with.

“You there!”

Adam stopped in his tracks when a voice called out and broke his train of thought, and the peace and quite of his little walk through the castle. When he looked for the owner of the voice Adam found another alicorn, with this one looking almost like Luna in size and body shape, but with a color palette that made her look like a generic barbie doll character. But in equine form. And for some reason, she looked rather annoyed as she stomped towards Adam.

“Is there something you need miss?” Adam asked the mare as she stopped a foot from him, and started to look him over like she was uncertain of what to make of him.

“How did you get in the castle?” the mare asked in a rather nasty tone.

“I live here, I guess.”

“You. live here?” the mare repeated before snickering. “Why would my aunt allow such a weird hairless monkey to live here in the castle.

‘Ooooookay. This pony is clearly a brat. And that’s putting it lightly.’ Adam thought before he replied to the rude pony.

“Well if you don’t believe me, go ask your aunt. She’s the one who both brought me here, and said I’m more than able to live here.”

“Don’t take that tone with me creature.” The alicorn said as she flared her fluffy wings. “I am a princess of Equestria, you will show me the respect that is afforded to one such as me.” Adam’s only response to the mare was a controlled, yet clearly, annoyed groan as he rubs the bridge of his nose.

“Okay look miss. I’m not going to get into an argument with you about me living here, or how I’m talking to you, so I’m going to go this way—” Adam said as he pointed down a nearby hallway. “—and we’re going to go our separate ways.”

With that Adam just up and left. The mare tried to say something, but just jogged away so he didn’t have to deal with someone who was clearly being antagonistic for no reason. after a few minutes of jogging through the hall, and looking back to see if the mare wasn’t following him Adam came to a stop to catch his breath.

“Well looks like I stumbled onto one of the few not, nice, ponies in this castle.” After getting over the brief little encounter with the rude mare, Adam went to trying to find something to do, and hopefully avoid whoever that alicorn was.

~~???~~

Chrysalis was utterly dumb founded about the strange creature that she had just stumbled upon. She has heard ponies of the castle speak of strange creature that the princess had brought to the castle, but so few ponies that work in the castle have seen it, so the disguised queen didn’t know what to expect. So when she stumbled upon the creature, and saw what it was, she was honestly baffled about what it was. After all nothing like it has ever been seen before, but that was little concern to the designed changeling matriarch.

“Will this thing be a complication to my plan?” Chrysalis muttered to herself as she slowly trots through the halls of the castle. “I don’t know what this thing is capable of, and judging how didn’t respect my disguises crown, it might not take orders from royalty.”

“Who doesn’t take orders from royalties?” the impersonated alicorn turned to look to her side and found her would be faience.

“Shining.” The false alicorn cooed as she nuzzled up to the captain of the guard. “I was just talking about this strange creature wandering the castle.”

“You mean that tall bipedal thing?” the captain said to the queen before a concerned looked took over his face. “Did it do anything to you!”

“No dear it didn’t, but…I would like to know more about it. Perhaps you could find out what it is?”

“I could sweety, but princess Celestia is the one that seems to know it the best.” Shining Armor suggested to the alicorn.

“I would sweetie but with our wedding coming up soon, and both my aunts helping with the proceedings, I don’t want to trouble them.” the stallion seemed to be thinking things over for a few moments before nodding to the fake alicorn.

“I’ll see if I can get some alone time with this creature, and see what I can learn.” Chrysalis leaned over and gives the stallion a loving kiss on the cheek, while also draining a nice dose of love energy from said stallion. Who went a little weak in the knees but recovered a few seconds later.

“Thank you, darling~”

Chapter 10: A Day of Discovery

The castle was a buzz with excitement, as in just two more short days the wedding between Shining Armor and Princess Mi Amora Cadenza will finally take place, and everypony in the castle was fulfilling their assigned duties. But it wasn’t just the normal castle staff that was hard at work. The maids and butlers handling the interior decorating with Pinkie & Rarities help, then there were the musicians practicing for their performance with Fluttershy’s bird choir, which were sounding incredibly sublime. Applejack and the kitchen staff were checking in all the ingredients, food stalls, pretty much everything in the kitchen to make sure they were stocked up, and testing out what food items that will be going on the full menu. Rainbow Dash for her part was living out a dream of hers, as she was practicing with the Wonderbolts in putting on a performance to climax the whole celebration. Twilight was given the duty in assuring that everyone, and everything ran smoothly by checking in with everyone, and marking their progress.

Then there were the guards, who were working on increasing on not just their patrols to ensure everything is secure, but also their duties as well to make sure that everything will run smoothly. Shining Armor was even having the guard increase their training in-between shifts to ensure that they will be ready for anything.

While all of the ponies were busy getting the final preparations done, Adam was up in his room sitting in a chair next to his room’s small fireplace, with the Scroll of the Shen Gong Wu open in his hands. But as the young man looked through the old scroll it had no images, writing, or anything! It was all blank, aside from a few entries, those entries being of the shen gong wu that he had, and the ones that the ponies have found up to this point. Other than that the scroll was basically a blank rolled up sheet of paper.

“Guess this scroll is not going to be of any use, aside from being a check list of what wu we have.”

Adam grumbled as he started to roll up the scroll and stuffed it back into his backpack. After the scroll was put away, a resounding booming sound caused him to look outside a window and when he went to see what it was, Adam watched as a group of pegasi soared over the castle trailing smoke clouds with sparks of electricity, and a rainbow streak, before they split off and made something akin to a flower in the sky.

“Looks like the flight squad is ready for the wedding to start.” Adam said as he walked away from the window.

“Then again it is a royal wedding, so that should be expected.”

A knock then sounded from Adam’s door causing the young man to flinch, as he wasn’t expecting anyone to come and visit him since everyone was too busy. But since someone was knocking at his door Adam made his way over and see who was stopping by, and when he opened the door he was surprised to find Celestia standing there.

“Celestia, what are you doing here?” Adam asked while stepping to the side to let the princess into his room.

“I actually came to see how you were doing Adam, especially being secluded in this room.” the mare turned to Adam as he closed door behind the two of them. “So how are you doing Adam?” the young man then leaned against the door before letting out a small sigh.

“Honestly…I’m just really bored.”

“Bored?” Celestia echoed.

“Yeah.” Adam said as he hauled himself off the door, and made his way over to his backpack by the chair he was just sitting in. “Back home I’d either be hanging out with my friends, studding for my mid-terms, or just driving around the city till something caught my attention. or I’d just play games, or watch TV.”

“Oh. I see.” Celestia replied. “I forgot that your probably from a time period that’s a bit more advance than Equestria, especially when it comes to entertainment.”

“I’m not saying that your world is primitive or anything, I think I’m just having some common withdrawals from back home.”

“I understand dear, the other humans had similar feelings during their time here.” Celestia said as she trotted over to Adam and gave him a pat on the back with one of her wings.

“But enough about me and my boredom, how is everything going with the wedding?”

“Everything seems to be going well, although…” Adam gave the princess a curious look as she trots a few feet away from him.

“Is something wrong princess?”

“Well, it’s more like two things have been bothering me.” Celestia turned to face Adam showing that she had a slightly troubled look on her face. “The first is concerning Twilight.”

“What’s wrong with Twilight?” Adam asked.

“You see Adam I’ve passed by Twilight and Cadence as they were checking everything being prepped, and I couldn’t be certain, but I believe Twilight and Cadence are, not getting along.”

“But aren’t they supposed to be old friends?” the princess nodded her head, but she still held that troubled expression.

“They were, but the few times that I’ve passed by the two of them, Twilight just kept giving Cadence this suspicious look. Like she was expecting Cadence to attack somepony.” Adam thought back to the only interaction he had with Cadence; she did give the aura of being an entitled brat, so it wasn’t hard for him to imagine Twilight not being pleased with her attitude, especially if she had to witness the pink alicorns attitude towards others.

“From my own experience interacting with her, even if it was by accident, she did come off as a real snobbish brat.”

“That is strange, Cadence is usually such a sweet and dotting mare.” Celestia retorted as her tail gave a small flick.

‘Guess this whole wedding thing is messing with her personality then if she is not normally like this.’ Adam thought before he spoke up. “What’s this other issue that’s bothering you.”

“I’m sure you’ve noticed that there’s been more guards patrolling the castle grounds, as well as inside the castle as well.”

“Yeah, but what’s so strange about that?” Adam asked confusedly. “This is a wedding with a princess, and a soon-to-be-prince, having extra security is a given.”

“Actually the reason why there’s more guards active is because I had this, premonition—”

“You mean like some kind of clairvoyance?” Celestia nodded her head before she started talking.

“From time to time I get these dreams that give me vague images that show me future events, or at least images that have some kind of significant point in time. But it’s something that rarely happens.”

“And I take it that the increase of guards is related to this premonition of yours?” Adam questioned as he sat down in one of the two chairs, while Celestia takes the other one as she continued.

“Correct. In it I see the wedding being attacked, and this black figure standing in the wedding hall with green fire surrounding it, along with a wall of countless glowing eyes.” Celestia raised a hoof to her forehead and started to gently rub the spot just below her horn. “I’m not sure how to interpret this dream, I know it means some kind of danger, but I have no idea what it is or when it will happen so I can prepare for it.”

“Well whatever happens I’m sure you can handle it.” Adam says in a upbeat manner as he tries to lift the slight dower mood of the princess.

“I mean from what I’ve read about you, and from what you told of yourself, your one thee most powerful beings in the world. So whatever this threat is shouldn’t cause you to much trouble.” a weary sigh catches Adam’s attention and that’s when he noticed that the princess looked even more troubled. The mare then got up from her chair and started to trot over to the center of the room.

“Celestia?”

“Adam…what I’m about to tell you is a secret that I have only told to those very close to me.” the princess then turned to face the young man, who was getting an uneasy feeling as the mare calmed herself before continuing.

“Over the centuries my magic has grown weaker, and weaker, and I’m not as physically strong as I used to be. I’m still able to defend myself and move the sun…however moving the sun and the moon for the past thousand years, as well as my aging has made me weaker.”

“It’s still impressive that your still able to move the sun that orbits your world.”

“It’s not as difficult for me since it is my special talent, it takes less magic than most believe for me to move.” Celestia retorted as she glances outside a nearby window. “But because of my decline in power, I fear that I won’t be able to safeguard the kingdom for much longer.”

“Least you still have your military to look after the country in case something happens.” Adam said as he watched Celestia trot over to the nearby window.

“Perhaps. But because I’ve safeguarded the country for the past thousand years, the military has had very little opportunity to really test themselves or even gain experience in actual combat. Shining Armor does what he can to make the military as best as they could be, but I fear that because of the lax nature of our society for the past seven hundred years, I believe that the military will be more of a token task force than anything else.”

“Well if this threat does come it will give your guards the experience they’ll need to better themselves.” Adam said as he looked at the alicorn as she just stares out the window.

“We’ll just have to wait and see.” As Adam watched the princess from his seated position, he then saw her troubled expression quickly switched to a more perplexed one. As if she was now starting to think of something. “Adam can I ask you something?”

“Sure.” Adam simply said as the princess trotted over to him.

“First of, do you have any combat experience yourself?”

“Well I have taken martial arts classes since I was a kid, but I haven’t been practicing since in my last few years of high school and college. So I’m a bit rusty.”

“And how well are you in using those shen gong wu, the ones that you had before meeting me.”

“Just enough to use them, though not in an actual fight.” Adam then slumped in his chair as he remembered the arduous journey that led him to Ponyville.

“Honestly, I was just using them while running away from all the wild animals that have been trying to eat me, I rarely used any of them to directly hurt anything.” Adam said as he explained his stance of using the shen gong wu he had, but he didn’t mention that during his trek from where he woke up to reaching Ponyville, he did practice using the shen gong wu. He then watched as the princess started to mutter under her breath before looking at him with a serious expression.

“This maybe a sudden request Adam but could you take part in the security of the wedding.”

“Wait you want me to be a security guard for the wedding?!” Adam blurted out as he sat up straight in his chair. “I thought you were still keeping me as a need to know basis.”

“True. But for the past few days of talking and getting to know you, I can say for certain that you are indeed a good person.” Celestia said as she sat down before Adam with a pleading look in her eyes.

“So Adam will you help me in ensuring the wedding will go well?”

Adam was unsure if he should even help in this particular matter, after all he wasn’t a fighter, and even if he did study martial arts he’s to rusty to even be a contender. Or even a threat to anyone. But seeing the princess give him that pleading look, and the somewhat worried tone in her voice, Adam did want to help her if he could. And the fact that she was asking him must means she has a good amount of trust in him. Though it would probably be for his best interest if he accepted, since Celestia is willing to allow other ponies to actually know of his existence, he would finally be able to go out and explore not just the city, but the world itself if he wanted to. Not only that, but Adam could actually go out and search for any other shen gong wu that are in the world, but if he does so it would be a taxing journey and undertaking especially if others find a shen gong wu and not give them up. So getting asked to be a security guard would help Adam get back into shape, if he was able to get some training time in with the guards.

“Alright Celestia, If you think I can help in anyway, then I’ll do what I can.” The princess’s expression instantly lighten up as she darted forward and started to nuzzle Adam’s cheek, which caused Adam to flinch slightly but ultimately resigned into letting the mare do as she pleased, as this is a natural way for a pony to show gratitude.

“Thank you Adam this has taken a great deal of pressure off my shoulders.” The princess then scooted away from Adam before she ignited her horn with magic, and in a flash of light Adam saw his own shen gong wu, and even his harness that he found alongside them.

“You’ll probably going to need these.” Adam stood up and took the harness and started to wrap it around his waist along his belt.

“Still not sure how useful I’ll be, but hopefully I live up to your trust.”

“I’m sure you will Adam. And thank you for going along with my sudden, and mostly selfish request. I’ll inform captain Shining Armor that you will be helping with the security detail.” Celestia then started to make her way towards the door but before she got to far Adam stopped her when he spoke up.

“Actually since you’re going to talk to Shining Armor, could you do me a favor?”

“What kind of favor?”

~~~~~

Celestia was looking down at Adam who was standing in the midst of the royal guards training area, and was standing off against two members of the royal guards, a pegasus mare and a unicorn stallion, while Celestia stood off to the side with her captain of the guard Shining Armor by her side. Celestia was still surprised that Adam has asked her to arrange a small practice fight with the guard, mostly so that he could get back into fighting shape and see just how his level of skill was. As well as see how well he uses his shen gong wu in an actual combative scenario. At the moment Celestia was fairly confident in Adam’s combative abilities, even if he himself wasn’t so sure, as the humans that she has known to be quite exceptional fighters. Even the ones that said they had no prior fighting experience. If there was one thing that Celestia greatly learned about humans, is that they can quickly become great fighters if given time.

“Now remember everyone, this is a friendly sparring match. So if your opponent concedes to their defeat the fight will cease on the spot, understood.” Celestia said aloud to the three contenders in the arena.

“Got it.” Adam responded.

“Yes your majesty!” the two guards said as they saluted.

“Then please prepare yourselves for battle.” The two guards crouched low as they stared down Adam, who was getting into a battle ready stance with his hands hovering over two of his four shen gong wu. Celestia looked between the two sides before raising a wing and then bringing it down as she exclaims:

“BEGIN!”

Almost immediately both pegasi and unicorn charged Adam, who just kept his stance as he waited for the ponies to reach him. Celestia watched as the pegasus was the first to reach Adam, using her wings to give herself a burst of speed and looked ready to tackle the human. But as she was a foot from Adam, the young man was able to grab the mare’s forelegs, and with a surprisingly speedy twist and spin of his body, flung the mare off to the side! However this left Adam exposed to the stallion, who leapt the last distance towards Adam. Yet Celestia was surprised to see Adam vanish as his body turned into a bolt of lightning, as a rumbling sound echoed through the training hall, and then seeing Adam appear behind the stallion in the same flash and boom of lightning. The princess then watched the young man tackle the stallion to the ground, and putting him into what looked to be a head lock.

Celestia was pleasantly surprised to see Adam be able to counter, and pin his attackers with nice efficiency even though he said he was rusty with his hand-to-hand combat skills. But the princess saw that this wasn’t going to be an easy victory for Adam. The pegasus mare quickly recovered from her throw, and has actually shoved Adam off her partner and immediately went into hoof-to-hand combat with Adam, who was doing not to badly in dodging the attacks. The princess then watched as the stallion got up the moment the other two started fighting, and was readying to cast a spell and when he was ready he called out for his partner to get out of the way, and once the pegasus did he fired a beam of magic at Adam. But the human was quick to dodge the initial beam of magic, yet the stallion was ready to fire another one. This time though instead of trying to dodge it, Celestia watched Adam pull one of his shen gong wu and fired a beam of golden electric rings at the incoming magical beam, canceling it out.

“He’s not doing too bad.” Shining Armor commented as the two ponies tried to gang up on Adam, yet Adam vanished in another flash of lightning and reappearing behind the two guards, and using another shen gong wu to turn into a current of electricity and flown past the two, shocking both of them which seemed to have dealt quite a bit of damage.

“Indeed.” Celestia agreed as she watched the pegasus mare actually recover from the electrocution faster, and charged to where Adam had reconstituted himself, and actually land a few good kicks to his sides.

‘Though I can tell he’s not as skilled as Takanashi, Clair, Erika, David, or Piero. But he’s certainly no slouch.’ Celestia mentally remarked as Adam countered the pegasus mare’s next attack with an over shoulder throw when she went for a punch. But then she saw the unicorn guard ready to launch another spell, and fired it at Adam when he wasn’t looking, but then she saw the beam grow in power halfway towards the young man.

“Adam look out!”

Celestia cried out as she watched the beam rocket itself towards the human, who only just now noticed the attack when it was a good few feet from him. But that’s when Celestia got quite the shock when she watched a current of air whip around Adam, and then launched himself a good twenty feet into the air when he attempted to jump out of the way! As Celestia watched Adam soaring over the arena she noticed that he was heading towards the other side the arena, and it looked like he was going to slam himself right into the wall! But before Celestia or any pony could try and save him from hurting himself, Adam used the shen gong wu that turned him into a current of electricity and flew back towards the arena. And once Adam was back in the arena he looked absolutely baffled, and just as surprised as Celestia was, as if he didn’t even know he was able to do…whatever it was he did.

“It looks like there’s more to Adam than even he realizes.” Celestia muttered to herself as she watched Adam shake off his stunned expression, and went back to his sparring match with the guards.

Chapter 11: Plans Evolving & Changing

Today marked Adam’s first day as being an extra source of security for the royal wedding that will finally take place tomorrow. At the moment though Adam was mostly just patrolling the halls of the castle, passing by ponies making final preparations, and touch ups for the whole shebang to happen, as well as talking to others about what they’ll be doing throughout the wedding. While Adam was making his rounds around the castle the same pegasus mare and unicorn stallion that he had his sparring match with, and a few more afterwards, joined him on his patrol and helped guide him through the castle.

“So any pony can use these shen gong wu, regardless of who they are?” the stallion who called himself Gilded Plate, or Gil for short, asked Adam as the trio continued to patrol the western area of the castle.

“Pretty much.” Adam simply stated. “But using them can be tricky especially if you don’t know what the shen gong wu does, or know how to actually handle it.”

“Well you seem to be able to use yours pretty effectively.” The pegasus mare named Star Wing remarked as she looked at Adam’s harness wrapped around his waist, and the shen gong wu that it held.

“Not by much.” Adam retorted as the trio entered a larger hallway where a bunch of maids were just putting the final touches to the decorations in the hall. “At best I know how to use them without blowing my hands off.”

The trio continued to make their way through the hall they eventually came upon a larger chamber, where they found the soon to be bride to the captain talking with Pinkie Pie, or more accurately Pinkie was doing all of the talking while Adam noticed that Cadence looked incredibly uninterested. The young man also took notice of Twilight, who was just a foot off to the left side of Cadence, and looked to be more upset or at least not pleased by how Cadence was acting. Adam and the two guards proceeded to continue their patrol of the castle, leaving the mares alone to deliberate on whatever it is they were discussing. But as soon as the three of them were out of the chamber Adam looked down to the two guards before speaking.

“Is it just me or does the princess looked a little, annoyed about whatever it was they were doing in there.”

“No I felt it to.” Star remarked as she stopped and turned to look from where they came from. “Princess Cadence really did seem like she was either annoyed, or just not as invested in what Ms. Pie was saying to her.”

“Same with Twilight. She looked incredibly incredulous to Princess Cadence’s attitude.” Gil further commented while the they all passed by a duo of patrolling guards. “Hopefully, everything will clear up once the wedding is over with.”

“By the way, how is the captain taking all of this?” Adam asked his new guard friends, who both seemed quite unsure about how to answer the young man’s question.

“Honestly whenever somepony brings the wedding up to him he gets this really, tired, expression and looks like he’s spacing out.” Gil said as he stared down at the ground as the trio walked on.

“I think he’s trying to hide his exhaustion and stress as best he can, but I think that he’s starting to crack under the pressure.”

“That tends to be the case no matter what kind of wedding is going on.” Star commented as she looked up to the ceiling of the hall. the mare then turned to look at Adam.

“Hey Adam, how are human weddings held?”

“I’m not sure. I’ve only been to two weddings, and they were both when I was a kid, so I don’t really remember much about them. I’ve just been to busy with my college classes and work to really be with my family…” Adam then developed a forlorn look on his face as he stops in his tracks, causing Star and Gil to look at him with slightly worried looks.

“Actually I can’t even remember the last time I even spoke to my parents, or anyone else from my family.”

“Really?” Star asked Adam, sounding a little sad as she does so. “Were you not close with them?”

“Not in a ‘ill-blood’ sort of way, or we had a falling out.” Adam commented as he looked out of one of the windows lining the hallway’s right side.

“Most members of my family are pretty bad workaholics, and focus on their careers most. I grew up not really knowing my mom or dad, or anyone else aside from my grandparents. And when I started college I just got to focus on my studies and my part time job.” A snicker then left Adam which then evolved into a more heartier chuckle, which seemed to startle Gil and Star.

“Now that I think about it, aside from some of my friends I’ve made on campus in the last two years that I meet on occasion, this is the longest I’ve actually spent time around people without my studies, or work, make me stay locked up in my room buried under books or just flat out exhausted.”

“But aren’t you sad that you’d never see them again?” Gil asked as he fully faced Adam who turned to look at him.

“Yeah of course. I mean I’m just now realizing how isolationist I was, and distant to people. Actually I’m a little pissed that I can’t patch things up with my family and friends.” Adam then slouched a little as he let out a disheartened sigh. “Now I have to live with that for the rest of my life…never being able to amend it.”

As Adam stood there in the middle of the hall, fully taking in the weight of past regrets that he won’t be able to rectify, he then felt something brush up against his leg, and when he looked down he found Star brushing against him like a cat, before she looked up to him with a small smile and a caring expression. The young man then saw Gil trot to his side, and give the back of his waist a few gentle pats while giving Adam his own reassuring smile. Silently thanking the two guards, Adam returned their smiles while patting their helmets. A moment later the group continued on with their patrol through the castle, and while he does feel better about his state in life now, Adam still feels a little a small bout of sadness deep down. If only he could go back in time, or did something different, sadly he was just going to have to live with the course that his life has taken.

~~~~~

After going over the final preparations for the events before, during, and after the wedding, for the last three hours and finally getting away from Twilight Sparkle’s judgmental and scrupulous glaring, Chrysalis was now free to trot about the castle. It felt so good to finally be rid of that annoying unicorn’s disapproving glare, like she had a right to cast judgment on her. But the disguised queen will deal with the annoying little mare later, right now she was going to enjoy her little alone time. As the queen of the changelings was trotting about the castle something of interest caught her attention, which was hearing a few of the patrolling guards talk about some strange artifacts. Artifacts that seem to have some kind of connection to the strange bipedal creature named Adam, who she has yet to actually meet because of her soon-to-be husband has not yet arranged a meeting.

But right now the princess was a bit more curious about these magical relics that are connected to said creature. So she politely asked the guards about what these artifacts were, and where are they so that she could have a look at them, which led the princess now making her way to the treasury vault so that she can witness these artifacts first hoof. Upon reaching the vault Chrysalis dismissed the two guards standing watch and preceded into the vault, once inside the queen started to weave through the mountains of bits, crown jewels and other treasures littered about.

“It would be so easy to rob these ponies and leave them financially deprived.” Chrysalis muttered to herself as she levitated a large ruby from a pile of jewels and simply looked it over in her magical aura, before tossing it back into the pile.

“All in due time. First I enslave that dimwitted stallion, use my position as royalty to de-throne Celestia and her sister, and take their positions as leader of this country to establish my own reign.”

The disguised queen continued to look through the vault of treasures in her search for those artifacts, and her search seemed to have come to an end when she reached the far left side of the vault, where she found hundreds of empty shelves just standing there. But the queens eyes were more drawn towards the few shelves that actually held something. The queen then thought that she found the artifacts she was looking for. Chrysalis then approached the shelves and started to study the items some of them held, all of which looked not very interesting on first glance but upon further examination the queen noticed something, each of the objects had varying degrees of a magical force they all held. However Chrysalis wasn’t able to tell much about what these artifacts could possibly do by their magical aura, and there didn’t seem to be any kind of ledger, or anything that would explain what these items do.

“These artifacts don’t seem to be all that impressive.” Chrysalis said as she placed the statue of an eagle back on its shelf. The disguised queen then looked towards the relic that was placed on one of the more higher shelves, and this one actually did have something written on its rack. Flying up to the shelf in question the queen saw what was written.

“Do not touch under any circumstances. Incredibly dangerous.” The queen read aloud as she looked at the object, which just appeared to be a dull looking coiled up black snake in a glass case.

“What’s so special about this trinket.”

“For one thing princess it’s a dangerous weapon.” The queen nearly fell out of the air when the sudden voice said out of nowhere. Looking down to the ground the queen spotted Adam and two royal guards, both of whom looked a little surprised while Adam had a more suspicious look on his flatter face.

“So I’d advise not touching it.” the biped said as Chrysalis made her way down.

“And who are you to think you can tell me what to do.” Chrysalis said as she brushed a bit of her mane back behind her neck.

“Princess Cadence what our friend is trying to say is that if your not careful with these artifacts, you could hurt yourself.” The unicorn stallion of the trio said in a rushed manner.

“If she’s lucky.” The tall biped added which caused the false alicorn to look squarely up at him.

“Well then why not tell me what these artifacts do so I don’t hurt myself.” The queen goaded the tall creature while giving a small stomp of her hoof.

“Of course he will princess.” The pegasus mare said before she flew up to Adam’s head, and started to whisper something to him.

The biped then agreed to tell the queen of what each artifact, or shen gong wu as they were called, is capable of. And the queen was quite intrigued, especially the one of the bird statue that allows one to enter the dreams of others, but also see what their worst nightmares are and even bring them to life in the real world. There also the mirror . But as the creature was going over the shen gong wu on the shelves, the queen was studying the biped. It seemed to have a rather calm and complacent personality, and it’s emotions were not very lively, at least from what Chrysalis could tell with her changeling senses. Yet Chrysalis still felt a sense of annoyance emanating from him, even if he tried to hide it.

“And that’s all of them.” Adam said as he placed the decorated gold coin back in its place on the shelf.

“What about that one.” Chrysalis said as she pointed up to the black coiled snake shen gong wu. “You haven’t explained what that one does, or why its supposedly so dangerous.” The creature just looked down to Chrysalis with a small frown on his face before he responded to the queen’s question.

“Let’s just say you don’t want to have anything scrape, or rub off its black finishing because if that happens, then bad things happen.” Adam then grabbed the dragon kite shen gong wu and walked away from the shelves. “Anyway that’s all of the shen gong wu that guards have uncovered so far, and we got what we came for initially.”

The biped then strapped the kite to the stallion and started to re-explain what it capabilities were, but the disguised queen turned away from the trio and looked back at the shen gong wu, and started to wonder if she could use them in her take over of Equestria’s ruling class. Even if she has Shining Armor enslaved to her, his love for his actual fiancé may not be enough to take over. After all, Celestia is regarded as the greatest spell caster in the nation, and with her sister being an unknown entity for the most part, Chrysalis has been thinking throughout the weeks planning the wedding in how she would tackle the two princesses. But she might have found a way to handle princess Luna, thanks to this human creature’s shen gong wu, although Chrysalis still needs to find a way to overpower princess Celestia and subdue her in order to move her plans forward.

“There you are sir.” Chrysalis turned to look behind her and found a larger earth pony guard talking to Adam and the other two guards, with the unicorn stallion hovering above the ground thanks to that flying artifact he was wearing.

“Princess Celestia is looking for you, we’ve found three more of your artifacts.”

“Well then let’s not keep the princess waiting.” Adam then and the three guards then made their way out of the treasury vault to wherever Celestia and these other guards were.

“Perhaps I should follow them, and see what else kind of artifacts were discovered.” Chrysalis said to herself in a low voice as she follows after the group. “Perhaps one of these new artifacts might be useful to my plans as well.”

Chrysalis and Adam’s group continued to follow the earth pony stallion through the castles halls, where they eventually found Celestia and two guards standing in one of the open chambers of the castle. And one of the guards looked like they had been rolling around in the mud, or some kind of gunk that was covering his armor and satchel. The other pony standing off to the side of the muddy guard looked more like a rather eccentric mare, she was wearing a fancy looking coat, a pair of glasses, and strangely decorated hat. Yet the most unusual thing about the mare was the strange small round lamp, or lantern that she was wearing around her neck. Aside from the two ponies Chrysalis saw Celestia standing before the pair, where upon seeing Adam she gave a delightful smile.

“Hello Adam, sorry to suddenly summon you but we found some more of your shen gong wu.” Celestia said before she looked in Chrysalis’s direction.

“Oh, Cadence I wasn’t expecting you to be here as well.”

“Well I got curious about these shen gong wu, so I decided to have a look at them in the treasury vault. Adam even explained to me what they all do, except one.” Chrysalis said in a slightly mocking manner before continuing.

“So when the guard said that there were more, I wanted to see them as well.”

“I see. Then Adam would you mind identifying the new shen gong wu second lieutenant Blaze Trial, and Miss. Rose Author have found.”

“Sure, and I think we’ll start with hers.” Adam said as he approach the mare first, where Chrysalis could see the mare’s emotions waft with intrigue and curiosity, and a slight hint of fear. “Miss. Rose how did you come across this item you have around your neck?”

“It was the strangest thing sir.” The mare said in a very posh and cultured voice, while using her horn to levitate her hat off her head, before removing the thing from her neck.

“While I was working one night, this barrage of glowing light soared through the night sky. I was so mesmerized by the display that I was shocked, and startled when one of them came crashing into my roof. And that’s where I found this.” The mare then levitated the object up to Adam who took it in his hand.

“I didn’t know what to make of it, so I left it in my attic. After getting my roof fixed. Then when Sir Blaze Trail came to my home town, asking if any pony had spotted any glowing lights crashing down anywhere, and that’s when he was told about two other lights crashing into the nearby bog. I met up with him when he returned and showed him the object that crashed into my roof after explaining what happened, that’s when he asked me to accompany him back to the castle to give this to you.”

“Well then Miss. Rose I appreciate you returning this to me.” Adam said thankfully.

“But what does this thing do?” Chrysalis interjected.

“This is the sun chi lantern. When the user of this wu activates it, they can harness the chi, or life energy of anyone else bathed in the lantern’s light. Giving them an increase in overall power for a limited amount of time.” Chrysalis immediately started to think of various ways she could use an artifact like this one to overpower any creature that got in her way. In fact, she thought that this artifact would be just the thing she needed to handle Celestia.

“So Blaze, what kind of shen gong wu did you find?” Chrysalis heard the unicorn stallion ask the mud covered pony.

“At first the ones I found didn’t seem like shen gong wu, as I thought they were just small animals just relaxing in the mud. But when I noticed the two big holes they were in, and the fact they looked like they were made out of metal I scooped them up.” the stallion then rustled through his satchel, and pulled out cloth-wrapped bundle. The guard then un-wrapped it and showed the two artifacts he found.

“Sweet. Looks like you found the crouching cougar, and the tunnel armadillo.” Adam said as he knelt down and grabbed both objects, which did look like animal figurines.

“And what do these two do Adam?” the pegasus mare asked as she hovered by the biped.

“Well the crouching cougar is basically an all-terrain vehicle you can ride, watch.”

Adam stepped a few feet from the group before holding out the small cat artifact. And after saying its name Chrysalis watched it glow with energy, before it was tossed a foot from the biped, and almost instantaneously transformed into a large mechanical jungle cat! The disguised queen was utterly shocked by the transformation itself, and she saw Adam climb on top of it she watched the cat start running around, and even leaping up to the top of flight of stairs, before leaping back down. After demonstrating the artifacts capabilities Adam deactivated the artifact, returning it to its small figurine state again. Once the feline artifact was deactivated, Adam then showed off the other animal-based shen gong wu which the biped explained was like the cougar, but it was more restricted to flat land transport, yet it allows its ride to dig into the ground with a powerful drill.

With the demonstration, and explanations of the new shen gong wu over with, Chrysalis started to think more on her previous though in how she’d use that lantern to best Celestia. If she can use it to absorb the energies of a large enough group of strong ponies, as well as Celestia herself, and fueled by the love energy she’d be siphoning from Shining Armor, Chrysalis could possibly defeat her and restrain her. Coupled with her idea in using that nightmare inducing shen gong wu to trap Luna in her worst nightmare, Chrysalis may be able to accelerate her plans if she can pull everything off. However there are two wild cards that could prove to be a problem. The main obstacle was Twilight Sparkle, the mare was clearly suspicious of Chrysalis being some kind of imposter, so she might try to do something to reveal Chrysalis for who she really is. Then there was Adam, even after meeting him and studying him for a bit, Chrysalis was still uncertain if Adam might have some hidden abilities about him.

“Thank you both for brining these shen gong wu to us.” Chrysalis heard Celestia say to the two ponies that brought the new artifacts to the castle.

“Not all your majesty, I was happy to be of service.” The unicorn mare said as she gave a small bow, and flourish curtsy with her hat.

“Same. But if you will excuse me, I’m going to get this gunk cleaned off.” the stallion said before trotting off down a separate hallway.

“In the mean time let’s take these to the vault.” Adam said as he carried the three artifacts to vault, with Celestia and the other two guards following him. leaving Chrysalis alone with her thoughts, and schemes.