Ponysiders - Demise Lives

Part Zero: The Ravencolt (Prologue)

Note: Only the Prologue  faintly follows the main storyline of the game, and although there may be references to it in other parts, I highly doubt I will use much of the game storyline. Also, the coloured names are referencing the games subtitles, as you can see if you watch the Crowfather scene here also, I wish to justify my use of HorseMAN; I don't think it matters :3.

Before time was born, there was a bright city for the angels, and a dark realm for the demons... And then a third kingdom for ponykind. But Battle, Horseman of the Apocalyse, destroyed Equestria before it's appointed time. Or so it was claimed. To spare his brother from oblivion, a second rode forth, and his name was Demise.

As Demise galloped towards the black citadel in the everfree forest that had been erected one hundred years after the apocalypse had ravaged Equestria, the ever present unique white raven, Dusty, flew alongside him, showing no emotion in his pitch black eyes.

Of course, this was no longer a forest.

No, things aren't ever that simple..

Many places had changed dramatically during the apocalypse, some had even broken away from the realm itself, as much of the once lush, green everfree forest had in this case.

These things happen when your brother lets all hell break loose on the planet. Literally.

Naturally, this hadn't been done on purpose. Well, at least, not on Battles' account, although he had unintentionally gone along with the angel/demon plan.

When the angels had broken the elemental stones of the Horsemen, they had not planned on things going south as they did, they hadn't planned on failing to fix the stones once their objective had been completed.

Heck, their objective didn't get halfway there.

The point was for Demise that, whether he wanted to admit it or not, Battle had wreaked the apocalypse loose on Equestria, innocent of meaning to or not. And now? Now he was left to pick up the pieces.

There was only one way to do this...

He had to resurrect the pony race.

He had to undo the apocalypse.

Here I am... thought the masked pony as he stopped in front of the grand icy bridge leading into the black citadel of the Ravencolt.

He made his approach to the bridge, ready for any surprises.

Surprise.

Five nasties popped right out of the ice of which thickly coated the bridge, the layer of snow above it flying straight into the wind as the skeletal creatures popped out.

Only five... pondered Demise. He mentally grunted, expecting a better challenge.

He had thought about that too soon. An additional five approached from behind them, having seemingly come from the citadel.

That's better.

--

That was a perk about being a nephilim. You didn't need a horn to do magic, making it much simple to use his favourite weapons: Scythes. It was even easier for him compared to what it had been for the other, normal nephilim, considering that he was a Horseman of the Apocalypse, therefore being a much more powerful being. His race, however, was something he didn't dare think about too long. Ever.

Their souls still haunted him to this day, regardless as to the fact that the Ravencolt was currently in possession of them. He didn't regret the slaughter he had wrought to his own people, and even his own brother, Absolot, as he knew that balance would not have lasted if he and the others hadn't killed them. Still, they haunted him, and he refused to destroy the amulet containing them. If he found that the Ravencolt had destroyed the amulet... He would surely do something that both of them would regret.

Deeply.

Dead. Demise noted to himself has he continued towards the enormous black towering citadel, leaving a large pile of very frosty (And now very inanimate) bones in his wake.

As the wind blew like a howling wolf, the grand bridge shined in all of its icy glory in the moonlight, Demise could sense that something was off... As he neared the great steel gates of the citadel, he looked at the five peaks of it, each a grand tower, and yet, even though the citadel was grand... It was ruined. Parts of it were... Flaking off. Literally flaking off and floating away. He could see two parts of the flaky citadel from where he was standing, that looked as though there had been other towers once standing tall and mighty over the icy landscape surrounding them.

It was old, then... Somehow too old to exist there. Or it had been ravaged by other things.

It was as he started to question something, of which the question was never finished, that he realised his mistake.

CLANG

He had took too much time inspecting the structure, as the gates had closed shut. By the nine hells... He cursed himself for not hurrying to the gates, and more so, as he found himself surrounded by roughly 23 average size skeletal ponies, all wearing minimal armour of which had all clearly seen better times. Not to mention the giant of a skeleton that stood in front, a huge axe hovering in front of it, glimmering in the moonlight.

Demise grunted, before summoning all of his fury and channeling it straight to the front of his mind.

Alas, the poor giant, though at least three times bigger than Demise was instantly sliced into two as the Harvester, Demises legendary scythe spiralled through the air from behind the giant and, making way through the giants spine with no effort, caused the fore mentioned slice.

The Harvester continued to spiral in the same direction, before drifting slightly to one side, retaining the same velocity and spin, and then finally be caught in a... Skeletal hoof...

And that hoof was Demise's own, with a flash of purple light, the rest of his body became a purely skeletal structure, of which was mostly covered by a dark purple cloak, complete with a hood that cast a shadow over his face. This transformation was a thing of glory, an amazing sight followed by a sense of dread, the feel of your death being close at hand and despair at the thought of it. None escaped the Reaper.

"The Reaper is here!" Shouted a gravelly voice from somewhere amongst the group of spear wielding ice skeletons, in speech somewhere between a growl and a normal voice. "Kill hi-"

SLASH

The last sentence was cut short as he was torn, ripped and shredded into a hundred pieces by the large, skull embedded scythe of which was being controlled by none other than Demise.

He then sprinted towards the enemies, right into their ranks. There was only 13 meters between him and them, and when they had both covered the distance all but save one meter, he acrobatically front flipped over all of them, landing on his hooves, and rending two of them in half with the harvester, one tried to stab at him but met only air as the Reaper sidestepped the blow, grabbed the skeletons skull and ripped it off. With the skull still in his hoof, he hurled it straight at an oncoming skeleton.

Crack.

The skeleton exploded in a rain of icy bones, leaving its hammer behind. Demise, still in Reaper form, ran straight for it, rolling to dodge an incoming attack from one of his attackers, he was right in front of the hammer. He picked it up in his dark purple coloured magic and swung it straight at the enemies, killing two.

Double kill he thought to himself, wryly grinning under his hood and mask.

He assumed an aggressive position and was about to run at the remaining skeletons.

But before he could end the remaining enemies with a slash slash slash, a voice spoke out through the wind in a sort of loud whisper. "Enough..."

All of the nasties surrounding him where quickly encased in ice, the ice working its way up their undead bodies from the ground up. It was the Ravencolt. There was no doubt about it to the Reaper, and so in a flash of light, the Robed figure was replaced with Demise, his usual self once again.

"Ravencolt,", he muttered in a warning tone, inserting a pause between the name and sentence for emphasis "Show yourself... Now..."

"And why would I do that? No. You will come to me." The Ravencolt said in a matter-of-factly tone.

Bright purple, followed by darkness.

Demise regained his conciousness on a cold surface, pushing himself up from the icy granite floor which he was sprawled on, his vision refocusing to adjust properly to his surroundings.

"Voices... Always voices. Torment without end." groaned the Ravencolt in a pained tone. "Demise, have you come to take back that which you entrusted, or rather cursed me with?"

"Easy, Ravencolt. I have not come to end your misery just yet." answered Demise.

"Then what, pale one, is your business here? Tell me, before I realise that you have made a mistake in coming here...", said the Ravencolt, retaining his pained tone.

The Ravencolt himself was an old stallion, with dark rings around his eyes as though he never slept, a white, slightly grey mane, with bushy eyebrows, showing only a fraction of his old age, and a blackish purple colour of fur to go with it. He also wore a coat with many raven feathers around the neck area, although the rest of the coat blended well with his fur, making only the feathers really show. There was one other important thing which he was wearing. One other very important thing.

The amulet of the Nephilim souls. It was a green gem, cut into an upside-down triangular pyramid shape. It had a golden ring at the top of it for the iron chain it was bound on to loop through, thus binding it to the Ravencolt as the iron chain made a cross shape across his chest, tight enough to be unable to be removed by tugging, and yet loose enough to not cause... Too much discomfort for the Ravencolt.

"I need not tell you, Keeper of Secrets. You already know.", Demise noted aloud.

"Yes, quite... You would redeem your brother, redeem him by restoring something that cannot be restored... You are mad."

"Then, is it such a wonder that you are the first I came to?", of course, this was a total deadpan sentence.

"There is... A way... It is not an easy one. Especially not for the likes of you. You must return to the past,", as he spoke, he conjured a gateway, old Equestria shining through it. "And learn friendship. From six very famous ponies from the past of the third kingdom." The portal/gate dissipated as Demise walked to it. "Not so hasty, horseman. You will take this back!" he thrust the amulet outward as far as it would go, towards him.

"No. You agreed to keep the amulet. That's final." Demise forcedly said, resisting the urge to threaten the old colt.

"No, no, no... The voices, they torment and threaten me without end. This is not a choice. You WILL take it!" He then crushed the amulet in his hand, causing the shards to cut his hands and bloody them, before throwing them forward at such a high velocity that in a flurry of green material, they had permanently become embedded in Demise's right shoulder, causing him to clutch at his chest as the souls grabbed at his own soul with blinding fury.

"I should kill you for that!", Shouted Demise, half groaning as he spoke, "But I can feel your end nearing anyway... You will not last long, old fool."

"Maybe I will, maybe I won't." he replied, "But regardless, you must travel to the small town of ponyville, during the height of the reign of the monarchy it once had, Celestia and Luna's reign. Learn of friendship. Learn of the elements of harmony, find about the one power they have that no one but you can know. Not even the monarch. One that can save Battle. Good bye, old friend.", and with that, the Ravencolt summoned, once more, the portal through time and space.

"Dusty." He said blankly, knowing full well the white raven could hear him. Not three seconds later and the raven had landed on his shoulder. "Let's go..."

And so Demise stepped through the portal summoned by someone he didn't want to trust.