Explosive Trigger

"Mister Raven, please stop moving; you're hurt." Xuez fretted over the human. Currently, the winged zebra was hovering a few feet from Raven.

The man waved off the young zebra's concerns with a wave of the hand. "It's not severe, a couple of puncture wounds and maybe a cracked rib or two. Anyways keep moving; I wanna find the armory." Raven picked up the pace, much to Oleander's annoyance.

Everypony cringed as Raven kept pulling ice shards out of his stomach. As soon as he did, the wounds started to close up on their own. "The Nasod's rebuilt me to be tough, and attacks like that won't keep me down for long. "

"Mister Maxwell, was that magic?" Cozy asked innocently. Raven grimaced at the question. What was the best way to explain this?

"Yes and No." Cozy deadpanned at his answer. Raven let out a tired sigh and continued. "Magic implies that I use a spell matrix. I don't; it's all about emotions. The claw feeds off my anger, sadness, guilt, fears, and shame." The man looked a bit crestfallen after saying that.

Cozy rubbed a hoof under her chin in thought. "Interesting, now if I could get one for myself! Hehe!

"I want one!" Night calls out in excitement.

"NO!" Raven roared at the top of his lungs, stopping the group and making a few back away. Night twister shrunk under the human's sudden rage and whimpered. Raven saw this and let out a calming breath. "I'm sorry for my sudden outburst, but what you're asking for is insanity. I was one of many unwilling participants in these 'experiments.' The Nasod arm did more than just make me more robust; it suppressed my other emotions. The only feelings I knew from that point on were anger, despair, and pain.

The man swallowed the lump that was forming in his throat. "I did so many horrible things in my blind rage... I would have been the Nasod's slaves forever if it weren't for a certain young boy." He brought his attention to Night. "Even with my mind free, I still felt the Nasod's influence over me. In a desperate and spiteful attempt, I infected myself with Alterasia to escape their influence." He gestured to his brand new arm. "I damn near killed myself when I did that. Thankfully when they did recapture me, they couldn't control my mind anymore, so they threw me in stasis."

Everpony's jaw just hung open after Raven finished his explanation. The man shrugged and kept walking. " It doesn't matter at this point; without El, anything Nasod related won't work."

"Whats El?" Cozy called out.

"Exactly!" Raven called back.

"Well, that plan is a bust...Why do I feel bad for some reason" Cozy wondered where this feeling of guilt came from.

2 Minutes Later

Rust, grim, and empty weapon racks were everywhere; this best described the current state of the armory. That didn't mean much to Raven as something caught his eye, a black crate in the far corner of the room. It had a note attached to it saying 'Property of Henir.' The cyborg shook his head at Glave's antics.

Meanwhile, Oleander found a somewhat clean spot and sat on her haunches. "Alright, everypony, it's lunch time." She flared her horn, and three saddle bags appeared into existence. All the foals rushed over to her, wanting their meal. The unicorn nearly toppled over when she felt something nip at her lower area. She blushed furiously and saw Jade down there. "Ugh! Amber, come and get your little sister... And for the last time, I can't produce any milk!" The unicorn whinnied while Amber pulled her baby sister from the flustered unicorn.

Raven ignored the group's antics and made his way over to the black crate. He pulled the lid off and looked inside. "Interesting." Inside were the following contents: mirror, pair of scissors, black eye patch, curved sword, padded armor with leather straps, sock, iron tip shoes, and a rectangle device.

He picked the mirror first and had a look at himself. "Same ugly mug... Although, I need a haircut." With that, the man picked up the scissors with his normal hand and started cutting his hair.

A few minutes later, he finished cutting, and he admired the new hairstyle. "Not bad" It was nice and short now and brushed down. Next, he picked up that rectangular device in the crate. It looked so familiar; he remembered Seris showing him this new device everyone was using. He couldn't remember the name of it.

"It's a smartphone, you moron."

"Ah! yes, a phone would have been useful during my time as captain."He placed a finger on the screen, and it lit up. The following applications showed: Mapping, Data extraction, Camera, communication, alarm clock, and inventory tracking."Useful, very useful"

After putting the phone down, the mercenary brought his attention to the armor. "Ah, armor, or lack of!" Thanks to magic, firearms, and energy weapons, heavy armor has become obsolete. No amount of enchantments will stop a missile from turning someone into a pile of gore. Last he remembered, the only ones who used heavy armor were the red knights and the Royal family from Hamel.

"Thankfully, I can still use super armor."

Raven brought his hand over and touched the armor, and he was shocked. He felt a shiver run down his spine while running along with the fabric. He could feel it as if it was a part of him. "What is this?"

Moon Charm finished up her peanut butter and daisy sandwich. The young thestral let out a satisfied sigh. Things were going better than she expected. They found the legendary creature known as a Human, and his super strong! With him, their dreams will come true! "I wonder what mister Maxwell is doing back there?" As if on cue, she heard footsteps coming from behind her. The bat pony turned her to her side, and what she saw made her eyes wide.

Behind her stood Raven, currently wearing a black top with leather straps near the top of his torso. That same top had a steel pauldron covering his right shoulder, along with black feathers sticking out of his sleeve. He wore a black metal gauntlet on his right hand as well. The very ends of his blacktop hung loosely from the back, and they glowed white-hot like the tips of Raven's claw.

A leather belt was around the men's waist with a steel buckle and steel chains attached to the side. Below the waist, he wore plain black pants, with bits and pieces of armor covering it, like the metal knee guard covering his right leg. In the palm of his right hand, he held a curved sword that was shifting and changing to suit his needs. A blue vine wrapped itself around the top, while a black carapace started to form along with the sword. And finally, he wore a black eye patch covering his non-functioning eye.

"EEE!" The young thestral squealed in excitement and flew up. She flew up, down, and all around the fully dressed man. "You look terrific! You look like the dark lord I've always dreamed of! like you're ready to take on the world!"

Raven could agree to the last part, but he still found the whole 'dark lord' thing creepy. He looked around and gauged everyone's reaction. Moon was excited; Cozy looked slightly impressed, Oleander looked unimpressed, Xuez looked afraid, the twins were making that same 'EEE' sound like Moon was, Amber had stars in her eyes, and she clapped her hooves in excitement. Finally, Jade, she was chewing on the end of her sister's tail, lovely.

Altogether, he dressed, and he impressed, mostly. "Alright, we'll take a 20-minute break. Once we finish, we'll go to the data room, which is currently on this floor. After I collect the necessary information, we can leave this place." He rubbed a hand under his chin, thinking about what he should say next. "We'll see where we go from there. Just finish up eating and drinking, and we'll be on our way. " Everypony nodded in agreement.

24 Minutes later

The group finally made it to the data room, and surprisingly it didn't look run down. The place was filled with dusty server towers and dead nasod scouts. At the end of the room was the terminal, and it looked like it was pristine."Alright, "Raven called out in an even voice. "Don't touch anything or break anything; this should only take a few minutes." With that, the cyborg made his way to the terminal. The only one following him was Oleander, while every other pony went and explored the room.

Unfortunately, after a few minutes of searching, most of the data was corrupted or just gibberish, Raven couldn't read. Thankfully, the phone had a data repair function and a translator, so he plugged it in and downloaded the relevant data into it. He stood there and crossed his arm; he brought his eye over to Oleander. " So... You look different from the rest of the ponies, besides being older, any reason," Raven asked in a bored tone.

Oleander didn't take her eyes off the screen and answered in an equally bored tone. "My father was a saddle Arabian unicorn, while my mother was a regular unicorn from equestria. Also, I'm currently 15 years old. So you know, I'm practically an adult" Raven didn't hear the sarcasm, but he felt it. "So..." The unicorn continued. "What exactly are you looking for?"

Raven just shrugged. "How long I've been asleep, what happened to the human race, where the El shards went, locations of other nasod facilities and bases. All that is just superficial; I'm looking for the nasod archive." Oleander gave him a questioning look, so he continued. "I'm not exactly sure what everyone in our group wants, but I know Ember over there." He pointed a thumb behind. " Wants to learn magic, and I don't know a damn thing about that, besides the basics. I also assume a unicorn trying to teach an earth pony magic would be like teaching a fish to climb a tree?" Oleander nodded once.
"That's why I'm looking for the archive; the nasods loved collecting all types of information and storing it. The place should have something about teaching a foal like her magic.

Meanwhile, Cozy was currently exploring the room with nothing to do. "More dusty towers. Boring!" How would she exact her revenge on her birth 'parents' and the rest of Equestria? She could try manipulating their newest party member, but she didn't like that idea. The human could easily kill her if she made the wrong move around him. "Maybe a temper tantrum might work?..hm?" Her attention was brought over to a red flashing light.

Like a moth to a flame, she got closer and found the source. One of the server towers had a glowing red button on its side; it was magnificent, and the button was the size of her hoof. It was asking to be pressed, and it was made for her! "but what about mister Maxwell saying something about not touching anything?" The pegasus shrugged; she was sure nothing would go wrong.

Cozy had her hoof a few inches away from the button until Amber bumped into her.

"OOH! A Red button, I wanna press it!" The Earth pony said in excitement.

"No way! I saw it first." Cozy pushed the earth pony away with a scowl.

"Well, It's red like me, so I get to press it!" The filly pushed back.

"That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard!"

"You're dumb!"

"Take that back, you mud pony!" the pink pony shrieked in anger.

"Don't call me that cloud pounder!"

They both started fighting and wrestling each other until Amber's flank was pressed against the button.

SELF DESTRUCT SEQUENCE ACTIVATED!

THE FACILITY WILL BE VAPORIZED IN 13 MINUTES

The announcement was heard throughout the whole facility. No one said anything or did anything for the next few seconds. Until Raven slowly turned his head and looked at the two fillies responsible for this. No words could express how furious he was right now. The fillies gulped, seeing Raven's angered gaze fall upon them. They did what any typical filly would do in this situation.

Cozy and Amber pointed a hoof at each other and yelled out, "SHE DID IT!" at the same time.

6 Minutes later

"If we get out of this alive, I'm going to spank the color off of their asses!"Raven thought angrily as he ran through the facility.

All the foals clung to Raven for dear life; the only exceptions were Jade and Oleander. Raven had to carry Jade in his human arm, and she was currently crying from all the loud noises and rapid movement. Meanwhile, Oleander galloped beside the man and did her best to keep up. "Can't you teleport us out of here?!" Raven yelled at the panicking unicorn.

"I can't! I need a line of sight, and we're too far underground for such a thing!" The unicorn yelled back.

This was not good; they had less than 7 minutes to get out of this place. "I have to time this right, or we're all dying here."

"Oleander, get on my back now!" That was the only place that the foals didn't cling onto. The dark magic user didn't want to argue and did as she was told. She leaped into the air and grabbed onto the human's back. "Hold on tight!" Raven kicked up his legs and ran even faster.

His lungs burned, and his muscles were screaming at him to stop, but they were almost there! Raven weaved and jumped past dead or dying nasods and other trash in the way. They had less than two minutes.

"We're not going to make it!" Xeuz yelled in panic. While the others screamed and cried.

"It's now or never! AWAKEN!"

The group felt the heat rise around them as a red aura surrounded Raven's body. "GET THAT TELEPORT SPELL READY!" Raven ran down even faster than before. The foals had shut their eyes because of the rushing air. Oleander flared her horn and got the spell ready.

Raven saw it, little white dots and darkness... Was that the night sky? "Ready or not, world, here I come!"

The Human and the ponies attached to him were outside. Raven saw the night sky, and it was beautiful.

Oleander released the spell, and all of them disappeared in a blink. A few seconds later, the entire facility and the mountain attached to it disappeared in a blinding light.

Canterlot Castle

Glave watched from the castle balcony as the whole of Equestria was subjected to a blinding light. The man let out a low chuckle at the display. "It's been less than an hour, and that group is already causing trouble! Wonderful, I knew I chose well! But back to work". He turned around and entered the room.

The room was filled with mirrors of various shapes and sizes but big enough to fit a pony. Glave stood in front of three distinct ponies wearing black collars with matching red jewels attached to them. "Alright, Dazzlings, we had a deal. I free you; you smash the mirrors. Now get to it." All three of them nodded and destroyed every mirror in the room.

Once everything was said and done, there wasn't a single unbroken mirror in the room. "Good, very good" Glave smiled under his mask. " No outside interference whatsoever." He brought his attention back to sirens turned ponies. "You lot are free to go, don't have too much fun!" He waved them off.

The board has been set, and the pieces are falling into place.

Sunset Shimmer was never seen again.

Footnote:
Raven
Passive:
Super Armor - - Raven utilities his inner mana reserves and creates a protective barrier just an inch above the skin and clothing. Protects him from environmental hazards and most weak to moderate attacks.
New Special Ability:

Awakening(Lv1) - - Raven has reawakened the fire in his heart! This ability lasts for 60 seconds. He receives a 20% boost to attacks and a 35% boost in movement speed. It can only be activated once a day. 60% drop in attack power and 40% drop in movement speed once the effects of the skill deactivate.

[Mutant Reaper fully geared!]

Author's Note

ALRIGHT! I got another chapter out! The next chapter will be about how ponies react to the explosion and blighting light.
Look forward to it!