Sunset in the gods

“Sunshine, Sunshine, Ladybugs awake. Clap your hooves And do a little shake! Sunshine, Sunshine, Ladybugs awake. Clap your hooves And do a little shake!”.

A small red-maned unicorn and a young pink alicorn were singing together while a phoenix watched them, although the alicorn looked happy while a little nervous as she bumped hooves with the unicorn, the filly barely seemed to want to participate but she did it anyway because for some reason she enjoyed it a little even though she never wants to admit it.

As soon as they finished singing, Sunset went to see the table that was in the royal gardens. "Now let's see if you learned anything." The filly checked carefully. "Plates, forks, spoon, teapot..." Sunset saw how Cadance was nervous to know the result of the class while Philomena just watched, although the alicorn had learned from Sunset how to use telekinesis, the filly thought it would be good for her to learn while they did their 'special greeting' so she would learn to divide her concentration. "Good job, you didn't make a mistake at all, for a moment I thought you would get a little distracted but I think I worried for nothing."

“So I passed?”

“Yes, you passed.” Sunset replied.

At that moment Cadance hugged the filly tightly. “Thank you! Thank you so much!”

“I can’t breathe!”

“Sorry.” She says, a little embarrassed.

“Now that I know you're good with telekinesis, I guess I can teach you how to teleport.”

Cadance was happy. “I've always asked you to teach me that, and now.”

“You better not start crying.”

“I'm sorry, please continue.”

While Cadance served her tea, the filly explained the basics of teleportation. “Did you understand anything?”

Cadance tilted her head as if she didn't understand anything.

“Maybe we should change the angle of this class.” Sunset said and in that instant she had an idea, she quickly teleported away leaving Cadance alone with Philomena.

“You know her better than I do, what do you think she's planning?” She asked the phoenix.

Philomena just made a motion that said 'no idea'.

Sunset reappeared with a large slice of cake. “I need you to eat this.” The filly said.

Cadance looked suspiciously at the slice of cake, it looked delicious and noticed that it was elegantly decorated. “What’s in the cake?”

“It’s not poisoned, I just need you to eat it while I explain something to you and don’t wipe your mouth when you’re done.”

Cadance thought Sunset’s request was strange but she decided to trust her, she ate a little and her eyes sparkled with happiness. “It’s delicious!” She said without noticing a small sinister smile from Sunset.

“So I’m going to ask you something, do you know who invented the teleportation spells?”

Cadance thought for a moment and answered. “Starswirl the Bearded?”

“No!” Sunset exclaimed, scaring Cadance a little. “Teleportation existed before Starswirl was born. No one knows who invented the spell, we only know that it existed, but since at that time there were no magic formulas to create spells, unicorns had learned in another way.”

“Trial and error?” Cadance asked, then Sunset smiled and whispered something to Philomena. The phoenix looked doubtfully at Sunset and then flew away.

“Don’t worry, she just went to deliver a message,” Sunset said. “And your answer is more or less correct, teleportation was born thanks to fear.”

"Fear?" Cadance asked, puzzled. "Is that possible?"

"Actually, many spells in history were born out of fear, or to be precise, the survival instinct. Every time a creature attacked a pony, fear plus the desire to survive made the pony want to be somewhere else."

"Were other spells born that way?"

“Yes, unicorns who tried to overcome their fears created shield spells and those who tried to face their fears created attack spells like fire spells, all of those spells were born from fear and the need to survive.”

“But Sunset, did you also feel fear and that's why you learned so much?”

“Of course not, I'm not afraid of anything.” She said while feigning indignation. “Starswirl the Bearded collected spells during his travels, studied them and created the formulas to use them without problems.”

“But Sunset, you know I'm not very good at understanding those kinds of formulas.”

That's when Philomena came back. “If you're here, it means the message got through.” Sunset said smiling.

“What message?” But Sunset ignored the question.

“GUARDS GATHER!!.”

"That was really fast." Sunset said a little surprised. “You didn't wipe your face, so we can continue.”

“Sunset, what is happening?” The alicorn asked a little scared.

“That delicious cake was Celestia's.” Sunset said.

Then a furious white alicorn was flying on top of the castle looking for something until in the distance she could see Cadanse with pieces of cake in his mouth making the alicorn's anger grow.

“Sunset, what did you do?!” Said the pink alicorn who was getting more and more scared.

Sunset finished her tea and left calmly. “Tomorrow here at the same time, I want to know what you learned.”

Sunset, Shining and Flash left the barracks as soon as it got dark, just as the instructions they were given told them to. As they advanced through the citadel, they noticed that there were no guards on the way, although Sunset suspected that something was wrong. Flash calmed her down by telling her that maybe the absence of guards was part of the plan.

As they continued to advance, other prisoners began to appear. Sunset wondered if any of them were part of those who devised the escape plan.

“This is going to be a great escape.” Flash said, surprised by the number of people gathered. “Sunset, if this plan is successful, then you will have to come up with a more complicated one.”

“I know that.” Sunset replied. “I assumed it from the beginning, whether the escape is successful or not, they will have to investigate what happened and maybe reinforce everything so that it doesn't happen again, but that also helps me, for a plan to be good you must not only know what you can do, you must also know what you can't do.”

Then they saw the exit of the citadel, before crossing the door they saw some hooded men giving something to the prisoners who were leaving, when they reached the door one of the hooded men gave them a sword to each one, then they crossed the doors and arrived at the city.

“Incredible.” Flash said when he saw the amount of people leaving from other doors. “It really seems like a great escape, there must be hundreds of prisoners.”

“Your Majesty, don’t you find it strange?” Shining Armor asked.

“Are you referring to the number of prisoners or the fact that they give us weapons?”

“I can understand that they recruit a few at the last minute but look around, there are hundreds of people here and I can recognize many of them who arrived in the city the same day as us.” Shining replied.

“I’m worried that they gave us swords,” Flash said.

“You’re right,” Sunset said. “Even we in the mines try to be careful when new slaves arrive, there’s something very suspicious about all this.”

“What happened in the mines, Your Majesty?” A voice said behind Sunset. “And why do they call you Your Majesty?”

Shining Armor quickly stands between Sunset and the person who interrupted them.

Lightning Dust raised her hands to calm the situation. “It wasn't my intention to listen.”

“Shining, put down your sword.” Sunset orders him.

“I see you have company.” Flash Sentry said.

“Yes, I ran into some friends.” Lightning Dust said, then Sunset noticed that there were a large number of prisoners gathered behind the mercenary. “And about what I asked you…”

“We are former slaves, we escaped from the mines in the northern mountains a couple of years ago.” Sunset answered. “And about your second question…” The redhead was thinking if she should tell him who she was.

Lightning Dust sighed. “You don’t have to answer me now, we have other problems anyway, 'so your majesty', are you going to participate in the escape?”

“No.” Sunset noticed a small expression of relief on Lightning Dust for that answer. “I just wanted to know what the escape plan is and then create my own but I think I’ll go back to the citadel, there’s something strange about all this.”

“Then you also noticed it, on my side I am looking for all the Washouts and then we will return to the citadel as quickly as possible, besides this place at night gives chills, the truth is I hope that all this is just paranoia and nothing really happens.” Then she leaves with the rest of the Washouts. “Would you like to accompany us to look for the rest?”.

Shining Armord whispers to Sunset. “Should we accompany them? We already know that something is wrong and we should return before the guards realize that we are not in the barracks.”

“For the moment we will help them.” Said Sunset. “Given the situation we will need more people for a future escape plan.” Shining sighed resignedly accepting the answer of his queen.

“I suppose that we will not return yet.” Said Flash deducing what Shining and Sunset were saying.

“We will help you but we need to know how to identify your mercenaries.” Said the redhead. “My name is Sunset Shimmer, sorry for not telling you my name before.”

Lightning Dust makes a slight smile and continues on his way. “When this is over I hope you tell me why they called you your majesty.”

“We should go back.” Flash said. “I still have a bad feeling about all this.”

“Sunset, you've been a little quiet, are you worried about something?” Lightning Dust asked. "I mean, is there anything besides all of this?"

“Why did they give us swords and also the people who were handing them out, why haven't we seen anyone else from those who devised the escape plan?”

Lightning Dust was also worried about that and decided that they had been outside long enough. “You're right, besides I don't want to risk it anymore, listen up everyone!” The mercenary shouted. “We're going back to the citadel!” And all the Washouts began to go back where they came from.

“Don't you think you'd draw a lot of attention with that shout?” Flash Sentry asked.

“I don't know if you noticed, boy, but we haven't seen any guards since we left the citadel.” One of the Washouts said.

“He doesn't mean the guards, he means the villagers.” Sunset said.

“I don't think they're a problem.” The mercenary said, “Don't you remember what they looked like? That grayish skin, I don't think it's because they're in good health, and everyone I saw was too malnourished, like they were never fed, we just have to...”

Then a window breaks and a hand grabs the mercenary's head and presses it until it shatters the skull and quickly drags the body into the house.

“Ambush!” Lightning Dust shouted. “Everyone in defense formation! We're heading to the citadel gates right now!”

Sunset didn't know what was happening, everything was just very calm and suddenly something appears and kills one of the prisoners in a brutal way, Shining and Flash had drawn their swords ready to defend Sunset from any attack, Sunset began to remember when they arrived in the city the amount of people she saw, she couldn't help but notice that maybe the inhabitants of the city were more than they seemed and that couldn't stop her from starting to feel afraid.

"Your Majesty we must leave here." Shining Armor said.

But Sunset was just still and scared with the feeling that she was stalked by predators, she was silent until she saw something. "Lightning." Sunset tried to call her.

"Not now! I'm trying to think!".

But Sunset insists "Look over the walls Lightning Dust!" She shouted as if it were an order.

The mercenary leader looks at where the redhead told her. “This must be a joke.” On the walls of the citadel she could see many lit torches that were not there before and she also sees that there were many people watching the city. “This was never an escape plan.” Lightning Dust said furiously.

On one of the towers of the wall Scorpan watched the city. “I'd say there are about five hundred humans down there.” He said with a wide smile. “Who do those Wrath Beasts belong to?”

One of the gods stepped forward. “They're mine.” The god was almost two meters tall, he was completely shaved, his clothes were just rags and his skin was the color of blood red.

“Tell me your name and what faction you belonged to before you got here.” Scorpan ordered him.

“My name is Redfist, I used to belong to the Fire Faction.”

“I want you to go and put on a good show.”

When the god was about to jump off the wall he saw something. “Great god, their prey is there.” Scorpan looks in the direction Redfist pointed at him.

The god smiles at the unexpectedness of the situation. “I don't care, if they can't survive against you that means they were never worthy of being my prey.” Then before Redfist jumped off the wall Scorpan said something else to him. “Redfist, I hope you find death.”

After Redfist heard those words he smiled sadistically and decided to follow the order that the great god had given.