From the ashes

“KING SOMBRA!!!” Cold stone galloped towards the pinned down king in panic, completely ignoring the Lunar diarch flying ahead of him. Celestia and her sister teleported out of sight as an explosion of shadow engulfed Cold stones vision and sent him flying back.

His body felt colder than ice but hotter than any fire and every inch of his body felt completely numb. seconds felt like minutes, minutes felt like hours, and so on.

Suddenly the feeling of cold wind rushed past Cold stone as he flew back. Opening his eyes, Cold stone found out he was flying through the air in an arch toward a nearby mountain face. Cold stone quickly used his momentum to twist his body around and raised his sword wielding hoof beside his head in preparation. Soon enough, the mountain face was a couple of meters in front of Cold and he thrusted his sword into the rock, making a straight carved line as he went down. In order to slow down even more, Cold stone slammed his free hoof into the rock as well and, with the combined force of his sword, started to slowly descended until he was a few inches from the ground.

Cold stone released a heavy sigh of relief as he dislodged his sword ,and now bloody hoof, from the rock and landed back side down into the snow. The pain in his hoof sent a flare of pain throughout his foreleg, but that wasn’t important, he needed to find and help Sombra. Slowly rolling over to his side and getting to his hoofs, he surveyed the area and his eyes widened in shock and confusion.

There was nothing but snow and a blizzard that wasn’t helping his already poor eyesight and ended up making him slightly shiver.

“Where in Tartrus am I? Where is the empire, Those alicorns, Sombra?” Cold stone scratched his head, but winced when he used his injured hoof to do so and looked down at it. “I’m injured…great.” He thought with a grimace as he carefully put his bloody hoof carefully onto the snow and looked back to the distance.”Maybe that dark explosion didn’t send me that far from the empire…I hope.”

Cold stone was brought out of thoughts by a distant explosion and the dark clouds and its blizzard were blown back to reveal a bright blue sky. Cold look to where the sound came from and saw a beam of colorful light shoot out and spread throughout the sky. The sight reminded him of the days where he and his family would look to the sky and gaze at a similar sight. Cold stone continued to gaze at the beam of light until something entered his line of sight.

At first, it was a tiny black dot that grew bigger and bigger until it resembled a sharpened object that was flying straight at him. Cold stone effortlessly dodged it and the object landed with an audible crash behind him, which made Cold lose his balance for a moment. Looking back, the object was a couple of meters away from him and out of curiosity he approached it. When he got close, he started getting the feeling he seen it somewhere before, then it hit him like a bag of bricks, it was-

“KING SOMBRA'S HORN!?” He shouted in shock. The ,mostly, red horn was lying in a tiny crater, at the base, it was obvious that it had been broken off. Cold stone stood there for what felt like a good couple hours as the edges of his vision darkened. The only pony he could call family was most likely dead and the only thing left of him was in front of him. No, it couldn't be possible. Tears started to run down his cheeks as he slowly approached the horn, the only sounds being the crunching of snow and Cold's pitiful whimpers. When he was less than a meter away, Cold dived onto the horn and grabbed it, hugging it tightly to his chest, as he loudly cried into the sky.

“W-Why does this happen to me!? What did I do to deserve this…why…” Cold’s cries died down back into whimpers as he balled up and cried to himself, still holding onto Sombra’s horn.

“I CAN’T BELIEVE IT… THIS IS RIDICULOUS… I SWEAR I’LL RIP THAT DRAGON AND HIS MARE FRIENDS APART!” A quiet voice roared in anger. Cold stone was quick to get to his hoofs at the sudden voice, holding the horn in his injured one.

“W-Who’s there, show yourself coward!” Cold demanded, trying to keep his signature stone face, even though the tear stains and shaky voice didn’t make him seem all that threatening.

“Black Ivory? What in Tartarus are you doing here?” The tiny voice questioned. This only resulted in Cold getting into his biped stance and holding his now chipped sword in his free hoof.

“I demand you show yourself now and maybe i’ll make your death less painful!” Cold still shouted to the empty air, with no response except a conveniently timed howl of wind.

“Ugh, Black Ivory you idiot, i’m down here!” The tiny voice called out. Cold lowered his sword and looked down at the ground in thought.

“Wait, That voice!” Cold looked down at the horn in his grasp and his eyes widened under his blindfold. ”King Sombra!” tears started to fill the corners of his eyes, but in joy that he hasn’t felt in a long time. ”OH thank the gods you're alive…what happened?” he said with a raised eyebrow.

“Now that you are done crying like a foal.” Cold stone blushed in embarrassment.” After Celestia defeated me, I activated a fail safe spell and banished the empire and everything deep into the north so nopony could find it. Unfortunately, I had the bright idea of using myself as the fuse and my physical body was lost. My spirit was bound to the crystal of the empire and I haunted it for years.” Sombra horn started to heat up to the point Cold stones injured hoof was cauterized, which wasn’t painless to the blindfolded stallion. " that pink alicorn and her husband came in and used some shielding spell that kept me out. THEN, after hundreds of years, I FINALLY had the chance to take the empire back. BUT THAT DRAGON AND THOSE MARES GOT IN THE WAY!! “Sombra finished with a roar of anger.

For Cold stone, it was a lot to take in and the more he went over it, the more he started to hate himself. While his king was fighting for the control of his empire all this time, Cold Stone was nowhere to be seen to help him and his king got banished TWICE.

“I-I’m sorry my lord. I wasn’t there to assist you, and as a result you were dethroned. I don’t deserve to be by your side for what i did.” Cold stone weakly responded while hanging his head low in shame. Sombra was about to berate him out of blind anger but nothing came out of his non-existent mouth. Instead his anger died down as Sombra felt something he hadn't felt in a while.

sympathy.

“Do not wallow in self pity, the spell was faulty at best and you most likely got stuck in some sort of short term limbo as a result, you couldn’t have helped me anyway.” Cold stone raised his head at Sombra's words and looked at the horn with a confused look.

“What do you mean by that sir?” Cold questions. Sombra was quiet for a moment but scoffed in response.

“That doesn’t matter right now, what does it mean that I need to come up with a plan to get back my power.” Sombra thought about the action of rubbing his chin while thinking of an idea, then something struck him. ”Black Ivory-”Cold stone perked up to his fake name and listened to the horn.” I need you to put my horn against your forehead.” Cold stone was about to question his king but was stopped when Sombra continued. ”Don’t question me right now, do this and we can start ,making plans from there..”

Cold stone hesitated for a moment, but took the horn in his hoof and put the cracked base of it against his forehead. The sudden rush of agonizing pain pounded at Cold head, making him fall back onto the snow and writhe in pain. This pain continued to spread through his brain and brainstem and the feeling of Sombra's horn fusing with his skull made it worse. Soon, the pain died out and Cold's body went limp as he heavily breathed in exhaustion.

“There, it is done, now stand.” Sombra's commanding voice broke the silence as Cold weakly got to his hoofs as he could barely stand. After a few more seconds of silence, Cold raised a hoof to his forehead as his hoof touched something pointy.

“W-What the-?”He continued to poke his newfound horn. It was similar to sombras, it was smaller and instead of it being red and black, it was an icy blue with a navy blue color at the base that matched his coat. “How is this possible?”

“I fused my horn into your skull in order to form magic based symbiotic relationship-” Cold raised an eyebrow at the word ‘symbiotic’ but chose to stay silent.”- and in short, you are becoming a unicorn like me.”

“This is a lot of information for me to take in sir…” The horn on his head started to pulsate and it gave Cold stone a minor migraine which made Cold wince.

“There is no time to explain right now, we must go back to the crystal empire and continue from there.” Sombra commented as Cold stone body weakly nudged itself forward as he started to walk towards the empire in silence.

—----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Twilight- 3rd person

It was a wild day for Twilight to say the least, the whole situation at the crystal empire left her and the rest of her friends exhausted on the way back to the train. She had failed the test Celestia assigned to her and the thought of being separated away from her friend scared her to no end.
But in the end Celestia ended up revealing that she did, in fact, pass the test. The news made Twilight's friends ecstatic and they all went back home to celebrate, mostly to Spike's victory. Twilight was happy that Spike got all the recognition for saving the crystal empire, but she felt as though she could have done more to help. Twilight was brought out of her thoughts as the front of the door to the library opened to reveal the small drake himself.

“Oh hey spike, you're finally back from your part?.” Twilight said as she used her magic to close and set down a book she had been reading. ”I thought you would stay a little longer, considering it is dedicated to you.” Spike waddled over to the couch and flopped onto it while breathing a sigh of exhaustion.

“I-I tried Twi, but a dragon like me can eat so many cupcakes before he gives up.” As he said this, a loud rumble came from Spike's stomach as he recoiled in pain. “But I don't regret it.” He finished as he made his body go limp and his tongue hung out of his mouth. Twilight giggled at the drake and levitated him in front of her.

“Well hope you can recover quickly, pinkie is throwing me a party as well in a few days.” Spike gave her a small look of annoyance which made Twilight give him a sheepish smile. ”Look on the bright side, it won't be in a couple of days.” Twilight walked towards and up the stairs with a spike in her magic, which didn’t help his stomach ache. They reached the master bedroom and they entered as Twilight placed spike into his basket as she hopped onto her bed.

“Really? Knowing Pinkie, would she throw you one at the same time as mine?” Spike questioned as he covered himself in his blanket.

“Apparently she ran out of supplies, so it will probably be one or two days before she can start one.” Twilight responded as she also got cozy in bed. They finished up their conversion and said their goodnights before the sound of spike snores reached Twilight’s ears. But the studious unicorn couldn’t sleep, the only thing keeping her awake was the thought of her not being there for any pony.

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Cold stone-3rd person

The sky was dark by now as Cold Stone trotted through the snow. The empire wasn’t that far away but the sight of it only made Cold stone to scowl.

During his trot, Sombra went into the details of what happened while Cold was in limbo and his king kept talking, the more Cold’s blood boiled. He’d agree that these random mares and, what really surprised him, a dragon just waltzed into the sombra empire and stole it from him. Cold stored the violent thoughts away so he could listen to Sombra.

“Wait a minute.” Cold stopped just outside of the border which made sombra stop talking. "Seeing how these peasants act towards you and your leadership. Don’t you think my new horn would make them suspicious of me.” Cold pointed out with a slightly worried expression.

“Why do you care what they think? All we are doing is going in there and taking back my power.” Sombra retorted. Cold stone stayed quiet as he entered the border, the feeling of warm air rushed over but didn’t faze him. Cold quickly took cover in a nearby alley and hid behind a dumpster as he took off his blind fold.

“I’m in no position to question you sir, but you and I are both weak, in body and magic. There is no way we would be able to trot up and take on anypony. If you will, I have an idea.” Cold stone gaze hardened as he started at the floor. Sombra had to reluctantly agree that Cold brought up a good point.

“I’ll admit that you are right, and see my track record of trying to regain my control, going head first in would be idiotic.” Sombra scoffed at his stupidity. “I allow you to speak.” He sighed in defeat.

Cold stone's mouth formed a small smile as his brain thought of a thousand ‘what if’s’. Shortly after, Cold stood up and put his blindfold back on as he trotted out into the open. The sight nearly made Cold sneer, The ponies fur were replaced with a crystal sheen as everypony were throwing a festival dedicated to Sombra death. Cold held himself back and his face gave off his signature stone cold expression.

“What are you doing!? I thought you had a plan, why are you wondering into the crowd?” Sombra demanded with a hint of panic in his voice. Cold stone Ignored him as he moved through the crowded streets, all the while getting odd glances from the crystal ponies. The pair soon arrived at a gigantic crystal build ,known as the library, and entered through the door.

The library was empty of any ponies, including the librarian, so Cold quickly trotted through the rows of bookshelves in search of something.

“Sorry I didn’t respond sir, I don't know if I could talk without speaking out loud.” He stopped at the ‘G’ section of a random shelf and scanned it for a book. ”As for my plan, we need to get power without alerting ourselves to others and after some thinking I got an idea.” The book he was looking for came into view and he pulled out ‘geography of Equestria: for dummies’.

Cold turned and trotted to a table to sit down in one of the seats and put his book onto the table. “From what you told me, as time goes on, your horn will fully fuse with me and i’ll start to be able to perform magic right?” Cold questioned as he opened his book.

“Yes, that is correct.” Sombras voice confirmed.

“Adding in the factor we have 3 options.” Cold turned his swiveling chair around and put his hoofs together as he continued.”Option one, we wait until my magic get powerful enough to where I can go hoof to hoof with an alicorn, but considering there are three of them now, that won’t work. Option 2, I wait until my magic gets to a point where I can use it properly, and I can make a magic infused potion to mind control ponies. Finally, option 3, We somehow make our own army and overwhelm them, but that would also take too much time.”

Sombra thought over Cold's options and there was one clear choice. Option 1 would take a long time and 3 seemed like a pipe dream, but option 2 interested him greatly.

“Tell me black ivory, what do you have in store for option 2?” Sombra asked, giving himself a devilish smirk. Cold turned his chair around and looked at the geography book. His hoof pointed to a location called ‘The Everfree Forest’.

“My mother was a fanatic for every type of flora there is, bought any book on the topic and was making potions and medicines in her free time.” Cold sadly smiled at the memories but continued.” I remember her telling me about a location her mother visited called the Everfree Forest, a forest filled with every type of strange flower and plant you can find. I read some of the books my mother got and there were pages in it dedicated to Hallucinogens.” He ripped out the page depicting the map of Equestria and put it into one of his belt patches.

Sombra let out an annoyed sigh. “How is a simple drug going to help me gain power again?” Sombra questioned with a non-existent raised eyebrow.

“What I am thinking of cooking up isn’t a normal drug, it’s magically infused.” Cold put the geography book back into its place and moved onto the ‘F’ section.”If I get a right combination of herbs and plants, i can make a drug that with make somepony mentally stupid and subsptable to magical influence.” The ‘F’ section came into view and it didn’t take long for the conniving stallion to find a book on floral science.”Then all i have to do is to infuse it with specific spells and put it into a town water supply, activate the spells, and then i’ll have a entire town under my control.” Cold finished as he sat down and started to read his second book.

Sombra was at a loss of words at the moment, he thought all this stallion was good for was just some living weapon. His evil laughs echoed in Cold's head.
—----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

An hour later

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“Excuse me sir, what do you think you are doing here?” an elderly voice made Cold turn his blindfolded head towards the voice. Upon seeing the ‘face’ to the voice, what he could tell was an older mare with tied back hair with big,round glasses. ”The library was closed hours ago because of the celebration, i can report you to the guard you know?” The elderly mare threatened. Cold stone held back the urge to kill this mare and calmly got out his chair.

“I’m sorry ma’am, I didn’t realize that and I deeply apologize. ”He lowered his head into a bow and raised it again. The mares glare softened a little as Cold made his way to put up his book.

“It is alright young sir, but i can’t excuse bringing weapons in here though.” she pointed a hoof at Cold's straight edge sword. ”But I’ll excuse it this one time if you made yourself scarce.” She started with a hoof pointed towards the entrance.

Cold blew out a breath of frustration through his nose as he put up the floral book and started to walk out. He had all that he needed by now so it wasn’t that big of a problem, but the mare's attitude was reasonable since he technically broke into the library. The blindfolded stallion only stopped when he was close to the mare and looked at her, which made her feel slightly uncomfortable.

“Before I go, do you know why I can get to the Everfree first the quickest?” At this, the mares eyes widened a bit at the request.

“Why would you want to go there? that’s one of the most dangerous places in Equestria, you have to be insane to go there!” The mare tried to protest. But Colds' hoof touched her shoulder and gripped it with surprising strength.

“That is none of your concern. ”He leaned in closer to the mare, who was starting to shake in fear. ”Now tell me…where.do.i.go.to.get.there.” Cold slowly questioned in a low and threatening tone, while gripping the handle of his sword.

“T-The train s-station is your best b-bet. I-It isn’t that far away from here, I-I'm sure you can find it…please don’t hurt me.” Cold stood in place for what felt like hours, but soon let go of his sword and the mare's shoulder. The mare panted heavily when Cold walked out of the door.

—----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Cold has faced many horrors in his lifetime. From the most savage of beast, to the harshest weather, and even other ponies. But what he saw at this ‘Train Station’ was one of the most creepy and scariest things he has seen. At the front was a…the head?... of the beast, pink with a boxy and round body with a big yellow eye at the front. It had wheels at the bottom and armor at the front for protection, the most frightening thing was that it was spewing smoke from the top.

Attached to the beast were colorful boxes on wheels with windows in them which was probably its stomach. To his horror, there were ponies inside but for some reason they weren’t screaming in terror? The Monster made a hiss and this made Cold stone get into his biped stance and shakenly draw his sword at the beast, making the ponies there stare at him with bewildered and shocked faces.

“I don’t know how I'll be able to cut his iron hide, but it’s going to become a problem when it becomes hostile.” The monster let of a hiss of steam which his Cold this time, sending him to his haunches and getting a couple of laughs from the crowd. He quickly recovered and was about to charge the iron beast when a middle aged stallion stopped him.
“Sonny, what do you think you’re doin’?” the stallion questioned with a country accent. Cold stared down at him for a moment before sheathing his danged blade and getting on all fours. ”Follow me son, let’s talk.” Cold stone's face scowled a bit but followed the stallion anyway.

“First of all, I am not your son. second, I was trying to kill that iron creature, why did you stop me?” Cold monotone voice demanded with a bit of anger behind it. The middle aged stallion chuckled as he found a bench, which he and cold sat down on.

“Looks like somepony woke up on the wrong side of the bed.” The stallion remarked, gaining him a deeper scowl from Cold stone. ”That ‘beast’ ya talkin’ about it the train. Ya ride it to get somewhere.” The stallion said while pointing to the iron bea- train. Cold's face reddened a bit from his mistake as he looked at the middle aged stallion.

“That…makes sense now. But still, I was told this thing could get me to my destination but I have never been on a ‘train’ before.” Cold Used air quotation at train, still not trusting the locomotive. The Stallion chuckled as he got off the bench and trotted towards the train station with Cold close behind him. They reached a wooden boxed area labeled ‘ticket booth’ and the stallion paid for a piece of paper labeled ‘equestrian rail road, dodge junction’.

“This here is what you will call a ticket, they’re the thing that allows you to travel on the train, now i don’t have enough bits to buy you one, nor do i know where you are going so you’ll have to get your own.” The stallion said with a kind smile.

Cold stone was confused and annoyed by this, why would this random stallion care about what he was going through. Not that he didn’t appreciate it, it’s just that it wasn’t common where he came from. The stallion started to leave but was stopped when Cold put a hoof on his shoulder.

“Why, why would you help me?” The blindfolded stallion question. Earning an amused expression from the middle aged stallion which was lost to Cold's eyes.

“What ya mean, it’s always nice to help someone that’s in need, that is what my ma taught me.” The stallion started to walk off again but was stopped when Cold stone spoke up.

“What is your name sir?” He was surprised that he said that, why should he care about his name, he’ll never see him again, so what is the point?

“Oh, it’s trailblazer, have a nice day sir.” After that, Trailblazer entered a train car and was lost to Cold stone. He turned around, trotted up to the ticket booth and mimicked what Trailblazer did, and tapped a silver colored object which produced a small ringing sound.

The half asleep mare behind the booth shot straight up and the sound and upon seeing Colds clothing, gave him a bewildered look.

“So are you some monster hunter?” She tried to joke, only silence and the sound of crickets chirping. ”Soooooo…where ya heading?” She questioned while pulling a long sheet of paper made of blank tickets.

“I need one of those pieces of paper to go to a town called ponyville.”’It’s the closest settlement near the forest’ Cold thought to himself. The mare was off putted by the way the way this stallion was speaking, so she pulled off a ticket and wrote down the location as quickly as she could.

“That’ll be 5 bits sir” The ticket mare put out a hoof through the window of the booth. Cold pulled out a small pouch of bit from behind his cloak. He would sometimes take the money of any victims he had but he never really used them. The mare hoffed the ticket over and took the bits, with a thanks, Cold made his way to the train and hesitantly entered and took a seat in one of the train cars.

Soon the train whistled, startling Cold stone, and started to move as the landscape passed by the window next to him.

Cold stone’s eyes started to feel heavy, so he laid his head against the vibrating window and fell asleep, ready to put his plan into action.