Glowing in Everglow

Diary of Cozy Glow

Just after I managed to recover from my wounds, the news reached me that Twilight had been mortally wounded in a battle against Cipher. But despite this setback, Flurry Heart's team had been successful in recovering the Foundation Stone and burying it where both Cipher and Prince Swift Blade would never find it. Flurry was strong for someone so young, even if she was aided by people like Chrysalis, Tirek and Twilight. Somehow, she reminded me of myself at that age, minus the amazing alicorn magic.

During my recovery, the storm outside just continued to pick up, and today it was worse than ever. The sky was perpetually black from storm clouds and the winds continued to pick up by the hour. In fact, this storm reminded me of how my people, the pegasi used to manipulate the weather. I wondered if perhaps the nearby pegasus kingdom of Mae Mae's reach were somehow involved. Apparently, I was not the only one who thought so, as I was soon called to participate in a meeting with King Shining Horn and Princess Scarlet Lance.

The Princess said she thought she had figured out what our enemies were up to, pointed her hoof to a map on the table in the war room. A place which the map described as the location of an ancient ruined tower. A ruin that used to belong to an older pegasi civilization, before Mae Mae's reach. The tower was known as the Storm Tower by the locals, and this weather was clearly not natural. The King explained that Prince Swift Blade once led an expedition into the tower but reported that there was nothing of value there. Shining Horn suspected now that his brother had lied and was now using the tower for whatever purpose. It was likely that if anypony knew the history of the tower, and how it functioned, they would be in Mae Mae's reach.

As such, the King ordered me to launch an expedition to Mae Mae's reach, in this weather, flight was impossible, so we had to go by hoof. I formed a team consisting of myself, Sunset, Aurora, Darkmoon, the undead Silverwing as well as Night's Blessing, who recently returned from her tribe to visit me in Taralos when she heard I was gravely wounded.

Mae Mae's reach was an island, inaccessible by land travel, but the King had arranged some boats, so we were able to cross. We eventually reached a point where we could spot the lake in the distance, through the heavy barrage of rain and heavy winds. Yet before we could reach the boats, our path was blocked by an enormous block of ice, on which was standing a strange bipedal creature, with the face of a skull and the tail of a scorpion. The thing was made entirely of bone, stood way over the height of a pony, even when standing on their hind legs, it was bigger than a gem gnoll, but smaller than a gem troll. It gave off an aura of icy cold. Darkmoon warned me to keep my distance, for what I was looking at was a Bone Devil. Darkmoon quickly explaining that the devils were malevolent creatures of order and the ancient enemies of demons, who were malevolent creatures of chaos. Devils didn't like to be confused for a demon and might lash out if you even suggested they might be similar.

The devil introduced themselves as Xarakanesh and told us it had come to Everglow to investigate the presence of the influence of a powerful demon known as the Devourer of Nations. I did remember what Fazban told me about that demon, the being the founders of Taralos made a pact with it return for the Foundation Stones. I suggested that if the devil wanted to know what we knew that they should tell us what they knew in return, in addition, I wanted the devil to let us pass. The devil agreed, quickly penning out a contract it asked me to sign. I wasn't born yesterday l, and carefully read through the contract before I signed, unfortunately it was in Infernal, the language of the devils. But fortunately, Darkmoon understood the language and took some time reading through the contract. When he was done, he turned towards the group and said:

"The contract says that we are to trade information for information, and that in return a safe passage, we are to provide assistance to the forces of the Nine Hells against the Devourer of Nations in an unspecified way at an unspecified time. "The devil smiled, looking at me for a second before retorting against Darkmoon.

"The Devourer of Nations is both an enemy of yours and an enemy of my Lord Asmodeus. Surely, we can agree that cooperation would be mutually beneficial. After all, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. And you do value friendship, don't you Cozy?"

I had never told the devil my name, so I was surprised they knew it. But I thought they had a point, when the Devourer of Nations came to claim Taralos, we would need all allies we could get.

I started with telling the devil all that I knew about the Devourer, which admittedly wasn’t much, only what Fazban told me about it, that it was a powerful Archdemon that was suspected to be the real identity of the mysterious entity the Founders of Taralos made a pact with to receive the Foundation Stones. The devil on the other hoof knew more, while it didn’t know how the stones came to be, or whenever the Devourer created new stones with each pact or if it was the same stones every time. What he did know is that information about the stones were usually presented to people who the demon deems especially vulnerable to its manipulations, telling them about these items that could defend the nation from any threat and ensure the loyalty of all within its borders. They were then taken on a fake quest to find the Foundation Stones, with challenges to overcome, just to make the whole thing seem more legitimate. After being found, the stones would then protect the kingdom for exactly 329 years, inspiring loyalty towards the monarchs and suppressing disharmony among the nation, it even made it near impossible for planar entities such as angels, devils or demons to manifest within the borders of the nation the Foundation Stones were protecting. The disharmony and disloyalty absorbed by the stones would be stored within them. The diamond stone, the most powerful among them, would even magically create a great capital from nothing.

But after 329 years, all hell would break loose, the stones would shatter in a massive backlash, unleashing the chaotic energy that the stones had been gathering for over three centuries, the people would turn their blades against their comrades and towards the monarchy they had been previously been so loyal to, the city created by the diamond stone would crumble, the barrier to the Abyss weaken, allowing the demonic army of the Devourer to come through. In the end Taralos would be reduced to ashes and the Devourer would feast on the souls of the royal family, as well as everyone else in the kingdom. Xarakanesh said that while the Devourer had repeated this cycle countless times, they were particularly interested in at this time because usually the Devourer was very patient, usually waiting for the fruit to ripen, but this time, they were in a hurry, seeking to end the stones and unleashing chaos before the 329 years were up, and they weren’t sure why. I told the devil that we would inform it if we ever found out the reason.

With that, the devil let us pass and we managed to get to the boats. The journey over to the island was difficult, the waters quite violent because of the storm and the boat almost capsized multiple times. But through the skill of the crew, some aid from Night’s Blessing and some encouraging words from myself, we managed to reach the island unharmed. When we reached the shore, we were met with the local pegasus militia as well as a familiar face, Rainbow Step, the ambassador we had met earlier when we had requested their assistance in saving the king of Arcys. Rainbow Step looked almost like a version of Rainbow Dash with a white coat, multicolored wings as well as rainbow hair in a style reminiscent to Rarity. Rainbow Step recognized me immediately and asked about any news from the outside world. She told me that because of how the storm made them unable to fly, they had been isolated from the outside world since the storm began. I told her that we were here because we suspected that the storm was caused by a place called the Storm Tower and that we suspected that Prince Swift Blade was manipulating it for his own ends.

At the mention of the Storm Tower, Rainbow Step turned serious, leading us to a large building which turned out to be a library. She told us that they had already identified the Storm Tower as a potential cause for the strange weather. She told us that the ruins did not belong to their civilization, but they had sent research teams over to research abilities of the tower, because for people who spent so much time in the air, its abilities were of great interest to them. There was another Storm Tower in Mae Mae’s Reach as well, with similar abilities, who built them wasn’t known, but they were known for the ability to manipulate the weather. Unfortunately, the tower in Mae Mae’s Reach was in ruins and no longer functioned. She suggested we should travel to the Storm Tower immediately and put a stop to Swift Blade’s plans, and that we were in luck, for their research team had discovered a secret entrance to the tower, leading from the caves underneath to the basement floor, an entrance that was unlikely to be known by Prince Swiftblade. A small team could sneak in, bypassing the prince’s military force that were currently stationed outside the tower. She handed us the blueprints to the tower, including the location of the secret entrance, I thanked Rainbow Step for her help.

Before we left, Rainbow Step asked us a final favor, she asked us to destroy the tower so nopony could use it against them ever again. The tower being massively dangerous to any flying creature. I had to agree, giving her my word that the tower would be destroyed, though I can’t deny that there were whispers in my mind that attempted me to use its power for the good of Taralos, whispers I wasn’t certain I would be able to resist when the time came.