"It's only the Pinkie Sense, you silly, heheheh!"

"Twilight? Twili-iiight?" Says Pinkie Pie, awakening her friend. - "...TWILIGHT!"

"Uh?! Pinkie?!" Twilight wakes up, a little bit frightened.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm CLEARLY Pinkie. I guess you had some kind of nightmare, huh?" Says Spike, turns out it was him who awakened Twilight.

"Oh, that "Pinkie Sense" yesterday made me go crazy... I dreamed about it. My apologies, Spike."

"Well, I told you already that's just Pinkie being... Pinkie. Just accept it, c'mon! You're too crazy!" Says the little dragon, with an ironic tone at the end.

"ANYWAY! I'll accept it..." Says Twilight, making Spike show a relieved expression on his face "Buuut..." She continues, making the dragon's expression disappointed now. "I should look into it a bit further." Finish the curious unicorn.

"Okay, okay, just leave me out of that stuff, right?"

"I'll try!" Her eyes are shining with curiosity, she quickly leaves her room.

"Uuuhh... I think I'll go back to sleep then." Concludes the little dragon, settling down on his bed, starting his wonderful nap.

The sun hits hard on a bunch of apple trees, with lots of leaves and animals around them. A ranch can be seen nearby, and a pink being coming out of it just towards the apple trees. It's Pinkie Pie, and she's looking for somepony.

"Where's that stubborn mare?! I need to make an apple pie today!" Says Pinkie as she walks bouncing and singing, looking for her friend. Suddenly Pinkie stops bouncing for a moment, looking backwards.

"Hmmm?" Mutters Pinkie, with a curious expression on her face. However, she sees it was only a rabbit passing. "Oooh, how cute..." Pinkie says, continuing to bounce. What she doesn't know is that the rabbit was placed there by Twilight, who is behind an apple tree.

"Did she notice me? I put the rabbit there just in case, but whether it was me or the rabbit, she noticed something behind her before she even saw it. Uh... This just makes me more confused. What would that be? Some kind of magical ability? I don't know, I need to check my complex magic books, this just doesn't make sense yet..." Thinks Twilight, already trotting right to her treehouse in no time.

Twilight rushes into her treehouse, waking Spike as he desperately messes up her books.

"Uhhh, what's your problem, Twilight? You're interrupting my wonderful nap."

"Spike, bring me all the books on the complex magic bookshelf. We are going to move for a little while."

"What the heck happened? Where we going exactly?!"

"Come on, Spike." Twilight says in a slightly more serious tone than usual.

"Kay, kay..."

"If I ever know in depth more about complex magic I might find something, but... I still feel like it can go beyond that... I remember something about "Chaos Magic" that one of the creatures that Princess Celestia defeated had, but I don't remember his name anymore...
Spike! Get all the legends books too, I want to check them out."

"Ooooouch..." Says Spike in a tired tone, already bringing several books in his hands. "But where are we going anyway, if YOUR MAJESTY would ever like to tell me it already."

"Ha ha ha. Very funny, Spike. We will go to the ancient castle of the Two Princesses, deep in the Everfree Forest."

"Uuhh that haunted castle? No way..."

"Come on Spike, you know there's nothing haunted there. It's only a very secluded place, which is exactly what I need right now. I have something very serious to study now."

"And what would this study be about?"

"Less talk and more work, Spike!..." When she says that, Spike immediately go get more books. "But I'll tell you!... After yesterday, seeing that "Pinkie sense", I was really curious to know how it works. According to Pinkie, it doesn't make any sense specifically, but I know there's some logic to it, and I'm going to find out, I MUST!"

"Calm down, calm down, you hothead. I already understand that you want to know it so badly. Well, I guess it won't do any good if I say you should let it go and let me go back to my nap, right?" Says Spike, looking at Twilight who strongly shows an expression of "no" on her face. "Yeah, as I thought..." He says leaving the books on the floor and going to get more.

Deep in the Everfree Forest, in the late afternoon, howls of Timberwolves echo from far away, as well as the footsteps of a pony with the weight equivalent of a child dragon on its back, not to mention a pile of books in a backpack.

"I'm saying, this place is too scary, what do you think about changing your mind, Twilight?"

"It's already the twelfth- no, thirteenth time you've asked me that, and I repeat, NO!"

"Oooow..." Spike murmurs, then sighs.

"And by the way, according to what i remember, we are already in the right place!" Twilight says while holding a map in the air with her magic.

"For real?!"

"Certainly!" She says as she continues trotting, then finally arriving at the old (very old) castle.

"Uuuhh... I feel like Nightmare Moon's aura remains here till today..."

"Naah, stop being scared, Spike. We already know that we defeated her and she became Princess Luna again."

"Hm, I dunno..."

"Lets go in!" She says excitedly, using her magic to open the castle doors. "IT'S SO BEAUTIFUL! It's everything so... Old school, I love it. These things are super rare!"

"It's scarier than I thought..."

"Shhh!" Twilight murmurs, being sarcastic

Twilight and Spike walk around the castle a lot, despite everything being dark, making Spike even more scared. Twilight also uses her magic to light some old torches as they walk around.

"Woah, this castle seems to have no end, it's huge!" Says Spike.

"Oh yes, the old castle is really huge. There are even some secret passages in it, including one in the library, which is exactly where we're headed. Buuut we have to walk a lot to get there."

"Ouch... All right, all right. It's even getting less scary already, heheh."

*Twilight looked at him ironically, then giggles*

"Yeah... Everyponies gone today, dammit! I'll see if Twilight is free at least, if not, I'll see if Maud is." Pinkie says anxiously out loud as she walks through Ponyville, already arriving at Twilight's treehouse.

"Twilight? Twilight? Spike? Is somepony there?" She says. Then, noticing the silence, she makes a kinda funny face as she slowly opens the door.

"Hmm... Where did they go? Did they leave? Could it be... Uh, it's obvious they left, silly Pinkie... Well, I walked through most of Ponyville just now and didn't see them anywhere. Wonder where they are?"

Pinkie notices the absence of many books. "Hmm... Twilight would never leave books disorganized or misplaced, at least not THAT MANY books. There's something wrong with her..."

"That's it! That library is perfect." Twilight says as she puts her backpack full of books on the ground.

"So is it nap time?" Asks Spike with a tone of happiness

"Okay, okay, you can sleep, lazybones. I won't need you for now."

"Oh yeahh!"

"But when I need it, I won't hesitate to call you!"
Spike gets a disappointed expression on his face, but then he settles down, cheerful again. "Well, it's fair." He concludes.

"Hmm... I need to review what's in books about the lord of chaos, Discord, and see what I can find similar with complex spells. It's like he switches between realities, which is also what Pinkie does apparently. It's confuse. If I hadn't come here, I wouldn't have been able to think about it very well..."

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING... WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?..."

"Uh? W-who's there? Twilight?! Where are you?..."

"WHAT DO YOU DO IN THIS CASTLE?"
Spike turns around, his pupils are tiny with fear as he sees the face that bulges behind him. -N-Ni... Night...

"JUST TELL ME IT ALREADY..."
Spike runs away, unable to say anything, but the being that questions him also chases him... Getting closer and closer... It hits Spike, making him scream loudly.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAHH!" After the scream, Spike realizes he's just in his bed.

"Spike? What happened?!" Twilight asks, kinda worried, going to him.

"The Nightmare Moon..."

"WHAT?!"

"I had a nightmare with... Nightmare Moon."

"Oh, a dream, it makes sense. Woah... I know that Princess Luna had powers to enter people's dreams, but i guess she didn't recovered that much of her power and she wouldn't do that, let alone as Nightmare Moon itself, since we already defeated her, right?"

"Yeah... I think it was just a dream. But damn, there was something that felt very real, I think I'm too scared of this castle... She asked about what we were doing in the castle, it must have something to do with my fear, right?"

"Well, it must be, but it's still weird putting the facts together... It seems to be only your fear of her, anyway, we can thought more about it later. I have to keep up focusing on my studies. According to some old books and A LITTLE of my personal deductions, I found more information about the "chaos magic" of the legendary Discord, the master of chaos:

Well, his magic allows him to escape reality and materialize anything he imagines.
Well, what I deduce is that there are other types of magic similar to this one, except by the "materialization" part. Other rare spells can also kinda "escape from reality" or even travel between realities according to some books from StarSwirl the bearded. Perhaps there is a "main" reality and ours is not that one? Maybe so... But it's not possible for me to get answers, at least I don't think so.
Alicorn magic apparently has something to do with this type of magic, but probably it's not so much. Another example is the elements of harmony, which have a lot of magic unknown in our world and reality.

Do you understand what I mean, Spike? A pony can, according to my deductions, obtain this type of magic. It will take my studies to classify each of these types of magic, but what they all have in common is to escape the reality itself, as if it were just one of many realities which are all small compared to a larger and MAIN reality. StarSwirl wondered a lot about the realities of our world and also wondered about the probability of just one reality in our world being 100% main..."

"Uuuhh... I think I preferred the nightmare with Nightmare Moon, honestly."

"Pffft! Spike!" Says Twilight trying to show anger but laughing right away.

"Heheheh, just kidding... Well, my brain was exploded after that, but I agree about the... Realities and... Yeah, that's right!" Spike says covertly, receiving an angry 'I know you didn't understand anything' look from Twilight. "Uh... You know those things aren't for me! But I'm here to listen to you, right?"

"Oh, that's true... You convinced me. Thank you Spike. Talking to you helped me relax more and clear things out and WOAH, MORE THINGS MAKE SENSE NOW, I NEED TO GET MORE BOOKS AND REVIEW SOMETHING! I..." She doesn't even complete what she was going to say, she just runs away.

"Yeah... She never changes..." Completes Spike, making a shrug gesture.

In a place with an infinity of rocks of various kinds, suddenly a pink hoove slips on one of them while bouncing.

"Hmm... Are they at home? I hope so! I hope I hope so and I hope they hope I hope so!!!" Says Pinkie Pie, hitting the door of her old house.

The door is opened by somepony, who says "WHO IS IT?! Oh... It's you."
It's his sister Limestone Pie, saying in a clearly hostile tone.

Pinkie pulls herself together, yelling "LIMESTONE!!" and then hugging her tightly.

Limestone gives Pinkie a rough push, however, saying softly "Yeah, I love you too."

Pinkie notices somepony shyly hiding in a corner, but interested in what's going on.

"Marble!" Pinkie screams, jumping on top of her other sister who stares at her with a super scared look cause of her jump.

"Pinkie... I don't... Need to be hugged... Like that... But thanks..."

Pinkie gives her sister a super-cheerful look, with a frighteningly huge smile on her face.

At this large rock farm, a little bunch of time passes and Pinkie asks her sisters about her other sister Maud, who according to them is outside examining rocks as usual.

"This is a more resistant type, you can tell by its texture, don't you agree, Boulder?" Says Maud, staring at her pet rock for very long seconds.

"Maaaaaaud!!" Pinkie screams, catching the attention of her sister, who turns her head with a completely neutral expression on her face, despite being excited deeply.

"Pinkie!" Maud says in a low and soft tone.

"Do you want to go out today? I called all my friends but they're all busy and... Wait, actually, Rarity said she'd be free later this afternoon. But she disappeared, just like Twilight. What do you say we go look for them? Since I didn't find them in Ponyville, I thought about going to the forest, but I was worried and..." Pinkie stops to breathe. "Well, what do you think?"

"Sounds great to me, Pinkie. What do you think, Boulder?"

The pet stone isn't able to utter a single word, but somehow, it seems to agree...

"Yaay! Let's go!!" Screams Pinkie, as she runs to her sisters' house.

Maud gives a barely perceptible smile.

In the Everfree forest, howls of Timberwolves echo from far away once again, in addition to the steps of a pony and the bouncing of another one, however, they suddenly hear the steps of a third living being.

"Who's there?" Says Maud kinda softly, quickly spotting a very tidy purple mane passing behind them.

"OOOOH, IT'S RARITY!" Pinkie screams.

"Uh? Pinkie! What are you doing here, dear?" Answers Rarity happily.

"I'm looking for Twili-iiight! Me and Maud. And you?"

"I was getting a special hair cream from Zecora, heheheh..." Rarity laughs with a frighteningly huge expression of pleasure, but immediately changing her gaze and laughing as the embarrassment of wasting time with beauty products came in her mind.

"Yo." Maud says with the most serious expression possible.

"Oh, hi, is it... Maud, your name? Nice to meet you, dear!"

"This is my sister! My sister, this is Rarityyyy!" Says Pinkie anxious, singing.

"Nice to meet you too, Rarity." Says Maud, still seriously, leaving Rarity with an even more embarrassed expression.

"Uhh... Twilight is missing, you said, Pinkie?"

"Oh yes!" Pinkie says, changing her anxiety to concern. "She's been missing all day, it's already getting late... I was trying to find Applejack to help me with making an apple pie, but she wasn't home, and then i tried to spend the day with somepony else but everypony was busy and all, and Twilight just disappeared..."

"Hm? How odd... Probably she's studying something or so? As she is so perfectionist, i think it makes sense..."

"I know right?! We're looking for her in the forest, I thought it was strange that she disappeared but her books were all messed up, I mean, just a few ones."

"What?! Twilight messing up books? Okay dear, now I'm a liiittle bit worried too. Are you sure she's not in Ponyville?"

"Yea, I'm sure! Come with us, Rari! Let's try to looking at that old castle where we defeated Nightmare Moon when we first met Twilight."

"-Hmm. I'm into it, dear!"

"Let's go! Let's go!" Says Pinkie pulling Rarity and also Maud, who was just silent watching both of them all the time.

"Spike! Spiiiike!"

"What is it? What is it?!" Says the little dragon, waking up from his wonderful nap.

"I did it. I found out..."

"What?"

"Spike, my 'reality traveling' theory... I confirmed it... In short, there is a 'barrier' that can be broken to see outside our reality, which I'm calling it the 'third vision'. Well, yes, it is possible for a pony to obtain this third vision, which Pinkie managed somehow, or was born with it maybe?... Anyway, after many hours, I managed to make my own spell calculation to activate this 'third vision' in myself. I'll try, but I'm too tired..." Says Twilight, actually tired, while Spike hears her just confused. "I need to rest a little before tryi-..." Complete, or rather try to complete Twilight, then falling into the floor by exhaustion.

"Twilight? Twilight?!" Says the dragon, trying to wake her up, but without success.

"Oh... This castle seems to have such a strange aura, dear..."

"Oh, I think it's your impression, silly! Let's get in!" Pinkie screams hysterically, running into the castle.

"WAIT FOR US YOU CRAZ-" Rarity screams.

"I liked the cobblestone of this castle." Maud says softly, making Rarity extremely confused.

"Uh... It's like a part of the Nightmare Moon was still here, this place hasn't changed at all..." Comments Rarity as she enters the castle, illuminating her way a little better with the light of her horn's magic.

"Look Boulder, there are some probably millennial stones on the ground, would they be your ancestors?"

"Ouch! It's full of dust here! My mane will get dirty..."

"Oh you are too slow, hurry up!" Says Pinkie, screaming from afar...

"How can you not get scared in this primitive and dark place?!" Says Rarity, sighing at the end.

Pinkie stops bouncing for a moment, letting Rarity and Maud catch up.

"Why did you stop now, dear?"

"There's something strange here on the floor, but it's too dark to see!"

"Hmm, let me light it up" Rarity lights it up closely with her magic, but bouncing backwards in fright. "Is that blood?!"

"Oh, what would a bloodstain do here?"

"I knew this place was dirty, but not THAT MUCH... It scared me."

"By the color, this blood seems to be from more than a millennium ago." Says Maud, softly.

"Uh, more than a millennium? So, was it the legendary battle of Princess Celestia's and Nightmare Moon? The Princess never told that this battle was so intense..." Says Rarity, slightly scared.

"Oh, whatever, let's keep exploring this thing!" Says Pinkie then, bouncing on the increasingly dark path.

As the three explore the castle, Twilight remains fainted for a few hours, leaving Spike in despair, however, she is still breathing...

"Damn, by my calculations, she stayed almost 24 hours awake, that's insane..." Says Spike to himself out loud, not noticing that his partner is already composing herself.

"Uhhh..." Twilight murmurs.

"You woke up?! FINALLY!"

"Oh, thanks for the concern, Spike."

"Is that stuff really true? I'm waiting for you to get disappointed with so many theories and all..."

"Yes, it's true, Spike. And I'm going to prove it to you right now, I've had enough rest, I want to do it already."

"Ah, there you go, and also your crazyness..."

"Ha ha ha, very funny, Spike."

"But it's really funny!"

"Anywaayy! Now the time has come. Step back a little, please."

"Ooookay..." Says the dragon, quickly moving away.

A lot of energy gathers in Twilight's horn, building frighteningly until it fills the room almost entirely with magic. Spike is startled, pulling away, but after a little while, Twilight's eyes are glowing white, pupilless. All the magic is gone, but Twilight seems to be also gone with it. Her body is static, lying on the ground, she apparently fainted again. Spike tries to wake her up like before, but this time she isn't even breathing, which worries the dragon. But a strong energy emanates from her eyes, which glow white for some reason...
"Twilight... What the heck happened to you?..."

Author's Note

Well, me and JPGartist were creating this grimdark since December 2022. We created lots of stuff and then i finally started to write the first chapter in the ending of March 2023.
Now, almost 1 month later working on it, i'm pretty happy with FINALLY finishing and posting it!
There's not the "horror" stuff yet but it will have soon! Things are like just developing for now...

Fun facts: I was actually inspired by D4C from Steel Ball Run when creating the "reality traveling" stuff, which can be a little bit evident because of it having "only one main reality". I also get some Stone Ocean inspired ideas for some next chapters. And for the "castle exploring vibes" i was very inspired by Castlevania, as in March 2023 i was playing a lot of it (which i love) and knowing deeply the franchise for the first time (really late).

Well, hope everyone enjoy it! If not, just point out any error or issue to me, then i can make my work better.