The 13th of May, 1006 after NMM, Canterlot Castle, Equestria.
After 6 months on trial, 17 defendants hear their sentences read in front of the Equestrian military tribunal. This tribunal, set up after the violent coup attempt against Equestria aimed to finally bring the coup members to justice for the vile acts and atrocities committed during the coup attempt and generally throughout their lives. Of the 17 defendants, 16 were sentenced to death.
One of these, was the former king of the crystal empire who while in that position was responsible for an absolute reign of terror, including the murder of opponents, and the mass enslavement of the general population.
His name is Sombra
Sombra was born in –104 in the frozen wastes north of the empire as a creation of dark magic by a shadow pony known as an "Umbrum", a race of ponies who fed on the fears of other races by creating nightmares and using psychological warfare to terrorise their victims. For this, they were imprisoned under the empire indefinitely.
It is not known how an Umbrum managed to create Sombra out of their prison, but shortly after his birth he was found in the wastes by a group of Crystal Guards who, believing him to be a unicorn colt, brought him back to the empire and sent him to the orphanage.
The colt, who appeared to be no older than 10, had absolutely no memory of anything and thus no knowledge of magic, language, mathematics or societal norms, yet was known to be an incredibly skilled learner, eventually reaching the top of his classes in school. However, many despised him personally. At school he was bullied on multiple occasions for him being "impure race" compared to the crystal ponies, his inability to get a cutiemark and his habit of speaking in the third person. There are even reports of vandalism against the orphanage with the perpetrators leaving derogatory messages about him. These events, would have a major impact on his actions in later life.
He did however have one friend, a crystal Unicorn named "Radiant hope", another orphan who like Sombra was a societal outcast. These two would become inseparable, one almost never to be seen without the other.
Sombra would later learn about the crystal heart and the crystal Faire, the yearly celebration that restores love, kindness and unity to the empire while vanquishing darkness by channelling positive emotions through the heart from Radiant. They then visited the heart and stared at it, causing it to give the pair visions. Where Radiant hope saw herself as an Alicorn princess, Sombra saw himself as the tyrant that he would eventually become. As he stared into the heart, a horrified Sombra bumped into the Empires ruler, Princess Amore, who told him that the heart has magical properties that reflects what is in their own heart. When Princess Amore asked Sombra what he saw, a still horrified Sombra said he saw nothing. Sensing his distress, she assured him that ponies have the power to change what they see and that they have the control of their futures.
Four days later, the Crystal Faire began but Sombra fell ill by becoming highly feverish, suffering paralysis in all 4 legs and experiencing crippling headaches. After the festival however, he made a full recovery. This happened every year until –99, when the pain became so unbearable that his body began to physically break apart and he began to transform into a pure Umbrum. Radiant, seeing the colt she loved be torn apart in front of her, instinctively cast magic to save him. In doing so she received her cutiemark which granted her the extremely rare ability to heal any physical ailment. Because of this, two months later, she would receive an invitation from Princess Celestia and Princess Luna to study with them in Canterlot.
Sombra, realising that this meant her vision in the heart was true, feared that his would also come true, especially without her presence. He ran from the empire to escape the possibility of his vision coming true, only to run straight into it. In the wastes, he ran into a blood red crystal that identified as his mother. It told him of his destiny and unlocked his magic that laid dormant inside of him.
Sombra, now realising the truth of his dark self, conspired to steal the crystal heart and dig his people from underneath the empire. That night he stole the crystal heart, but was caught by Princess Amore in the act, where he then turned her into crystal. Radiant would then find Sombra and try to convince him that she could help him, and to free princess Amore. Sombra however, said that Radiant could become the queen of the empire with him as king. When Radiant refused, Sombra shattered the princess into pieces, and Radiant fled the empire. They never saw each other again.
The following morning, the Empire would forever be scarred. His reign began on the 26th of April, –99 and he made quick work to solidify his power. The crystal guard leadership were enslaved and all other soldiers had to pledge their undying loyalty or be executed. Some vocally refused, and for that transgression he gouged out their eyes and ripped off their limbs in front of the rest of the guard.
The most egregious massacre, occurred on the 4th of May, –99 when he raided the police headquarters for the records of the ponies that vandalised the orphanage 4 years prior. After finding them, he rounded up the vandals, as well as those who tormented him in the orphanage and the school. He took them all to the city centre in the ruby district and proceeded to slice out their tongues, cut off their cutie marks and sand their skin off until the crystal coat was stripped off. He then levitated the still alive victims upside-down and impaled them through the mouth with crystals summoned from the ground. The bodies would remain there for a week.
Almost immediately after this, the majority of the population was enslaved and forced to dig to attempt to find the Umbrum forces underneath the city. To ensure order in the mines, just before he began, he went to the Empires prison and gave the inmates there a choice: to be sent to the mines, or live free as mine and concentration camp guards. Many agreed to join him. The guards, made rich from the belongings and property of their victims, were given almost complete free reign over the inmates to do as they wish, including rape and torture, and they did, provided that the inmates were still able to physically work in the mines. None of this, concerned Sombra in the least.
On the 5th of June -99, Princesses Celestia and Luna, after hearing concerning reports from the kingdom about the enslavement of the citizens, issued an ultimatum to King Sombra: surrender the throne or be removed by force. Realising there was no way to beat the princesses, he laid a curse on the empire which would activate when he is defeated. The curse would cause the empire to vanish and its citizens stuck in a torturous limbo until the curse wore off 1100 years later. One day later, Sombra was banished to the frozen north and the empire vanished for 1100 years.
On the 6th of June 1001, the empire would return from limbo. Princess Celestia immediately sent princess Mi Amore Cadenza and her husband, captain Shining Armor to the empire to protect it from Sombra. The following day, she sent her student Twilight Sparkle and the elements of harmony to bolster the defenses at the empire. When they all reach Mi Amore, they discover that her magic spell which is generating love energy is protecting the empire from Sombra, but her hold on the spell is weakening. To find a more permanent solution to stopping Sombra, the elements ask the crystal ponies for information that could be useful. However, they find that the ponies, because of Sombras curse have no recollection of life before his reign and are undergoing serious trauma whenever they remember his reign.
The only bit of information they received was a tip to check the library. When they did they discovered a history book that told them about the crystal Faire so they endeavoured to recreate the Faire to ward off Sombra. However, the book neglected to mention that the positive emotions created by the Faire are channelled through the still missing crystal heart, as Sombra had destroyed the notes about this.
As this fact was realised, Princess Mi Amore used up much of her magical energy that was protecting the empire and her spell momentarily failed. When it did, Sombra swiftly began encircling and conquered the outskirts before the shield was re-raised.
Twilight then began to look for the Crystal heart while the rest of the elements of harmony were tasked with running the Faire and to make sure the crystal ponies didn't know that the heart wasn't found. Eventually, Twilight did find it in the top tower of the castle. However when retrieving the heart she activated the towers defence mechanisms which trapped her and alerted Sombra that it was found.
Spike, who was outside the defence mechanisms radius then grabbed the heart just as the empires defences fell. When this happened, Sombra swiftly conquered the empire with the exception of part of the Faire ground and the castle. When he saw Spike with the heart however, he assaulted the castle and flung Spike off and carried himself up to reach the heart. Before he could however, Princess Mi Amore with a final burst of energy was launched from the main balcony and snatched the heart, and with the love generated from the Faire, channelled it through the heart and banished Sombra back to the frozen north. After this, the camp and mine guards realised they would most likely be prosecuted under the new Crystal regime and fled North West of the empire to a cave system.
During the clean up operation afterwards, Equestrian mainland authorities discovered the existence of the camps as well as the identities of its guards, a diary detailing Sombras life and Umbrum origins, as well as research papers dealing with mind control spells and necromancy experiments, the latter was later revealed to be tested on any prisoners that died during the dig to see if they could be effectively revived. If they could, the journal mentioned a plan to exterminate the workforce and resurrect them as obedient puppets. The journal and other documents also contained plans for a full scale invasion of Equestria and the Griffin Kingdom.
4 years later on the 27th of July 1005, Discord, in an attempt to boost Twilights confidence before her coronation, disguised himself as King Grogar and found Sombras loyalists in their cave hideout set up during Sombras reign to the Northwest. The loyalists held a piece of Sombras horn in their possession and with Discords help, used it to free Sombra from the frozen north. Discord then attempted to form an alliance between Sombra, Chrysalis, Cozy and Tirek to attack the coronation and be defeated by Twilight to give her the confidence to rule Equestria. However Sombra, overconfident in his abilities refused to ally with them and launched an attack on the empire by himself, conquering it in less thanan hour. The invasion, confirmed that the research found in his journal and lab papers was at least partially completed, as he used mind control to make the crystal ponies fight for him.
Before he imprisoned the Royal family, an emergency message was sent by them to the elements of harmony and one day later, they arrived to depose him off the throne and were apparently successful. However, after his apparent defeat, Sombra followed the elements of harmony back to the tree and shattered the elements and the tree to dust and imprisoned the element bearers behind a wall of crystal, while declaring that Equestria shall be conquered, starting with ponyville.
The bearers though, realised they could dig under the prison and so they managed to escape and head to ponyville. They arrived to find the town completely mind controlled and heading to Canterlot to lay siege. At the same time, the everfree forest that was controlled and subdued by the tree of harmony started to expand into the town. While the bearers were trying to stop the forest, Sombra conquered Canterlot and proclaimed himself emperor. Just before Sombra did so, princesses Celestia and Luna after being alerted of the trees destruction by Starswirl the bearded, went to subdue the forest, inadvertently leaving Canterlot more vulnerable to Sombra.
With the princesses and Starswirl subduing the forest, the bearers set forth for Canterlot and were met by Sombras possessed army outside the castle gates. Unwilling to kill their friends and family, they teleported into the castle and bumped into Discord who agreed to help them.
After entering the throne room and finding Sombra, Discord deflected Sombras magic with 0 effort. However, when Discord commented about how Fluttershy was his favourite pony Sombra attempted to kill her with his magic. Discord jumped in the way instinctively and was shot instead. Though he didn't die, he was drained of his magic. The elements believed all was lost, but he reminded them that regardless of whether they have the physical elements or not, they still embody the virtues of those elements. With this being realised by them, they managed to defeat him and undo the chaos he caused. Though Discord later revealed he made up being injured, his speech certainly did give the elements the nudge to be victorious.
On the 23rd of October 1005, two days after the imprisonment of Cozy, Chrysalis and Tirek, Discord told the Equestrian rulers and the bearers about the existence of the loyalists in the hideout near the empire as well as their involvement in the old regime. Princess Celestia, wanted Discord to arrest the loyalists at once as he could easily teleport there and subdue them with ease. However, Princess Luna came up with another idea. With a fragment of Sombra found in the Canterlot castle afterhis demise, she suggested that Discord once again disguise himself as Grogar and with the loyalists help, begin the process of bringing him back once more, but in the middle of the process, incapacitate him with a magic dampening ring and arrest his followers so that they all may also be put on trial and give the ponies of the crystal empire, Ponyville and Canterlot closure and Justice. Princess Celestia agreed.
On the 27th of October, 1005 Discord performed his part of the plan perfectly. Sombra and his 13 surviving followers were teleported to Canterlot and interred at Tartarus until the trial began 1 month later. On the 1st of December 1005, Sombra was officially put on trial by the Equestrian military tribunal and was accused of Crimes against Equinity, waging wars of aggression and war crimes.
Sombra however, argued that all charges against him for alleged crimes committed prior to the 6th of June 1001 should be dropped, because Celestia and Luna already punished him for his reign with a 1100 year imprisonment. He also argued, that the crimes he committed after this date were not as serious as those committed by Lord Tirek during his first prison escape and he was jailed in Tartarus, not executed.
However this was not enough to save him. The court, pointed out that Sombra was imprisoned for 1100 years for the murder of Princess Amore and the enslavement of the empires citizens, not for the multiple murders, tolerance of abuse in the mines and camps, practice of banned magic and cursing the empire and its people to be banished for the same time as his imprisonment. Thus, while some charges were dropped, the majority stayed.
On the 13th of May 1006, he along with the 13 camp and mine guards he managed were sentenced to death by hanging. On the 4th of July 1006 they were all publicly hung at the crystal empire at the same spot the crystal ponies were tortured and killed during his reign. The surviving crystal ponies, did not forget what these ponies had done to them and made them suffer. The 14 gallows were lined up down the district and an open back chariot carrying each of the prisoners was driven to each one. There, the prisoners with their horns dampened and wings tied to their sides had the rope put around their necks. This was specifically planned so that when the chariots moved forward, the prisoners would fall from a small height that would not break their necks. This short drop method of hanging, resulted in a torturous death of strangulation that lasted between 10 and 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, Sombra was ponounced dead at the age of 1109. The guards then left the prisoners to the crowds who then brutalised the corpses for the suffering they caused.
After 2 hours, the crowd was dispersed and the bodies to taken for cremation and scattered in Tartarus.
