The Story of Everfree - a Narrative Chronicle

Chapters

02 - The Problem and its Solution
08 - Aftermath
10 - Celestia's Journal
15 - Canterlot
01 - The tragedy of Hyperion and Periapsis
03 - Signs of Trouble
04 - Celestia's Virtue
05 - Luna's Virtue
06 - The (near) Extinction of Ponykind
07 - The Battle of Everfree
09 - Luna's Quest
11 - The Tree of Harmony
12 - The Rule of the Sisters
13 - A Crystal Merchant Makes a Discovery
14 - Nightmare Moon
16 - A Zebra Alchemist Encounters an Ancient Soul
17 - The Cataclysm
18 - The Modern Era
19 - Epilogue -- The Dream of Nyx

02 - The Problem and its Solution

Hyperion viewed the mortal ponies as insects and vermin. When he noticed them at all, he was disgusted with their construction of towns and villages on his planet. They had no place in his physical masterpiece, yet he tolerated their existence as long as they stayed mostly out of sight.

This posed a problem with his mate. She had grown rather fond of the mortals and spent a lot of time tending to them. Hyperion felt that Peri had an unhealthy obsession with her pets, giving too much attention to them. As a result, he grew jealous, leading to numerous moments of friction between them.

Typically, Hyperion would respond by attempting to win his mate’s attention with impressive physical constructs—a beautiful garden, a spectacular sunset, or even a meteor shower—anything to secure her attention.

However, what he could not tolerate was the growing fascination Periapsis had with the mortal ponies—the very creatures that would construct villages and cities on his masterful artwork. The very thorn in his side, which he had only mildly tolerated, had now become the very thing his mate spent her time tending to.

Hyperion was frustrated that such a situation could arise at all. There was no reason for it. Were not his impressive efforts to win her attention much, much more significant and attractive than anything those insects could offer? What was her problem, anyway? And after several discussions, why was he unable to dissuade her from this? Hyperion was most perplexed by the whole situation.

Then, one day, he realized what it was. Periapsis needed something to nurture. Hyperion did not have this need, but he recognized it in his mate. He had finally discovered the solution to her obsession. He put forth the suggestion that they have children together so Peri's nurturing attention could be diverted to something worthwhile. It was the perfect solution—little alicorns to care for and raise up to be just like them. Actual people, not these... vermin. He proposed the idea to her, and to his pleasure, she agreed.

A year following Hyperion’s suggestion, Periapsis gave birth to a foal she named Celestia. Her presence was bright like the sun. She was their little princess. A fitting title, for it made sense that an alicorn, daughter of the world’s rulers, would be a princess. Hyperion's plan was apparently a success. Periapsis diverted her nurturing attention to their daughter, and they basked in the joy of a happy family for a short while.

Not one to let success exist in a vacuum, Hyperion suggested a second child. When Celestia was six years old, Periapsis gave birth to her sister, Luna. Dark and spunky, she was a fitting counterpart to her elder sister, and for a while, it seemed like their family was complete.

08 - Aftermath

It had taken many months for the royal sisters to gather the remnant of the mortal ponies. Dozens were hidden inside mountain caverns. Some were found hiding in thick forests. Some were wandering aimlessly beyond the outskirts of the city where the final battle took place. All were terrified and in shock.

Two hundred and eighty survivors, out of millions. The world itself was unrecognizable. The only thing the sisters could do was try and offer hope. They had already earned the trust of the mortals. Thankfully, all three tribes of pony were still represented, although there would need to be some prolific crossbreeding if the future of ponykind was going to thrive.

The sisters gathered the remnant in a nearby clearing with a river running through it. With the help of all three tribes, the two alicorns built a small town for them to live in. They named it "Ponyville" as it was the first pony village of the new era. It was a half-hour trot from the site of the battle, just outside the devastation zone, where there were still trees. Here, the sisters lived among the mortal ponies, helping them structure their budding new civilization. They learned to tend farms and barter with one another for goods, eventually creating a new culture all their own.

Occasionally, Luna and Celestia would visit the site of the battle and its strange ravine. They crafted a stone pillar and placed it on the edge of the cliff. Its inscription read:

Everfree Memorial
For all of ponykind. May you be forever free.

The site of Everfree was chosen as a memorial to the sacrifice Periapsis made to save ponykind. The name was chosen as a reminder that they would never again be subject to Hyperion's cruelty.

After two years of rebuilding, the sisters decided it was best to take steps to prevent something like this from happening in the future. It was not unknown that alicorns were occasionally born to mortal parents, and that they very likely could bring about the destruction of pony society—although, supposedly this most recent example had been the worst. Still, the mortals deserved better. They needed protection.

It occurred to the sisters that the remnant of mortals would not have had any knowledge of ancient history prior to their own lives. Ponykind had been in survival mode for years, enduring Hyperion's wrath. No records existed apart from what Celestia and Luna had in the floating fortress where their family had once lived—a fortress that would need to be hidden at some point. Its library would be useful in preserving magical knowledge, but many of its secrets would have to be guarded from the eyes of those who might abuse them.

10 - Celestia's Journal

With Luna away, Celestia set about her task, which was to do some housekeeping. She was to build the Royal Library from selected materials that had been a part of their library in the floating alicorn fortress. Pony civilization now numbered three hundred and ninety, as many foals had been born over the past four years.

It would be some time before ponykind needed to expand beyond Ponyville and explore the ruins of the Old World. Still, Celestia's duties were to plan for millennia into the future. If ponykind was to once again cover the globe, they needed education and infrastructure. The Royal Library would be a good place to start.

Celestia kept the books containing the most dangerous magical theory locked away safely in the fortress and divided the rest between commonly useful texts and advanced texts for trusted eyes only. It would be important to eventually build a sect of talented unicorns who would serve royal functions for the good of ponykind, using this advanced knowledge.

It would still be centuries away, but Celestia was already planning the establishment of a Royal Palace, a Royal Guard, and a School for Gifted Unicorns. Meanwhile, Celestia herself would take on an important teaching role, as long as there was peace in the land, and raise up educated ponies who would spread her vast knowledge to successive generations.

One order of business was to hide the fortress. It was massive—the size of a palace itself. Hyperion had created it to be powered independently, so it could fly even in his absence. Celestia chose to bury the fortress beneath the ground in the Wild Lands, far from any populated region, and constructed a common looking settlement above it on the surface.

This served as a place where she and Luna could visit to talk and think, away from other ponies. It was remote enough where it would be quite some time before curious eyes discovered its location. And when they did, they would find nothing special apart from some alicorn's trinkets.

Celestia began a journal of events surrounding her parents and the reason for the fall of ponykind. She documented the facts behind alicorn metaphysics and how a fully matured alicorn might be killed. The purpose of the journal was to document how an alicorn can be defeated in case for some reason she was no longer alive when the need arose, and as a backup plan in case Luna's weapon failed.

She also used the journal as an outlet for her personal feelings regarding the current era, the rebuilding of pony civilization, her thoughts as ruler, and observations on mortal pony nature. Celestia kept the journal in a locked chest in the basement of her writing studio, which was built above the buried fortress.

15 - Canterlot

Following the banishment of Luna, Celestia grieved her loss. The castle was in ruins after their battle. There seemed little point in repairing it. She wished not to see Everfree again, for it brought too many terrible memories. It had also developed a very unpleasant air about it that reminded Celestia of the time before Luna had returned from her quest, when the forest had grown hostile to ponykind. It didn't seem that bad at first, but it certainly felt creepy and intimidating.

Celestia was not concerned with such matters, however. After the loss of Luna, few things seemed to matter to her anymore. It was so cruel how she had been taken. But it was too late, now. Celestia left the Elements in the castle, not wishing to see them again. The last thing she had expected them to be used for would be the destruction of the only family she had left.

Now, her beloved sister was gone. There was no one she could share old stories with or talk to about things that the mortals simply could not understand. She was alone in her role as ruler over a people who had very little in common with her apart from a general appearance.

Celestia suffered depression for decades and finally decided to accept her fate in life and “rule them well” as was her mother's final wish. She abandoned Everfree and established a new, permanent capital city named Canterlot, built on a plateau set into the side of a high and steep lone mountain. It was a fitting place to rule from both because it represented her solitude and because its central and quite visible location within Equestria provided an excellent political nucleus for the nation.

The Royal Palace was a sight to behold. Unlike the former castle, this was a structure made for the purpose of ruling a nation. It was opulent and regal, projecting an air of diplomatic superiority and prestige. Ponies and foreigners from around the world would gather here and know that Equestria was a great nation, ruled by a great leader.

Celestia's nation enjoyed a peace and prosperity that had never before existed in pony history. Over the next nine-hundred years, the pony nation of Equestria enjoyed the status of being the greatest nation in the world.

01 - The tragedy of Hyperion and Periapsis

Author's Note

I wrote this in 2016, at a time when MLP:FiM had yet to reveal any ancient history within its narrative. This history is what I built for use in my stories, such as Black Feather.

01 - The tragedy of Hyperion and Periapsis

In a world where alicorns occur exceptionally rarely, the unexpected convergence of two of these majestic beings shattered the status quo of history.

The time was over six thousand years ago. It marked the first instance of more than one alicorn existing in the world at the same time. The chances of a mortal pony giving birth to an alicorn were low enough that only one appeared every few millennia. Typically, by this time, the preceding alicorn would have departed Equus for various reasons. Despite their immortal nature, all alicorns would eventually find themselves at odds with the fabric of this world.

Throughout the extensive history of Equus, thirteen other alicorns had surfaced. Some caused worldwide calamity, and all posed a significant burden on pony civilization. All but six eventually chose to depart Equus for the stars in pursuit of greater meaning. The remaining six had met their demise in catastrophic magical detonations that reshaped the world, resetting the calendar years and heralding the dawn of a new age.

Two alicorns existing on Equus simultaneously presented an interesting situation. There was a male and a female, and so they became a mated pair, seeing one another as equals, but having very different preferences and characteristics. Each of them viewed the world as their playground to do with as they pleased. But what pleased one was quite different from what pleased the other.

The male alicorn, Hyperion, reveled in mastery of the physical world. His joy stemmed from crafting breathtaking landscapes and vistas, controlling the appearance of celestial bodies to create awe-inspiring displays. He meticulously arranged the night sky for its beauty and built a regal floating fortress to be their home. To impress his mate, he would orchestrate a total solar eclipse, showcasing both his power and his affection for her. He sculpted the mountains and seas to fashion a world where she would find happiness and he could receive her love and attention.

Hyperion largely disregarded the tens of millions of mortal ponies inhabiting his world, almost forgetting their existence altogether, for it was natural that a fully matured alicorn loses youthful memories. From the mortals' perspective, the occasional upheavals of the world at Hyperion’s whim were perceived as ‘natural disasters’ that they learned to try and keep their distance from. Since Hyperion seldom addressed the mortals directly, they remained largely unaware of him as an individual.

In contrast, the female alicorn, Periapsis, held a fascination with animals and living beings. Unlike Hyperion, she did take notice the mortal ponies, vaguely recalling her origin among them. Peri kept a collection of both animals and mortal ponies as pets, and was particularly fond of her ponies, that she groomed and cared for. She enjoyed putting her pets in various luxurious accommodations and watching them interact with one another. When she was feeling bored, she would sometimes instigate a conflict between pony factions to see how they would resolve it.

She occasionally had her favorites, but for the most part, individual pony lives did not mean much to her. She never viewed them as people, but more like livestock for her own entertainment. She was usually kind to them, but if one crossed her, she would swiftly destroy it and move on. The mortals under her watch learned not to question her in any way, and that she would provide for them generously as long as they did not object or protest. They lived in a bizarre hybrid of fear and fortune.

03 - Signs of Trouble

As it turned out, Periapsis never truly abandoned her fascination with the mortal ponies. While her nurturing attention was indeed given to the young royal sisters… as they grew older, she found time to rekindle her old hobby of tending to her “pets”.

When Celestia reached the age of ten, Periapsis introduced her to pony-tending. She taught Celestia how to keep and care for them. Celestia was eager to learn the art of managing the mortals because she adored her mother and related well to her nature. She wanted very much to follow her mother's example.

Hyperion became incensed that Peri continued her obsession with the mortals, and worse, encouraged their daughter in the same. What an outrage! Here, the problem had gotten worse, not better. Now there were two alicorns irrationally obsessed with tending to insects.

Celestia screamed for him to stop.

“What’s the matter, Sunshine? I’m trying to teach you something.” His voice was cold and authoritative.

Celestia stared at the lifeless body before her. The other one was still alive and had fixed onto her with terrified eyes as she sat there, trembling. The mare’s eyes were magenta, just like her own.

Tears rolled down Celestia’s cheeks. “I won’t do it!” She was ten years old.

Her father looked down at her, his expression unreadable. He waited.

She glared hard at him, a look of fierce determination set in her eyes like diamonds. She stole a quick glance at the slain pony lying in an expanding pool of blood. After a full minute, her father took a deep breath and let it out slowly through his nostrils.

“I will not have you following her example. One obsessed alicorn is more than enough for—”

“Mother is not obsessed!” she blurted out in desperation. “This one belongs to her, and I will not—” Celestia felt an impact across her face followed by blood trickling down her nose.

“Do not interrupt me, child. Now, I gave you a task.”

Celestia stared at the pale-blue mare once again. He was wrong about them. He had to be. She returned her gaze to her father and stomped a hoof on the ground.

“Very well. If you won’t do it, I will. But you will watch.” With that, Celestia found she could not look away. A flicker of light sparked from the tip of Hyperion’s horn. Celestia heard the loud crack of a bone breaking and the chilling screams of pain coming from the pony before her. Then another crack, followed by dozens more within seconds. The pony vomited up a liter of blood, then collapsed dead onto the ground.

Hyperion spoke softly. “We’ll try again tomorrow.”

Celestia was hyperventilating. She couldn’t take her eyes off the mangled body of the mare lying before her as the rhythmic hoofsteps of her departing father faded away.

In a fit of anger, Hyperion destroyed a small pony village. He was surprised by how much satisfaction this brought him, if just for a moment, to smash the object of his frustration. He knew Peri would not be pleased with this, but she would get over it.

To distract himself from his frustration, Hyperion would divert much of his attention to his daughter, Luna, teaching her his talents in crafting magnificent vistas. Luna seemed to prefer applying this talent at night as she manipulated the appearance of the sky in all its glory.

Hyperion also was not neglectful in teaching Celestia the art of astronomical manipulation. By the time they reached their late teens, both Celestia and Luna had mastered the ability to manipulate the sun and moon in the sky using the abilities their father had given them.

As the sisters matured, Periapsis foresaw heightened conflict with Hyperion. To prepare for this, she clandestinely taught each of her daughters a secret way to meet and talk about things in a manner immune to Hyperion's interference.

To Celestia, her mother gave the secrets of the Aether and how to enter it at will. From here, she would have access to unique advantages such as a limited exploration of history and meeting with others in a nonlinear timeline. Here, time operated very differently from the physical world.

To Luna, her mother granted the secret of dream-walking, enabling Luna to enter the dreams of others and observe what their subconscious was doing. She could also interact with the dreamer, offering solace and resolving troubled sleep. Periapsis sometimes did this with the mortal ponies she cared for, as they often suffered from night terrors.

04 - Celestia's Virtue

Young Celestia had been growing in the ways of her mother, agreeing with her that the mortal ponies had value, in opposition to her father’s assessment that they were mere pests. But something about Peri's regard for them seemed off to Celestia. She perceived something deeper within the mortals than even her mother did.

As she spent time with them, she got to know their way of life. She learned of the fear that they had of Periapsis despite the alicorn's apparent care for them. Celestia believed it would be better if the mortals did not have to live in this fear. Not only that, but she began to see them as actual people rather than animals to be cared for—people with their own rights, even.

At the age of twenty-two, Celestia did something unprecedented in all of history.

She had an impressive understanding of magical theory, and she knew the difference between alicorn magic and unicorn magic. She knew that these two kinds of ponies drew their power from vastly different energy sources, the Aether being the source of unlimited alicorn power, and the Lifestream being the limited source of unicorn power.

Celestia was also an accomplished spellcaster. She discovered the process by which an alicorn matures from a youth, with quite limited power, to near-omnipotence as an adult. She learned that if a young alicorn were to claim an identity with one of the forty virtues of the mortal ponies, that this alicorn would halt the transformation into full maturity.

Celestia knew this would be irreversible, and it would mean giving up tremendous power. But she could not deny her heart leaning toward the mortals. She truly understood them to be valuable people with a valuable ethical standard that neither of her parents understood. Celestia made her decision to undergo this process herself and discovered her virtue of Benevolence.

The process was surprising for her. As a young adult alicorn, Celestia had recently been struggling with the temptation of abandoning her unique perspective on the mortal ponies and just going along with her mother's view. But upon discovering her virtue, she could truly see them with incredible clarity. She was suddenly awakened to a whole rich world that she previously did not even know existed.

The mortal pony civilization came into sharp focus for her, and she wept over their treatment by her parents. She introduced herself to them for the first time as their Princess, and she promised to look after them and advocate for them. Celestia had finally become aware of the “Traits of Harmony”.

05 - Luna's Virtue

When Celestia discovered her virtue and abandoned the natural path of a matured alicorn, Hyperion was disgusted with her choice. He didn't know what to do. On one hoof, she was still an alicorn. But on the other, she was more like one of those insects. He could not reconcile the two. He could have destroyed her right then, but he had invested much in her, and he could not bring himself to end her life.

Instead, he focused on trying to convince Luna that the mortal ponies were not worth throwing her life and future away for like her sister did. She listened to him and weighed his arguments. Luna had always been the more mysterious of the two. She would silently judge you, watching and waiting for the right moment to present her conclusions.

Luna weighed what Hyperion told her, but also what he showed her through his actions. She also watched her older sister and the changes she underwent. Luna was only sixteen years old, and she had a lot of decisions to make.

Seven years later, Hyperion had shown his true colors as far as Luna was concerned. Time had proven that Celestia had made the correct decision. She had become a ruler that the mortal ponies appeared to really need. No, not merely need—they actually wanted her. In some way, Celestia's strange ramblings about the mortal ponies being real people started to make sense.

Luna began to question everything she was raised to believe. She knew, even as far back as her memories would allow, that Hyperion was unjust in his treatment of the mortals. But she never saw anything wrong with her mother's treatment of them until some rather long talks with Celestia in her late teens.

At the age of twenty-three, Luna made her decision. She had seen her father's unjust treatment of the mortal ponies, often killing them in the most cruel or humiliating ways possible. Celestia advocated on their behalf, urging Luna to recognize that they were actual people and worth defending. After much consideration, Luna discovered her own virtue of Righteousness.

The transformation was startling. She knew from watching Celestia over the past seven years that she would cease to gain further alicorn gifts and powers. But Celestia did not seem to mind. For Luna, it was a jarring experience. She knew the magnitude of what she would be giving up, but it was still the right thing to do, to undergo the change. Once it was finished, Luna became the champion of justice for the mortal ponies. She ruled alongside her sister as fellow-advocate and defender.

Meanwhile, Periapsis was proud of her daughters in her own way. While she did not see the ponies as actual people, she still cared for them and spent much of her time keeping them because it pleased her. She did not understand the depth of connection that her daughters had with the mortals, but she did not condemn it either. She found it a bit amusing, and also a bit overreactive, to toss their entire lives into the mortal society, giving up so much in the process.

But she was not angry like Hyperion. He was truly outraged. His prize daughter, Luna, had essentially given him the worst insult imaginable. Hyperion grew increasingly bitter and hostile toward Periapsis and eventually their children as well. He eventually reached a breaking point with his family's interest in mortal ponies and began actively destroying their civilization.

06 - The (near) Extinction of Ponykind

Over the next three years, relations between Hyperion and his family steadily broke down. Periapsis refused to abandon the mortals despite Hyperion's insistence. As a powerful fully-matured alicorn herself, she was not helpless in this conflict. She came to the aid of the mortals when she could, but ultimately, the advantage was his.

For an alicorn, destruction is the easier option. Hyperion tried to get her to give in by targeting those whom she enjoyed the most. He got quite creative in the various ways that he would end their lives. Sometimes, it was quick when he simply wanted them erased. Other times, he would make a spectacle of it, and the streets of whole cities would run red with pony blood.

Meanwhile, Celestia and Luna were relatively powerless to resist their father. The best they could do was come up with places for the mortals to try and hide, and to try and keep them alive in whatever way that they could. Peri was distraught over the conflict, not understanding how the stallion she loved had grown so cruel. It was no longer a matter of eliminating pests. It was a vendetta.

Hyperion eventually vowed that he would make the mortal ponies extinct if she did not completely forsake them. For her part, she feared that he would eventually turn his wrath on their daughters as well, once the mortals were no more.

Hyperion then began a systematic annihilation of ponykind. They had numbered in the tens of millions with several large cities across the world. As powerful as he was, Hyperion could not kill them all at once. The task would take over a year, fueled by his rage.

He also kept his distance from his mate, feeling the need to complete his agenda. The mortals took away the mare he loved, and he would make them pay for it. Their very existence was now anathema. There was no way this could end until they were wiped clean off the face of the world.

Periapsis met in the Aether with her daughters to discuss a plan to preserve ponykind from extinction. She blasted several tunnels and cave networks into various mountains, careful to hide the entrances. Celestia and Luna would direct ponies into these shelters and hope their father never found out, for he would simply bring the mountains down on them if he knew.

Thankfully, the other species on Equus seemed to go unnoticed by Hyperion. The various sapient races that Periapsis did not take a personal interest in were spared most of Hyperion's wrath, but the whole world suffered anyway due to the destruction.

All records and technology were eliminated. Any form of pony government or civilization ceased to exist. The mortals would undergo an absolute reset and have to rebuild from scratch, if they even survived at all.

In the end, there were fewer than three hundred mortal ponies who remained alive.

07 - The Battle of Everfree

Helpless against Hyperion's relentless onslaught, Periapsis realized that being on the defensive was a losing situation. There was only one way she could save ponykind, and that was to kill Hyperion. She knew he was unbeatable physically. There had to be a way she could outwit him. She knew there had been ancient alicorns who suffered spectacularly fatal burnouts. If she could cause him to burn his horn out somehow, she would be successful.

The last remaining mortal pony city that was still populated was under attack. Periapsis and her daughters rushed to meet the aggressor head on. Hyperion was enjoying himself, taking his time with his victory imminent. Some of his most cruel ways of killing were on full display. He would telekinetically pull their bodies apart or turn them inside-out while forcing them to stay alive during the process.

Peri slammed into him with the speed of a missile, knocking him through several buildings before skidding to a stop against a hill. He laughed and congratulated her for the effort. He then struck back, burying her under tons of falling rubble. The two continued fighting, each inflicting only minor injuries upon the other while the surrounding landscape looked like a hundred bombs had been dropped on it.

Hyperion focused his attention on Celestia and Luna, seeing them vulnerable. He had hoped they would be the cure for Peri's insanity. It was now time to end that mistake. He charged at them, but Peri intercepted his efforts with a shield bubble around the sisters.

A matured alicorn's shield is effectively impenetrable. It was little effort for her to maintain it, and her daughters were safe for now. Hyperion made a show of telekinetically throwing live ponies at their shield with such force that they burst upon impact. The greatest pain was felt by the sisters themselves as they could only watch in horror.

Peri knew it was time to end this. With her daughters protected within the shield, she pounced on Hyperion and held him with all her strength. She then manifested magical chains to bind the two of them together.

With the two alicorns chained to one another, she then focused on his horn, bringing to bear the unfathomable power of the Aether against him. Peri's magical abilities were easily on par with Hyperion's, even if her physical strength was somewhat less. With the intense onslaught against his horn, Hyperion had no choice but to raise a magical defense to protect himself.

He tapped the Aether for the energy necessary to keep his horn from being destroyed. For that was the only real threat here. An alicorn's horn is his life. Fortunately for him, it would take an inconceivable amount of energy to actually destroy his horn. He was only mildly concerned because Peri would need to tap so much energy that she would risk her own life in the effort to end his.

And that was exactly her plan. Periapsis abandoned the hope of self-preservation. The entirety of Hyperion's focus was now on hardening his own horn. He had nothing left even to break the chains and wrestle himself away from her grasp. For the first time in his life, Hyperion experienced fear.

The energy being used by both alicorns was orders of magnitude brighter than the sun. The surrounding buildings were set ablaze. Celestia and Luna watched helplessly from within the shield that protected them. They only hoped the mortals had enough sense to put as much distance between themselves and the alicorns as they could.

Hyperion's horn began to vibrate with the increasing stress. Peri closed her eyes and willfully dropped the final portion of her restraint, tapping the infinite power of the Aether, beyond her horn's ability to withstand.

With a tiny fraction of the energy she was using, Peri brought time itself to a near standstill. She and her daughters appeared in the star-filled void of the Aether for just a few seconds. “Goodbye, my children,” she said, her tone bittersweet. “Take care of them. Rule them well.”

And then she was gone.

Hyperion felt his horn's integrity begin to fail. He had no choice but to tap more energy than he could safely use. Sensing that his defeat was imminent, he likewise slowed time to a near standstill, for only himself. With his remaining milliseconds, he designed the instrument of his vengeance.

His senses reached out to a nearby apartment complex, collapsed from the battle. Within the rubble, a heart was still beating. A mare, heavy with foal, who would have given birth within a month, in better circumstances. Hyperion reached out with dark and potent magic, and snatched the living soul right from the foal’s unborn body.

Into this innocent foal, Hyperion poured his wrath—an irresistible directive intertwined within her very essence. She would become the personification of his hatred and malice. She was now the Nightmare, existing without body or form until the time was right.

She would survive Hyperion’s physical death, lying in wait for somepony to fall into the trap. And when she was finished with ponykind, his vendetta would at last be fulfilled.

Time resumed, and in an instant, the two alicorns experienced a fatal burnout. The unrestrained energy flowing through each of their horns created an explosion that completely leveled the city. A shockwave split the ground, creating a long and deep ravine. Bare rock became molten glass. Everything else had been vaporized, scattering to the wind.

Hyperion's horn shattered into thousands of fragments the size of grains of sand. The force of the explosion dispersed the remnants of his horn for miles in every direction. Peri's horn remained intact, but her body was obliterated, leaving the horn embedded in the molten rock at the bottom of the gash in the earth.

Being severed from her skull, her horn transformed into a dark blue crystal.

The shield protecting the royal sisters collapsed, leaving Celestia and Luna hovering there above the barren landscape in complete shock. Their parents were simply... gone. The alicorns of old were no more.

09 - Luna's Quest

Four years after the Battle of Everfree, the sisters set about their plan to prevent calamity with future alicorns. Luna's task was to retrieve the six legendary alicorn horns that supposedly existed somewhere out there in the world.

These ancient horns were said to briefly tap energy directly from the Aether, providing incredible power to whoever wielded them. Each horn took the form of a crystal that could change its shape to identify with its bearer.

According to legend, each of these horn-crystals brought great fortune to the town of its bearer, as they were able to use its power to defeat evildoers and malicious schemers. The crystals were of little use to those who did not understand the principles of magic. As such, often when one was stolen, the thief or rival king quickly discovered that the pretty artifacts in fact did nothing. This resulted in them being stored in vaults as mere representatives of power rather than providers of actual power.

Luna was quite well versed in war magic; her father had taught her well in her youth. She devised a plan to create a weapon of extraordinary power by combining the six crystals and binding them in a way where they could only be used in conjunction. Used this way, their power would be orders of magnitude greater than what they could provide individually.

This joining also added an extra layer of security to prevent misuse, as Luna bound each crystal to a specific pony virtue. This way, not only would the bearers have to be virtuous ponies, but they would need to be six ponies of specific virtues who were all working in agreement toward the same goal.

Luna built in a failsafe so that she or her sister could wield them solo, but unity would be required for mortals to operate the weapon. As such, Luna named the set of crystals the Elements of Harmony.

Luna levitated a dark blue crystal out of her saddlebags with affection, knowing just how to bind the Elements together. She had noticed this crystal one day when visiting the memorial. It had been fused into the stone floor of the ravine during the battle. Luna plucked it out with her telekinesis and took it home to Ponyville where she showed her sister.

This was their mother's horn! It had become an adaptive crystal much like the horns of other alicorns who had suffered a fatal burnout. A chill ran down her spine as she considered the fate of their father's horn. Alicorn horns were supposed to be indestructible and permanently bound to both the Aether and the deceased alicorn's soul.

But their mother had been targeting his horn specifically to destroy it, and so perhaps it did not survive. It was certainly nowhere to be seen, and Luna's detection spell turned up nothing conclusive—just a vague sense that it was... “somewhere” in the Everfree region.

Luna's quest took three years. She circled the globe twice in search of the Elements. She sailed on ships, climbed mountains, explored dark underground caverns, and followed treasure maps hidden in ancient books. She met with several strange races in many nations, snuck into vaults, and plundered tombs.

She even had to outright steal the Element of Magic from its bearer—a strange and frighteningly powerful creature named Discord who refused to give it up. She stopped at nothing to acquire the Elements, for even if they had become sacred artifacts, tens of thousands of years old, it was more important to secure the future from an alicorn threat.

Finally, Luna returned home to Ponyville, only to discover a troubling surprise at the Everfree Memorial and its surrounding region.

11 - The Tree of Harmony

One concern Celestia developed was late in Luna's absence. Luna had taken their mother’s horn crystal with her. She had developed a spell that could use the crystal to help locate the Elements of Harmony. But in the crystal's absence, something strange had begun to take place in Everfree.

The region for miles around the memorial began to grow very strange plants and trees. Nothing apparent had seeded them, so this was a mystery to Celestia and the citizens of Ponyville. An entire forest had developed over the course of a year, and the most alarming thing about it was that it seemed to... hate ponies.

Whenever a pony ventured through the region, there was a good chance of some sort of mishap. Perhaps she got tangled in vines, or attacked by rats, or haunted by nightmares for weeks afterward.

What's more is that entirely new species of creatures began to appear in the forest—species with no apparent origin other than the forest itself. These creatures were generally frightening and seemed to be confined to the forest’s boundaries, although Celestia worried that one day they might venture further out and cause trouble in nearby Ponyville.

When Luna returned with the Elements, she was surprised to see the changes Everfree had undergone. It made visiting the memorial difficult and presented a risk to nearby ponies. She set about her plan to create the anti-alicorn weapon by binding the Elements to one another using her mother's horn crystal.

With the weapon completed, Luna placed Peri's crystal in the ground at the bottom of the ravine where the battle had taken place and surrounded it with the Elements. She then cast her binding spell and covered them with dirt.

Within a week, a small tree had sprouted where the crystals were buried. Another month had gone by, and the malevolent forest transformed into a normal, healthy forest. The dangerous beasts seemed to fade away, and no pony was harmed or felt threatened when travelling through the region. Everfree had become neutral land once again.

What nopony realized was that the malicious plant and animal life had spawned because of Hyperion's influence. His horn had been shattered into thousands of tiny fragments and scattered across the region, providing immense amounts of energy to manifest and sustain these dangerous creatures.

Since his horn had captured the essence of his thoughts and feelings at the moment of his death, Hyperion’s malice against ponykind permeated the Everfree region and produced a wilderness that was hostile specifically to ponies. When Peri's horn crystal was returned to Everfree, her influence counteracted Hyperion's with the help of the Elements, making the region neutral and safe to travel in.

12 - The Rule of the Sisters

For millennia after the Battle of Everfree, the Royal Sisters guided ponykind into an expansive, prolific pre-industrial civilization of 750,000. With two immortal alicorns ruling their society, the ponies had few significant conflicts. Certain powerful adversaries showed up on occasion, calling for the need to either fight alicorn style or use the Elements of Harmony against them. Fortunately, the Tree of Harmony allowed for the removal and replacement of the Elements so that they could still be used while preventing Everfree from once again becoming dangerous.

This was an era of magicians, wizards, chivalry, and exploration. Ponykind had established several small cities across the expanding nation, which had been named Equestria. They had run into the borders of several other nations in the process.

The friendly Zebras were fellow equines to the south and respectfully requested that the ponies not advance into their territory. The deadly Griffins had a small clan-based nation in the high-country off to the north-east. And the Yaks to the far north were too belligerent to make it worth the difficult journey to open diplomatic relations with.

A group of pony pioneers decided to stay in the frozen north, however, to set up a crystal mining outpost that would eventually expand into thirty-four small quarry settlements before ultimately declaring independence from Equestria when an artifact was discovered that allowed them to self-sustain.

Buffalo inhabited the dry plains of Southern Equestria and did not seem to mind being incorporated as long as no one interfered with their traditional running grounds. The zebras also told ponies about an aggressive and hostile race of minotaurs along their western border, which thankfully consisted of jungle too thick to settle in.

To the east of the zebras, near the Equestrian border, dragons roamed. These enormous beasts were often many centuries old and had inhabited the region since before the Royal Sisters were born. They had been absolutely no threat to fully matured alicorns. To Celestia and Luna, however, even they would have a difficult time coming up with a way to take one down, should the need arise. The ponies of Equestria learned to keep a respectful distance.

The Royal Sisters moved the capital of Equestria several times over the next four thousand years. Usually, the capital's location served to encourage growth of the nation in a particular direction. Ponyville had remained small, by decree of the princesses, to always keep a portion of pony society tied to its humble roots. Eventually, with the borders of Equestria not expanding for some decades, the sisters decided it was time to build a more permanent place to rule from.

They decided it should be a castle.

The Castle of the Two Sisters was built next to the Everfree Memorial, near the edge of the ravine where the Tree of Harmony kept the land in check. It was a beautiful landscape with deciduous trees that provided vividly colored leaves each year. The castle itself was an impressive construct, filled with humorous pranks Luna had insisted on installing to playfully scare the little ones who visited. The castle was completed 4034 years after the now legendary battle.

The sisters were somewhat saddened that contemporary ponies rarely considered the battle of Everfree as having taken place at all. By now, it had mostly fallen into myth, with only the sisters themselves knowing what had really happened. So they decided no longer to include that part of history in modern education.

Perhaps it was best to allow ponykind to simply forget that chapter of their history. Another alicorn had not arisen in four millennia, and they had the Elements in case one did and decided to cause trouble. It seemed, at the time, that perhaps the calamity of alicorns would never again assert itself upon the world.

13 - A Crystal Merchant Makes a Discovery

4221 years after the Battle of Everfree, a young crystal trader named Sombra was traveling through Everfree to visit the Castle. Sombra's special talent was finding magical crystals. This was a very similar talent as Rarity would eventually have when it came to valuable gems. Crystals were similar to gems except they often had enhanced magical properties that Sombra had learned to manipulate. Sombra's business was in providing useful magical tools that he designed from the crystals he discovered.

While in Everfree, Sombra's horn powerfully suggested that he take a walk off the usual path through the forest. He came upon a rock which looked ordinary in every way, except his horn told him that it had the properties of a powerful magical crystal. Confused, he put the rock in his saddlebags and took it home.

In his workshop, he broke the rock into gravel, searching for the source of the magical energy. Eventually, he narrowed it down to a crystal so small that it could barely be noticed. It was roughly the size of a grain of sand, and yet it had the power of a flawless crystal the size of a pony’s head.

Fascinated by this, Sombra decided to make a return trip to Everfree. He discovered that there were an incredible number of these crystal bits dispersed through the forest. Many of them were buried underground, and it took some effort to find fragments that he could isolate and take home. He collected twenty-five in all, and decided to try and see what he could build with them.

Sombra noticed something very strange about the crystal bits after taking them home. They seemed to grow stronger the farther they were taken from Everfree. Sombra could not explain this because they also grew in strength the more he added to his collection. With his entire collection assembled on a worktable, he applied some exploratory spells against them.

Suddenly, they snapped together like magnets, and all twenty-five grains of crystal formed a tiny tetrahedron that hovered an inch off the table before him. The newly formed crystal was the size of a pebble, but Sombra was surprised at the sheer amount of power that he could sense within it. What was more, is that it seemed to speak to him in whispers too faint to understand.

Sombra spent two months collecting another fifty crystal grains from Everfree. When they were all joined together, he ended up with a crystal the size of a small bean. He also began to get some very unusual thoughts and ideas. Sombra became obsessed with crystals and developed irresistible desires for power and conquest.

In addition to his desires, Sombra found himself growing tremendously in strength and gained several new magical abilities, one of which was to transform himself into black smoke and then reappear at will. He also gained the ability to take a pony's mind captive and fill it with illusion and deception.

Sombra continued to grow in strength, but he knew that he was not powerful enough to take Equestria for himself. Instead, he moved to the mining settlement in the far north so he could capture the power of the unique artifact known as the Crystal Heart. Once he arrived, he used his dark magic to enslave the population and force them into servitude, digging in the frozen mines for more crystals.

These slaves were unique "crystal ponies", who had been saturated by the magic of the Crystal Heart, changing their physiology and appearance. Sombra considered these to be "ideal" ponies, and forced them to be his subjects for the duration of his fifteen-year reign of cruelty.

This reign came to a swift end as Celestia and Luna personally stormed his palace. After a brief battle and a solid attempt to deceive the sisters, Sombra was defeated. This did not happen in the way the sisters expected, however. Sombra was more powerful than they had expected, and in a surprise event, Luna was attacked by the consciousness that had possessed Sombra. Even he did not expect what happened next.

When Sombra was corrupted by the crystals he found in Everfree, it was the Nightmare who had infected him and given him his power. The Nightmare was Hyperion’s failsafe that he created as he was being defeated in battle. When the Nightmare was finally freed from Peri’s restraining influence within Everfree, she set about plotting the slaughter of ponykind.

Encountering Luna was precisely what the Nightmare needed to advance to the next stage. She abandoned Sombra, rapidly infecting Luna instead. Before Luna could react, the Nightmare took hold of her, killed Sombra, and banished the entire Crystal Empire from existence.

Ultimately, the power holding it in banishment would fade, and the Crystal Empire as well as the unthinking vestiges of Sombra would return. The act weakened the Nightmare enough for Luna to contain the parasitic consciousness and lock it away in the back of her mind.

14 - Nightmare Moon

Over the next year, Luna struggled and fought with odd urges. She became strangely resentful toward her sister, coveting the attention Celestia had received in her role as benevolent ruler of Equestria. Luna began to get more irrational, exhibiting emotions such as bitterness in increasing amounts. Worse, she had completely lost touch with the concepts of righteousness and justice—concepts that she had based her life on for over four thousand years.

Luna looked at her sister and the attention she received from the mortals and became envious. It was a feeling she had not experienced before. Her station in life was of her own design; she had never begrudged others for not giving her the same attention as they gave her sister. Luna preferred the solitude her position offered. At least, she used to.

Where had these feelings come from, where she suddenly felt compelled to demand fairness with her sister? She was not her sister, and their roles were different. But the feelings soon turned to envy and rage that her sister enjoyed an audience and a glory that she did not.

Luna kept these feelings hidden from her sister for the most part. But eventually, they had arguments over it. Celestia was confused as to why Luna suddenly wanted attention she had not previously craved. Celestia tried to reason with her, but this only brought more strife as Luna became more irrational.

One night after a bad argument, Luna simply... stopped fighting it. She was not strong enough to resist the temptation. She could see what was coming, and she was frightened—the image of a jet-black mare with slitted eyes, who cared for no one but herself. But she could no longer resist.

With tears, she submitted to the dark power that had been building up within her for the past year and became Nightmare Moon. Her body physically transformed, and she abandoned everything she had based her life on. She decided to forcefully take what she desired. And that first thing was to usurp her sister's position as sole ruler of Equestria. She would also bring eternal night, which her subjects would be forced to appreciate.

Celestia was horrified at the transformation. She wasted no time confronting her sister. Luna had always been the better warrior. The two fought for hours in intense combat over the land and air, but Celestia was no match for the rapidly growing strength her sister wielded. There was only one answer, and it crushed Celestia's heart.

Broken and bleeding, Celestia took the Elements of Harmony and used them against her sister. In an act of horrific irony, Luna's anti-alicorn weapon was used against Luna herself. She was banished to the moon with a spell that would last a thousand years.

Celestia wept over the loss, blaming herself for allowing Luna to feel so neglected. She was not aware of what it was that had infected her sister and caused her to lose sight of her own values and purpose. Afterward, Celestia took on the responsibility of ruling Equestria by herself.

16 - A Zebra Alchemist Encounters an Ancient Soul

5181 years after the Battle of Everfree and 67 years prior to the return of Nightmare Moon, a zebra alchemist named Ziph was visiting Equestria in search of magical herbs. It was known among the zebras that the Everfree Forest contained many strange and exotic plants with magical properties, so zebras often visited to take advantage of these herbs that the ponies seemed to have no interest in.

The Elements had long been removed from the Tree of Harmony, kept in a secret room in the ruins of the Castle of the Two Sisters. As a result, the Everfree Forest had once again grown dangerous and unnatural. This included a myriad of strange and frightening beasts, adding to the menace of the forest.

The ponies generally avoided Everfree, with quite a few refusing to venture there at all. In contrast, the zebras did not seem to mind. For whatever reason, the forest did not seem to dislike them as it did the ponies. That seemed strange to Ziph, considering this was a location deep within the pony nation.

He was searching a cavern set into the side of a ravine when he noticed strange plants that he had found nowhere else in the forest. He placed a drop from a test potion onto the plants, and it confirmed his suspicion that these plants would react well in many magical zebra brews.

The Equestrian government had given him permission to take what he pleased in terms of flora in exchange for some zebra artifacts for the Canterlot museum. So he helped himself to the mass of thorny vines and pods.

Once he had cleared away the plants enough to see the ground beneath them, he found something unusual tangled in their roots. The small shard of hard material seemed to speak to him. Being a mystic, Ziph saw this as a very good sign. He took the shard, along with the plant samples, back to the zebra nation of Arkadia.

Ziph closed the door behind him, glad to be home after his long return journey from Equestria. He opened his saddlebags and took out the small treasure he had found. He placed it on the table and carefully unwrapped the cloth that held the object.

It was a slender, conical shard of some kind, about two inches in length. A fine, indented groove spiraled around, making it look very much like the shell of a turret snail. For indeed, that is what he thought it was at first, until he discovered that it was not hollow at all. He decided to cut off a small sample for some testing.

Five broken dragon’s-tooth gem-cutting blades later, Ziph found his forehead hitting his desk in frustration. Dragon’s teeth were the hardest known substance in the world. They could cut through a diamond like it was wood. The strange little cone wasn’t even scratched. He held the object in front of his face with a hoof and regarded it.

“What are you, my little curiosity?” he asked.

Ziph startled when he clearly heard, in his mind, the exact same question asked back at him.

He also heard the words “mortal”, “weak” and, after a pause, “suitable”. A tiny pinpoint of light shone from the tip of the object. He peered closer. Suddenly, bands of energy, colored like fire, reached out and enveloped his face. They forced their way into his mouth, nose, and ears.

The power was unimaginable. Ziph was completely helpless to resist as he was thoroughly violated. He could feel it working its way through his entire body and then invading his very mind and memories.

When it was over, the voice spoke once more. No longer a whisper, it was deep and piercing.

“So… She’s still alive.”

He then glanced out his window at the rising moon off to the east, regarding the Mare in the Moon, clearly visible upon its surface. He chuckled as he heard the voice in his mind speak in perfect timing with his lips.

“Well, well… What have they done to you, my daughter?”

17 - The Cataclysm

Hyperion had awakened. It had taken over five thousand years for this, the largest fragment of his horn, to be found. Fully in control now, he compelled Ziph to begin working on a project that would rekindle his vendetta against ponykind. It was a project involving the arts of blood magic and necromancy.

Hyperion was not content merely being a passenger in some random zebra's body. He wanted his old body back. Hyperion now knew that both of his daughters had somehow survived and that the mortal ponies had built a great nation, though for some reason, Luna had been banished to the face of the moon.

Over the following eight months, Ziph lost both his sanity and his reputation as a respectable alchemist as Hyperion compelled him to write a spellbook. The book contained some of Hyperion's most destructive and sickening magical tricks. A variety of things that, if used by the zebras, would not go well for the ponies.

Various types of war magic were included. And of course, the soul transference magic necessary for Hyperion to one day regain his own alicorn body. Ziph then presented the spellbook to the zebra war council who, by this time, was desperate for solutions to the minotaur problem.

The minotaurs had aggressively broken through the zebra borders and were pressing inward relentlessly. The zebras were entirely outclassed by these brutes and were losing badly. Minotaurs didn’t even have magic or technology, but their sheer strength was enough, as even one minotaur was capable of ripping apart whole squads of zebras bare handed.

While the zebras were generally quite skilled in hoof combat, martial arts, and mystical subterfuge, they still fell in great numbers to minotaur forces. Three years into the war, it was clear that something new would be required if the zebras were to survive as a species.

The war council was suspicious due to Ziph's tarnished reputation. They agreed to consider his spellbook only because they had run out of better options. Ziph was finally allowed to present his solution. They had him waiting in a meeting room at the war council’s headquarters when Hyperion decided to act.

Ziph locked the door and set the tip of Hyperion’s horn on the floor next to the open spellbook. Having no further need of Ziph's body, Hyperion performed a blood/soul transfer as the first step in restoring himself. Ziph began screaming as his body opened up and bled out onto the floor. The blood washed over the spellbook, removing the written words from it.

By the time another zebra broke the door down, Ziph was gone. The now blank book sat open on the floor next to a strange conical shard, lying in a large puddle of blood with a pile of zebra bones scattered around it. Strangely, the blood seemed to be flowing into the shard. The zebra ran to get something to clean up the mess, but by the time he returned, all the blood was gone.

The war council named it the Cataclysm. They found that the powerful artifact could somehow impart dark and terrible war knowledge to any zebra who spent a day locked in a room with it. So effective was the magic it contained that the mindless brutes who had invaded Arkadia were soundly defeated.

The zebras then pushed the minotaurs themselves nearly to extinction to underscore their superiority and make sure the beasts knew never to cross them again. Bio-magical warfare had become the savior of Arkadia. The dark magic that the Cataclysm taught was lauded openly among the zebra's warrior caste.

Many opposed the practices, but the war council was quick to praise the artifact’s secrets. Over the decades following the Minotaur War, dark magic in many forms became a staple aspect of many zebra potions and practices. The more insidious spells from the Cataclysm were kept secret, but eventually, few zebras knew of a time when dark magic was not a part of zebra potion brewing and mystical practices.

18 - The Modern Era

When Twilight Sparkle and her friends used the Elements (again) on Nightmare Moon, it had a different effect than when Celestia had used them. Rather than banishing Luna once more to the moon, it ripped the Nightmare out of her and restored her to her uncorrupted self.

The Elements had grown stronger over the years. Previously, they could not cure Luna, so the only option was either to kill her or imprison her and hope for a solution at a later date. This is why Celestia set the banishment for a thousand years. Fortunately, as fate would have it, six ponies happened to come along whose virtues matched the Elements precisely, at just the right time to get the job done.

The Elements had been held in close proximity to the Tree of Harmony for about 1200 years. They were once connected to the tree directly, but at some point after the castle was built, thieves were nearly able to make off with them. The sisters had decided to keep them hidden in the castle instead, and Everfree only very slowly degenerated into the creepy forest of modern times. Most of that transformation happened after the battle with Nightmare Moon when the castle was abandoned.

Three years after the return of Luna, the Everfree Forest suddenly began spreading aggressively and grew much more dangerous. It turned out that the removal of the Elements by Twilight and her friends had caused the Tree of Harmony to become seriously weakened.

The elements needed to be returned to the tree directly in order to restore Everfree to being relatively safe to travel through. The bearers fought their way to the heart of the forest and discovered the Tree of Harmony at a small inset of a deep ravine, very close to the old castle.

After this, life in Equestria moved on as normal, and the citizens were relatively happy. Mortal ponies remained entirely unaware of the long and troubling history behind Everfree, or the true nature of alicorns. Celestia and Luna continued to rule, and the six Element bearers served the nation in various ways according to their virtues for several years until the Great War with the zebras changed everything once more.

But what happened to the Nightmare? The unborn foal, forcibly taken and corrupted by Hyperion all those millennia ago, still existed. It was only a matter of time before she would find a way to return. The only remaining question was whether she would still be compelled by Hyperion’s directive or if she finally, after all this time, had volition of her own.

19 - Epilogue -- The Dream of Nyx

I am floating.
Warmth.
Comfort.
Love…

It was my fondest memory—one I have always tried to return to. But it was only ever a glimpse.

In the darkness, there was no fear. I swam in the tight embrace, forever submerged with my long legs folded tightly against me, and yet, I did not drown. Neither was I alone. My two companions soothed me in their persistent rhythms.

Heart. Always steady, always with me, I could not only hear her but feel her soft thumping. She was strong, much stronger than my own quicker heartbeat. And I knew she could never fail me.

Breath. I never quite understood her, for I had no counterpart of my own. With her, came a slow, heaving sound, and my whole world moved with her. Up. Down. Tightening, ever so slightly, then relaxing again. She soothed me to sleep when my thoughts became jumbled. Assured me with soft coos, in a language I did not understand, that I was loved and cherished.

And so it was, for all time. Until it wasn’t.

Trouble. Heart was quickened. Powerful. My world was shaking, moving, and twisting. Breath was also strong, heavy, and jagged. New sounds, loud and awful, punished my ears. Bright lights and flashes, muted against the soft, red walls of my world. I did not understand. My own heart quickened to match my companion as I felt emotions new, and foreign, and unwelcome.

Fear. What had happened? Why was my world in turmoil?

Something smashed hard into my world and then all was still. The faint red glow had gone black. Breath was…

“Breath?” I asked urgently in my mind. “What is wrong?” She had become ragged, strained, desperate. Always so calm before, I could no longer feel her reassuring rhythm. At least Heart was still strong, pounding in my ears, urging me to pay attention.

Minutes passed slowly, going from bad to worse. “Breath? No, don’t go! I need you.”

She had slowed, coming in short gasps. Then, my world stopped moving.

“Where are you? Breath?!!”

Heart was worried as well. She had never faltered until now. Thump. Thump-thump. Th—

Silence. I had never experienced silence before. My companions were gone! I was alone.

My thoughts became a frenzied panic. What can I do? I tried to kick, but my world held firm. My thoughts… I can’t think clearly. Becoming fuzzy. What will…

Suddenly, I felt myself being pulled harshly away. I can’t feel my legs. Where is my body?! Someone new was with me. A new companion, perhaps? Someone new who would love me and assure me that everything would be alright?

Horror. My body was gone. Not numb… simply gone. I was brought into a place impossible to describe. In my consciousness, I could see terrible things. I never knew the world was so big! So very, very big. And so horrible. Others were here, not my companions but entities I could not hope to understand. And they fought one another in ways that made my mind freeze up.

I became wrapped around one of them. Finally, an anchor once more.

No. No, this can’t be. New emotions invaded my mind, forcing me to submit.

Hatred. Malevolence. Fury. I can’t… There is no longer choice. No love. No comfort.

I felt myself change. He was so powerful. Who was I to resist? So overwhelming, telling me what I must think and what I must feel. The passion. The breathtaking drive to… destroy.

I had become a new thing. Something I was not. I am now given purpose. One singular task.

To slay them.

All of them.

I am… The Nightmare.

Author's Note

Thank you all for journeying with me through an important part of history. All of this was created many years ago to lay the foundation for my story Black Feather.

Past Sins is a suitable "next chapter" in the MLP version of this history, as it covers the origins of Nyx being brought onto the scene. However, it's notable that this is my version of exactly what Nyx is and how she originated that is not canon to Past Sins. This chronicle, particularly the Epilogue, reveals her earliest memory, as it takes place in the Equinox saga.

In my version of events, Nyx herself is the Nightmare that Hyperion forced to become an agent of destruction. In separating her from Luna, the Elements also had the effect of freeing her from Hyperion's directive. Now, she is merely a traumatized child who must decide what values she will hold and what impact she will have on the world, for good or evil.