Realium

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Realium

By Deathstrike666

Chapter 2 – It Begins

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The princess of the night paced quickly around her throne room, as she was doing for the past several minutes After hearing what her sister told her, she knew why she was irritated, it even started to make her angry.

“Why would the Griffon’s do this?”, asked Luna with an enraged tone in her voice.

“I don’t know,” replied Celestia calmly while slowly shaking her head, “Our two civilizations have been at peace for years now. I honestly don’t know why the Griffon Kingdom would declare war on us.”

“We must warn the citizens of Equestria about this new threat and prepare our armies for war before it is too late,” suggested Luna.

“I agree,” said Celestia, “We were lucky that our spies intercepted one of their messages. If they didn’t, we wouldn’t of known until it was too late.” Celestia turned her gaze from her sister to her guard, a dark red pegasus with a raggedy red and bluish grey mane. He had been there the entire time, he was going to leave earlier but Celestia ordered him to stay. “Captain Deathstrike, I want you to go and get all the commanders. I want them in the war room within the hour.”

“Yes, Princess,” replied Deathstrike with a salute before leaving quickly through the doors of Luna’s throne room.

The two princesses left shortly after the captain. They walked side by side through the moonlit halls. Not speaking a single word on the way to the war room. When they arrived the doors were covered in dust. The doors took a little bit of force to open and they did so with a loud creaking screech, revealing a large black space.

Celestia’s horn starts glowing and one by one large candles along the walls light up. As they lit up they revealed a large oval shaped table in the middle of the room. The table was littered with maps, tactics, and other large pieces of paper.

“Couldn’t somepony have dusted this room sometime within it being last used. They had eight hundred or so years to do so”, wondered Celestia as the two walked into the room.

Princess Luna’s horn started glowing. Around the room, every single speck of dust and cobweb started forming into a large ball above the table. There was a lot of dust and cobwebs. Once they were all gathered the ball vanished into thin air. The two princesses sat at the large oval table and waited for the commanders to arrive.

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A purple dragon was walking through a dark cave. The only thing illuminating the darkness was the large stick he had set on fire in his right claw. There were several small cuts in his scales but they weren’t deep enough to draw any blood. He was shaking all over as he walked through the cave. Something had terrified him. As he was walking he took quick envious looks over his shoulder making sure the thing wasn’t following him.

“You cannot hide for ever, Spike,” said a male voice coming from the darkness causing the dragon to back against the cave wall in fear, “Why don’t you just give up and join me”.

“I will never join you!” yelled Spike into the darkness; his heart was now racing and he was still looking around to find where the voice was coming from. “Certainly not after what you did to my friends!”

The voice laughed in response. “Your friends. They were never your friends. They never have been your friends. I am your only friend, now”.

“NO! You’re not my friend! Twilight has always been my friend!”, yelled Spike angrily.

“But she is gone now,” said the voice calmly, “She is gone forever. So why don’t you just stop this and become my chaotic servant?”

The voice had now cornered Spike into a dead end. Spike’s heart was racing. He was now breathing heavily. Pools of sweat were now running down his forehead. He had seen what the voice had done to the Keepers of Harmony. The voice had corrupted them. Changed them. Destroyed them.

Before the dragon could respond a hand shot out of the darkness and pinned him against the wall. The hand lifted him up a little so that his legs were no longer touching the ground. He started struggling against the voice’s grip but it was no use.

“You will join me,” said the voice calmly while he placed his other hand on Spike’s forehead.

Spike’s eyes closed. The voice’s hand just stayed there for a second. When the voice removed his hand Spike’s eyes opened again but they had changed. His eyes were no longer green; they were now a dark grey. After seeing the changed eyes the voice lowered Spike back down to the floor.

“Now I will repeat the question,” said the voice, “Will you join me?”

“Yes, Master,” replied Spike while kneeling on the ground.

The voice just replied to this with a loud chaotic laugh.

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The princesses waited as one by one their commanders took their seats. After a few minutes, the last of the commanders entered the room and took their seat at the oval table. All the commanders were mumbling to themselves about what all this is about. Celestia rose from her seat, drawing everypony’s attention.

“I know you are all wondering why we are gathered here today,” said Celestia, “We are all gathered here because of some very grim news that I received a few hours ago.”

All the commanders started whispering to each other before one of them asks, “What is this grim news?”

Celestia gives a small sigh before responding, “A few hours ago I received a message from our spies that the Griffons are going to invade Equestria and that they are marching towards Equestria right now.”

All the commanders gasped in horror. There hadn’t been war in Equestria for last seven hundred and forty eight years. None of them had ever thought that another nation would ever declare war on Equestria.

“Why would they declare war on us?” asked one of the commanders breaking the quiet whispering.

“I do not know why,” replied Celestia shaking her head, “All I know is that we should prepare defence measures for when they do get here”

“How long until they do get here?”, asked Luna.

“Three to five days,” answered Celestia, “So that doesn’t give long to prepare ourselves. Before they arrive we need to get our armies ready and evacuate every city and town that is at a direct risk from the Griffons”.

“What are we sitting around here waiting for?” said a commander while slamming her hoof into the table, “We need to start now!”

“I agree, Spitfire,” said Celestia.

There was one thing that ponies didn’t know about the Wonderbolts, that their main job isn’t about being about being Equestria’s top flyers. They were actually looking for the best flyers to join as a special part of the Equestrian Army that focused on the more dangerous and life threatening operations.

The meeting lasted for another hour. During this time they mainly discussed tactics and how they were going to fund the war. The sun was just rising as the commanders started leaving the war room. Each one of them knew of the hard times to come.

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Sitting in the lowest chambers of a ruined castle sat a light blue alicorn stallion with a dark purple mane. Several candles were scattered around him, forming two circles. Looking at the ground, the alicorn was drawing several magical symbols with his horn.

“So it begins,” said the Alicorn to himself with a small grin on his face as he finished the last symbol, “Two thousand years of preparation has led to this”.

He slowly stood up and walked towards the the only entrance to the dark chamber. While he was walking away the symbols started to faintly glow a dark gray. The alicorn knew that they needed time to absorb magical energy before they would properly work but he knew that they would be ready when they were needed in his plan.

“I have brought the death and salvation of Princess Luna!”

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Deathstrike and the Alicorn