Truly Evil?

No traps so far, but we're pushing our luck here, Dusk thought. He especially became concerned when Ician lifted the body up. Great, we just touched her. We're dead ponies for sure.

Instead of searching the coffin, he decided to keep his eye out for anything that might try to kill them.

The body levitated upwards, but the only thing beneath was the stone of the coffin. It was bare except for a small bit of rune work, but even novices could tell it was just simple preservation magic at work, the reason why the body had stayed intact so long despite what would naturally be occurring.

"Then..." Ician gulped, finding nothing but the rune. "Then... we have no choice."

He looked to the others. "You... might not want to be here for this. Just saying. I doubt you'll find this... pleasant in any way."

He took a deep breath and held in it, squeezing his eyes shut. "No holding back."

His eyes snapped open wide. He began searching the body itself, taking care to touch it with nothing but his telekinesis.

Even the body held nothing. The only things in this room were the flowers, the coffin, the recently disturbed corpse, and the picture. Nothing moved, no traps triggered, despite the very melancholy atmosphere this would appear to be the most normal room in the manor so far.

"... Nothing." Ician deposited the body gently and carefully back in its place and pulled the coffin lid back over it. "Nothing at all... but at least I can be sure that there's nothing here." He began to scrutinise the picture carefully, seeing everything he could about it and taking in any details a cursory examination might have overlooked.

This final search of the body itself is what broke June's resolve. She slowly began to advance on Ician, her head tilted. "Have you no respect for the dead?" She spoke in a disturbingly casual tone, as though it were an inane topic. "None? Is this mission so important that you would defile a corpse in its own grave to try and find something that isn't there?" Her voice remained even. This sudden rush of what should have been anger, could she form it, blocked out the atmosphere of the room. "I said we should leave and you should have listened."

"June," Dusk began, hoping to keep this situation from escalating, "I don't like it either. I even suggested we leave too. But as regrettable as it is, we can't skip over something just because we're uncomfortable with it. And I think Sin Ester will definitely make us regret it."

The picture hadn't changed since the ponies had first looked at it. It still showed the happy couple not truly posing, but standing next to each other and sharing a laugh. The background was predominately sky because of the slight upward angle of the photo, but the hints of trees could be seen near the bottom.

The stallion was dressed in a classic formal tux with the distinct blue star speckled tie of a professor of Celestia's prestigious magic university, there was also a pin on his coat marking the stallion as a member of the house Stardust. The mare had a rather simple but elegantly made white dress. Both outfits were already spotting a few stains where cake hadn't gone quite where it was supposed to during some likely fun mishap. A truly heartwarming scene captured forever, that would serve as a cherished memory in time, but in the now and in this melancholy room, it only served as a harsh reminder of what was and a cruel taunt at what might have been to come.

Ician's right eye twitched. He put down the picture and spun around to face June. "The dead are already dead. There's no helping them anymore, is there? But this mission is for the living. If... no, when we succeed, we bring a criminal to justice. We save Equestria from being tormented by him any longer than it has to. Are you saying that one corpse isn't worth all that?" He shook his head and began to examine the flowers thoroughly.

June ignored Dusk, advancing towards Ician at a relaxed pace. She stopped a few inches from him, eerily calm. "I am saying that the disrespect of a pony's final place of rest is not worth anything we can get from this room. Which is nothing. Sin is a pony, and this is where he shows it." A pause, and her expression softened. "As for the dead already being dead, at the very least we can do is give their memory respect. In this case, by looking at the rest of the mansion."

Oh come on. Let's try something a little different, Dusk thought to himself. He didn't want this issue to rip their little group apart. He reminded himself of what his mother would do whenever he and his siblings would fight.

He placed a hoof on June's shoulder and said, "June. What's done is done, and we can't change that. I admit I felt it was wrong to open the coffin and disturb the body, although for different reasons than you. And Ician, you should at least have an understanding that the ends don't always justify the means. I know not everypony will see what you did was right. Now, I'm not here to say which of you is right or wrong about this. What I am saying is that it is wrong that you two are fighting about it. Just leave each other alone about it until we've all calmed down a bit. Then perhaps we can talk about this a bit more civilly."

The only abnormality for the flowers was how well they seemed to be doing in an environment with so little light and fresh air. That however was easily explained by the preservation enchants on the vases, bowls, and other containers they were sitting in.

"Hmph." Ician put down the flowers and turned to face the other two. "I'll say this now. I make no promises about my behaviour from this point forward, and I'll do what I feel is necessary to complete the mission." He shook his head. "But I agree with Dusk. Arguing with each other at this point would only be counterproductive. We need to work as a team if we even want to have a hope of succeeding. So let's agree to disagree." He extended a hoof towards June. "Truce?"

June looked at the hoof for a moment, then up at Ician.  There was definitely sense in a truce.  For now, at least.  She studied him for a few more seconds through her sunglasses, her eyes hidden by Ician's reflection.  She then gave a slow nod.  "Let's get out of this room.  Then a truce."  With that, June turned and headed back up the stairs.

Dusk breathed a sigh of relief when they agreed to have a truce between them. Though there was still room for something to go wrong, he thought everypony would be reasonable about this for now.

"I think that's reasonable enough, since we've pretty much checked everything. Let's go." Dusk then followed June back up.

Ician hovered back for a few moments as the others left. Just as well. This is just a postponement... when it all comes to a head later I'll be ready. Out of habit, he checked the slot in his cloak where his knife was. It was still there, of course. But it made him feel better.

He glanced back at the picture, eyeing it for a few more moments. He let out a quiet sigh and pulled the hood over his head further down, shrouding all of his face in shadow. His snake slithered off of his back and coiled itself around the top of his hooded head. He quietly followed the others up the staircase.

Back in the picture room, the three ponies would arrive to see the same kind of scene as they'd left it. There seemed to be nothing that had changed since they'd last been in the room.

Once they were out of the stairway, June took a deep breath, releasing it slowly. She reached into one of her backpack's outer pockets, and revealed a flask. She took a quick drink, to calm her nerves. The alcohol didn't do anything, but the simple action and the strong smell helped. Besides, she always drank after a funeral, and by the Explorer had that felt like one. Except for the defiling of the body and Ician's casual disrespect for- no, that would be talked about later. Truce for now. She offered the flask to Dusk. "Drink? It's safe, don't worry. Whiskey, I think."

Dusk took the flask in his magic and said, "Well, one couldn't hurt." He too took a quick drink and passed it back to June. He often didn't drink, saving it for celebrations or depressing times. This certainly was a depressing time, especially since he felt things were going to get a lot worse from here on.

"Let's just get a move on." Ician muttered. "I'd rather not... think. At all, right now." He reached up towards the dial. "I'll take my possibly life-threatening distraction to go, please." He turned it to the last and final setting, raising his sword half-heartedly as he prepared to fight - perhaps not very effectively - for his life and more importantly the mission if need be.

The dial shifted to the last color on the wheel, black, and with it another secret panel opened from the ceiling this time. Down descended a flight of stairs on some sort of hidden mechanism, leading upwards into the unknown. Anypony with any amount of magical sensitivity however would feel something very wrong emanating from this new opening, the foul stench of dark magic practically billowed out along with the smells of sulfur and brimstone as the opening appeared.

"Yup. That's a very good distraction." Ician pulled his hood down even further in a subconscious attempt to block out the putrid, acrid fumes of sulfur and brimstone, not to mention the nauseating wave of dark magic that hit him like a brick wall. To the face. On a speeding train. "Stay on your hooves, everypony. There's no telling what's in here, and at this point I wouldn't be surprised if even the floor tried to kill us." He threw his trap-checking book up the stairs and used his magic to push it along, trying to trigger any traps.

As soon as the door opened, the flask dropped from June's hoof as she started coughing, eyes watering behind her glasses.  It took everything in her not to throw up.  The stench was horrible to any normal pony, to say nothing of June's enhanced sense of smell.  That combined with the feeling of the dark magic emanating from the opening made it almost unbearable.  She started moving away from the opening, fumbling through her backpack for something to make it bearable.  Eventually, she pulled out a cloth mask, covered in runes, and quickly strapped it over her face.  She took a few shaky breaths, making sure the enchantments were working, and her sense of smell cut off.  As jarring as it was to suddenly lose such a powerful sense, was so glad for this mask.  But nothing could be done for the feeling of... wrongness coming from the opening.  June looked between Dusk and Ician.  "I... I'm not going in there."

Dusk, having nothing to block the smell, simply had to live with it. He immediately put a hoof to his nose, trying to block the smell as much as possible.

"Ugh. Who wants to guess that's where Sin Ester is?" He sarcastically asked.

The book moved along the stairs without triggering a thing, and smell didn't die down along with the feeling. Whatever was causing those two awful things to be was still there, waiting for the next poor souls to enter whatever room it was in and deal with it.