Castle Oblivion

Wild Card watched one of the ponies walk into the cards, a strange sight to see something not even try to get out of the way but instead to walk into the attack. He expected some sort of vile trickery, such as the being taking the wound and continuing towards him... but no, they just fell, the tears in their body completely visible. The look the final one gave Wild wasn't one of anger... but of confusion and innocence.

This look tore straight through Wild, causing him to fully realise what he had just done. With reluctance, he forced the cards through the bodies of the fallen three ponies and walked over to the one who held the card depicting Ace, crouching down and picking it up. "I... I didn't want to... I had no choice..." He stammered, trying to reason with himself that what he did wasn't just plain murder. "They didn't respond... They just didn't do anything. We didn't get any sleep, we're shown our past, we're thrown into this horrifying place, we're separated from the group, they stole Ace and then they just stood there..." Wild put the card of Ace back into his front pocket, and the runic cards simply floated around him slowly. "W-why is all of this happening?" He asked out loud, as if hoping an answer would just arrive.

The stallion turned his head to look at the copies of the ones he had just killed standing at a window and pointing to the door. His ears flattened against the side of his head as he ran to the wall furthest away from the ponies. "Don't let them out! They'll want to avenge these ones... themselves, whatever the hell they are!" He yelled, sounding terrified and pointing at the large group, before hearing the sound from earlier, the sword that could cut through metal and caused a stallion to simply kill himself instead of facing it. "Oh no... No no no. This must just be a bad dream, yeah, that's it. We're sleeping safely in our tents and this is just a nightmare... wait... we control our dreams. This can't be a dream then. Why can't we be like other ponies and be able to believe these things are dreams?" Wild was sounding increasingly panicked, his eyes darting around, one eye grey while the other was a deep green, but both had shrunken irises.

Lightning watched as he saw the ponies fall so easily. The stallion felt uneasy as the last one stood there looking at them before it finally fell. It felt as if they had done something wrong, very wrong. He didn't know why at first, but it just seemed wrong for some reason. Wild seemed to be having the same feeling by the way he was acting. Then, he heard a small tapping on the window nearby. He eyed them carefully as they silently asked to be freed. His eyes shifted over to the door they pointed at, but wondered if they should actually be trusted. They seemed harmless and still failed to give him a reason that they would attack, outside of being weird. Soon, Wild yelled to warn them about the weird ponies. Wild had lost it that was obviously. His attention stay on Wild before his ears were filled with a terrible noise. 

The grey pegasus gritted his teeth as he heard the noise and felt his heart start to race. He knew the thing they had avoided from before was coming back. The nightmare was coming. His eyes focused on Wild with a slight irritation. The stallion wanted to be angry, but for being scared and panicking. Yet Lightning couldn't be mad. In all honesty he felt the same, but he knew if he panicked now it would only leave one pony else to get them out of there or simply leave them as he got away, Rain. He held his breath and calmly went over to Wild. The figure would have heard Wild yelling easily, probably smiling about it as well. The thought of this being a nightmare shook him to his core. This was really Nightmare Moon, but how did she come back? Where were they anyways?

The stallion shoved the questions out of his head. Those questions could be asked later when they were not about to be killed, they were going to survive. His eyes shifted to the rest of the room. They were at a disadvantage because of the lack of room, but hopefully Nightmare wouldn't be able to swing her sword around with it being stuck in the walls. But, the fact it sliced through a door and rusted the railing put a question for that idea. "If you all want to get out, then help us." He said before quickly moving away from the window and then opening the door for them. If they did want to kill them it wouldn't be much different than the outcome they would have with the figure outside of the hallway. Lightning doubted they would do much if they helped, but looked like they would be a good enough distraction for them to escape. 

The thought of that made him feel a little heartless, but if they didn't how else would they survive this? He looked over at Rain and gestured him over to the door he had opened, hopefully understanding that he wanted him to make sure none of those things attacked. Lightning would grab onto Wild's collar and smack him across the face once. "SHUT UP!! You think you're the only that's scared! Huh?!" Lightning didn't wait for Wild to respond before he jerked him up onto his feet while the grey pegasi stood up himself. "If this is a freaking nightmare then we just need to fight through it until we wake up. Not sit here crying like a little bunch o little foals. Now, you got two choices. Sit here and most likely die. Or you can stand up a be a real stallion as we try to fight through this." Lightning's attention shifted to the door again before sighing and walking away from Wild, hopefully without the stallion trying to harm him or the black winged figure coming in just yet. 

He pulled out his second gun as he watched what the strange ponies did and then would wait for the figure to walk through the door and hopefully the strange ponies trying to help them. Lightning hoped his little "pep talk" had helped managed to get Wild to stop panicking or at least get him to fight.

Seeing the odd display of accepted death on the non-hostile zombie-like ponies, he searched their faces as they fell, confusion, and amongst all else, a leading begging look as if to ask: "Why?" That must have been terrible for Wild, he walked over to the, slightly taken aback stallion and rested a hand on his shoulder, "You did what you thought was right, you just need to come to terms with it." He got a gesture from Lightning, nodding he let go of Wild shoulder and walked towards the door, looking oddly at the strange stallions, he heard a smack and yelling behind him, he didn't need to see, just a louder (and perhaps more effective) comforting, looking back at Lightning he said, "Should I open the door? For... Them?" He gestured to the stallions at the window then looked back at Lightning curiously, that noise of metal made his water vibrate in fear, metal may be deadly, however even a foal could tell you water is the sharpest object known to all of pony-kind.

(("Shrouding Dark Cloud"))

As the monster's foot came out, Young Sugary's first reaction would be to slash at it with his sword if it got too close to him as he was already attempting to poke the portal for good measure with the Light imbued weapon. "This is a really big one..."

While he wasn't sure how to take Verde's unusually cheery attitude about their circumstances, she seemed to have the right idea by making the first move. So, while she took to one direction, he'd scurry along in the other direction to fully surround the creature as he charged up his magic, launching burst after burst of fireballs onto the creature's face and neck while bringing out three pikes from his Inventory and float around him to prepare for further ahead.

Oathbound dismissed his extra weapons after seeing the Heartless disappear, but kept his original pair at the ready. He was not convinced that the threat was dealt with, merely going back for reinforcements.

Or worse. "Don't think they're done yet. Something tells me we've got way worse in store before this is all over." He said, before going to Fine Fantasy and looked her over quickly.
"Are you alright, Fantasy? It was kinda rough there."

The large creature charged at Sugary first, apparently deciding the smallest was also the weakest; it promptly received a very clear sign that wasn't the case as the fireballs impacted it's eyes and neck, one of them flying right down the creatures gaping more; it reared upright and pounded the floor, shaking the entire room and causing visible cracks.

"To the portal!" Oathbreaker yelled. "If the floor caves in on this thing it'll take us all with it!" He insisted as he tried to distract the creature away from Sugary, slicing off one of the tendrils on it's back with a thrown axe, to a roar of protest from the creature.


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Before the eyes of Lightning, Rain and Wild, several distortions in the air appeared, as if the air had heated up exponentially; blue smoke joined the distortions before at least a dozen of the strange ponies teleported into the room, one of them unlocking the door to let out the others.

One had a move and grabbed the three stallions shoving them along the corridor forcefully. Any possible idea of it being aggression was chased away as they saw why.

The other stallions had linked arms or raised their fists, forming an a defensive barricade with their bodies as the sword sliced through the stairwell door. The stallion guiding them hammered his fist on a door, revealing another stairwell when he knocked the door down, and began hurrying them through it...



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"Oh they'll have worse." Astron assured them as Celestia walked off, not even bothering to check if her brother was okay, his arm visibly bleeding. "They never attack in force on the castle, it's been the same thing for months; they send enough to the castle to get our attention to draw us into a bigger ambush, and while we defeat that they attack the castle."

The Prince sighed in annoyance. "We've been on lockdown for about three months now. Luna's the only one of us who leaves the castle anymore."

Wild Card was rather surprised by the "good cop, bad cop" scenario he experienced. A sudden slap followed by being hauled up to his feet, especially after Rain had talked so calmly to him, all of which caused his eye colours to change continuously, reaching a fiery orange before settling to the regular eye colour Wild had, as if flames had just died down in his eyes. "I needed that." He said simply, dusting off his suit and wiping away any stray tears, though darker lines could still be seen coming from his eyes as the fur was still wet.

"Well... at least we got Ace back. That's a good thing." Wild said with a slight hint of happiness. 'Search for Ace, hopefully he's back with the card of him.' He thought to himselves, before raising a finger and pointing at the distortions. "Okay things are getting weirder and weirder..." "Now I can agree with tha-" "Hey!" At this moment, Wild was being forced along the corridor by one of the strange stallions, much to his annoyance.

"What in Tartarus do you think you're-" "Oh..." The dark blue pegasus looked back at the defensive line of ponies, and the part of the dreaded metal cutting sword that was visible. "Okay this guy has got a good idea." "I'm extremely sorry for... um, killing your friends back there..." He apologised to the stallion who had just broken down a door, before running down the stairwell as fast as he could, hoping the other two in the group would follow. "Bottom floor equals exit!" "In most cases."

Young Sugary was about to panic as the creature was beginning to aim for him despite having been the last to attack. Fortunately, it seemed his barrage along with Viridian's did the trick and worked better than expected, allowing him to keep his distance and his relative safety from the behemoth.

When told to jump into the portal the creature came from, however, he briefly hesitated. "The portal!? That could take us-...!" He paused in thought briefly. "... Anywhere...?" He looked to his weapons, at Oathbreaker, at Viridian, at the monster, at the room, and finally back at the portal itself with reluctance. "Ooooh... I don't like this..." He nonetheless steeled his nerves as best as he could, put away his pikes again, and just focused on his sword and wand in his grip as he made a quick dash towards the black hole in the ground, clopping being more and more heard as he ran quicker and quicker. And then finally came the leap of faith as he stared into the abyss, sword shining brightly as he pointed it towards the hole while holding his wand and arm over his helmet. "... But feel my furyyyyyyyyy~!"

"Good call, Breaker," Viridian agrees as she embeds the kunai in the center of the beast's forehead, waiting until the moment where it appears that it might be recovering from having its bells rung quite thoroughly. She then smiles, points in the direction of the embedded kunai, and says "Kaboom." Whereupon the magic "written" onto the kunai is released in a concussive explosion that would feel like a god's sledgehammer in the place where the kunai was embedded. Even as the beast would be reacting to this, Viridian is already on her way forward and the spent (and rather bent-looking) kunai zips back to her as she sheaths the remaining ones. Upon reaching Sugary, she puts a hand on the small of his back. "Fury later." And then she gives him a shove forward even as she calmly steps over the edge.

"What about the other parts of Equestria? Are you in contact with them?" Oath asked, not quite sure if this castle was the only place left from all the possible places where resistance could have formed up.
Then again, it did take two alicorns and two magic wielding ponies to hold back the tide.
He still found himself loathing the fact that the Princess of the Sun was forced to take arms against this black menace.

"And what do you mean worse?" He didn't like the horde that was already defeated, the possibility of something even more dangerous was not a thought he fancied. He was already starting to feel a bit tired, not helped in the least because of the strain made by him summoning a battalion's worth of axes and using them all at once.

Lightning thought he had already opened the door and nodded to Rain so that he could open the door. He had moved a good distance down the hall as he noticed the distortions appearing. The stallion raised his guns at the things and got ready to shot at them, since things strangely appearing normally weren't good. While, he would have normally shot have shot at them, but there was too many and one had opened the door had failed to open eariler. His eyes darted around for a moment as he backed away from the newcomers, not commenting to what Wild had said. For a few moment he lowered his guns before he saw one move quickly towards him.

Lightning went to raise his arms up again, but before he could he saw the sword cut through the door. He saw the things form a wall of bodies to protect them and turned to follow the place the pony was pushing them to. "I hope you know a secret that we don't because this place leads to a dead end." He said as he took another glance back at what was going on behind them.

As Wild pulled all of himself(s) together Rain began to feel the air heat up, before he could mention it to the others a poof of blue smoke "spawned" five-ish ponies that began pushing him, as well as Wild and Lightning, normally being pushed around never put Rain in a skip happy mood, but hearing the metal slicing noise again he chuckled nevously, "Great plan, let's follow you guys." Trying to keep up to avoid being pushed, or worse tripping. He allowed them to continue to push him towards the end of the corridor, leading to the stairs.

His flasks water flowed quickly into the flask as he and the others pushed onwards.

"As I said Oathbound, it has been the same every time; they send a small distraction force, when they have felt out our defenses for the time being they send one of their big bastards and try to finish one of us off. Celestia's being driven up the wall by it and I've lost my castle in the attacks. So yeah, we're all a bit tense right now." Astron admitted, running a hand through his mane; from the way it stuck up it seemed he'd made a habit of doing this lately.

"Still, it seems we mig-" the alicorn paused as he looked behind Oathbound. "That's not you doing that is it?" He asked, turning Oathbound around so he could face the shadowy portal forming before them.


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Sugary and Viridian tumbled out into a brightly lit corridor, which was much chillier than where they had been previously. Oathbreaker landed heavily on Sugary with a loud "oomph" and pulled his considerable weight off just as quickly.

The warrior stallion had barely had time to straighten up before his eyes rested on the stunned Astron and Oathbound standing with him. "This... might be problematic." He remarked, not moving, staring like a deer caught in headlights.


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The stairs lead pretty far down and the further they went it seemed to get even darker than it already was in the building. Curiously enough before long there stopped being actual doors on each floor altogether, instead they just ran past landings with no reason to exist until finally the stairs led down into a straight drop.

The drop down below was the darkest yet, it was pitch black, such that it seemed honestly as if the world ended right where the darkness began. The sounds of the strange ponies pitching battle with the swordsmen were barely audible now but from how often they heard the swish and sickening thud of the sword, it didn't seem to be going well for them.

Verde picks herself off the floor and notices Oath. She blinks and looks between Oathbound and Oathbreaker before grinning. "Oh, this cannot help but turn out well," she proclaims cheerfully before her gaze falls upon Astron... and the smile disappears. "...and... who might you be?" she asks him, taking a few steps towards the alicorn with a very odd expression on her face. "I mean, you're clearly a male... um... alicorn but..." she pauses and swallows. "I apologize, please excuse me, but I have a distinct feeling that I should know who you are and have met you before. You seem so familiar to me and yet I'm quite sure I've never met a male alicorn before." And for some reason, when I look at him, I feel a strong pang of grief, she added in her own head as she continues to stare. Why would I feel sad upon seeing him though? He's handsome. I should be delighted.

Young Sugary was about as comfortable as one would expect when having little choice but to go through a dark hole made by mysterious powers. He nonetheless charged on with extra oomph as Verde had given him a boost as he jumped first...

Though jumping in first would not affect the outcome of the exit as he lost his balance somewhat on the way out, only to realize Verde had somehow passed him by. And was then further knocked off balance as Oathbreaker knocked into him, sending the lightweight stallion to the ground and briefly knocking the helmet off. As he quickly tried to get on his knees at least, and get his helmet back as his long mane flowed out, he felt stunned as he slowly got a better feeling for his surroundings... and noticed Auron the alicorn.

Massive was the alicorn's lifeforce to the young stallion, and so he was deeply puzzled and wary as to the unfamiliar Prince as he then slowly retreived his helmet, while pointing his sword at him.

Oathbound listened to Astron's explanation, understanding it and accepting it for now.

However, when the question popped up, his eyebrows went up a bit as he was turned before his expression hardened. "More of them..." But then he saw the stallion from before along with one of the ponies he had camped alongside with. "Viridian? Sugary?" He looked at the two before the third figure's presence finally dawned on him.

"YOU!" He called out, grabbing Oathbreaker by the neck while his axes flared up and two more pairs sprang up, all around his body. "You were banished from Equestria, to never seet foot here ever again. By the power invested in me by the Solar Princess, I should behead you and send you to Tartarus! Why have you come? What did you do to Sugary and Viridian!?" He all but yelled, shaking the pony with a single arm while the other grabbed an axe.

Wild Card carried on running down the stairs at an alarmingly quick pace, occasionally opening his wings to steady himself and then closing them again. It seemed as if he had run down staircases in a hurry before, and in all fairness he had done this many times. Most casinos had multiple floors after all. But he stopped himself quickly with a flap of the wings just before falling into the gaping chasm of darkness.

"Oh bugger..." "Seems like you were wrong, Cheshire... bottom floor isn't the exit. I'm pretty certain we passed the bottom floor several floors ago anyway." Wild said out loud, leaning forward to look down into the darkness. "Welp, we can't go back up, that's for sure." The stallion lifted a foot and placed it forward as if taking another step, which he did... but being a pegasus he merely flew above the pit itself before falling. "Ace! Some days you are just stupid." "But, where else is there to go? This hole might lead to somewhere good, and we're at no risk of death by gravity." "Either way Ace, best for us to wait for the others before making a decision..." He decided, hovering above the pit with his arms crossed and looking at the staircase.

Lightning hadn't really thought to use the stairs as he got shoved and would have instinctively let his wings completely take him down the stairs. Instead he was forced to run down them because of Wild being in front of him. The stallion grumbled to himself because he nearly fell a couple times and was only able not by coping Wild's technique though it was somewhat hard to do with it getting darker the further they went down plus the fact he was not to roll down the stairs. It wasn't helped by the fact he wanted to move faster by the sound of bodies hitting the ground. So, once they finally reached the bottom of the stairs, Lightning wasn't really appreciative of the fact that Wild's example kept him alive since it could have also have him end up with a lot of pain. It wasn't helped by the fact that Wild was now simply hovering over the pit instead of going into it, not even slowly. "Screw it, I'm going first." He said to himself as he stepped over the ledge and fell into the black pit. The stallion opened his wings and slowly made his way down, now hoping he hadn't done something stupid.

Oathbreaker quickly slapped Oathbound's hands away and rolled back away from Oathbound, summoning his own axes to his hands. "Calm yourself. Stow your sense of honor and keep your eyes on the bigger picture." Oathbreaker snarled, dropping back to Viridian and Sugary with his axes raised to keep the group at bay.

"Does someone care to explain this?" Astron attempted to demand before a grey stallion flew out of the same portal the others had come through and slammed straight into him, knocking the wind out of the royal and sending him crashing onto the floor.

"Quite the drama." A droll voice remarked. From around the group the world seemed to go fuzzy, as if a bad signal on a video screen. After a moment of this they found themselves in the same white corridor they had started in, no sign of the Castle, The Laboratory or even of Prince Astron.

At the end of the white corridor the same black hooded figure was slowly clapping their hands with a mirthful tone to their voice. Just behind the assembled group Wild Card appeared as the laboratory he was in also faded away and relocated him to the main corridor.

Oathbreaker immediately drew his axes again and levelled them at the figure. "Behold who you should be aiming at brother." He snarled at the hooded figure. "This foul creature would see all of Equestria plunged into eternal darkness."

Verde looks at Oathbreaker a moment, then at Oathbound, and then at Oathbreaker again. "OK, so, not really important or relevant right now--the soon-to-get-his-plot-beat nimrod over there is--but I'm wondering about this brother thing and how Breaker knows what's up and Bound is just pissed off. But, yanno, another time and place." She puts her shield between herself and the hooded figure, peering at him over the edge of it. "OK, so, Equestria plunged into eternal darkness. I think I'm sort of against that. In fact, I think I'm really, really against that and I think it'd be good times if unfortunate things happened to whoever the buck this joker is." She wraps telekinetic sheaths around her throwing weapons, keeping them prepared. "So, melodramatic guy in robe right out of central villain casting... who're you?"

Young Sugary would only begin to make heads or tails about Oathbound and Oathbreaker, and who Astron might be. But that Paled in comparison to the knowledge that everything around them all was falling apart and returning to what it once was.

While Verde might have been more inquisitive, he was much more volatile by comparison. His youthful spirit burning with passion sought out base Justice as he charged his magic and shot a small bolt of lightning at the hooded being from the tip of his sword, more an attempt at shock theraphy than an intentional lethal output. "Here's your drama, you jerk!" He didn't know any better. He didn't know if he was a good fella or not. But he was sure of one thing, and that was the fact that the hooded being made him feel uneasy and his greater than thou attitude infuriated the young stallion after what they had just gone through.

Lightning hadn't expected the sudden change in direction or the fact the he would crash into someone. The stallion groaned a bit as he looked over at the person he rammed into as the world started to become fuzzy. He only had a moment to realize that the person he hit was now on the ground before he vanished. He managed to push himself off the ground to look over at the hooded figure. The other Oath immediately drew his attention as he blamed the figure for bringing them here, but that wasn't something Lightning was really focusing on. There were suddenly two axe wielding ponies with slight color swaps as if they were a videogame character that was picked by the same person. The grey pegasus got onto his feet while Verde was talking and while he did agree with what she said, he thought Sugary had lost his mind. Did the guy deserve to be hit by lightning bolt? Hell fucking yes! For whatever reason this cloaked figure had dragged them into some weird parallel dimension and later teleporting them into different places via zipper monsters. This was not the person you simply shot at and expect to win, Lightning hoped that the guy wouldn't try to kill them for this. Just a glimpse of that power worried him and now they were going to fight him?

Lightning probably could have stopped the bolt if he had expected the spell to be shot. Now, the stallion now could hope that figure would let them off the hook for this or that they were powerful enough to beat him and that he was just overestimating the figure's power.

Wild Card raised an eyebrow as the area around it fizzled out of existence and placed him behind the group he was originally with at the beginning of this quest. Noticing the floor beneath him, he stopped flying and gently landed on the ground, looking up afterwards at Lightning who had, less than gracefully, flown into someone. This caused parts of Wild to smile, but his attention was mostly taken up by the two variations of Oathbound.

'Wow, he's got a bit of doppleganger trouble there.' 'Even though they look rather different in terms of colours and the added fact that one is a unicorn?' Wild thought to himself, before turning to the hooded figure and glaring at him. The dark blue pegasus decided to stay where he was for now, a few paces behind the group, and watch the events from around the group itself. He didn't get the best of views - mostly because of the odd unicorn's silly hat - but he heard Verde ask the figure who he was, along with seeing a flash of lightning heading towards the hooded figure. "Think we should tell them about where we were sent to?" "I think it would be best if we deal with this before getting up to speed with everyone here..." He growled, mainly to himself but audible for the group as well.

Oathbound frowned hard and stood silent for a long while before he nudged Oathbreaker on the shoulder. "This isn't over. Once this lunatic is dealt with, you're next." He said, making a throat-slicing motion before turning to face the hooded figure.

In his head he slowly started to realize something. "Wait a second... I've remained angry all this time and he hasn't leeched off any of it... He thrives on my negativity, yet hasn't taken advantage of it!
What the heck is going on here?" He thought, though he let none of this show on his features other than his frown deepening.

"Forgive me brother but you'll have to get in line." Oathbreaker snarled as he summoned his own axes. "This wretch has been sending me in circles within this castle for I don't know how long." The dark side of Oathbound snarled, spitting on the floor in the direction of the hooded figure.

The hooded figure simply stood there as Sugary's lightning attack hit and passed right through him, the image of him fluctuating and flickering before returning to normal. "My apologies Sugary but what you see before you is merely a projection; I apologise for the rudeness but I simply cannot afford to present myself so openly to a group of well armed individuals who seek my death. Not before I have achieved my goal."

The figure shifted his head slightly. Most likely he was looking at Verde but the hood was so wide that it was hard to be sure. "As to who I am Miss... that is precisely what I aim to find out." He said simply before waving a hand dismissively. "You all are irrelevant. You have no place in this castle nor in my affairs; be gone." He pointed a finger and a portal of swirling darkness, the same kind he used to teleport, opened behind the group. "I afford you this one chance to leave. I cannot allow you to take the Element Bearers, not until I have what I need from them."