19 Secrets and Lies
EpicSmiley12-Thanks for reading this! And yes, there will be more doom. But first, a short bit of history.
"You handled that very well, Sirmyurin." Mauraxus was coiled up next a huge glowing blue square on the wall. The square was currently showing the ponies standing enraptured by the vision that the memory droplet was giving them. Sirmyurin himself was sitting nearby, drinking daintily from a cup of tea, black mane writhing around his face.
"Why thank you, Mauraxus. I try. But we really should be focusing on the next room. What delightful things could we have them do? What delightful things could we do to them?"
"We should ask the superior before doing anything."
"True, true. But hasn't the superior allowed you to spearhead the first few phases?" Sirmyurin pointed out.
"Well, yes. To a certain degree." The dracolich rose off the floor and opened a yellow portal. "But Talonbite won't respond to us. The superior owns his soul, so we'll need to use other means, and hope that Talonbite is smart enough to pace himself."
"If I may, can I give a suggestion…" Sirmyurin whispered into Mauraxus's skull. The bone dragon nodded in agreement.
"An excellent idea. Let's do it." The pair sauntered into the portal. "How do you come up with these ideas?"
"Practice, Mauraxus. Practice and a whole lot of looking into the minds of others."
"Ah."
As the blinding white light of Veil's memory shard faded away, Veil sank to the floor. This was all too much to take in at once. She felt like she'd been punch in the gut. Had she really done, felt like that?
"I…I…don't…no…"
The rest of them had no idea how to respond. Obviously, Veil had been involved in some kind of shady business before coming to Equestria. They had known that already.
But this…this was unbelievable.
The question was, did Veil do that of her own free will, or had Sirmyurin done something to her? Or was it that creature in the darkness that had been training her?
Just who were the beings they were dealing with here? Sirmyurin had admitted to not being from Equestria, but if so…were there other worlds with ponies, or…no. Sirmyurin had told them that he only looked like that to prevent breaking their minds, which gave rise to an even more disturbing possibility.
Sirmyurin and his superior, whoever that might be, was just playing with them. Sirmyurin's attitude had been…flippant, but Twilight had just assumed it was trying to act confident, just like Nightmare Moon and Discord. But was it possible that the black maned alicorn was something…more? And what about Mauraxus? Dragons existed, that was easy, but she had never even heard of an undead dragon.
They needed answers from an honest source, both on Veil's past and on their current situation, before she could come to conclusions about the 'memory' they had seen.
"Please, you have to believe me," Veil was begging Rarity. "I don't know, I don't remember any of that! Please, please don't leave me!"
She pulled the lexicon off her back, glaring at it, rage flitting across her black-furred face.
"This is all your fault!" Veil shouted, hurling the lexicon away. It hit an invisible wall and fell back down, not two feet away.
The mood swings, it seemed, were back.
"Hush dear. We won't leave you." The white unicorn gave a nervous laugh. "For all we know, that could have just been some ghastly lie that Sirmyurin wanted us to believe. You're far too nice to just start hurting others."
"Yeah, we won't fall for that lying liar pants' lies!"
Veil sniffled. "Thanks Pinkie. Thanks Rarity. Ahh!"
They jumped at the sudden gasp of pain. Her leg was bleeding, barely visible in the gloom. Veil glumly held her other hoof over the wound, trying to staunch the bleeding.
"Don't you worry. I came prepared for this, Veil, and I don't believe you would do anything like what Sirmyurin showed us." Fluttershy said as she dressed and bound Veil's foreleg.
Twilight came over with Veil's lexicon on her mouth, being unable to levitate it. Veil blanched when she saw it.
"Veil, back in the white room, this book gave us a clue as to what to say. Maybe it has other useful information?"
"Like what?" Veil looked reluctantly at the book. She could swear it was emitting an evil aura, but there was no denying the fact that it had been helpful in solving the riddle.
"All right, Twilight. I'll give it a try. Not like we've got any other options."
Veil placed her armored foreleg on the cover. Nothing happened.
"Maybe we need to ask it a question." Rainbow suggested.
"I've got one," Twilight said. "Ask it what the next challenge is, so we can beat it easily."
"Okay." Veil cleared her throat. "What is the next challenge?"
The book exploded open, shedding sparks over the ponies and making their skin itch. Again, the pages whirled and flapped before settling down on a page near the front. There, printed neatly, were the words:
Proper Authorization Required to Access Future Events.
"What? Proper authorization?" Rainbow Dash picked up the book and shook it. "What's that supposed to mean? I want to find out about what we're dealing with, Celestia darn it!"
The book, as if in response, shuddered in the cyan pegasus's grip and turned two pages back. There, inked on the page on the right, was a masterfully drawn color picture of a dragon's skeleton and that menacing floating sword. The dragon's left paw held what looked like a glowing orb. It was being crushed in the bone dragon's grip.
The opposite page read:
Mauraxus
Race-Dracolich
Rank-Gigas, Outer Realms Operative
One of the only Dracoliches in the current employ of the Grand Master, Mauraxus was taken in after almost being destroyed by a warrior on the world ******, after a fierce and heated battle. The name of the world was blurred out. Fueled by rage, hatred, and an overwhelming desire for revenge, the black dragon did not stay dead, rather, converted his flesh and scales into magical force and was resurrected as a dracolich. After striking a deal with one of the Grand Master's senior operatives, Mauraxus traveled back in time and brutally annihilated not only the warrior, but the warrior's entire village, eventually convincing a Court member to burn the entire continent with augmented dragonfire and capturing all their souls.
The sword was looted off his adversary's corpse, and enhanced by many centuries of enchantments and souls, binding itself to Mauraxus. The weapon, now known to the general public as Soulshatter, holds the captured souls of over one hundred thousand beings, making it a very good source of energy. Soulshatter is also capable of fighting on its own, and will aid its owner through any means possible, whether by changing its appearance or by casting spells.
Mauraxus's role in the current time is to aid his superior on a retrieval mission. Due to the resistant and stubborn nature of the quarry, Mauraxus has lured the target to the superior's manor, where the target will face a series of challenges.
Mauraxus plans to use the target's-
The entry continued onto the next page, but the page refused to turn, no matter what they shouted at it.
"Fine. What is Sirmyurin?" huffed Rarity after ten minutes of trying to turn the page. The lexicon's pages turned three pages back, revealing a picture of the alicorn holding up a teacup. He was smiling that infuriating smile of his. The opposite page held a short message, scrawled in black ink.
Complete another challenge for more information.
Cheers, Sirmyurin.
Author's notes
Lexicon being a troll… :L
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