Sorry about the long wait, I went kinda into what I call a writing frenzy which is pretty much me forgetting anything else while writing. it wasn't MLP related though and I am not even sure if I ever will submit that Fullmetal Alchemist story I wrote.
anyway, enough rambling from me. this chapter happens right after the last one.
it the second part made from the episodes "Princess Twilight Sparkle" but changed for the lore I am currently building up.


Twilight blinks and is confused to why she is suddenly in the space realm Princess Celesia– no, it's not the same realm. This place is darker in colors, making the countless stars stand out a lot more. This place made her think about the night sky.
"Where am I?" She asks herself quietly.

"You are currently at the port, the door for the library of visions the potion you drank hold." A deep and calm male voice speaks.

Twilight spins around and gasps at what she sees. Standing in the middle of this realm is an alicorn, a male.
But it is clear this alicorn is not the one she met in the human world, Ignis has fire-colored hair and purple eyes. This one has a marine blue coat. His flowing mane and tail are brown with a large azure stripe going down both. Faint orange glows in both come and goes instead of the sparkling effect Celestia and Luna have. He wears a dark blue- almost black crown and a large collar with a crescent moon, revealing this alicorn is royalty.
His eyes are a striking red which makes them stand out from his dark coat, but unlike Celestia whose eyes show wisdom and a joy for life, this alicorn's gaze is melancholy and in-depth knowledge as if he has seen everything and finds life itself depressing.
Twilight is not sure what made him get such eyes; only she has a feeling this alicorn has seen more than most with that cutie mark of his. It is a crystal ball, inside the ball is something that looks like a green mass with what she thinks is a sun in the middle.
"W-Who are you?" Ahe asks this male alicorn.
"I am King Nebular of the Luna clan and the last remaining of the First." The alicorn— Nebular replies with that deep and calm voice of his, Twilight gets the feeling that nothing can surprise this alicorn anymore. Hearing that Nebular is a king, she decides to show some respect and bow but it did not look like he noticed: He's not even meeting her eyes. "Um… I am Twilight Sparkle." She introduces herself but does not get the response she expected.

"I am sorry but I do not have anything of what you seek. Try another question."

Twilight blinks, not sure why he said that. "What do you mean? What is this place?"

Nebular turns his gaze to the countless of stars as he explains. "The potion you drank is one of my proudest creations. By it, I can show you everything I have seen, both by either have seen it with my own eyes or the future my mark allows me to see."

Ohhh, so Nebular here isn't real, well he was but Twilight doubts he is still alive. Must admit that it does come as a surprise Nebular's special talent is being able to see into the future. Perhaps this giant library of knowledge can help her and her friends to figure out what is going on in the Everfree forest, who knows, maybe he saw it in his many visions. But first; her curiosity gets the better of her. This potion might hold the only clue to how the time of the alicorn mystical age was like. "Can you tell me about the alicorns?"
Nebular nods and his horn glows red. Several of the 'stars' fly over to them and in a flash, Twilight find herself in a harsh world.
The land almost void of any plants, volcanoes are spewing fire and ash into the air, covering the sun and making the rain dangerous. Twilight is horrified at the sight, more so when she realizes that the pony ancestors; small as cats, tails barely having any hair, their coats all in a plain brown. She notices that these early ponies do not have horns or wings, nor a cutie mark. Their lives were a daily struggle with everything trying to kill them.

"Back when the pony kind was young." Nebular's voice speaks. "The world had just suffered a huge blow and killed many species into oblivion. It threw the land into chaos and the Goddess saw that unless she interfered, the remaining of her creation would perish."

Twilight suddenly finds herself above the clouds, further up than any pegasi could ever fly, the realm this high up is dark, cold yet somewhat beautiful with the many stars and strange clouds.
Nine of those stars flicker and when they go out, nine alicorns, with only one she recognizes as Nebular. These alicorns looked up when a bright glowing alicorn with rainbow wings, hair, and tail appeared. At the base of the horn is a star in the same shape of the Element of Magic. Twilight's eyes wide in shock in the realization of who this bigger, glowing alicorn is: Harmony!

"After our creation, the Goddess gave us our life mission: bring order to the world." The nine alicorns fly down to the ground and by their powerful magic, they stop the vulcanos, clear the sky so the sun can reach the surface. They get water from the ocean and makes the clean water rain down onto the ground. The earth recovered and the ancient ponies gather around the ten alicorns, bowing for them. "We took our rightful place as rulers of order."
A lot of time passes, everything was peaceful and yet the ponies do not change to look closer to present ponies, much to Twilight's confusion. The nine alicorns have made home above the clouds, watching the earth below. Then suddenly, draconequus appeared and began to mess with the ancient ponies, some of it caused a lot of problems while other of their tricks could have seemed more like a big nuisance. The alicorns descended upon the draconequus and the leader of the alicorns step forward and so did one of the draconequus.
Twilight cannot understand what the two spoke about, the language they used is so ancient that no book remains about this time. Whatever the two spoke about making the leader alicorn so agitated that he attacks the draconequus but the group of chaos spirits all teleport off, showing up to causing trouble wherever they went.

"Peace did not stay for long, the Goddess nemesis, Disharmony came to destroy life as we knew and thus; the War of Order began."

At first, Twilight cheered for the alicorns to defeat the draconequus and whatever creation of chaos that came to harm the ancient ponies. That until she saw that the hardship a fire wolf actually taught the ponies how to wield fire and thus make tools out of metal, allowing them to tend the fields and protect themselves better. That the draconequus harassment forced the ponies to band together and that in turn made the ponies become more to their present forms. Unicorn and pegasi started to appear, using their horns to perform tasks the earth ponies couldn't do as fast and the pegasi made it so they weren't so dependable on the back then unpredictable weather.
A creation of Disharmony, a poisonous snake that would cause deadly sickness to anypony that touched it caused the ponies to search for an antidote, they found it plants and began to see this snake more as an inconvenient hazard than a threat.

"We First weren't enough, so we created a spell that allowed the common ponies to gain our magic. We called them Accensions, and with those, we created our army."

Her cheer for the alicorns turns to sheer horror as she watches the nine alicorns create more like them by accending ponies as Celestia did to her and Cadence, breeding a new kind of alicorns, and those were made into the alicorn army. Forcing their view on order down on everyone, the ponies didn't object as they didn't know a life without the alicorns, they didn't know they were slaves to their masters.
But other creatures, such as the griffins. Back then they were bigger and wore gold as ponies would wear clothing. This did intrigue Twilight, for present griffins did perhaps show this gold hoarding behavior, but didn't wear it as jewelry nor have this noble behavior. Several of the griffins confronted the alicorn army, by the looks of it, they refused to obey the alicorns view on order. To Twilight's horror, the alicorn army did not play that way, for the moment the griffins tried to live their own lives as they saw fit; which meant hoarding the gold, the alicorns went to war with them for the very gold that was the source of the ancient griffin society.
"Stop it!" She cries but the alicorn army did not stop, their constant war on the griffins slowly turned them into the greedy and self-centered species she knows about from the present.
They fought the dragons, forced them away from their lands and chased them into the mountains so the ponies could expand and any dragon daring to fight back; would be utterly torn to shreds by the army. Minotaurs or other quadrupedal species would be straight out killed or imprisoned, simply because they weren't ponies. The only species the alicorns tolerated were other equines such as zebras and changelings, but only barely.
And whenever they found a draconequus, they utterly destroyed them.

"We ensured Order to pony kind; their land was safe." Nebular voice speaks and the scenes of the alicorns fighting everything none pony fades away, taking the horrified Twilight back to the starry realm.

…Is this how the age of alicorn was? A peaceful yet very controlled life for the ponies while all other species got reduced to something so inferior to their past selves? Twilight Sparkle cannot believe it, that the alicorns are the fault of why only ponies prosper while other races struggle as they have lost the sense of who they were. Now she knows why, it's because the alicorn army kept harassing them and there was no way for the other species to fight back, they stood no chance against the alicorn army.
Still quite shaken up, Twilight eyes the magical figure of King Nebular. "Even with all of this senseless war, you didn't bring peace to ponies. The winter of the Windigoes—" and just as she said it; two orbs fly over and she finds herself in a marvelous throne room, built out of a material she cannot name. She notices that those sitting on the thrones all are of the first nine alicorns. However, only four remained, Nebular is one of them.
A bright yellow alicorn stood before the First, his flowing mane and tail are the same bright yellow color as his pelt but the further away from his body, the darker it got. This made it look like the colors got sucked out from him. This male alicorn wears a beautiful silver armor with several sapphire gems embedded around the neck and shoulders. He bows to the two kings and queens. "I have reports from the ground."

"Speak." A golden with glittering sun-colored hair speaks with a voice he demands respect. This alicorn is the bulkiest of the remaining First.

"The battle against the draconequus is finally over, their leader has been imprisoned." The soldier speaks and suggests. "We should put her as a display for—"

"No one was asking for your opinion." Nebular speaks in his calm but stern voice. The soldier alicorn did not like that. "I wear a mark of Harmony's realm. I am of your rank, meaning I am an equal: not a mere soldier!" Nebular ignores him like a tired parent ignores a foal throwing a temper tantrum.

A pale blue, with mane and tail that looks like the night sky turned into clouds alicorn mare turns her cold gaze down to the soldier. "You are one born of two accended ponies, one granted the magic of the Goddess. You do not hold our immortality or the powers we wield. You are nothing compared to the First."

That was pretty harsh, Twilight thinks to herself and glad she does not stand before these alicorns.

"You should consider yourself lucky you were born as an alicorn." The pink with flaming blue hair and tail mare speaks in a hard tone. This alicorn boasts her chest, which has a white spot around the chest. "You may have been granted a mark similar to the First but know: only if either of us chooses you as life-partner, you have no rights for a crown."

The soldier alicorn frowns deeply, clearly frustrated by his situation but bites it in him as he bows and leave the thrones room. With the soldier gone, the pale blue alicorn mare glances to the other mare and asks. "Do you think Nova would be worth the title as prince?" The pink alicorn laughs. "Of course not, but he is strong and could grand us worthy heirs to fill the empty thrones."

For Twilight, she lost a lot of respect to these rulers of the alicorns. They are so infuriating arrogant and the huge problem is: they have the power to back it up. The alicorn soldier going by the name of Nova would never be considered an equal among these leaders like Celestia did with her.

"Nova would only be worth producing an heir." Nebula speaks to the two mare alicorns.
The golden stallion turns his cyan colored eyes to the darker stallion. "I do not like his insubordinate behavior, but…" He turns his eyes to the five empty thrones. "We are running short of leaders." And he turns back to the two mares. "What are your thoughts about this possible prince?"

"You can forget about me giving him any ceremony bounds." The pink alicorn snorts as if Nova himself was a big joke. "He won't survive a night in my champers and besides:" Her sky blue eyes lands on the pale blue with the night cloud hair. "We need more protectors of the dreamscape, especially with the Tantabis running amok. Don't you agree, Astral?"
The alicorn going by the name of Astal hums, before voicing her thoughts to the other mare. "You may have a point."

"Your Majesties."

Twilight jumps at a familiar voice, she, along with the four rulers turn around and a tawny with dark brown socks stallion trots into the room. Twilight recognizes who this is by the flaming dragon head cutie mark, and the golden armor around the neck and front legs. His flaming hair obscures his eyes for a moment but when he stops, it reveals his dark purple eyes. "Reports from the North, the platoon up there have suffered great loses against an enemy we have never seen before." Ignis reports to the rulers.

"What kind of enemy soldier?" The golden alicorn stallion demands and Ignis, unlike Nova reports without the stuffy attitude. "Horses of ice, my king. They freeze everything they touch and leaves the lands into a frozen wasteland. Not even the alicorns of the day stand a chance against them."
The four rulers eye one another worried, more so when Nebular's eyes begin to glow white and he tells everyone. "The enemy is the Windigoes and unless strife is gone, pony kind will be nothing but statues of ice."

The scene changes and Twilight now find herself inside a dark and depressing room, she yelps, when she notices some kind of creature chained to the wall beside her. Only the three glowing eyes, filled with rage is spotted in this darkness.
Right there, red magic surrounds the metal door and Nebular walks inside, he has large bags under his eyes, as if he hasn't slept for weeks. Twilight notices he too has several wounds, one of them being his left-wing bandaged. The ancient alicorn steps over to the trapped creature and demands in a voice that he is not in the mood for games. "Tell me what your creator is planning, what is the reason behind this cursed winter."

The creature chuckles, moves and reveals a face much like Discord except this one's muzzle is horizontal compared to Discords vertical. It's clear what this creature is with all the mish-mash body parts it is made out of. This is a draconequus. And very different compared to the one Twilight is dealing with in the present. Compared to Discord, this other of his kind is stocky in built, head, lower body and most of the tail is a dark purple. Around the neck is a necklace of teeth, this one has a third eye in the middle of the bushy-like forehead, having the same red colors as the two other eyes. This bushy spike that held the third eyes is light purple that goes down the muzzle and the middle is magenta, the same color is the sideburns. The left ear is long while the right looks to be chewed over, Twilight has no idea if it has been. The draconequus left arm and right leg both have the same grayish-brown color and being hoofed. The right arm and left leg is the same way, having the same thing in common of being yellow and are from predators; a lizard and a lion. The back has green dragon scales and the two large wings are both in a mix of dragon and bird. By the right having the limb dragon with bird feathers and the left having the limb as a bird and the wing itself having the membrane as a dragon. At the end of the tail are large magenta feathers, pulling up dust as the draconequus moves to a better position in the magical chains holding it.
"And for what reason should I tell you, oh mighty Bringer of Order?" The draconequus asks mockingly and much to Twilight Sparkle's surprise, that voice might be husky but is distinctively female. Now that she takes a better look, she can see this draconequus do have a few signs of being a female but quite easy to overlook.
"Are you going to kill me like the rest of my kind?" She asks and does not sound afraid in the slightest, in fact, she sounds angrier.

Nebular does not answer her question, instead, he demands again, harder this time. "What is the reason behind this winter?!"

The draconequus burst out laughing, never a good sign when a spirit of chaos does that. Still laughing she speaks. "You really have no idea. And you stuck up alicorns keep claiming 'you can see the future~!'" The last she sings songs as if it's a big joke before she starts laughing hysterical again. Twilight has the feeling that if this draconequus wasn't in chains, she would've been rolling on the floor in her laugher.

"ENOUGH!" Nebular shouts loudly and stomps his hooves hard down onto the floor, cracking it a bit. "I do not have time for your games draconequus. Our subjects are dying and it's all your master's fault!"

This time the draconequus laugher completely stops and she glares daggers at him with her three red eyes. "You alicorns are so stupid in your arrogant. Do you really think this winter is made by the draconequus— which let me remind you: are all destroyed thanks to you!" She straightens up but can't get her full height thanks to the chains. "If you are so great at seeing the future, then tell me: what do you see?!"

Nebular is a bit taken aback by her shouting, but after a moment of errie silence between them both, he closes his eyes and Twilight watches in awe but also the horror of what he saw by his own magic.

'I see a cold wind blowing through
I see days neither fun nor free'

As the old history books said, the three pony races are fighting among one another, starving and freezing to death.

'I see a future caused by you'
I see a path not meant to be

Nebular opens his eyes and stares at the draconequus, she ignores him and does a bit of her magic .

'The future should be filled with magic
Dreams and wishes brought to life'

The magic forms into many different creatures running happily around the shocked Nebular.

'But the days ahead are dark and tragic
No time for hope when all is strife'

She waves her hoofed hand and the happy creatures turn into the Windigoes. She watches the ice spirits fly around the cell.
'Whatever might have been
All the dreams that creatures share'

She turns her glaring eyes to the alicorn.
'Because of you, mighty alicorn
Now the future is a cold nightmare

"NO, we are the Bringer of Order!" Nebular retorts but Twilight can see fear in his ruby-red eyes. "We brought harmony to the world, you are the cause of this!"

The draconequus laughs. "No wonder why Harmony's trinkets do not work on you anymore, why Hope, Courage, Guidance, and Love now is lost in another realm. You cannot see the truth even when it's staring right at your face. Accept it alicorn, your need for order has brought nothing but misery in our world. You have forgotten what Harmony is truly on about. And for that: you all will perish."

Nebula fearful gaze is swiftly replaced with anger, one that screamed that he is going to do a big mistake. "Perhaps you are right, but we have faced your master many times before and we will defeat the Windigoes." He turns around and leaves with: "After we have dealt with them, I will take care of you."

"What more can you do than take my freedom and make me the last of my own kind?" The draconequus retorts back as the darkness of the cell reclaim her once more.
Twilight can't help but feel sorry for that draconequus and feel bad how Nebula's treatment of her was much how she had treated Discord.

The scene fades and Twilight is back in the starry realm again. She really would like to know more about the past of the alicorns but she thinks it's best to focus on why she drank this potion in the first place. But how to ask this question?... well, she might start with asking if Nebular even knows about them. "Do you know princess Celestia and Princess Luna?" Both to her surprise and relief, several of the memory stars come over to her.
After the light has faded, Twilight finds herself on a beautiful field, that for some reason looks familiar.
It takes her a moment, and when she does realize why she knows this place, she gasps. "This looks exactly like the outskirts of Canterlot." Except there are no buildings or a castle for that matter. All there is on this grassy field is a Drake sleeping with her babies that look very much Spike.
A white with pink hair filly runs past her and over to the dragon family. Before she can reach them, she is caught by magic and Queen Astral lectures the filly hard. "Celestia, don't approach the dragons. They are not pets."
Twilight's eyes wide in shock that this filly is her teacher! Celestia looks so… different. Her hair is not rainbow colored nor flowly, it's a simple pink with a purple stripe down hair and tail. She looks very much a normal filly… if it wasn't for the horn and wings.
Filly Celestia is not happy from have been stopped. "Mom~! I wanna play with them!" She whines but Astral: her mother does not budge on this decision and takes the filly back to the fields where a baby Luna is napping in a bed of flowers.
Watching over her is Ignis.
Astral puts Celestia down beside her sister and tells the young filly matter of factly. "A queen does not go out and 'play' with foreign species. One day these lands will be yours and Luna's kingdom and it will be your duty: as the eldest to protect your— Celestia!" Astral interrupts herself when she realizes her oldest daughter is not listening and instead busier having fun goofing around Ignis calm flaming tail.
Twilight can't help but smile at this scene, more so when Ignis did engarge a bit in her playing by toppling her over by one of his wings.
Astral is not amused though. "Don't encourage her, Ignis."

"Come now, love." Ignis softly argues, glancing down to the madly giggling Celestia. "Foals do not think about such things as duty." And turns back to her, asking with a faint smile. "Don't you remember your own childhood?" Which fades rather quickly from Astral's reply. "I have never been a child. Have and always will be like what you see now."
Ignis shifts on his hooves, clearly embarrassed about this blunder, did not change when Astral remarks still in that simple tone of hers. "Maybe it would be best you did the foal caring."

"Eh, sure but wouldn't it be strange that a simple soldier takes care of the future heirs of these lands?" Ignis asks, gently brushing Celestia and the now awaken Luna off to play, allowing the two adults to speak in private. "I mean, Nova does not fancy me, to begin with."

Astral smirks walk up beside him and stroke his head in a seducing manner. "He may have the title prince but my words will always overrule his. Besides, from what I can see:" Both eyes the two playing fillies, Astral's smile has faded. "Our daughters need their father to keep them safe."
Ignis blinks a bit confused. "You sounds like you wouldn't be there for them." He folds his wings over her flowy mane. "We will defeat the Windigoes and together raise our girls to worthy rulers."

"Of course." Astral replies, Ignis did not see it but Twilight has a clear view to the hopeless gaze in her orange eyes and Twilight can see that this ancient alicorn already knew she will not survive to see these lands a second time. Putting on a mask, Astral meets her lover's gaze. "We should head back to our lands, I have put my duties on hold for too long." Ignis nods and after have gathered Celestia and Luna, Ignis uses his fire magic and they teleport away.

The scene changes and Twilight find herself in a scenario that is quite familiar, the grass has become square pattern, patches of the ground are levitating up in the sky and fish flying. Twilight takes notice that the houses in this chaotic place are not modern and she realizes this is not her time, but back when the princesses and that other alicorn faced Discord. Did Nebular see that too?!
Right as it crossed her mind. Celestia and Luna, clearly older and closer to their adult sizes, yet not fully there.
Twilight notices that Luna looks exactly how she looked like back when she and her friends used the Elements of Harmony on her as Nightmare Moon. Celestia looks a bit different too, her hair is still pink with that single purple streak in both hair and tail. It's a bit weird for Twilight as she is so used to a princess Celestia with that rainbow-colored and flowy hair.
There is another alicorn, a male. He is aegean colored with a flowing transparent green tail, his mane and cutie mark are hidden by a black cloak. This male has the same gleam that he has lived for a very, very long time as Nebula but unlike that alicorn, this one looks physical old.
Twilight blinks when she realizes this alicorn is limping and first there she takes notice of the large wound on his left hind leg, it looks like something tried to bite his leg off! Celestia and Luna also look quite beaten up, but none have a wound as severe as this male alicorn.

The three walk determent over to a pink square pattern hill where a throne stands, it turns and reveals none other but Discord and he is very amused of the battered looks the princesses and male alicorn have. He laughs loudly and speaks still chuckling down to the three past alicorns. "Oh, this is so much fun. How about a game of 'Pin the Tail on the Pony'?" He asks and lifts a tail that looks awfully like past Celestia's.
Turns out it is her tail, younger Celestia jerks in shock seeing her tail in Discord's lion paw and gasp when she realizes her tail is gone and demands him angrily. "Return my tail this instant Discord!" The draconequus simply laughs and tells her still laughing. "Oh you look so cute when angry little filly!" He summons a canvas and paints a drawing of an angry Celestia, underneath it he writes the words 'obey' underneath it. "You should keep this around for your subjects." Discord remarks and points at the painting.

"ENOUGH!" The male alicorn shouts in a booming voice, spreading out his wings. "No more we will play your games Spirit of Chaos, we have come to end your reign of chaos and return peace to Equestria!"

Hold up, that voice. "No way." Twilight gasps in shock of who this male alicorn is. "Merasmus?!" and here she thought he would become a powerful unicorn, boy was she wrong! Who should have thought that there existed alicorns in the human world as well?
Discord, on the other hand, is far from intimidated by Merasmus words, in fact, he seems almost bored. "Oh it's almost sad, I mean the two fillies have way more talent than you Merasmus." A cannon appears beside the turned wizard, and the three alicorns stare at it. "I doubt you even know how to cast a spell without it blowing back in your face." and a pie shoots right into Merasmus's face, knocking the male alicorn to the ground. Luna is kind enough to help him remove the crumbs and fill from his face.
Discord then summons a bag of black seeds, munching on them and asks the glaring three. "Hungry?" They do not reply, so he shrugs. "Suit yourself." and continues on munching on them.

Celestia and Luna turn to Merasmus, he nods to them and all three levitates the— back then six Elements. Celestia has Generosity, Laugher and Kindness. Luna has Honesty and Loyalty and Merasmus levitates the Element of Magic.

"Oh! What have you got there?" Discord asks, which means this must be the first time he sees them.
"The powers to defeat you!" The turned wizard declares.
Discord burst out laughing, even though it is clear the three are charging the Elements. "You should see yourselves right now. The expressions on your faces. So intense. So sure of yourselves." They indeed are, and even when they fly up to the air with Merasmus pointing the conduit Elements at Discord with the five others powering it up, Discord does not move as he is too busy laughing. A rainbow-colored beam shoots out from the Element of Magic, right at Discord who is still rolling in laugher, only stops when he is turned into stone.
But unlike when she and her friends used the Elements, the world did not return back into normal. So for the three heroes, the victory is bittersweet.

"Do you think thy land ever recover?" Luna asks somberly after the Elements have powered down once again. Celestia eyes Merasmus and he replies them both: "Some things are too great for anyone to recover from."
Luna and Celestia drop their heads, but Celestia raises it with determent eyes. "Come, we have a lot of work that still needs to be done." and they all leave to possible clean up the mess Discord left behind.

Twilight watches them head out. Startled that this is the reason why Equastira's is so dependent on pony influence.

The scene changes and Twilight find herself outside Canterlot in middle of the night, looking up she realizes this is the time when Luna was banished to the moon. She turns around and sees Celestia, older and looking exactly as she does in the present, but… there is a certain sadness over the princess Twilight only has seen a glint of, back when Celestia told about her true feelings about the Summer Sun Celebration.

"Fate has been cruel and order unkind
How can I have sent you away?

Celestia starts singing somberly as she heads out to the castle's grounds.

"The blame was my own; the punishment, yours
The harmony's silent today

Celestia activates her magic onto the moon

"But into the stillness I'll bring you a song
And I will your company keep
Till your tired eyes and my lullabies
Have carried you softly to sleep

A sharp light and Twilight finds herself in the same realm that holds the alicorn's magic.
Celestia flies past up, up to screens showing her own past. The princess moves over to one showing her younger self sits on the throne before the three pony races. Celestia puts her hoof onto this image of her past memory.

"Once did a pony who shone like the sun
Look out on her kingdom and sigh
She smiled and said, "Surely, there is no pony
So lovely and so well beloved as I""

Indeed the memory showed that all three pony races basked in Celestia's warm sun and personality.

"So great was her reign and so brilliant her glory
That long was the shadow she cast"

Behind the smiling Celestia's shadow lies Luna and the young filly looks miserable

"Which fell dark upon the young sister she loved
And grew only darker as days and nights passed "

Luna grows up and still is completely ignored as everypony has only their eyes on Celestia. Her older sister only began to notice when Luna started to snap at her in anger.

"Soon did that pony take notice that others
Did not give her sister her due

But instead of being understanding, the young pink-haired Celestia instead got huffy and verbal fights among the sisters broke out.

"And neither had she loved her as she deserved
She watched as her sister's unhappiness grew"

And to Twilight's shock and horror, young Celestia turns her back on her own sister, returning back to the common ponies cheering her name.

"But such is the way of the limelight, it sweetly
Takes hold of the mind of its host"

While the only company young Luna got was the Ponies of Shadow.

"And that foolish pony did nothing to stop
The destruction of one who had needed her most"

Luna turns to the watching Shadow Ponies and takes their power in her anger, in her craving to leave Celestia's shadow. And she turns into Nightmare Moon.
The mistress of darkness covers the sun with the moon, causing an eclipse and Celestia is way too fast to fight her own sister for Twilight's liking.

"Lullay moon princess, goodnight sister mine
And rest now in moonlight's embrace"

The two alicorn sisters fly around in the dark lit sky, trying to hit one another with magic.

"Bear up my lullaby, winds of the earth
Through cloud, and through sky, and through space"

Nightmare Moon kicks Celestia down onto the city and fires a beam of magic after her, it destroys buildings and terrified the past ponies.

"Carry the peace and the coolness of night
And carry my sorrow in kind"

Celestia takes to the sky again and tries to overpower Nightmare Moon with her own magic, but is unable.

"Luna, you're loved so much more than you know
May troubles be far from your mind"

Celestia crashes back into the castle, she struggles onto her hooves, eyes on the Elements being held by the stature Twilight recognizes from when she fought Nightmare Moon. Celestia takes the Elements and uses them against Nightmare Moon

"And forgive me for being so blind"

Nightmare Moon gets blasted onto the moon, the shape of the unicorn head appears. When the battle has ended, it's only there young Celestia realizes what she has done and after a moment of frozen horror, she breaks out in a wail of tears.
Still with tears in her eyes, she turned to the cheers of the common ponies. Slowly Celesia leaves the ruined castle and smiles down to her subject.

"The years now before us
Fearful and unknown"

She keeps up this smile as years pass by and she grows up to the one Twilight knows from her time.

"I never imagined
I'd face them on my own"

Only when Celestia is alone, she lets the façade drop, showing how she truly feels: sorrow and regret.

May these thousand winters
Swiftly pass, I pray"

Once again on Canterlot's courtyard, adult Celestia slowly lowers the moon down the horizon

"I love you; I miss you
All these miles away"

Twilight feels tears falling from her eyes, feeling so horrible that her mentor had to suffer alone for such a long time. No wonder why Celestia was so happy when she said that the Summer Sun Celebration now would be a celebration for her.

"May all your dreams be sweet tonight
Safe upon your bed of moonlight
And know not of sadness, pain, or care
And when I dream, I'll fly away and meet you there

Twilight feels the magic of the potion fades.
She caresses her bit hurting head from the many visions and somehow having a conversation with an alicorn from a very, very distant past.
Getting her sight straight, Twilight Sparkle notices that everyone is staring weirdly at her. "Why are you all looking at me like that?" She asks them.
"It's just... you were mumbling' to yourself..." Applejack replies slowly and Pinkie Pie adds. "Ooh! And don't forget the uncontrollable sobbing!" Oh, well that last part: the one where she saw Celestia truly for the first time, that one really got her.

"We were really worried about you." Fluttershy muses.

Discord on the other hand. "I for one found it delightful. Sort of a one-pony theater piece, if you will." He teleports up beside the confused and uncertain Twilight, showing her a picture of her crying like a baby. "You should really consider taking it on the road." A bit to his annoyance, she didn't fully respond to his taunting.

"Did you find out whose rump we need to kick and where we can find them?" Rainbow Dash asks, kicking the air for a pretend enemy.

She saw a lot, a lot of horrible and eye-opening things, but nothing revealed what is going on in the present. "I saw something from a long time ago. The time before the founding of Equestria… the era of the alicorns." Her friends gasp in shock, most of the mercs look confused or really didn't care. Twilight did take notice that Discord for once did not have that trickster attitude going, he looks angry as that female draconequus did. "I saw Princess Celestia, Princess Luna and Merasmus use the elements, but it didn't explain what's happening now."

"Hm, it seems he wasn't lying when he said he was six thousand years old." Spy muses under his breath, he must admit that he had his skeptics back when he first heard the wizard spew out that fact.

Zecora steps over to Twilight, suggesting. "Perhaps for the answer you seek, another sip of the potion will give you a peek."

Twilight thinks that the creator of this potion might be the only one able to help her out. Who knows, perhaps he saw a vision about this. He did also show her something she didn't ask for but Twilight kinda asked for those visions, she realizes she made the request too broad for the potion's magic to know what she was after.
She drinks the potion and frowns annoyed when Discord appears before her with a film camera, remarking. "oh, I do hope she breaks into a song this time." Before she can yell at him, Twilight is once again taken by Nebula's powerful potion.

Once again, Twilight finds herself in the realm holding the countless of vision and memories. Seconds later, the mirage of Nebular appears, she walks over to him and after some thinking on how to make the question very specific so she won't get another punch to the face of memories.
"What is causing chaos in my time?" She asks and Nebular casts a spell up to the heavens, the whole place turns white and in this void, black gems appear where a Shadow Pony emerges.

"The source of all evil, all chaos is made by these shadow creatures. In their infant form:" The shadow pony turns into a strange ball of blue smoke. "They are mostly harmless for an alicorn. They reside in the dream realm and can be fought, yet never killed. If they gain strength by nightmares of ponies." The blue smoke turns back into a shadow pony "They will leave the realm and cause havoc upon everypony, by touch they will turn a pony into their slave. Nothing can harm them other than Chaos's arch-enemy: Harmony."
The shadow Pony screeches and disappears from the rainbow light of the Elements.

Twilight feels like this is a good point to ask. "What are the Elements of Harmony?"

"I am sorry but I have nothing of what you seek."

Oh right, the alicorns knew them under a different name. "The Pillars of Virtue, tell me about them." She jumps when a crystal tree burst up from the void, in its branches are the Elements.

"The Pillars of Virtues are the very essence of the Goddess, only alicorns are meant to wield them."

Yeah, that is definitely a lie.
The void disappears and Twilight finds herself on some sort of field, right before her stand a huge crystal tree, in each of its branches are the ten Elements with hers being in the middle.

"These artifacts are the only weapon against the Dark Forces along with the tree itself. We can remove the Pillars from the tree and use them as a weapon."

The nine First alicorns remove the Elements, all except the Element of Magic, much to her confusion. Twilight notices that Nebular has Guidance and the princesses mother has Kindness. She frowns a bit at this, Astral didn't really come off as a kind pony and Nebular might guide her now but something tells her that he wouldn't have done it if she had asked the real him.

"The tree can survive for a time without them, but in time we have to return the Pillars. If not:"

Darkness surrounds the tree that keeps losing its bright crystal shine, then right when it lost all its shine, the shadows destroyed the tree and all hell broke loose.

"The era of Chaos will reign supreme until a new tree will grow from the seeds in the form of the Pillars magic."

Is that what is happening now? A tree of Harmony is growing weak and thus unable to keep the Shadow Ponies at bay? "Where is the tree of Harmony?" She calls out to the void.
The scene changes and Twilight finds herself inside Everfree Forest.
At first, she is confused, then she spots young Celestia, Luna and Merasmus. She follows them, all the way through until they reach the not destroyed castle of the princesses.
"This way." Celestia tells the turned wizard, she and Luna take flight down to the grotto that separates the forest with the castle's ground. Merasmus follows and so does Twilight. Down here, much to Twilight Sparkle's shock, stand a tree of Harmony. It is smaller than the one from before and only has the five Elements.
To her confusion though, this crystal tree has Luna's and Celestia's cutie marks. She does at first mistakes the star in the middle as her mark but then remembers that Harmony had a star mark on the forehead plus the Element of Magic is a star as well. Merasmus walks past her and to her great shock, he removes enough of that black cloak of his to reveal his own cutie mark. Which has a star shape and although it does not look fully like her star mark, it's still enough for him to think his black star with green flames cutie mark is the one upon the tree.
Celestia takes flight and flies over to the tree, she shoots a beam of magic at the tree that reacts on her.

"Are you sure?" Luna asks her sister in a worried tone of what they are doing is the right thing. And Celestia replies. "I remember mother tell stories about this tree. These are the only means by which we can defeat Discord and free the citizens of Equestria."
By her magic, Celestia removes each of the Elements, the last being the Element of Magic which resided inside the part of the tree that has the star shape. Celestia eyes Merasmus who still stand on the ground, she cast one look at the star-shaped element, then speaks as she levitates it down to him. "As your cutie mark bear the very same mark and you have more magic than me and my sister combined, I think you should be the one wielding the conduit of the Elements."

Merasmus takes the element with his magic, he blinks in what he probably feels is the power of the elements. "This is very powerful magic." He mused and asks with his gaze to the tree. "Will the tree be able to survive without the Elements?"

"The Tree of Harmony possess powerful magic on its own." Celestia replies, she and her sister fly back down to him. "The magic will fade but as that magic remains strong, it will continue to protect our land from harm."

The scene fades and Twilight is again back in the memory realm, she got what she needed, now Twilight only has to wait for the potion to leave her system and allow her mind to return back to the present.
Sanding around and doing nothing is not something Twilight would prefer, so she thinks that solving a mystery that has been bothering her for a bit: the alicorn amulet. It is one of the most powerful artifacts she knows about and no books ever tell who created it. Many do however believe it was Star Swirl the Bearded.
Maybe Nebular knows. "Who created the Alicorn amulet?" Nebular did not react on her which is a bit odd, maybe the potion does not know what she is talking about? "It's a immensely powerful artifact, anypony that wears it is said to get the power of—" Suddenly the whole place shatter and Twilight falls into the darkness, she flaps desperately her wings, scared and confused about what is going on.
A memory passes by her, showing Nebular walking past crystal ponies. To her utter shock, the alicorn stops before two ponies, one a pegasus mare with a golden goat and sky blue braided hair.
She realizes she knows both of those, the pegasus looks very much like the description to Star-Swirls biggest rival. Legends say she was an evil sorceress going by the name of Sea-Circle.
The crystal pony is one she and her friends have faced back during the battle for the Crystal Empire, he looks way different with the crystal coat, his horn looking normal and no evil magic is coming out from his red eyes.

Sombra is the first to notice the approaching Nebula and Twilight is quite caught off guard by how tense the evil king becomes, more so when the crystal pony does a rather good job in hiding it behind a friendly smile. "Ah, and what do we owe you this… surprisingly visit?" Sombra asks in old ponish, here Twilight is happy she has studied it, otherwise she would have no idea what they have been saying.
The pegasus mare on the other hoof does not even try to hide her distrust of having the alicorn around. She spread out her wings and pegasi magic sparks from her entire body.
Nebula either did not notice or he simply did not find her as any threat as he speaks to her in a simple matter of fact. "You have something that belongs to us."

"And what might that be?" Sea-Circle asks disdainful, yup she definitely does not like the alicorns. And after having seen their true colors, Twilight does not blame her. "Maybe our very lives? You want us back to Homeland and do what you want." The last she says in a condescending way and both Twilight and Sombra stares at her in shock that she dared to say that towards a milliner old alicorn.
Nebula frowns deeply at her tone. "I am willing to look past your… desertion; if you return Harmony's star."

"What?" Twilight blinks and turns to the pegasus, Sea-Circle looks as confused as well and the pegasus sorceress tells him, for the first time not in an insulting tone. "I have no idea what you are talking about." and she asks Sombra. "Obsidian, does anything that he says makes sense to you?" and Som—Obsidian shakes his head. "Sorry, not a clue."

That did enrage Nebula and he snaps at them both. "Don't lie to me, citizens! I can feel the Pillars shards you stole!" and Sea-Circle retorts back, not flinching as Obsidian did. "I don't have anything from your kingdom, I want nothing to do with the alicorns!" She stomps her hoof hard onto the crystal tiles. "Whatever you think I have, I don't, so either you leave or you have to kill me: for I will never return to Homeland!"
Nebula stares at her in shock, Twilight can only guess that this is the first time anypony has confronted him about the giant flaws when it comes to the alicorn reign. Before Nebula can speak whatever he realizes the alicorns mistake or keep refusing that they have done any wrong.
Several armored alicorns appear, one of them is Nova.
Twilight Sparkle stares in horror at that alicorn, compared to the last vision she saw him, this Nova's body is filled with scars, half of his ear is missing and he has lost sight on the left eye.
Nebula turns away from the now very nervous Sea-circle and Obsidian, his ruby eyes land on the battle-scarred Nova. "What are you doing here Nova? I gave you the command to assure order among our subjects."

"And I will." Nova replies, his face hardens. "But in order to do that. I need the power of the Goddess." and without hesitating or warning, he shoots a powerful magical beam at Obsidian, severing his head with his body, the surprise on his face forever frozen as the head rolled over the crystal floor.
Sea-Circle stares in shock at her fallen comrade, then in rage she takes flight, screaming. "You pay for that!" Her body glowing in magic and with a strong stroke with her wings, she sends tornado at Nova, but he simply blocks it with his magic and retaliates.
Twilight closes her eyes but the bright light coming from Nova's magic makes her still able to see him incinerate Sea-Circle through her eyelids.
Slowly she opens her eyes, watching Nova do something to the two corpses that form two orbs of what looks to be their magic.

Scanning the two orbs with that cold demeanor, Nova commands the three surrounding alicorn soldiers. "Restrain him."
Much to Nebula's shock. The armored alicorns attack him, he does put up a good fight but really does not stand a chance against three battle harden alicorns and soon they have him trapped him with their magic.
"What is the meaning of this?!" Nebula demands. "I am your king!"
Nova walks over to the imprisoned alicorn. "Yes, but desperate times calls for desperate measure and you are not fit for the times ahead of us." He levitates out a gem. He eyes the last of the First. "Do not worry, I will lead our people in your place and restore our kingdom back to its former glory." He uses his magic through the gem and in horror Twilight Sparkle watches Nebular not only lost his mark but most of his entire life-force into the gem which turns red as his eyes and he collapses onto the floor.
Nova eyes the barely moving alicorn. "With your powers and the Pillars, I will be able to defeat everything that Choas will throw at us." He puts this now red gem into an alicorn shaped necklace, forming the Alicorn Amulet. He then leaves. One of the guards hesitates and asks. "What about him?" nodding to Nebula and Nova replies in a cold matter of fact. "He won't last long."

Horrified of the truth of what she has just seen, Twilight walks slowly over to Nebula, even though she knows she cannot help the dying alicorn, she still feels like trying.
She thought this would be the end of the vision, but oh how wrong she was.

Shadows begin to appear, mostly around the two fallen ponies. Engulfing them, Twilight let's out a terrified scream when Obsidian suddenly gets on his hooves, the shadows put his head back on the severed neck. His eyes close and when they open, the dark magic glow appears from them. his teeth turn predator and horn curves into a blood-red shape. "ENOUGH!" He roars and charges at the alicorns that turn around in surprise. The shadows swallow them and the horrified Twilight.


whew, this was a long one! okay, a few notes from me before leaving you guys. I have long wanted the alicorns to be the past enemy of this story. I think I got the idea from the many times' reviewers of mlp episodes commented on how ponies tried to have control over everything and how the other species in that world are pretty much trapped in dark ages.
so I decided to turn the alicorns into those who caused everything to go down to hell instead of being the draconequus.

like the potion of visions (what I decided to call it) there never came a proper explanation about the Alicorn amulet, I decided to build a bit more on it.

and lastly, this chapter makes a very good view on what the Shadow Ponies truly are. see if you can figure it out to their true purpose.

I think that's it for now. see you next chapter.