Chapter 9: Ubiquitous Knowledge

"Lies and secrets… they are like a cancer in the soul. They eat away what is good and leave only destruction behind." ~Cassandra Clare

Sweeitie Belle slowly put a hoof on the doorknob of the door that supposedly led to the land of knowledge. Carefully she turned the handle and pushed the door open. It led to blackness. Sweetie Belle blanched. She hated blackness. She turned to protest weakly to Madness, but that pony was gone. All that was left was the door, the forest of Weeping Willows, and an ocean of Grief that was slowly drowning the forest. Sweetie Belle sighed in resignation. She had no choice but press forward. She suddenly dropped forward, as she abruptly found the ground was of nonexistence. However, Sweetie Belle did not even bother screaming. This was either the end or not. She didn't care. If she did suddenly find her death at the hands of cold hard earth, then that was it. If the cursed land saved her once again in the oddest manner, then that was that, she would press forward. And as always, the land of the MIND denied her a sweet release from misery, for suddenly Sweetie Belle noticed she was no longer falling at terminal velocity. In fact, she was now floating earthward at a somewhat easy pace. However, Sweetie Belle nearly jumped out of her skin when she suddenly came to earth, for the ground was as black as her surroundings, and so she was in no way ready for the abrupt ceasing of her descent.

Sweetie Belle shakily straightened up and looked about… if one could even call it that, for everything was absorbed in utter darkness. Then, suddenly… Fire erupted all around Sweetie Belle, causing her to cry out in fear. She wanted to die, but death by fire was in no way favorable when compared to the swift death she craved. However, the fire refused to consume her. Instead, the flames began to coalesce and shift, becoming like glowing, superheated clay. The open fire became what looked to be a building. In a flash of light the resemblance became more of a reality as a fiery red house came into existence in the flames' exact spot. Sweetie Belle blinked as she looked it up and down. The house was more of a cottage, really, with a slanted roof of rotting wood, and crumbling plaster walls. Sweetie Belle slowly approached it, and the door swung open before she even got close. The inside of the cottage was sparse, but the walls were stained with a thick tarry substance, like Grief. However the black bubbling liquid did not act in a hostile manner towards Sweetie Belle as she entered the building, it did naught but ooze down the walls.

"Where am I?" murmured Sweetie Belle, "A house…? A mind…? A mirror…? I do not understand... Perhaps..."

At this moment Sweetie Belle noticed a small table to her left, pressed against the wall, just beneath a window. Upon the table was a locked box, with a key in the keyhole. Sweetie Belle trotted up to the box, but before she decided to turn the key, she looked out the window. To her surprise (which is saying quite a bit, due to the fact that little surprised her at this point) the outside environment she was looking at currently was much different from the outside environment she had been in moments before she entered the cottage. She was looking into a beautiful forest, which seemed to be in the gentle grips of fall. Orange and red leaves floated gently down to a moss-covered earth, laying a carpet of striking colors.

In an instant Sweetie Belle dropped whatever she was doing and rushed to the door. Flinging it open, she galloped outside, but all was in vain. The outside was just like it had been the second she had left it: a void of pure nothingness and blackness. Whatever she saw in the window was naught but a vision. A façade, some could say. Ears drooping, Sweetie Belle trotted back inside and closed the door. She trotted back up to the box and turned the key in the keyhole. There was a gentle clicking noise, and the box swung open as the lock gave way. Inside the box was a small slip of paper.

Sweetie Belle picked it gently up with a hoof and unfurled it to read the contents printed upon it.

"A tale must have a moral, but can a moral exist without the hints from the beginning that build the final moments? Can you say (the same) for your story?"

Sweetie Belle blinked. The words "the same" were in parenthesizes. Did that signify something? Tentatively, Sweetie Belle opened her mouth and said "The same?"

In an instant the world around her melted, and the ground turned to nothing. Sweetie Belle was falling again. However, unlike the time before, where she was falling while surrounded by pure void, this time she had some unusual company. Elements of the regions she had journeyed through fell in the air beside her. The sign from Expectations, a flower from the Garden of Hate, a sprocket from the Tower of Bargaining… And while she fell, distorted voices echoed out to Sweetie Belle from the nothingness.

"For all the sleeping you may or may not have done, your mind haunted the living, phantomwise, as your body moved under the skies… But, in truth, you were never seen by waking eyes."

"Any direction is the right direction to somewhere, therefore making it a right direction in general, as I said."

"If I deny enough, then perhaps I will finally conquer Isolation! Denial and Isolation go hoof-in-hoof, you know."

"Anyone in the MIND can get corrupted by the Grief. Grief has the ability to blot out everything if strong enough. First goes Reasoning, then everything after that goes down with the ship. Next thing you know – poof! – you are finished."

"You can always trust an insane pony to do something insane, something unpredictable. However, you can never trust a sane pony because you never know when they will do something sane, or when they will do something insane and subsequently extremely stupid."

"Oh yes. Now I remember. You had such an unusual name that I thought you might help me with telling what time it is. After all, interesting names sometimes warrant an interesting personality. Yes? Now, tell me, do you like my mane?"

"So you tell me. But we both know you are willingly lying. Why is that? I am a book. I am an inanimate object. Has Madness made you so insecure that you must mask your purpose to even the air and earth around you?"

"A single drop in the ocean. As simple as a flame of light. Do they both make such an impact? Is the good of light worth all right?"

"Knowledge is only apparent when you are apparent in knowledge."

"Pony, you are mad!"

The last word, "mad" started to repeat again and again, each singular word being spoke in a louder and louder voice, causing the air to rumble and the object falling around Sweetie Belle to shatter in shards and be held in suspended animation seconds after their fragmentation. Sweetie Belle's vision turned red, and the very atoms of the air began to rumble and shake with the cacophony of absolutely deafening noise.

Sweetie Belle slowly opened her eyes. She was floating in what looked to be a tarnished brass and rusty iron hallway. It was a dozen meters wide, but as for the length and the height… Well, those seemingly stretched on forever. However, it was not the proportions that was as striking as the other prevalent element: for as far as the eye could see, there were massive keys of many colors, shapes, and sizes, hung from rusty chains that were suspended from eternity above.

"What is this place?" breathed Sweetie Belle, her voice echoing in the vast halls, only to be swallowed by the void.

"You have entered the very core of your being… You are now in the hall of the keys of knowledge…"

Sweetie Belle turned about, and was not surprised to see Mandess standing behind her.

"Mandness," murmured Sweetie Belle, "You are the first being I have seen in this strange new land."

"As always, you look with your eyes first, and not your mind. You have met many a pony in this land, at least as many as you have ever in your life… You just did not notice them…"

Sweetie Belle simply shook her head and turned about. "What must I do in this place?"

Madness trotted up until he was side-by-side with Sweetie Belle. "You must look for the key to the knowledge within you."

"Within me?" asked Sweetie Belle, "Are you saying that the knowledge that I am looking for was within my mind this entire time?"

"Perhaps it was. But you seem to think that something that was within was never new when retrieved. You may want to be careful with such frivolous assumptions."

"I am really not in the mood for this kind of talk, Madness. How am I to find my key of knowledge with so many keys about?"

"You will know when you find it. After all, the first and last element of knowledge involves naught but knowing. Quite obvious, wouldn't one think?"

Sweetie Belle shook her head. "I don't feel anything nagging me from inside. I do not think I will be able to what you ask!"

Madness simply chuckled. He gave the hall of keys a final glance before vanishing into nothing. Sweetie Belle sighed loud and long before looking about. Then suddenly she felt it… A single, dull, thump. The sound was soft, but it resonated within her mind nonetheless. Sweetie Belle turned her head a bit. The sound seemingly echoed only within her head, but she felt as if she could tell that the sound came from a direction nonetheless. The small thumping noise came again, and this prompted Sweetie Belle to begin trotting.

It seemed like hours passed as the little filly worked her way between massive, swinging keys. Almost like pendulums, the giant masses of metal and brass swung upon their rusted chains. Back and forth, back and forth. As Sweetie Belle continued to traverse the seemingly endless hallway, the thumping noise that reverberated inside her head grew seemingly louder and more frequent. And then it appeared: a massive, sharp, angular key, dripping with a black, tarry substance that looked the same as Grief. Sweetie Belle did not believe it, but the gentle nigh-physical innuendoes within her head told her otherwise. Was this her "key of knowledge?" This massive, ugly key that was already soaked with black Grief?

Sweetie Belle sighed. It didn't matter now. All she could do at this point was to carry forwards. Slowly Sweetie Belle approached the key, and the thumping within her head increased exponentially as the radius between her and her destination reduced. The noise was a veritable cacophony by the time she was half a meter from the dripping, viscous surface. Slowly Sweetie Belle reached out and touched it… And her hoof became stuck fast. The filly immediately tried to pull away, but it was to no avail. Her hoof was stuck. And to make matters worse, she felt the giant key rise slowly skywards, like an elevator. Sweetie Belle knew she could not escape, so she swiftly flung herself forward in order to get her other three hooves caught in the tar. It was not a moment too soon, for in an instant the key began accelerate upwards at an obscene rate. It was a miracle that Sweetie Belle's limbs were not dislocated from their ball-joint sockets, but then again, the MIND had never had much use for reality and physics in the first place. For a full ten minutes the key shot skyward, and then, suddenly, it came to an abrupt stop, releasing Sweetie Belle from its tarry grip and sending her catapulting away.

As Sweetie Belle reached the apex of her trajectory, a flash of light and a moment of terrible vertigo disoriented the filly. The next thing she knew she was falling earthward once more, but instead of drifting amok through a black void, she was tumbling to the ground through clouds as if she was falling from the sky on a planet much like the one she had probably belonged to eons ago. As she fell, she could catch glimpses of the earth leagues beneath her. Below her was a vast plane of swaying green, undoubtedly an absurdly massive meadow. However, the largest component of the landscape was what looked to be a gigantic ruin of gold and ivory. It stretched high into the air, and spanned many square lengths of the meadow. Clouds continued to rush by Sweetie Belle as she drew closer and closer to the unyielding earth…

Then, abruptly, Sweetie Belle decelerated again and drifted the last dozen or so meters to a rather comfortable stop. She was unharmed. Her landing spot was actually rather scenic. The earth was covered in crisp, soft grass, and Sweetie Belle was surrounded in massive blocks of marble. Many of them were massive, and resembled large chess pieces, though each block was in some state of decay. Each was heavily covered in dew and ivy. However, the wind was soft as it wove its way between the plethora of giant stone sentinels, and the sky was beautiful with an unblemished sun. A sun that was lacking a hideous grin… That was a first. Sadly, most of this was lost on the hardened Sweetie Belle.

"I have been experiencing more freefalls in the last couple of hours than I have on this entire accursed journey," huffed Sweetie Belle, quite perturbed.

"Oh, one must be careful with those statements. You might end up rethinking and retracting at a later time! While one pony claims that as a freefall, another might simply equate it to a simple hop, skip, and jump! And if that is the case, then where would your grand assumption be then, eh?"

Sweetie Belle whipped out her Zepto Sword, readjusted her bowler hat, and whirled around to face the voice that had so suddenly echoed out from behind her. She found herself facing what looked to be a male Earth Pony that was seemingly constructed completely out of marble. It was a sentient, walking and talking statue.

"Oh… Well… Who are you?" said Sweetie Belle slowly, almost at a loss for words. She had met her fill of oddities and unusual, cantankerous characters, but this could be considered new in all respects.

"Me? What an intriguing question! It pleases me greatly, but also worries me. Generally beings don't ask the name of inanimate objects, and those that do… Well… They must be mad!" exclaimed the marble pony.

Sweetie Belle sighed and sheathed her Zepto blade. "I only asked for your name… and why say you are inanimate? You clearly have your wits about you."

The marble pony chuckled, as if Sweetie Belle's statement had some form of merit with respects to humor. "Am I? That is all a matter of perspective, but then I suppose he died ages ago. But then again when one is mad as the one that owns that bowler hat no one really cares about the rifts between animate and inanimate objects! But I digress. My name? My name is Quip. I am a Fragment of Knowledge."

"A… Fragment of Knowledge?" said Sweetie Belle slowly, "Does that title imply there are more of you?"

"Enough to rival the chess pieces of a chess set!" cried Quip, "Oh yes… There is Quip – that's me in case my first important declaration passed by your ears, unveiled – and then there is Proverb… And Reprimand… And Innuendo…"

"So, there are a few of you out there," interrupted Sweetie Belle, who was comparatively wise to the fact that many of these odd denizens of these odd realms were prone to insufferable ramblings, "I understand now. So, Quip, do you have a moment to tell me about where I am?"

Quip looked about for a second, and then gave Sweetie Belle a side-long glance. "Do you have any idea?"

Huffing slightly with frustration, Sweetie Belle replied, "I would guess that we are in the land of Knowledge. I did step through a door and go through an extremely distressing amount of odd regions to get here, after all."

Quip nodded. "I suppose you could be right… though you could be wrong! Innuendo or Proverb would be so much better suited to answer such a question as the one you posed! But I digress, where else could you be but the land of Knowledge! I mean, we even have a sun! You don't get too many of those, now do you?"

Sweetie Belle looked at Quip curiously. "No… But how did you know that?"

"I didn't," replied Quip, "You just told me. So you are of the MIND. Intriguing! No doubt that bag soaked in blood contains the hearts of the Great Questions?"

Sweetie Belle opened her mouth to inquire about how he knew of the Great Questions, but then swiftly changed tact. She narrowed her eyes and said, accusingly, "Wouldn't you like to know…?"

Quip grinned. "A smart one, that. You catch on quick. Let us go now! The council undoubtedly knows of your arrival. If you indeed wish to speak to them, then no doubt they greatly crave to speak with you as well."

Quip beckoned to Sweetie Belle and began to trot through the grasslands, weaving in and out of the massive marble statues. He paused beside a massive stone Rook to beckon to Sweetie Belle once more, who was hesitating, still unsure of Quip and the knowledge he unnervingly had. "Come, little filly!"

Sweetie Belle shrugged, readied her Zepto Sword, and cantered up to the waiting Quip. Eyeing her drawn blade, Quip said, "No need to be armed as such, missy, the extensions of Grief have not made it as far as you have."

Sweetie Belle almost shuddered as she remembered the Grief-covered key that had brought her here. She looked at Quip and said, "I think I will keep it at the ready. Why? Do I unnerve you?"

Quip winked. "You only wish for such things. Come."

The duo worked their way through the massive chess pieces. As they continued to trot, Sweetie Belle could not help but attempt to inquire into the nature of the land of Knowledge once more.

"Why is this place like this? The ruins? The statues?" breathed Sweetie Belle, staring wondrously around her. Lush grasslands, countless massive marble chess pieces standing sentinel, a massive ivory castle ruin framed against the bright sky, a shining sun… And most of all: completely peaceful silence.

"Knowledge isn't as organized as you think," said Quip, "There are pieces, and there are ruins. Were you expecting a grand fort or wondrous city? Just think of knowledge's wellbeing in all of known history! You must truly be desperate for some answers, filly."

Though his tone was sharply jovial and somewhat kind, Sweetie Belle could not help but glare at him for his insufferableness and withholding disposition. "I have been nearly killed more times than there are stars in the living sky, Quip. I would like to know why."

"Answers! Knowledge is a good place to get them, but then again I am not personally the harbinger of knowledge incarnate, so I think I cannot answer any of your questions in the way you wish, little filly," said Quip, who actually looked like he was thinking for once.

Quip suddenly stopped, backtracked, and peaked about a large Bishop-shaped mountain of white stone. "Innuendo!" cried Quip, "We have a little filly here trying to make her way to Knowledge! She is asking the most dreadful questions, and I do believe you would be more suited for this leg of the journey!"

Suddenly a mare constructed completely of white stone trotted around the massive marble bishop. She glanced at Sweetie Belle and shrugged. "I suppose…"

Quip didn't wait for her to say much more. "Great! I'm off to the lesser side. See you in the middle!"

Quip galloped off without saying another word. Innuendo and Sweetie Belle stood side-by-side, watching the stallion vanish into the forest of stone sentinels.

Sweetie Belle was the first to do something. She shrugged and turned around to look at what was before her. The forest of chess pieces was thinning out, transitioning over to a marsh. It was not a horrible, ugly marsh, but it certainly had an air of foreboding hovering over it, accompanied by an equally thick mist.

"What is this place?" said Sweetie Belle, half irritably, half worriedly. She had had her full of mists considering all she had faced, and she was not too keen on venturing deeper still into the very same type of situation.

"Knowledge starts off as one thing, then coalesces into another," said Innuendo. Her voice was soft and calm, and Sweetie Belle found she had to pay close attention if she wanted to understand what the mare was saying. "At that point it is malleable; subject to the will of others. Be careful you don't lose your way."

Innuendo began to trot into the mists without saying another word and without even waiting for Sweetie Belle. Sweetie Belle started, and then quickly galloped in after her. However, to Sweetie Belle's surprise, the moment she entered it, she found herself on the other side. The mists had only, though very high, spanned a dozen or so meters in girth.

"W-w-what?!" gasped Sweetie Belle, utterly confused. She glanced at Innuendo, almost begging the pony with her eyes to reveal to her of what had just happened.

Unfortunately for her, Innuendo only said, "You have survived so much and yet the mists are so weak. Perhaps… Perhaps… Does 'concentric inception' mean much to you yet, young filly? Ah… I see it does not. Much must have been lost for this to be a short journey. I will admit that even I am impressed by how short this journey was. But… but perhaps another can help you… See down there? Where the mists coalesce even further into a river. They funnel into a waterfall that spews out into the darklands. My brother Proverb lives at the edge of the waterfall, perhaps…"

But Sweetie Belle was no longer listening. When Innuendo had pointed with a hoof in one direction, Sweetie Belle had glanced in the other… and then she saw it: A massive tower of shining white. It was only a couple kilometers away. It was an absolute miracle that she had not seen it hours before.

"Innuendo!" cried Sweetie Belle, "Look there at that tower! Is that where the Council of Knowledge resides?"

Innuendo looked at the tower, and then at Sweetie Belle. "A council that exists within those halls do indeed provide knowledge…"

Sweetie Belle hopped in place. Though buried deep, a bit of the old Sweetie Belle emerged. "Yes! Yes! Yes! Perhaps I can talk to Proverb later… I need to go there first!"

Innuendo looked worriedly at the mists behind her. "The trip is generally longer… I do believe we should visit…"

Sweetie Belle didn't even wait for Innuendo to finish. She dashed off towards the tower, her hooves a blur. It should have taken Sweetie Belle about thirty minutes to get to the tower, but as Sweetie Belle left Innuendo far behind and crested a hill the tower suddenly loomed in front of her. In fact, the altered perspective of distance was so sudden that Sweetie Belle almost crashed head-first into the door. Panting slightly, Sweetie Belle looked the door to the tower before her up and down. It looked to be made of simple mahogany, with small carvings covering the wood. It was not until Sweetie Belle stepped back that she realized that the entire tower was covered in these carvings. These carvings were smooth pictures of ideas. Ideas, inventions, emotions, thoughts… All forms were depicted on one carving or another, covering the absurdly tall tower of marble from foundation to spire tip. Having soaked in the glory of her supposed final destination, Sweetie Belle cantered forward to knock on the door. However, before her hoof could even rap on the door, a voice came from the wood itself.

"What have has to be done? To which being was must it be done? When must it be done? Who must it be done to? Where must it be done? Should we even question whether it must be done?"

Sweetie Belle blinked as she thought about what the door had just said. She was no stranger to puzzles, but she needed to first understand the core of the question. In a second she got it: they were all questions. The door wanted the Great Questions.

Sweetie Belle readily unslung the blood-soaked bag that held the hearts of the Great Questions and flung it at the base of the door to the tower of Knowledge.

Mrs. Which, Mr. Whether, Mrs. When, Mr. Who, Mrs. Where, and Mr. What… They were all there.

There was a pause, almost as if the being possessing the door was considering what it had before itself. But then… The door slowly swung open, and light streamed out from the inside. But there was one component wrong with the scene: when the door opened, the hinges screamed like a woman in despair.

Death is close. You move your remaining knight to G6. The Unknown fears closed spaces. They move their king to F7.