The Life and Death of King Sombra
Chapter 1: The Life and Death of King Sombra
Reupload: hey, so this story was getting a little grief for the strange coding stuff that I accidently uploaded. I honestly don't know what it was, and I would greatly appreciate it if you could PM me telling what that was and maybe how I could avoid it.
Do you not fear death? You should, for he is a merciless being, incapable of remorse or sorrow. He knows only the pain he causes, and the pain the world caused him. For you see, Death was a pony, just as you and I, but something terrible happened to him. He was a unicorn once. One day he left Canterlot to go save a land far to the north, called the crystal empire, from the harshest winter in decades. This pony, Death, I shall call him, he was bringing supplies with several of his most trusted friends and several natives of the Crystal Empire who were guides. Among his guides, was his wife. No mare matched her simplistic beauty, her light blue fur sparkling with the essence of the crystal heart, a revered stone of great power, that all crystal pony's celebrate. Without that heart, the crystal pony's are weak and boring, they are cowardly and pathetic, without the Crystal Heart. Death left his friends and family across all of Equestria, to save these crystal pony's from the cold, dark winter. He was a very smart, honorable stallion, and he gained much fame for his lineage through acts of selflessness and kindness. Death set out along the long road. The trip was fine at first, for they were not far enough north for natural snow to fall. But as the night took hold, so did the groups fear. Death had confidence in his ability to ward of any beast that showed it's snout, but his wife and the rest of the team weren't. "He's just a unicorn! He cannot fight!" One said to another. The other replied, obviously sharing sentiments. "When the timberwolves get him, i'm taking this food and feeding my family for a year." Even his wife had no faith in him, for she knew he was a gentlecolt, an armchair adventurer, and so on. She tried to convince Death to leave the cursed forest, but he held fast. The team was tired, and they all needed food and rest. So the team reluctantly agreed to sleep the night in the forest. In the night, a pack of TimberWolves assaulted the camp, tearing two pony's limb-from-limb before Death was able to dispatch the pack. Their was only 8 pony's left. After the group mourned, they moved on, continuing north. They encountered a dragon, who took 3 crystal pony's before the group escaped. They encountered large tundra, where a great white bear took another canterlot stallion. Soon, only Death and his wife remained, straining to lift the large amount of supplies they set out to give the crystal empire. As they drew near to the empire, Princess Luna began to have fun in secret. She conjured a storm to cover the empire in snow, for the heartswarming festival in the weeks to come. But Luna, for her foolishness, she blanketed the way to the Empire in a thick snowstorm. Death's wife clasped her husbands hoof and wept. "We must turn back, my love, or we are surely to be lost and killed!" Death held strong, he reassured her that he knew the way to the empire, even though their guides had long since fallen. His wife finally had given up, and turned to leave her husband to freeze. She had given up on the crystal empire, her homeland, and her love, her husband, because her husbands headstrong manner of acting with a lack of rationalism. " I let you rot, dear husband of mine, if it teaches you that this is a feat you cannot complete, for you are one stallion, in a blizzard, with one mare, who is incapable of labor, for she is too weak from lack of water to drink!" Death would not leave the crystal empire to die. He cast away his wedding ring and galloped into the storm as quickly as he could, dragging his cart full of supplies with him. His wife stumbled in the opposite direction, unaware that she was going in the direction of the crystal empire, and it was her husband who was retreating. She arrived at the crystal empire, and after realizing what she had done, she galloped out to find her love. Death, as he was, was very badly off. The blizzard held, and his cart had tipped over. When he fell into a crevice, he felt more than his ankle break. His heart broke when the realization that he had led innocent pony's to their deaths, and left his wife to die in the snow and ice of the frozen north. He gave a howl so terrible, that it rings whenever a blizzard passes through. In that howl, he passed away, the aching in his heart was too much to bear. He tore his horn out, and pierced his own chest. The he tore his own heart straight out of his chest, and destroying it under his hoof. His essence flew away into the winds and was carried to the crystal heart, where it encased the gemstone with a bluish shine. Then, and only then, did his spirit leave his body, to pass before the eyes of the great mother. But the great mother was perplexed, for she sensed his presence in the shadows, but could not find his spirit. The shadows swirled around the Great Mother, who in her all-powerful state, she feared it little until Death's eyes appeared in the shadows. They seemed to flow like a liquid until the Great mother shot at them with her magic. The shadows ripped a hole in itself to dodge the blast, before reforming into Death. But he was not what he use to be. The hate for himself had horribly corrupted his soul. He now had a mane of blackness, seemingly a void of darkness and despair. His eyes were green with red pupils, and his tears for his lost comrades created a mist of green and purple energy flowing continuously out of his eyes. On him he wore full battle armor of Damascus steel to hide the gaping hole in his chest, where he cast his own heart aside. He fired magic into the air to gather the great mother's full attention. "Who is this pony? A mere mortal, or are you more? How do you live when you have died?" The great mother called upon Death, perplexed by how he escaped his namesake. Death, looked at the great mother evilly, who warily shifted in her seat on the highest mountain in Equestria. "I escape death by becoming it. The stallion who is often called Death is no more. The inhabitant of him is not. I rename myself King Sombra. May the shadows forever cover the world, to mourn for those stallions who gave their lives for the Crystal empire, and let the planet meet the true Death for what my evil wife has done to me! She casted me aside and her homeland because of her cowardice!" The great mother laughed heartily, for the thought of a mortal destroying the planet was ridiculous. It was impossible. And King Sombra knew it. " I know you know that's impossible." King Sombra smirked evilly. " You underestimate my abilities." The great Mother nodded her head. "You are mortal." "Indeed I am. And if a mortal is who I am, then I will not destroy this planet. I vow I will conquer this world, from the Crystal Empire to the Everfree forest, the world will be mine to pillage and punish as I please!" With that, King Sombra took a shadowy form and flew away, leaving the great mother to worry about her children. Her children were caught unaware by the coming storm. Sombra, as he is now named, swept into the crystal empire, killing anypony who stood in his way. When he flew up to the great central tower, he defeated the true king with ease and took the King's red robe, casting it upon his own back. He the used his blackened magic to summon the souls of the pony's he had killed, even the former king wasn't exempted. He captured and corrupted all of them, making them the first shadow pony's, evil spirits who serve only King Sombra. With the Crystal Empire in his power, he hid the Crystal Heart and therefor his own heart away, to stay any hopes and dreams of rebellion from the hearts of the crystal pony's. the Crystal Heart was and still is a magical relic of the Crystal Pony's livelihood and Sombra's lost heart. King Sombra forced the pony's to watch in horror a he destroyed his former wife, who left him to die in the snow. He tore her heart out and feasted upon it, laughing horribly as the life waned from his poor wives eyes. He then forged wrought iron chains to secure the crystal pony's, and sent them to work. They built massive crystalline walls all around the empire, blocking out much sunlight from the eyes of the poor crystal "slaves", as King Sombra called his captured Crystal Empire Pony's. They forged armor and weapons for the Shadow Pony's, and often were sacrificed to become Shadow Pony's themselves. But unfortunately for King Sombra, the Princess's of the land, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, found out about the Crystal Empire's conquering and roused the guard with haste. They marched to the empire for long months across the Frozen North, only to be met by the walls previously erected. Celestia attempted to destroy the wall, gaining access to the empire, but was met with legions of Shadow Pony's rising out of the ground and devouring the armies above the ground. Celestia and Luna were barely capable of flying above the grasping hooves, wild arrows, magical blasts, and screams of the battle below. The Princesse's of the sun and the moon flew to the top of the central tower, where the throne room was contained, with King Sombra himself as it's guard. "Weak Alicorns, you won't survive the onslaught to come." Sombra laughed evilly as he changed to his shadow form and covered the throne room with thick darkness. The Princess's stood vigilantly, waiting for whatever was to come. Suddenly, black and twisted crystals rose from the floor, surrounding and capturing Princes Luna in it's hardened shell. Celestia flew away, reluctant to leave her sister in peril. She flew high above the spire, circling around, listening to the dark laughter and defiant cries below. Suddenly, silence. Sombra's shadow flew out through the window, slowly but unfalteringly to Celestia. She mustered all of her power and fired blast after blast of magic at the shadowy cloud, Sombra's glowing green eyes shifting around the cloud to dodge the attacks. Sombra reached out and grasped Celestia's horn, and tossing her to the ground far below. Crystal Pony's in iron chains looked skywards as their Princess plummeted downward, Sombra's form following quickly behind. He caught the alicorn by the wing, feet above the ground. His form changed to that of his blackened and twisted unicorn form, his red, sharpened horn radiating with power. "Bow, pathetic creature. Prove your worth to all of your devout followers surrounding you." Sombra mocked as Crystal Pony's gathered around curiously. Sombra clutched Celestia's neck with both hooves, squeezing the life out of her. As Celestia's eyes rolled back into her head, the sound of explosions was heard far above in the Central Spire. A Catalina blue streak flew through the sky and slammed into Sombra with extreme force, sending him and the streak sprawling. Celestia took the opportunity and cursed Sombra, banishing him into the Frozen North. Sombra disappeared in a powerful vortex, an arc of green and black magic flying through at the last second, slamming into the stand where the crystal heart was formerly held. The earth shook and the blackened crystal walls around the Crystal Empire crumbled to shards and the entire empire began to flicker, it's inhabitants included. Celestia quickly turned to the unknown figure who saved her life and picked it up and flew away as fast as possible. They reached the edge of the empire just as the entire empire disappeared without a trace of it ever existing. Princess Celestia turned over the figure in her hooves, and saw it was her beloved sister, Princess Luna. She smile and flew down to the edges of the former Crystal Empire, and looked at the corpses littering the battleground. The guards stood no chance against the Shadow Pony's who destroyed them. The princess's, as to not cause panic in the masses, destroyed every trace of the Crystal Empire or King Sombra's existance, letting it descend into a myth or was completely forgotten in the millennia to come. The only remaining evidence of the Crystal Empire was a crystal shard, a magical device that opened a map of the former empire in it's former glory. Only when the Empire finally reappeared, did the Crystal Empire and King Sombra become a reality and a menace to the livelihood of Pony's worldwide.
Authors Note: hey that was pretty short, wasn't it. Well, I just wanted to write this because the lack of detail in Sombra's backstory was infuriating me, and I wanted to elaborate on my current ongoing story, Mage Trials. This is a legend that I used to give the universe of Mage Trials more depth and make it feel a little more realistic, and isn't probably even close to what the creators of MLP had in mind when they created King Sombra.