In the highest chambers of the Time Temple, the Time Goddess went about her business, making sure time itself remained in balance; and all was right in the world. The Goddess’s name was Rhinne, who happened to  very young and beautiful. She levitated in her chamber from atop her throne where she can see everything.

The Goddess scanned through all the dimensions, and time periods;watching every event that took place. All was going smoothly until she felt an uneasiness overtake her. She stepped down from her throne and teleported herself to the entrance hall of the temple, and could feel the grand doors’ presence tower over her like giants.

Rhinne felt the presence of one extra door inside the hall though. She singled out its aura, and went over to the giant door that had just appeared. Rhinne thought this door was different from the others as it wasn't of the same design as the other doors. It was a giant, gilded door that had some odd shapes and symbols on it. She took a hand off an ornate hour glass she happened to be holding in her arms closely to her chest, and put in on the door.

It took the goddess some time to feel out the rest of the shapes on the doors. She began to speak to herself after feeling the door to identify the symbols, “These are... horses? No, Alicorns.” Rhinne wasn't totally convinced with her identification. Alicorns were only myth as far as she knew. She had heard of Pegasi being used as mounts to help explorers travel around quicker; and Unicorns were normally pets. Griffons existed, but they were normally horrid creatures of really aggressive nature. The Time Goddess could sense a completely different world to Maple behind the door.

After Rhinne had skimmed the world beyond the door, she let out a breath. There was no feeling of worry, nor was there dread. The Time Goddess didn't know exactly how to feel about this. “It appears we might have some potential allies,” Rhinne mumbled to herself. She needed to get this information to Empress Cygnus as soon as she could. After moving away from the door, Rhinne felt another presence enter the room. It took her few seconds to recognize the person.

The one who entered the halls was a light-skinned man with blonde hair and lavender eyes. The man approached the Goddess as if he were approaching royalty. “I see a new door has appeared in the temple,” he began, “Judging by the insignias and symbols on the door, I'd say that the sentient beings of this new world are equine?” The man stood there holding his cane in one hand and brought the other to the beak of his black raven mask.

Rhinne turned to the man who stood before her and replied, “Yes, that happens to be the case.” She pondered for a moment, and a thought came to her mind, “Do you think you can send a message to the Empress for me, Phantom?” He nodded with a grin. “It would be my honor,” he answered with bow.

As Phantom was about to take his leave from the temple, he turned his head to ask one more thing, “What other species besides equine are beyond those doors?” He had a small grin, one that easily showed his curiosity about exploring a new dimension; or world for that matter.

The Goddess herself pondered for a moment. She started to speak an answer to Phantom's question, “I believe that there are more than just equine beings who inhabit this new world. Rest assured, hopefully, we don't run into any hostiles in the process.” Phantom let out an almost inaudible chuckle. Rhinne furrowed her eyebrows as if trying to scowl at him. “Phantom, you'd better not be thinking of committing any sort of thievery upon your arrival there,” She began, “If that happens to be the case, then I shall not allow you pass through the door.”

Phantom rose his hands in, showing his palms as a gesture of compliance. “Alright, alright, I'll hold off my temptations for the time being,” he replied with a sigh. With that, he left through the temple doors, and dematerialized in a gust of cards. They moved off towards the sky, spiraling towards a ship that hovered above the temple.

After Phantom had taken off back to his ship, the Goddess herself was deep in thought. She started to have that unnerving feeling of dread loom over her. Rhinne shivered as the memory of the Black Mage wormed through her mind. The haunting past of how she was overthrown and incapacitated by the Black Mage and his servants was like a living nightmare.  made it her sole duty to make sure that no evil traverses over to this new realm. Never again will the halls of her temple be defiled by dark magic ever again.

******

The sun was out and down in Ponyville the ponies went about their daily business. Ponies worked, fillies went to school, and Twilight, a unicorn, had her face buried in her books like usual. It wasn't surprising that the unicorn was so into her studies, but rather more surprising when she was doing something a little more productive. The unicorn lived in the Ponyville Library where she was free to do all of the studying she wanted. Twilight’s current reading was of one of many books written by Star Swirl the bearded. It contained many fascinating theories of the many different types of magic such as aging spells, time dilation, interdimensional travel, even theories on the manipulation of elements like lightning and wind. The book was titled Magical Theories by Star Swirl the Bearded.

Twilight continued to ravenously read through line after line of the ancient prose, absorbing what information she had not already gleaned from the previous readings. Everywhere she looked, there was something that she seemed to have miss- a frantic knocking at the door inerrupted her reading session. She grumbled to herself. The unicorn’s head perked up to turn toward the door. She got up and trotted over to answer whoever was knocking. When Twilight carelessly flicked the door open, Applejack fell through the entrance and flat onto her face, knocking her hat ajar. Twilight cocked her head to the side.

The orange earthpony got back on to her hooves, adjusted her hat, and took a few breaths before speaking. “Twi’, something just appeared at Ponyville Town Hall. Ah’ think ya should come down and see!”

Twilight stared at Applejack for a moment, before blinking a few times.Scrunching up her nose and shaking her head to clear a wave of confusion. “Why do you need me to see it,” she asked, “What is it anyway?” Applejack took another breath of air to bring to her a complete state of calm.

She looked back over at Twilight, and she proceeded to answer, “See, it was like some kind of real big door with these weird shapes that appeared in Ponyville!” This caught Twilight’s attention as she widened her eyes at the statement.

“Hold on, I’ll go get Spike so we can send a letter to Princess Celestia right away,” She replied before going back inside to get Spike, who happened to be organizing some books as he’s normally instructed to do.

“Spike,” Twilight addressed the baby purple dragon, “Quickly, grab a quill and a sheet of paper. We’re going to town hall to inspect this “door” so we can send a detailed letter to Princess Celestia!” With that, Spike dropped what he was doing, and quickly ran upstairs to grab a quill, paper, and ink for the quill. After retrieving the necessary items from the bedroom, Twilight and the baby dragon followed Applejack towards the town hall.

Spike grinned at Applejack as the trio made their way to Town Hall. “So, was somepony scared of the big spooky door?” The dragon commented.

“And what might you be tryin’ ta’ get at, Spike?” Applejack retorted.

Spike chuckled, “Oh nothing, just that you got so easily scared of a door.” The small dragon answered with a comeback of his own.

“Why you-”

“Alright you two, knock it off!” Twilight intervened. She was getting tired of the two’s bickering. “We need to focus on figuring out what this is all about.”

When they finally made it to Town Hall, all of Ponyville was there to see the door. They all witnessed its appearance into the town, and remained there since it appeared. Some ponies that happened to pass by went over to the door to look at it along with the rest of Twilight’s friends.

The door stood tall at about twenty feet dead in the center of the crowd of ponies. It glistened in the sun with its radiant, silver tint. Twilight made her way through the crowd of ponies to get closer to the door to inspect it further. There was a bipedal creature in the center of the door. Next to her was some kind of feathered dragon. Another picture below that showed a caption of five bipedal creatures battling it out with another clad in a robe unleashing magic from its appendages.

“What d’yall think of this here, Twi’?” Applejack asked as she trotted over next to Twilight. The purple unicorn thought for a moment, but nothing seemed to come to mind. All she could do was shrug at the question. Twilight inspected the door even further, and noticed a bit of text in the bottom left corner of the towering door. She trotted over to the text, and examined it. “It appears to be telling some kind of story,” Twilight announced. The rest of the ponies began to murmur amongst each other. The rest of Twilight’s friends made their way to the middle so they can hear her better.

Rainbow Dash, a light blue Pegasus, flew over to Twilight and asked, “What kind of story is it trying to tell? What does this all mean anyway?” The situation was confusing to the Pegasus mare. She rubbed her head with her fore-hooves, and groaned as she tried to come up with an answer to her own question.

Twilight, after reading the text to herself, read it out loud so the rest of the ponies could hear her. Before she started, she took a gulp, cleared her throat, then proceeded to read it out. “There comes a time when a world is in need of allies. I am one who has fallen to an evil man’s wrath, hate, and malice. I ask of you to join their alliance, and aid my niece and her world to prevent the evil man from being released back into the world. I ask of you to aid Maple World, and help to restore the peace that once coated it.” The purple unicorn had finished reading the text, and right below it was a signature that said “Empress Aria.”

Applejack, who had been beside Twilight the entire time she was reading the note written on the door, responded in a confused tone, “Who the hay is this Empress Aria,” she began to shout, “And what in tarnation is Maple World?!” Applejack couldn’t wrap her head around any of it. It made no sense to her that something like could just come out of nowhere, and then somepony she doesn’t even know writes a note from beyond the grave. That’s literally creepy.

Twilight recoiled at her friend’s shout, and shook her head. This made no sense to her as well, but she insisted getting some answers. “Spike,” The unicorn said turning her head to the dragon on her back, “Let’s get to writing that letter to the princess.” Spike nodded and lept off Twilight’s back, and pulled out the quill and paper, and put the ink on the ground.

The dragon dipped the tip of the quill in the ink, and prepared to write. “Ready when you are, Twilight,” he announced.

“Right,” Twilight Sparkle mumbled, working out what she should say. “Dear Princess Celestia,” She began, sauntering around the door. She paused for a moment squinting against the glare coming off the polished silver, “Today a giant silver door manifested itself in Ponyville, pretty much dead center near the Town Hall.

Spike mumbled an affirmative, busily scribbling away as best he could. Twilight continued to speak as the dragon continued to write down everything she said word for word, “It is unknown where this door actually came from, but what we do know there is a small scripture etched into it. I don’t know exactly what it means, but it mentioned something about “Maple World” and an alliance. Whatever those are. I humbly await your response. Your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle.”

Spike scribbled the rest of the words onto the paper. He then rolled it up when it was done, and blew a green flame on it, showing that it had been sent to Princess Celestia. All the ponies had to do now was wait for a reply from the Princess. Whatever was beyond the door was a mystery to them, but soon all would be revealed to them. Next Chapter: Chapter 2 Estimated time remaining: 28 Minutes