It was beautiful, this Back Hall. Once I had regained my energy I walked up the long steps that led to the most stunning and grand room that I had ever seen since waking. It was completely untouched by the Shadow as far as I could tell and an actual bright stream of light shone from the many windows that lined the walls. From the looks of it, the light outside meant it would be dark soon, but still, it was more light than I had ever seen in this entire castle yet.

Elegant pillars and arches lined the room and created a large space almost as big as the foyer was. Behind me to the right of the stairs leading back to where I came from was another set of stairs that curved up to the left and onto another level above the ground level of the back hall, on top of that level I could also see two doors similar distances apart from each other. To my right further was another set of stairs that led down into darkness, I didn’t feel the need to go down into anything dark at the moment. And to my left was another door at the far end and the other set of curving stairs that connected with the other one. I walked forwards into the room further and up to the fountain that was in the middle of a small alcove in the room. The water looked pure and untainted, unlike that of the water that was in the Cellar Archives. It wasn’t until now that I had realized how thirsty I was after all that I had gone through. I drank from the pool of water at the bottom of the fountain without restraint. The water tasted as if it were a gift from Celestia herself. It was the most refreshing thing that I’ve tasted since waking. The only other liquid that I can recall tasting thus far was blood.

I stopped drinking as I heard wind gust past me and a door creaking open. I instantly raised my guard and looked around. I then spotted the door that was to my left was open and nothing else around it, but inside it though, I could see something very large. I left the fountain and began to make my way over to the door. I neared it and saw a room inside that looked almost as large as the Back Hall. I went through the door and it was narrow for a bit before expanding into a massive room, more large sets of pillars made two rows and in the middle was a long carpet that led to a teleporter. My jaw dropped in awe as I observed it. I only remember that teleporters were technology that was only recently being made. It was supposed to work by holding a certain amount of magic within it and it could be used by all races to moves long distances without the aid of a unicorn.

The teleporter itself was not fully visible as a large portion of it was behind the wall. But what I could see was a small room put at the end of the larger room with a metal grate covering it. Along the wall around it were rods that when activated would channel the magic into the room and teleport whoever was inside to its set destination. I wanted to investigate it at a closer distance so I moved again, only to have another flashback come to me.

“You have a teleporter? How in the world did you get that kind of technology this new this far east?”

“You would be surprised at how much I’ve attained during my time, Charcoal.”

“So I assume that this will take us to the Inner Sanctum?”

“It will definitely take care of the vertical part of our journey, I trust that you’ve used a teleporter before?”

“Only once, when I was growing up in Canterlot. It would take you to one of the tallest towers there where you could see all of the lands that lay beyond the mountain, it’s beautiful.”

“Good, but be warned, this one will be taking us down instead of up.”

That’s why they seemed so familiar, I remember it now. Using the teleporter that was set up in Canterlot to teleport me up to that tower that was used as a public viewing platform. But what Alexander had said also concerned me. That could only mean going down once again into a place that I didn’t know. It also made me somewhat overwhelmed because I had made it through all of that just to learn that the Inner Sanctum was still much farther away than I had thought. I figured it to be just beyond the Refinery or something. But no. It was still much further down. I guess that’s what I meant when I told myself in the letter to ‘descend into the darkness’.

I figured that I might as well see if I can get this thing working, I didn’t feel like wasting time to go looking through rooms that may lead to nothing of use while my way further towards the Inner Sanctum lay right in front of me. I opened the metal gate that blocked my entrance and walked into the small room. It looked only big enough to fit three, maybe four ponies inside. To my left was another lever that I could only assume turned it on. I braced myself and pulled the lever down.

Nothing.

I tried several more times, still nothing. This clearly wasn’t working, so I exited the small room and looked around it for any indication as to why it wasn’t working. I then found a large panel that stuck out of the wall to the teleporter’s left. On the panel were three small holes that were evenly spaced along it. My eye had caught this panel because two of the three holes were empty while the third had something in it. My memory gave me one last detail that I remembered about the teleporters. This must have been where the magical rods where put to power the machine. It ran on three of them simultaneously and while they did deplete very slowly, they were not easy to replace. My hopes were draining fast as I looked at it. There was no way that I could use the teleporter while it was like this, I would have to search the rooms in the Back Hall for any signs of replacement rods. Surely Alexander kept a supply of them, being this far out in the woods.

I turned and left the room, seeing that there was nothing else that I could do in there and once I entered the Back Hall I began to climb the steps to my right up onto the upper level to check up there first. The upper level had two doors, a guest room and a study. I decided to try the guest room first because I was hoping that I would find something in there, not the rods, but something more personal maybe.

__________________________________________________________________________

It was a complete mess. Nearly everything in this room was overturned or broken in some way. It was another square room with a few windows at the far edge, but not as much light as before. There was a desk with a couple of ripped out drawers along with an overturned dresser and many other things spread across the floor. It was at least lit though. Another thing I didn’t trust by now. I was just about to take a step until I stopped due to another flashback return.

I heard the sounds of things being rifled through and thrown around while I began to say “My journal is gone. What would they want with my journal?”

This could explain why I was finding all of these journal entries in pieces around the castle so far. But that was an odd thing for someone to steal. I navigated my way around the overturned furniture to the desk and picked up the piece of parchment that I saw lying on top of it amongst other miscellaneous things.

2nd of July, 839

I received a letter today from one of the outposts set up on the border of the Griffin Territory disclosing the fate of the Professor’s expedition. A week after my departure, one of the members of the expedition returned from the snowy plains, he was badly injured, as if maimed by one of the griffins. This struck me as odd because the Griffins scarcely interacted with explorers much less archeologists who dug in the area and kept to themselves. They very rarely attack unprovoked. They had never figured out what attacked him though as he was completely delirious and rambled about the camp being attacked by something horrible. A search party was quickly dispatched and after days of searching finally found the camp. It was in ruins and the Professor and the rest of the expedition was nowhere to be found. Tomorrow I will collect the things they found amongst the wreckage. I’m not so sure what to make of it, but I’m worried for him.

It pained me to not even know the professors name, but it was never stated in any of the journal entries thus far so I assumed that I would just have to keep his name as “The Professor” for now then. I turned to my left and walked through the door open frame that led into the actual room that I must have slept in while I was here. A large bed sat at the end of the room with more furniture and other things scattered about. On the desk though, was another journal entry. I went to go read this one.

3rd of July, 839

Today I picked up the Professors things. I went through a large amount of mismatched documents from what remained of the camp sight. There were many documents ranging from quick notes to large accounts of what had happened since I left. I began to search through them for any indication of what might have happened to him. On May 17th, the day that I found the orb chamber, he wrote:

“Found and recovered Charcoal after one hour of entrapment.”

I was confused greatly by this as I had been suffocating within minutes of being trapped. How could I have lasted an hour? As I read the accounts of what happened, I began to notice frustration within his writing. He wanted to get the rest of the team to revisit the chamber again but what happened in the orb chamber seemed to have driven parts of the team mad. The Professor finally decided to visit the orb chamber for himself where he found an orb and returned with it to the surface. This had confused me even more. If he had retrieved the orb, then what are those pieces sitting on my living room table?

I too was confused at this last entry. What had happened to this expedition that I was supposedly on? It all seemed to be connected to this orb that I found while I was there, from what I can imagine of the entries thus far must mean that the orb had something to do with everything that is happening right now to me.

I added this to my list of things to think about when I wasn’t running terrified for my life. I turned and looked at the bed. I almost considered sleeping in it if it weren’t for the giant bloodstains on and around it. Examining it further, I began to realize that another memory was starting to appear to me as the white flash overtook my sight.

I heard the sheets of the bed rusting together and footsteps coming from the main room.

“Charcoal.”

“What?!”

“Still having nightmares I see.”

“Yes, I can’t get rid of them, they come every night, and are only getting worse.”

“We’ll put a stop to them, you’ll see.”

The more I heard Alexander’s voice, the more disturbed I became about it. From what I could hear it sounded very dark, like there was always a hint of something else, some hidden motive underneath his words. It was hard for me to rationalize, I just didn’t trust it.

I looked around the room and found another tinder box along with more lamp oil. With nothing else that looked like it could give me any clues to finding the rods or any more about my past I decided to try the last room that was across the main room from where I was. I made it over and as I opened the door another quick flashback came to me.

“The key. Please let it be here”

It was indeed rather quick but gave me more reason to search the room now. The room was a small and rectangular  with only two small drawers in the middle and two large wardrobes at the ends. Most of the drawers were pulled out and scattered across the room like the others. Though there was another journal entry on the small drawer to the left so I moved towards it and picked it up to read.

4th of July, 839

It’s done! The orb is assembled. I had awakened from a terrible nightmare and went to my living room where the orb pieces were. They remained on the table where I left them, but somehow I knew how they were supposed to fit together. Without fault, I joined the orb pieces with the aid of some tar to hold it together with. The pieces fit together perfectly and now resembles the orb that I remembered seeing when I first encountered it. The ancient relic is now complete; I don’t think that it’s perfectly round surface could have been made by even the most skilled artisan in the world. It was all too strange.

It fit perfectly together? Just like that? How was that even possible? Then again if what I previously read was true I survived an hour without air in the chamber on my expedition. What object has the power to seemingly bend reality like this? Perhaps this was alien after all. I took two steps to my left to look through the large dresser before I heard the main door to the guest room swing open, then nothing else for a second. I froze, having no idea what else was possible alive here, except…

Rrrarghrr…

Dammit! I swung around and shut the door before quickly looking around to decide what to do next. I only thought of one thing, hide. I did just that as I jumped into the large wardrobe to my right and closed both of the doors shut before cowering inside. No sooner had I heard the sound of something large slamming on the door to the room. Another slam. Another. A loud crashing sound indicated to me that the door must have come down and I heard the monster stumble inside and shift around.

Eeeuuughhhh….Rrarghh…

It continued to make more grunts as it continued to look around the room. Fear couldn’t even describe what I was feeling right now. If I had any memory of my life it would probably be flashing in front of me right now. I was sure that I was dead. I only sat and prayed that it wouldn’t come any closer.

The door the main room opened and closed.

I hadn’t even heard the thing move away from me; I was too busy trying to keep my bowels intact. Even after it had left it took me a good five minutes for me to gain the courage to ever so slightly push one of the doors open to look outside. I was right, it was gone. I took another minute to reestablish the fact that I wasn’t dead and that I was still alive. After doing so I continued my search for this key mentioned in the flashback. Nothing in the room really struck me as odd as I looked around, except for… that painting. I saw a small opening behind one of the corners of a crooked painting on the far end from me. I walked over to it and began to push the painting aside, revealing a small key. In doing so, another quick flashback came on like before.

“Ah, there it is. I guess it was a good hiding place for it after all.”

Indeed it was. I even remembered the room that this key opened as well, the storage room; it had to be where the rods were. Satisfied with my finding, aside from the intrusion and nearly getting killed, I didn’t see the need to remain here anymore and headed back out of the room into the Back Hall, keeping conscious about monsters potentially about in it.

__________________________________________________________________________

It turned out that I didn’t need to worry about any monster, as the remains of it, or at least the torso of it, was in a bloody mess right outside of the door. I took a few steps away as the sight first shocked me. Though I thanked whatever actually managed to kill this horrid thing. I dared not go near the body as I had no idea what it would do, if anything. So I decided to head back the way I originally came up the stairs, stopping though outside of the door that I neglected to explore, the study. I did have the key to the storage but maybe I might find out more about why I was here, like more journal entries in there. I know I said that I wasn’t going to worry about such things before, but my curiosity was becoming too great now.

__________________________________________________________________________

The Study from when I first entered look similar to the guest room, except the coloring of the wood was darker, along with the actual hallway itself being dark. It wasn’t to the point where I couldn’t see to the end of the hallway but it was still getting pretty bad. I lit my lantern and moved forward, stopping at the first door that I saw to my right and looking inside. It was a mess inside there as well similar to the guest room, nothing of interest was inside from what I could tell though but I considered checking it out until I saw a piano in the far corner of the room. I shuddered and turned away to head to the next room directly across the hall from the one on my right.

I opened the door and saw it was a large room that went back a ways with two large windows at the end. It was completely dark outside now. How could that be though? It was still relatively bright outside from what I could tell while I was in the guest room. That was only about ten minutes ago. This castle seemed to do that a lot to me now that I thought about it. Time seemed to warp around it and cause it to look differently everywhere around the castle or something. None of it, among many other things, made any sense here.

I made my way to the widows, avoiding the piles of books that were stacked about in the room, and was amazed as I looked through them. I could actually see out the windows in here. It came a bit bittersweet though as it was night time out and my vision was limited anyway. Through them I could see the guest room’s windows and parts of a forest in the distance. Heavy fog obscured most of the tree line but I could see much farther out than I had before. I turned my attention away from the windows and to several pieces of parchment on the desk. Reading the first few lines I knew it had something to do with the orb and Alexander even though it was untitled, as I could now see what his writing looked like. I was intrigued about it none the less if it had something to do with the orbs.

I had been traveling through these thick woods for what seemed like an eternity before I had finally found what I was looking for. Underneath the forest floor was a large temple where the item that I sought lie inside. The orb indeed carried tremendous power as I had sensed while I removed it from its stand. With the orb I began to set in motion my plans to finally return home. I began by building the castle that would hold the orb so that I may study it further and attempt to unlock its secrets. The castle itself was only made as a disguise should any inhabitants, if there at all any, came roaming through these woods. Most of it is empty inside except for the Inner Sanctum but I can easily change or add anything if necessary. I know very little of this world or how technologically advanced it was, if there were even any inhabitants in the first place, only that if I was here then it must have orbs on it. One very important thing that I found out though when I first arrived here was that this planet was very potent in magic, something that I found to be very useful in my work and actually building the castle. I will now begin my studies into the orb and how to unlock its power so that I may return home.

There was another page under this one, it looked much newer compared to the other one.

It turns out that I was right. This world does have sentient beings living on it, and they are ponies, of all things. While I pondered the situation, I came up with an excellent idea of how this may ultimately be beneficial to me. Changing my appearance was easy enough, after that all I had to do was meet with these new visitors and see if they lived anywhere near here. I greeted them openly as they arrived and they seemed grateful for some place to rest. As I had talked with them, I quickly found out that these travellers were actually a vanguard of explorers from the nation of Equestria trying to expand eastward. It was a perfect opportunity for me indeed. I strongly encouraged them to begin settlements here around the castle after giving them a story I made up about why it was here in the first place so that it may serve as protection. They easily agreed and within weeks the settlement of Bridleburg had been established, renaming the castle as well, I didn’t mind as it had no proper name prior.

I quickly filled the castle with all of the books and furnishings that I had either created or were brought by the settlers and also became attuned to their customs and history. I especially found this Princess Celestia to be quite interesting. According to them she controlled both the sun and the moon while being seemingly immortal, but it didn’t bother me all that much because I knew what she really was, only another being that has managed to actually control the power of the orb, to the rest of them though it may appear like she was some sort of goddess. How little they knew of true power and where it comes from. Seeing as I am now in charge of the settlement’s care and its legal system, obtaining the vitae will be much easier now and I can finally stop my failing attempts at producing it artificially or from the animals that I would find around the forest.

I was completely bewildered. This seemed to be Alexander’s account of how he came to this area and how the castle got here. What was this vitae that I’ve heard several times before? If this were true it would seem that Alexander has and orb as well. The thing that disturbed me most of all out of this though was him stating that he changed his appearance. That only implied he was not a pony, but something else. And the small bit about the princess, that caught me completely off guard. I didn’t want to believe a single word spoken of it, but if he managed to build this entire castle only with the orb, that must be something, power that rivaled that of hers. This was all getting too strange for me. But I know at least knew how this entire place came to be.

I pondered the records heavily as I exited the door and turned left down the hallway then left again as it turned. The hallway went down further towards another set of windows at the end and another hallway that turned right. As I was walking towards the turn I could have sworn I kept hearing what sounded like dogs. Completely deranged dogs barking madly in the distance, but not from any real direction. I tried to tune out the noise and continue further as I neared the end of the hallway. On the ground next to one of the windows was another jar of oil. I moved over and picked it up. As I did the floor shook and I took a few steps back as the window started to crack. It didn’t completely break though, so I only gave it a long look before continuing down to the right. The left side of this hallway was completely covered to the end in windows, but at the end of the hallway itself was another large pile of rocks, cutting off the rest of it. There was, however, a door in the middle of the hallway to the right.

I instantly regretted opening the door. The inside of the room looked like a mutilation chamber. There were bloodstains and pools of blood all over the tables set up inside and various tools and saws about with animal carcasses on a few of them. I leaned back outside of the room for a second to push the rising vomit down before continuing. In the center of the room was a large table that took up the majority of it, leaving the only walking space around it. I began by moving to my left and looking at the smaller table set up in the corner of the room. A severed dog head sat on top of it and as I neared to turn left to continue around the table in the center of the room another flashback returned.

“Let’s see what you have to offer,” I heard Alexander say while a dog whimpered in the background. The next sounds I heard where a saw cutting through flesh and the dog yelping before ceasing to make any more noise.

“Yes, I can sense it. It’s definitely there.”

Sickening. I could barely keep a hold of myself as I tried to remove the thought from my mind and continue on. There was another slightly open door at the end of the room that I was heading towards. Inside looked like an actual room that one would expect to find in a study and not an animal slaughter. It was smaller than the previous room, a lit fire burned in the far left corner, something I don’t think I’ve seen thus far; does that mean that someone was in here recently? I shook again at the thought of one of those things being in here with me. A desk was in the middle of the room with a few sketches of dog anatomy but nothing too important. I looked over to the right of the room and found another note on a smaller table that looked more interesting.

Anatomy Frontiers

August 9th, 790

I’ve decided to conform my research notes into the current dates that the inhabitants have to keep all of them in order. As per my current research I’m finding it to be a disappointment. The energy that I’m attempting to harvest from these creatures comes from fear stimulated in the brain which creates the necessary source I need. The only problem is that it isn’t a sufficient amount for what my needs are. I’ve so far found no research on this area of study from the inhabitants here. It is clear to me though that these ponies emit the energy in far greater quantities than the animals do. I think I’ve found a way to extract it from them as well and have found the perfect way to do so as I have taken the responsibility of the legal system in this area, so it might just work out for me yet.

I got a bad notion from this. He was killing animals by basically torturing them and harvesting this energy from them. But he also said that ponies emit it much more than common animals do, so I started to think of the only logical conclusion to what he would do. The thought was completely disgusting, but from what I have heard of this Alexander so far, I’m sure that he would resort to doing that. I turned away and decided to search through the desk for anything useful. I went through the three small drawers and found a tinderbox. Then I opened the larger cabinet and jumped back.

Skulls and bones poured out of it. Pony skulls and bones.

This was a bad place, I had to get out of here. I moved as fast as I could out of the room and the larger room into the hallway, shutting the door behind me, taking a few deep breaths of air that didn’t have a sense of decay to it. I began to head back towards the exit, but got curious as I passed the windows, especially the last one. As I neared it, I heard it crack and chip even more. I looked through it and saw the ledge that was on the other side of it. With that, I got another, somewhat crazy I’ll admit, idea. I took a large rock that was near the window that must have rolled over from the rockslide and chucked it as hard as I could at it. My apparently crazy idea worked and the window shattered and left a large opening for me to climb over and onto the ledge outside of it. I stepped through the window and on the ledge with care to avoid any potential glass that might have fell on it and looked out into the night. I was very much disappointed as I looked down and saw for about twenty meters before I saw nothing, not even the ground. I had slightly hoped this window might be able to lead me down safely somehow. Other than disappointment, it was somewhat relieving to breathe in fresh air from the night.

I couldn’t see any further past the tree line than I had through the windows, though I now saw something that I couldn’t while I was looking through the windows. The red organic material that plagued most of the castle parts that I had left behind was everywhere. It grew all in between the trees and completely covered a few. It looks like the Shadow was moving around the castle faster than I had thought. I looked to my left and saw that the ledges to the left of me were mostly broken apart or gone, but the ones to my right were all still there. And best of all, I could barely see an open window at the end of them.

I began to make my way across the ledges. It wasn’t that far between them, only a long step, but it was still nerve wracking considering how long of a fall it was. I reached the halfway point between to the window and heard large rumble to the distance. I turned my head and saw a tree violently shaking before toppling completely over and onto the darkened ground. This only made me move faster now. Three more ledges and I finally reached the last one. The window was broken too like the one I got onto the ledges. I stepped inside and saw that the room was actually lit, and a mess like the rest of the areas I’ve seen thus far in the Back Hall. All over the walls were schematics of the teleporter that was back where I came from. It all looked interesting but ultimately useless to me, I know what I needed to make it work. There was a door at the end of the room but the rocks covered that up and made any further progress impossible. There was, however, another canister on the desk that was in the right corner of the room. I went over and touched it to trigger the memory like before.

I dislike what I’ve become to produce what I need to return, but I must do what I have to, no matter what the cost. These ponies definitely contain the proper energy that I need to return, but the means for extracting it are quite horrible indeed.

I’m still studying the orb and the full extent of its power, but so far I’m completely convinced that it is what I need to return. This is all for you, my love.

I didn’t know what to think. Alexander seemed genuine with his emotions about what he said, but I’m finding it more difficult to believe as I learn more about him. He only wanted to return to wherever he came from. I couldn’t believe that I was actually now entertaining the notion that he was indeed an alien, but at the cost of what he has been implying to do that so far seemed like too much to me. I know as well that the only one now who could answer my questions is Alexander himself.

There was nothing else in the room besides that memory to think about as I left it and walked back across the ledges and through the window that I had first entered. There were a lot of pieces so far to this puzzle of mine and Alexander’s past, but not enough to make a complete picture from it. Nothing impeded my way as I returned back through the hallway and through the door to the Back Hall. It was time to go into the storage to continue my journey.

__________________________________________________________________________

Being back inside the Back Hall made me feel much better after witnessing such a disturbing place like the study. I descended the stairs and took a minute to stand near the fountain and calm myself by watching the water while at the same time mentally fortifying myself to head into storage. I turned to my right and started my way towards the stairs. Torches lit the stairway down as I went further down. After a while the stairs met a bottom and went straight once more. The door was at the end of a long walk down the hallway. As expected, the door wouldn’t budge when I tried to open it without the key. But as soon as I pushed it into the slot and turned it, the click indicated that had changed.

__________________________________________________________________________

It was dark. Not just dark, but much darker than anything I had seen thus far. If it weren’t for a small light shining in the distance, I don’t think that I could have seen past a meter without everything being absorbed by darkness. It was so unnatural, how could the darkness be this thick? I raised my lantern, which ultimately didn’t help much more than lighting only a tiny sliver of light in front of me. It was still much better than nothing though as I took my first few nervous steps inside.

I reached the small light that I saw when I had first entered the hallway in the middle of a large room, behind it was table that had another lit candle on it but did no better at fending off the darkness swarming around it. There was, however, another journal entry, this one looked long too as several pages were there with different dates.

5th of July, 839

I went to the Canterlot library looking for answers or any further material on the orbs. My  search turned up little information that was relevant but I did manage to find a set of addresses from the remains of the camp that was sent to me. My search led to little more knowledge about my subject until I found Professor Bedrock. He knew much about the expedition and I eventually managed to get on the subject of the orbs. He told me that the orbs come from the time before the Princess’ reign. They were kept in large temples and that the also held great power. I asked him how he knew all of this and he told me that he had worked with the professor before and had even found another temple just like the one that we had found. But that one had no orb.

In the temple though were ancient writings that took months to translate but they eventually told of a story about how the orbs had been used by ancient ponies that used the orbs magic to attempt to control everything form the weather to the sun and moon. They even referenced another being, one that was also sentient but not a pony, which looked like strange creatures that stood on two legs instead of four from the statutes that they had also found. But the orbs and temples had suddenly ceased to be used anymore, and from estimates depending on the temples themselves, right around the time that the princess had taken over as ruler. It was too coincidental to what the ancients were trying to achieve to what the world is like now. He had also mentioned the Elements of Harmony from the old tales of the Mare in the Moon and how they were depicted as orbs.

I was completely amazed by all of this and asked why he hadn’t brought any of his findings to the public. To which he simply said that he was too afraid to. With the nature of the orbs and their disappearance the same time that the princess came to power, it was almost a conspiracy. And if he had put this out into the public’s view he was afraid that he might be charged with treason and conspiracy to overthrow the Princess. Thinking about it further I had ultimately agreed with his reasoning and thanked him for helping me.

As I was leaving, I overheard a shocking conversation. Apparently the geologist that I had visited only a few weeks ago had been murdered last night. Crime is usually never a big issue around here so this was something that I took especially hard. It was strange, but somehow I felt responsible for what happened to him.

The journal entry ended and skipped to another page.

14th of July, 839

I went through the rest of the professors addresses listed and found either similar information that Professor Bedrock had told me or nothing at all from their letters that I had received back, except for the very last letter that I had received. It was from the Baron of Bridleburg, of all ponies. It struck me as odd that the professor would know others so far out to the east but I didn’t think about it too much because the letter had intrigued me so much. It said nothing of the orbs or their origins like many of the other letters that I had received, only this:

“I know. I can protect you. Come to Bridleburg Castle.” Signed Alexander.

I didn’t know what to make of it. Protect me from what? Was there something after me? I managed to find a route that would take me to Bridleburg far to the east. It was a long route, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to commit so such a journey yet. As much as the letter distressed me I didn’t trust this Baron that I’ve never hear about yet. As I write though, my thoughts are being drawn to the constant nightmares that I have been having every night where a disturbing voice that cannot be described calls out to me, like from a void. I’ve had many sleepless nights for a time now since finding the orb. Tomorrow I’m going to see if I can find a doctor who can give me sedatives to help me sleep.

There was one last page after this one.

17th of July, 839

They’re all dead, all of them. The geologist, Professor Bedrock, and even the doctor that I had went to for sedatives. They all died the same way too, limbs scattered, heads split, bodies flayed. They’re all dead. And I’m positive now that it’s all my fault. Is something following me? It has to be something involving that thing that I brought back from the expedition, there are no other possible explanations for it. I didn’t mean for any of them to die, it’s not my fault. I have no choice but to trust this Alexander. He had better know what he claims, otherwise I feel that we will both be regretting this.

That was a lot of information to take in. But at least now I know why I was in this hellhole in the first place. It must have something to do with the orb and this Shadow following me. Much of what I had read had also deeply disturbed me. The entire history of these orbs seems to revolve around some sort of giant conspiracy involving the princess. How all of this related to Alexander supposedly being otherworldly though I didn’t know. But it also more confirmed what Alexander had written of in the study, this was all very disturbing, and maybe I could learn more about it once I got out and wasn’t being chased by a murderous Shadow. I just didn’t have time to be worrying about things such as that right now. Another thing too, scattered limbs and flayed flesh all sounded very familiar to what I’ve seen here as well. Much of the pieces of how I came to be here were in place now, but there was still much more going on that I didn’t know that I needed to find out. I left the entries where they were and returned to my search of the rods.

I couldn’t even see the edges of the room from the center so I had to go walk around the perimeter. I made a full sweep around the room and found only two potential areas to go into, a hallway that was forwards from the room’s center where I had entered, and a closed door to my left. There was an entrance to the right, but unfortunately the stairs only went down half way before being filled with rocks, so there was no chance of going in there.

I decided to try the room on the left first by opening it slightly and peeking inside to deem it safe before I actually entered. I didn’t trust anything down here. Another thing that I began to find myself doing was closing the doors behind me as I went through them, probably from the encounter in the guest room and that water monster. I did it in the study but found no need for it ultimately, which I wasn’t complaining about either. I would just rather have a small chance to react before being stormed by those fleshy monstrosities. The room was three rows of shelves, one on each end and one in the middle which made two walkways to the left and right. I tried the right first and found nothing of interest, on the left though were two tinderboxes and more oil. Before I managed to move another step after collecting them though it seemed that I finally got to make use out of my door system.

I heard it, that same deep growl from one of those monsters come from outside the door. I instantly went into motion and looked around, my hope drained rapidly though as I saw nothing large that I could hide behind. So I moved behind a couple of medium sized boxes in the corner and felt my heart beat faster as I was sure that the monster would finally get me this time.

A loud slam on the door once again. With each one my heart began to speed up a little faster until ultimately the door came completely down, revealing the nasty thing behind it. It was difficult to see, only an outline showed really, I saw it shuffle inside and look from left to right. I was on the verge of tears as I was sure it would spot me, but miraculously, it went to the right of the room. It went in the opposite direction of me! It looked down that side of the room quickly before turning back out and leaving, heading towards the hallway that I had seen but didn’t go down yet. The way that I have to go still, joyous. In a strange I was now somewhat thankful of the darkness, it was strange, but it did just save my life. Had it been any brighter and I’m sure that thing would have easily spotted me.

I stepped over the remnants of the door that the monster had placed and back into the main room. I decided to light the two lanterns that hung from the ceiling near the center table to light the room better. It didn’t really add anything more to viewing the room better but it definitely made me feel more secure and straighten my now blurring vision once again. I took another minute to build up some courage, as little as there was left in me now, and begin to start making my way through the rest of this storage so that I could hopefully find the rods that I needed and get out of here.

I crossed into the hallway and no sooner had I began to have a flashback.

“Please, let me go. I won’t tell anyone. I swear! I just want to go home.” It sounded like that same female voice that I had heard when I was back in the foyer.

“No! Get away from me! Leave me alone.”

Was that my memory, or someone else's? There was definitely another one present in the memory but I didn’t know who it was. It could have been me or anyone else. I hoped that it wasn’t me. The thought of killing another didn’t sit well with me at all. I continued on, stopping for a moment to look at the long blood streak on the floor from what looked like something bleeding being dragged across it. I looked away quickly and tried to forget I saw it. The hallway turned left and it was still dark so I kept my lantern out for what little light it provided.

In the distance I could constantly hear crying, crying from the same voice from the flashback. It sounded so pitiful and helpless that it tore away at my heart and I shook my head in frustration to try and get it out. After a while it had stopped, by that point I had reached the end of the hallway that I was heading down and it turned right once more. These halls were much wider than the rest of the ones I’ve been in so far, which I didn’t know if that would be either a good or a bad thing. It turned right and there was a door to my immediate right as I turned down it. I tried it but it refused to open, and I lost all interest in it as well as I saw a skull on the floor near it. The hallway came to a small set of stairs down and onto stone once more. This storage area looked much like the Refinery.

A single candle was lit and laying on the ground near the corner where the hall turned once more to the right. It went down for a while with a couple of large boulders on the sides making a tight space to move through for a while before coming to another room that looked similar yet smaller to the first one that I entered. The only path out though was to the left through another hallway. As I began to move into it I received another flashback.

“Why are you doing this? Get away from me!”

It was short, but I could hear the sounds of things moving around in the background too. I was still hoping that this was not my own memory. The hallway turned right after a short distance then came to a doorframe to the left that led into a larger room. It was separated in the middle by a single shelf that made a walkway around it. Aside from that it was nearly impossible to see anything else even with the lantern. There was one door that I could see to the right though and another doorframe all the way at the end of the room only because of a small candle next to it.

I went to the door on the right first to see if there was anything in there first like there was in the beginning of the storage area. I neared the door and did my routine by slightly opening the door do peak inside.

Rrrarghrr…

I don’t think I could describe the level of fear and shock that had just been stricken into me. I only saw a small way inside but that thing was clearly visible, and it saw me too. It started after me from inside the room. I slammed the door shut and my mind once again slipped into a fear induced panic that took over my body and forced me to run back where I came from. I would have completely frozen otherwise. I ran. I ran and ran faster and faster, feeling less fatigue as energy surged through me to get away from that thing. The door came crashing down and I heard it growl as I made it through the doorframe and down the hallway back into the small room and continually back further. The monster had more than likely not even seen me once it had broken the door down but I didn’t care. I had to get away from it.

I finally made it back to the very first room that I entered in the storage and collapsed in exhaustion besides the candles that lit the center table. My vision lagged as my head tossed about. There was the same incessant ringing that I heard when I first fully encountered one of those monsters in my head once more. My heartbeat was steadily rising still. I was clear of danger by this point but that was something that had brought me to the brink of my sanity by just going through that. Those vile, horrible things induced some sort of unnatural fear  in me that made me react this way. I was still laying on my side, barely holding on to consciousness as the blackness around my vision nearly took over.

With what little power I had left over myself I began to search through me leg bag and pulled out a Laudanum before pulling off the cover and with trembling hooves poured it into my mouth. It took a minute but the effect came fairly swiftly as I began to calm myself again. It took a few minutes, but my mind finally set back to as good as it could get and I stood once more. I was still panting pretty heavily from running such a long distance but it was time for me to actually go back. I didn’t want to go back, I didn’t want anything to do with this entire damned castle, but I had no choice by this point.

The way back to the room where I encountered the monster was clear, only I kept hearing the whimpering sound again and again to the point where it had begun to drive me mad, if I wasn’t already. I practically began to crawl through the room with the speed I was at. I took no more chances around here this time I moved on the left side of the divider and avoided the doors, apparently there were two now that I looked. I got next to the candle that lay beside the doorframe and looked inside. The only thing that I could see inside was stairs leading up. So I had to move forwards again. Like the first flashback I had in this area, as soon as I stepped through the doorframe it came to me.

I heard the sound of a knife raising. “Please, don’t do thi-” She didn’t even get to finish as I heard several slashing sounds and blood spilling before any sounds from her had stopped.

Why? Why did she have to die? Even after hearing this flashback I could still hear the crying and whimpering from her in the distance. It was really getting to me now. I had no idea who killed her or why.

As I moved towards the base of the stairs, I saw a blood trail leading up the steps. I tried to avoid it the best I could. When the stairs reached the top and leveled into another hallway that turned right and so too did the blood trail. I used my lantern here as I neared the end of the hallway. It came to a small room up at the end from what I could see with several hanging chains and a strange looking pedestal in the center. A single step across the threshold into the room was all it took before a shriek pierced my ears and the pedestal suddenly shot a flame out from the top of it and kept it lit. I collected myself again from witnessing that and moved inside cautiously. I got closer to the fire but not too close, I didn’t want to go anywhere near it, that was not traditional fire. The only room left from here was a door to the right. I really didn’t feel like opening any more doors in this place but this is where it all led to so I continued on. I opened the door ever so slightly and looked inside. No monsters. Good.

I went in and closed the door behind me. The room was small and narrow and at the end turned to the right slightly, making the room an L shape. I quickly noticed my prize on one of the shelves on the right. At least a dozen rods sat there. My hopes soared now, I could finally move of from this terrifying place. I grabbed two of the rods and placed them in my bag.

Rrrarghrr…

Of course. Because I can’t just once get anything and feel accomplished without it being torn down. Had I not experienced enough terror out of this demented storage area enough yet? I went back to where the room turned right and hid behind the giant box that was there. I didn’t hear any slamming on the door, but I could definitely hear it moving about outside. My only hope at this point was that it would somehow kill itself by the fire on the pedestal.

The loud steps eventually faded away down the hallway than I came into this room with. I went back to the surprisingly intact door and reopened it to find the monster vacant from the room. The only thing left to do now was make it back safely to the Back Hall, something that I doubted would happen. Either way, I began to make my way back. There was nothing from the hallway to the stairs and even in the room where I saw the thing face to face. I rounded the corner into the hallway where the boulders were and around again to begin heading up the stairs.

Urrrghaargghh…

I knew it couldn’t have been that easy. It was never that easy. The sound came from on top of the stairs where I was heading up but now I was running straight back into the room that was at the other end and hiding in a corner of it. I could still see the light from the candle at the far edge of the hallway at the base of the stairs that I was just at, but no monster came into view. It took me a good five minutes to regain my courage to attempt my way back over again.

There was no monster this time, though I could feel my heart beating especially heavy when I crossed through the area that I heard the monster in. I slowly rounded the corners all the way until I finally made it to the first room of the storage. By this point, I didn’t care anymore, I locked into a full sprint and kept going, ignoring anything else. I didn’t know if there was anything that sounded from behind me but all I knew was that I had reached the door safely and finally made it through and can now fix the teleporter.

__________________________________________________________________________

I made it to the base of the stairs before another flashback came to me.

“How exactly did we find this place?” I heard myself ask.

“An old friend from Canterlot had given me a map.” An unknown voice answered.

“Why isn’t he with us then? Wouldn’t he have want to come?”

“He wanted to, but things don’t always work out the way we plan, do they?”

That last part chilled me slightly. It sounded like he had meant something else by those words. That must have been the Professor that the journal entries spoke so much about. He was becoming more and more of an odd character. He clearly knew much about the orbs and the conspiracy surrounding them, but how? Who exactly was this professor?

My thoughts were cut off by the Shadow’s roar and more of the red organic material flooding the Back Hall. It was time to get the hell out of here. I rushed on towards the teleporter. As I passed the fountain I noticed that the water was now completely red with a corpse in it. I didn’t even bother to stop. I made it through the doorway into the teleporter room and navigated my way around the red flesh to the rod panel. I quickly removed the two rods from my bag and pushed them in place. As soon as the second one slid in I heard a faint humming coming from inside the wall.

I had to move faster as I saw more of the flesh beginning to cover the rest of the Back Hall from where I could see and beginning to spread into the teleprorter room. My heart was racing once more as I fought against time to begin working this thing. I ran into the small room inside the teleporter and began working. I started by shutting the metal gate and turned towards another panel on my left. Usually teleporters had several destinations that one could go to but for this one there only appeared to be one possible location that I could go. By this point, looking at the oncoming red organic wave of flesh, I didn’t care where it took me so long as I got out of here.

I pulled the large lever down and heard the low humming grow into a large rumble as I saw the rods sticking out of the wall begin to shine and glow more and more as it charged up. The flesh wave was growing even closer now. It all came down to if I had just gotten here at the right time. I saw the wave get no less than five meters from me and begin to rise to attack the metal grate before a blinding flash shot from the teleporter rods into the room and hit me.

Everything went black.

__________________________________________________________________________

I was alive. But only mere seconds from being the opposite. The teleporter had done its work and I was now standing in the open space of a large room. There were four pillars near each corner that held up the tall room and a single entrance into someplace that I didn’t know about at the end. There was a room behind me use the teleporter again to go back, but I decided it best to not do that. The only way out now was forwards.

I reached the middle of the room before the onset of a white flash indicated another memory to me.

“Come. This way,” Alexander’s now recognizable voice spoke.

I heard a loud moan in the distance before I then heard myself say “What was that?”

“Forgive me, I should have warned you before. Seeing that I have taken on the responsibility of serving as the legal system in this area, one of my duties here is being a prison warden. This is the place where we keep the convicted.”

“Like a…dungeon?”

“Indeed, very much so. Come, do not linger.”

A prison. A damned prison. Of all the places that teleporter could have taken me. Then again, I didn’t exactly have the time to be picky in my mad rush to escape before being killed.

The door at the end was becoming clearer now. It was a vertically barred iron gate, iconic for prisons I guessed. A loud wail from somewhere inside didn’t help my courage much as I entered through the gate. It was pitch dark inside so I had to use my lantern once more to see. The walls and floors were now completely stone with no sight of windows anywhere. I supposed it was because I was more than likely underground if that flashback I had previously was right about the trip through the teleporter going down.

The prison’s ceiling arched and had supports on each side made out of wood. Other than that the actual stonework looked much like the rest of the castle. The hallway was rather large too compared to many of the narrower ones that I’ve been in. It immediately turned right then left up ahead from what I could see looking down it.

My journey through the prison didn’t start of well for as soon as I took my first two steps inside I heard from a monster growling a distance away before the sounds of a gate ripping open and a terrified prisoner, or what I assumed to be a prisoner, screaming for his life before it suddenly stopped along with the monsters growling. By the end of it my eyes were wide open, even down here there were more of those things.

I attempted, rather badly as I usually do, to remove the thoughts of being shredded apart by one of those horrible things and continue on. I made it to the end of the hall and turned left before moving forwards a little more. The wide hallway that I was previously end suddenly narrowed greatly. Up further I came to a point where the path split and I could turn right or keep going forwards. This was starting to get really bad now. I’m now in a bunch of narrow hallways with lots of different paths that I could take where any one of them could easily end up running into a monster.

I’m crazy, I must be. To be down here for this long and go through all of this. How could I not be? It’s that damn urge I always seem to have, to go forwards, to push on no matter what. I don’t know what was driving me, but I had to keep going. I decided to not go down the hallway to the right but instead keep going straight. I could constantly hear the pitiful and broken moans and cries of all the prisoners throughout the prison. In a small way I hoped that I would find one and at least have someone to talk to and regain my sanity if only a little.

This path led me on for a little ways before coming to another decision on where to go, either straight still and up a set of stairs or to the left. I was going to go straight until a menacing growl from one of those vile things rang from up top of the stairs, causing me to quickly extinguish my lantern and run down to the left path without caring what was down there, except for maybe another one of those things. The hall came to a dead end quickly but there was an open cell to my right with a candle inside so I decided to get in and hopefully out of the monster’s view.

After a minute or so the thing shuffled off again back up the stairs. There was something that I had found in the room though, a hammer. Not one of those tiny woodworking ones that I saw in several places before, but rather more like a mallet. I honestly had no idea why I decided to keep it, maybe it gave me some comfort, like a false sense of security maybe. Still, this was a prison and that meant that there might be locks that I might have to break in order to get through here. Maybe, just maybe this would come into use later. There was another series of metal ripping and some pony screaming that cut off my train of thought before everything fell silent again. What exactly was the point of these monsters being here killing the prisoners? Then again what was the point of these things existing in the first place?

I made it back to the base of the stairs and began to ascend them with increasing fear as I was, once again, following a monster that was here only a minute ago. I reached the top of the stairs and saw that the path split off to the right again. I decided to ignore this as well and simply continue going straight, as I saw no monsters that way. Though after continuing though for a while the straight path suddenly ended and I now had three choices, go into the cell in front of me, to the left of me, or go down another hallway to my right. I cursed out of frustration, there were too many choices and confusing paths that made dizzy.

I shook my head hard to clear my thoughts and keep a thought process going. I first decided to try the left cell as the cell in front of me had no light coming from inside while that one did. The metal door opened with ease, though making more creaking sounds than would like because it could draw a lot of attention should any of those things be nearby. There was another lit candle on the ground with a smashed table and an overturned bed, nothing out of the ordinary from the cells that I had seen so far. Another white flash passed over my eyes and a memory came to me as I had entered.

My voice began the flashback. “Where is she? Where did she go?”

“No, I won’t tell you. Never,” An unknown female voice sounded, but it was different than the one that I heard in the storage area.

“You’re just making things worse for yourself. Look, this is no place for a young filly to be all by herself. She could be hurt or even worse down there.”

That couldn’t be me. I sounded so…angry. What could a young filly do to make me so angered that I would hurt another? This turn in character for my old self was not helping me, but the item that I had found behind the overturned bed had. It was a stone chipper. I could scarcely believe it too. Now I could break near any weak lock with this. Feeling good yet still uneasy from the flashback, I left the cell and continued straight down the dark hallway that I neglected before.

Besides another disturbing gust of wind blowing past me, I made it to the end with relative ease and found myself outside of another cell door. I slipped inside easily too with no lock guarding this door. It was lit inside this one too and another flashback came upon me as it had in the last cell.

I could hear the sound of something breaking away at stone. “But I don’t want to leave without you mother.” It was a young filly’s voice; this must have been the one that I had been referring to in the previous flashback. And I had confirmed my suspicion as soon as I heard the same unknown female voice from the flashback before begin to speak.

“You must go. Hurry, get out of here and find your way to the settlement where they can contact the princess.”

“But I don’t want to leave without you.”

“We don’t have any time to make the hole any wider. I hear someone coming, I’ll cover the hole with the bed, now hurry.”

Cover the hole with the bed? Looking at the bed in the center of the room, there was only one way to find out. Using all of my strength, I slowly dragged the bed out from its original position and I was right. I eventually revealed a small hole leading down somewhere. It was definitely too small for me to fit through though. It would seem that I would find a use for that hammer and chipper after all. This hole could have been why the hammer and chipper was here in the first place Working my way around the blocks that surrounded the hole, I finally broke away enough pieces for me to fit through. I saw no other reason to stay here so I went head first through the hole and began crawling my way through.

__________________________________________________________________________

I kept getting claustrophobic as I pushed my way through the tunnel. The walls felt like they were closing in on me the further they went. Worst of all, I kept thinking that there may be a monster in it, I would have no chance if that were the case. I finally reached an fork the path but I quickly noticed that the left path was blocked by fallen rocks, leaving me only the right one to venture through. The tunnel went on briefly before reaching a small amount of rocks blocking the entrance into another section of the prison. Pushing these out of the way were easy enough as they weren’t nearly as large or numerous as the ones that I found earlier in the tunnel. I crawled my way out of the tunnel and gave a deep breath. This hallway was even lit too.

The hall I arrived in went either to the left or to the right. The sign in front of me pointing to the right read “Kitchen”. I wasn’t exactly hungry after seeing this much blood and gore so far, but it was worth checking out. I turned right and on my way there found another path that went to the right. It ultimately turned out to be a complete waste of my time as there was one door in the hallway that wouldn’t budge and at the end was a gate with a padlock on the other side of it away from me, rendering my hammer and chipper useless. I returned onto the original path I had taken and up a set of stairs before arriving at a door to which I assumed could only be to the kitchen.

The kitchen reeked of something foul smelling. All the food that I could see upon first looked all appeared to be rotten or moldy. There was a strange green fluid in a metal barrel at the end of the room but I waited to check on that as I had found another journal entry on the table to my right upon entering.

2nd of August, 839

I finally arrived at the town of Bridleburg. It was a haven in the middle of the dense woods and was shadowed by my ultimate destination sitting on the large hill in the distance, Castle Bridleburg. My guide who had taken me all this way had advised me to wait until morning to continue on. I’m now staying at the inn and trying to sleep, but as I close my eyes the only thing I can see is the victims that died because of me back in Canterlot. They’re dead. They are dead because of me. I just can’t get over it. It’s all my fault.

It seems like all of the journal entries I’ve found thus far have been going chronologically. I had nothing else to go off of from this so I kept it in my mind but continued on, there was nothing else I could get from this unless I had more information.

I checked around the rest of the kitchen for anything useful. I only found two tinderboxes and another jar of lamp oil. But there was something interesting in the back of the kitchen, a giant barrel of acid. I heard it when I first arrived to the kitchen but didn’t actually know what it was until I got closer to it. The mixture was a nasty green and churned and bubbled inside. I was fully convinced of it being acid once I halfway dipped a rotten apple inside and when I pulled it out it the part that I had put it was completely gone. I didn’t know what to think of this either, it was interesting to find it here but ultimately seemed useless for now.

There was nothing else in this room of use so I went back to the door to continue searching through the prison. The door was closed as I had been routinely closing doors behind me now. I reopened it and started on my way.

Urrrghaagghh…

I turned right back around and slammed the door shut. That thing was right at the base of the stairs and I was sure it had spotted me too. I had to find somewhere to hide. Looking around, I saw several potential spots, but I chose the one that was at the farthest end of the room. It was inside a small corner of the room that had a brick covering that sectioned it off and made me unnoticeable from the door. A got into the furthest corner and laid down so that my body was covered by the small brick rise.

There were several smashing sounds on the door before it, like all the others, broke down and the monster came dragging inside. The closer that it got to me the more terror I felt surging through me. If it had moved past the brick that obscured me I would be instantly seen and cornered, a perfect target.

My heart was racing. Faster and faster. The closer that thing got to me, the worse I physically and psychologically got. My vision once had once again begun to blur and blacken around the edges. I had to clench my mouth shut again as my teeth began to jitter and grind like they had before. It was probably less than three meters away from me now. It made the most disgusting noises and grunts as it moved about too. I was sure that I was going to die, like all the other times I had seen it. These things almost seemed to have the power to drain hope as well.

It walked away. It actually just walked away.

It was at least ten minutes before I had gotten the courage to leave my hiding spot but once I did I saw that it was gone. I was being such a fool. Hiding like a coward every time one of those things came by. But what was I to do? Those things had incredible strength if they could knock down doors and gates. If I did anything to reveal myself I’m sure that I would die. There was no way I could fight back against those things, I would just have to keep running and hiding. But I was alive, and that’s all that mattered at the moment.

I finally did as I had originally started and left the kitchen again to continue exploring the rest of the prison and try to find a way out of it. I had made it back to where I first entered this section of the prison by tunnel with no problems, but I hadn’t gone any further that that down the hall. From the looks of it, it turned right at the end. I made it to the end fine and looked down the hall. I could see stairs leading up but the torches going up that way were all dark. So as I began to head up the stairs I lit the torches that were on the way to light my path so that I know where I had been and in case I needed to run really fast to escape something, which was very likely.

The stairs ended after a ways and turned right again. It was even darker down this hall but I could see a tiny bit of light at the end of it, and it looked like there were large rocks at the end too. I used my lantern until I made it to another torch and lit them with the tinderboxes that I had collected. It was even worse here with the darkness since I was confined to a small hallway.

The dark. It was a horrible thing. Just being in it makes me begin to feel uneasy and paranoid, like it’s always playing tricks on me. The longer I remained in complete darkness the worse I got too. I was thankful I had my lantern with me most of the time elsewise I would have more than likely gone insane by now. I was still somewhat unsure as to whether I was sane or not though already. It was hard to tell being by myself all time, the only other things that I’ve heard so far are either crying pitifully or trying to murder me.

I made it to the end of the hallway where the tiny bit of light was. It turned out it was from above with a broken section in the ceiling. That was the cruelest thing of all, knowing that there was light above me by not being able to reach it. Taunting me.

I heard several coughs coming from behind the rocks before a dying voice called out.

”Help...me…”

I gasped and backed a few steps away. The voice sounded no more after that, but it was still enough to shake me pretty hard. There was so much despair around me. I gave a heavy sigh before looking down the hallway that connected to the left. The hanging sign above read “Cell Block III”. This was a dark hallway as all the others were. I made it to the end of this one and saw that it split to the left or right.

I really had no reasoning behind my choices, but I decided to go right this time. I was blindly navigating through here either way. The hallway turned left, and then eventually came up to another potential path option, going right. This one, unlike going straight, had a light at the end, so I went down this path first.

I instantly regretted my decision for as soon as I started down this path one of those monstrosities went shuffling through past at the end of the hallway from my right side and disappeared again to my left. I would have turned back right there but I saw something in the cell up to my right that had caught my attention. I carefully made my way over to it and with my lantern I saw that it was another journal entry. I went inside, shutting the door behind me, though I didn’t know why because if one of those things came in here there was no chance for me in this tiny cell. I went over to the table and began to read it.

3rd of August, 839

It feels like I’ve finally escaped the rest of the world and all of my problems. Castle Bridleburg is a majestic creation unlike anything I’ve ever seen before atop a forested hill. It felt like another expedition to me, seeing a place as alien looking as this. The baron Alexander is a peculiar, yet gracious pony. He seems a bit disconnected with most of the world outside of Bridleburg but does know much of the history and customs of Equestria and is also not as eccentric as most of the royalty tends to be. The room given to me is much better than any inn that I had ever stayed in. But as the sun is lowered and the moon rises, the area around the castle seems to gain an eerie gloom to it. The servants of the castle are a peculiar lot, always quiet and skulking about, but I didn’t pay much mind to them. Alexander seemed pleased by my presence and told me that I had arrived just in time.

The only thing I could think about after reading this was the fact that there were others actually alive in here. I didn’t think that could even be possible with how bad this place has become. But I suppose that gave an explanation to the dozen or so corpses I’ve seen on the way here so far.

I didn’t really feel like following another one of those things unless I absolutely had to so I went back to where I started to head down this hall and returned to my original path. The hallway eventually turned to the left again and then I saw it split once again to the right. This one though had a few torches leading to the end and I could see a faint shimmer of a gate at the end. I figured it was at least worth checking out since I was sure there would be no monsters down this one, or at least if there was they would be behind a gate and it would give me time to escape.

It was definitely a gate at the end. And I could even see the way out of the prison through it as a very ornate door stood at the end of the hallway past it. But this one had a padlock in good condition on it. I tried to smash it off several times with my hammer and chipper but it wouldn’t break. Even the hollow needle to try and open in proved ineffective. It was, though, in a worse condition than the other padlock that I remembered seeing before. A sudden idea popped inside my head. Maybe that acid could break or at least weaken it so I could break it. I started to head back, but turned right down the hall that I was going down before to see if what I was thinking about the direction of this particular hallway was correct. It came to a corner and I saw another broken piece of ceiling with that same taunting light coming from it.

“That shimmering, blue light.”

I froze and my eyes shot open. My head turned from side to side and I looked around. There was nothing else near me that could speak. I looked down at my trembling legs before realizing that it was I who spoke. I just said that. I had just spoken to myself and scarcely knew it. What was happening to me? Am I really going insane? This was incredibly disturbing. What was I going to do next, start hurting myself without me knowing?

I pressed my hoof against my face and shut my eyes forcefully to try and regain my senses. It was just a slight slip, any pony else would have done the same thing if they were in my position, or so I thought. It was all really just to try and rationalize the fact that I was talking to myself. I had to keep going; maybe running into a monster will get me to stop

worrying about that for a bit.

I pressed on. The path split again to the right and I followed it all the way to the end to a cell that had a light coming from it. All of the cells were complete messes but this one had a journal entry lying on the floor next to the candle that lit the room. I began to wonder how all of these entries had gotten so scattered everywhere.

4th of August, 839

The nightmares once again woke me up in the middle of the night and for a short time I had completely forgotten where I was. Alexander found me and asked me to join him in the parlor. As I tried to calm down from another restless night; Alexander began to tell me what he knew. He told me that the orb that I had found casts a long and malicious Shadow. Not only was it a powerful item, but a dangerous one as well. Just by touching it you invoke the powers of the orb and if you are too weak to control it, the Shadow will destroy you. It’s a slow thing that lags behind the orbs wielder, killing anything that they have come into contact with on its path to retrieve the orb.

I told Alexander that I didn’t care for any powers and that I should just throw it away. Alexander told me that would be impossible because I was on its path to reclaim the orb and would die either way. With the orb though, I would at least have a chance to fight back when the time comes. I asked him what he meant and he said that he could protect me, but at a price.

‘But at a price.’ What does that mean? I at least knew more about the orb now and its effects. So this Shadow was apparently the guardian of the orb, and now it’s trying to kill me because I only touched the orb unknowing of the consequences. Fate never struck in such a cruel way before. I would have to get back to the kitchen now and get the acid to open the door.

As I was leaving to head back to the kitchen, I passed another closed cell to my left. I didn’t have the intention to look inside really but as soon as I had gotten near it a flashback entered my mind.

“I, I don’t believe this. Why, I mean why? What had I done to deserve this? It can’t be. I mean, it wasn’t my fault! Why did he have to go back in there? Why would he go back into a burning house? You don’t do that, he should have known better.”

That was definitely not my memory. I don’t know how I’m picking up memories of others, it seemed so strange. It made no sense either; all he did was ramble about burning houses and not going in them. I cleared my head of the memory and continued onwards back to the kitchen.

I had made it back to the kitchen easily as I was indeed correct about the hallway that I was in and it looped back around into the lit the path that I had set up and could now follow it back. The barrel of acid looked like it would be strong enough to break through nearly anything. I remembered now that I still had my chemical pot that I had held the other acid in previously and figured it would be the perfect container for this one. I held it very carefully as I slowly dipped it inside and retrieved a small amount of acid within it. It wasn’t much, but it was definitely enough to break or at least severely weaken the lock.

The way back to the gate was for the most part completely devoid of monsters as well. It almost unsettled me. Not finding a monster every turn seemed wrong to me by this point. I wasn’t sure whether or not to be thankful though. I arrived at the gate and checked the lock again; it was definitely in poorer condition than the others, though better than one that I could break without the use of acid apparently. I took the small amount of acid that I had and splashed it against the lock. Just as planned. The lock turned green and I could see the cracks showing in it now. It wasn’t completely gone but it was barely holding on. I took out my hammer and chipper and drove the final hit into it before it collapsed onto the ground. I smiled with triumph as I could now finally get out of this prison.

Errrarghrr…

I had barely begun to open the gate before that sounded, right behind me. I quickly glanced back and saw one of those things right at the end of the hall now madly rushing towards me. It ran very awkwardly as it shifted from side to side as it moved but it was fast none the less. I turned my head back screaming and fumbled with the gate for a second before making it through and shutting it behind me. No sooner as I closed it did a large metallic claw slam against the gate and sparks flew off to the side. In that brief moment I saw its face much more clearly than I would have ever wanted to have. I nearly froze out of fear but pulled away and didn’t give it any more time to break through any further so I ran faster now away from it. The door was right there. I moved at full speed to it and opened and closed it behind me faster than I had gotten to it.

End Part 2. Next Chapter: Part 3 Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 18 Minutes