"Please refrain from chipping any of the crystals off of my castle," Twilight commanded with a sly smile, having caught Hiccup examining the crystal walls far too closely for her liking. He shot up straight and walked away with a shamefaced grin. Twilight had taken the human right to her castle, taking a detour around most of Ponyville so that the ponies didn't see him. They had lost Rainbow Dash along the way, as she said that she had something she wanted to do. She would introduce him to them soon enough, but now didn't seem the time.

"They're just so...unbelievable! I've never seen any mineral like them where I come from," Hiccup informed Twilight as he gazed up in awe at the massive structure that glistened in the light, his eyes darting to each part of it as if he were trying to take it all in at once. "I would love to examine these more when I have some free time. I'd love to see what new things I could create with them."

"You're an inventor Hiccup?" Fluttershy asked from atop Toothless' head, the dragon being kind enough to give his new friend a lift.

"Oh, what do you know, we have another scientist on our hooves," Rarity said. "You must share some of your knowledge with Twilight, she just enjoys learning about new things."

"First I'd like to focus more on the dragon problem," Twilight cut in as she used her magic to open to doors to her castle. "Welcome to my home, Hiccup and Toothless. Make yourselves at home." Both Toothless and Hiccup's jaws dropped, hitting the crystal floors when they saw the majesty of the interior of the castle. Twilight couldn't help but smile at the awed looks of the human and dragon, whom she was starting to notice seemed to be just as expressive as its master.

"Wow...this makes all the dragon resistant buildings I helped design look like...nothing," Hiccup muttered beneath his breath as the five entered into a room with a six thrones around a star engraved in the ground.

"Don't feel too bad, the whole place was created by a magic box filled with the power of rainbows that helped us send a centaur to the depths of Tartarus!" Pinkie explained "helpfully" for Hiccup. While Hiccup tried to place what Pinkie said to any sort of reason, a small purple and green dragon ran out from a different room and skidded to a stop in front of Twilight.

"Twilight! You're finally back from your errands with the princess!" Spike exclaimed with joy as he tackled her leg, hugging it tight while Twilight wrapped a hoof around his back. "You won't believe what I managed to do with my fire in the few days that you've been gone!" Spike grinned as he broke free of Twilight's grasp before he looked over at the wide-eyed human, finally noticing Hiccup for the first time. "Oh, are you that human Twilight told me about? The dragon master?"

"By Odin's beard, he actually can talk," Hiccup whispered before he stuck out his right hand and slowly began to approach Spike, gently placing his hand upon the top of Spike's head with a small sigh. For a long moment he stood in silence with his hand upon Spike's head, before Rarity finally broke the silence.

"Um, darling? Whatever are you doing?" Rarity asked.

"Whatever he's doing, it feels nice," Spike lazily said as he closed his eyes and leaned into Hiccup's hand. In a moment Hiccup was on his knees and examining every scale, spine and tooth with wide eyes. Hiccup began to mutter under his breath as he reached underneath his chest armor and pulled out a ragged looking journal, opening it and pulling out a pencil. With quick strokes and movements he drew an accurate picture of Spike, before writing Spike at the top of the page and underlining it.

"You really are an incredible dragon," Hiccup muttered as he squinted his eyes at Spike, the young dragon puffing out his chest in pride. "But not an easy to place dragon. Not a striker, not a boulder, definitely not a tidal. What type of dragon are you?"

"That's easy! I'm a fire breather!" Spike exclaimed before inhaling deeply and unleashing a pitiful burst of green fire from his mouth. Fluttershy let out a small giggle at the sight before Toothless let out a yawn and walked over to Spike, whose eyes shrunk as he noticed the black Night Fury for the first time. He held perfectly still as Toothless prodded him with his nose, taking in a deep breath, and smiled a toothless smile at Spike before he went back to exploring the castle room.

"Well, Toothless seems to like you. No, definitely not that class either...hmm, this might take a while," Hiccup muttered while his pencil scribbled away furiously in his notebook and it wasn't until Twilight levitated the notebook out of his grasp that he broke out of his thoughts. "Hey!"

"You can focus on categorizing Spike later, but right now we need to talk about living conditions, meeting with the town, proper etiquette-"

"Aw, come on Twilight, I like the attention," Spike said before he let out a small hiccup, snapping Hiccup's attention back to the small dragon.

"A dragon that can get the hiccups? Amazing," Hiccup muttered as he pulled out another sheet of paper from a compartment in the suit and began to scribble down on the page while observing Spike. Twilight threw her head back with an exasperated sigh before looking down at the journal she still had clutched in her magic. With a shrug she opened the pages and flipped through them, quickly scanning and taking in the pictures while finding to her annoyance that she couldn't read the words.

"Most of those do not look remotely like the dragons that we have around here," Rarity muttered as she peeked over Twilight's shoulder, Twilight nodding in agreement as she saw an image of a dragon with a massive maw filled with razor sharp teeth and white, blank eyes.

"So many different variations and species. And according to this he's trained or battled all of them," Twilight noticed as she looked at a page with a giant, reddish dragon that towered over the others before her gaze turned towards Hiccup once again, the human trying to examine Spike's mouth. "Seems we really did get a dragon master."

"So what's up with the six thrones?" Hiccup asked while looking inside of Spike's throat, holding open the dragon's mouth with his hands. "You said that you were a princess and that you had superiors. Are these their thrones?"

"No, those are for me and my friends. We are the champions of friendship and work to unite all who live in this land," Twilight explained as she walked over to her own throne while Hiccup pulled his head out of Spike's mouth, letting the dragon go. Twilight levitated the notebook back to Hiccup as she continued to speak. "See, each of my friends is a member and when all of us are together we can unleash a power far greater than any other magic in the land. By looking at the markings on our thrones, you can tell which one belongs to whom. This one is obviously mine," Twilight said with pride as she sat upon the throne with her cutie mark.

"So Rainbow, Fluttershy, Rarity, Pinkie...wait, who's that one?" Hiccup asked as he pointed to the one with apples on it.

"Oh, that belongs to Applejack, our resident honest pony. She's off delivering apples to another part of Equestria, but she should be back soon," Twilight explained as she rose off her throne and pulled out a map of the castle. "Let's see, I have a few rooms available in the lower part of the castle if you're fine with that, but if not I've got a spare bedroom up in the-"

"Nah, I'll just use Toothless for a bed. I've done it before whenever I'm gone from my home for awhile...like now," Hiccup said as realization began to cloud his eyes and he sat down next to his dragon with both hands massaging the sides of his head. 'But just how long am I going to be in this strange land? How long can Berk last without me? With all of our enemies and Drago still being out there? Astrid should be able to cover for me for a few days, but eventually they're going to need me...'

"Hiccup? Are you alright?" Fluttershy asked, stepping down from Toothless' head when she saw Hiccup's eyes change. He shook his head once and gave a tired smile to the Pegasus before looking at her wings with a curious expression.

"You know, I had only read about Pegasus in myths and legends, kinda like the unicorns. How many different variations of ponies are there?" Hiccup asked.

"Three, for the most part. Earth, Pegasus and Unicorn," Rarity explained with a kind smile, cutting Twilight off before she could start. "Unicorns are magical, pegasi can fly and Earth ponies are exceptionally skilled with the mud and grime that I would rather not touch."

"But then there are alicorns like me, a mix of all three," Twilight added as she walked beside Rarity. "Alicorns, at least as long as there has been written history, have been the rulers of Equestria, aside from the few times evil has tried to overthrow them."

"Interesting. A ruler is picked depending on their...features instead of it being passed down through family," Hiccup muttered, getting a curious eyebrow raise from Twilight.

"Seems that your world's hierarchy is different from the humans I...know of," Twilight quickly fixed before revealing too much to Hiccup. "You said that leadership is passed down through families?"

"Right. My dad is...was the chief of Berk, but now I am," Hiccup said with a small sigh as he slightly hung his head. Toothless blinked twice before wrapping his tail around Hiccup and licking the top of his head, getting both Hiccup and Rarity to exclaim in disgust as Hiccup was covered in saliva.

"So...you're kind of like a king then?" Rarity asked before adjusting her mane and putting on her prettiest face. "Hello there Hiccup, my name is Rarity."

"Chief is the more accurate term," Hiccup corrected as he wiped the dragon saliva off of his suit and flicked it onto Toothless, who grunted as he tried to paw the spit off of his face. Hiccup then looked up through one of the windows at the sky, trying to take in everything that he had learned in the past couple of hours. "This is all a lot to take in. Do you guys mind if I go sort all of this out?"

"Er, I guess not?" Twilight answered. Hiccup nodded before hopping onto Toothless' back in one well-practiced motion, sliding his foot and metal leg into the stirrups on either side of the Night Fury. He rotated his leg twice and the fin on Toothless' tail responded by moving, getting a smile out of Hiccup before he looked down at Toothless and said, "Let's go flying, Bud."

With a roar of happiness Toothless bounded out of the castle foyer and blasted open the doors with a ball of fire, Hiccup apologizing to the ponies over his shoulder before Toothless rocketed outside and shot into the sky with a burst of speed. Twilight and the other ponies ran outside to see that the Night Fury had already ascended rapidly into the sky, getting an impressed look from Spike.

"Wow, that dragon's fast! I don't know too many dragons that can fly like that," he exclaimed.

"Spike...you don't know too many dragons at all," Twilight reminded him.

"I rest my case."

High above the land, Hiccup could see just how strange this place was from his cold and tough home. Where Berk blew cold air, the air in this land was warm and comforting. Where Berk was grey and mostly rock, Equestria was filled with life and color, so much so that it was a little hard on his eyes.

'It's hard to believe, but even harder to deny. I'm definitely in a different world now. Still half-thinking this is a trick by Loki,' Hiccup mused as he shifted his foot, allowing Toothless to spin to the side and dive down slightly, giving the pair a closer look and the lands below. But as they flew, they quickly found an area of land where the ground was scorched and the smell of a smoke was all too familiar to the both of them. It clung to the air. Hiccup knew what he was going to find before he even saw the torched village, but his stomach sank a bit as he and Toothless gazed over the burned buildings and blackened landscape.

"Seems that she was telling the truth and they do need our help. Talking, magical ponies need our help...this is definitely one of our strangest days," Hiccup said with a shake of his head before patting Toothless on the top of his head. "What do you think, Bud? Think we should figure out a way to get home or should we stay and help these ponies with their dragon problems?"

Toothless' response was to dive down to the town and land dead center in what used to be the square, looking around as he inhaled the air. The dragon's eyes narrowed as it began to move around, sniffing while his eyes moved left and right.

"Smell something, Bud? Is it the dragon that attacked this place?" Hiccup asked, but at that moment Toothless let out a roar of fury and whipped both himself and Hiccup around quickly, fire in his mouth as he looked around for the being that was watching them. But despite nearly feeling the eyes upon him, Toothless found that they were alone. He slowly let the fire die in his mouth before letting out another roar and taking back to the sky with a confused Hiccup in tow.

Yet, while he had been unable to see anything or anyone there, Toothless was certain that they had been watched, that there was something there that his regular sense just didn't see. And whatever it was, he didn't like it and wanted to get Hiccup as far away from it as he could. But as the dragon tore through the sky on his way back to the town, he made sure to remember what the sensation felt like in case it ever appeared again.

And he would be ready if it did.

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"And finally, you appear," a silky voice muttered, yet there was a darkness that clung to every word, a voice as dark as the inky black cave in which the voice took refuge. Yet in the darkness, a white, toothy smile could faintly be seen as the owner of the voice opened their eyes, eyes that were just as white as the smile. "I was not sure whether or not you would come so quickly, but it seems that the dragon master is finally here."

The voice then rose from a throne that was made with the bones of numerous different beings and sauntered into the cave, away from the throne of bones that had been charred black by an intense heat, heat that came from the very dragons that the master was there to combat. The voice came to a stop in front of a massive mountain of fire and scales, yet fear never once crossed her eyes as she poked it with her hooves.

"There's a place I want you to go and a...master that I want you to test," the alluring voice spoke, causing the massive dragon to lift its head and gaze down at her with pure red eyes. "Ponyville. Do whatever you need to draw out the master and test his abilities. If he isn't as good as I've seen, then I have no issues with you killing all of them. Fly quickly now."

The dragon bellowed as it flapped its wings, rising to its full height before hurling itself towards the exit of the cave in a fury of power and flame, leaving the voice all alone as another toothy smile broke out across its face. "Yes, with the dragon master here, nearly all of the players are in place. And when they are all together, then we shall see if this vision of death is truly as entertaining as I believe it to be."