Chapter 1: Enter the Cliche!

-Four years after the events of Prologue.

Asuya was on patrol in the Everfree Forest, making sure that none of the creatures in the forest left and caused havoc in nearby villages. He had had some altercations with a pack of manticores a few weeks ago, so he made sure to keep and eye out for anything and everything that sounded suspicious. He was just about to make his way back to Zecora's hut to check to see if she needed anything from him, when he heard a pony scream off in the distance. With that, Asuya bolted off in the direction of the sound as fast as he could given the constricted space in the forest. He flew straight to the edge of the forest, only to find a lavender unicorn with a darker purple mane and tail with a lighter streak of pink along the length of both under one of the manticores from a few weeks ago. Seeing this, he charged the unknowing beast in an attempt to release the unicorn from the beast's grip. He was successful in this and held out his hoof to the unicorn mare and helped her onto her hooves.

Looked into the mare's eyes and asked "Hey, are you OK? Did you get hit by that manticore's tail?"

The lavender mare looked back, obviously impressed at Asuya's charge "Yeah... yeah, I did get scratched a little, but I'll be fine."

Asuya nodded and turned back to the manticore, who was getting up from the ground "Listen ma'am, I know we just met and everything, but you need to trust me when I say this: Go back to your house NOW. I've seen this manticore in the forest before, and things are about to get incredibly dangerous." He then looked back at the mare, looking for the scratch mark. Upon seeing it, he relaxed a little "Well then, I've got good news for you. That little scratch you got isn't dangerous at all. Granted you lose use of your magic until the venom exits your body, you shouldn't feel any other side-effects."

The unicorn blinked and tilted her head "How can you tell?"

Asuya steeled himself once he heard the sound of the manticore's roar and turned to face the ugly beast. "If we met again, maybe I'll tell you, but as of now you need to leave"

With that, the unicorn started to protest, but before she could even say anything, another manticore lunged at her. Fearing for her life, she attempted to use magic on the beast, only to find that she couldn't. Just as the beast was about to land, Asuya landed a left-hoof uppercut to the monster's gut, effectively stopping it's momentum enough for Asuya to roundhouse the manticore over towards the first. Asuya then proceeded to take a defensive stance between the unicorn and the manticores. Good thing too, because the manticores both charged the stallion which they had a grudge against. If you can imagine a DBZ type fight, where all involved are attacking and dodging really fast, take that and slow it down, and replace the aliens that you would probably see with two manticores and the hero with Asuya, and that's basically how the fight took place. After Asuya had literally knocked both manticores back a good 10 to 20 feet, it could been seen that he hadn't a scratch on him.

He turned around and looked at the unicorn, who was staring at Asuya wide-eyed due to what she had just witnessed "Go NOW! Before you get hurt!"

The unicorn shook her head and stood beside the stallion "No! I'm not letting anypony fight two manticores alone!"

Asuya looked across the field and to his dismay saw the rest of the manticore family he encountered last week appearing from the forest. With urgency in his voice, he yelled at the unicorn mare "Listen, while I appreciate the help, you'll get killed if you stay! I've handled these beasts on my own before. I need you to go now while you still can! And don't even THINK of coming back with reinforcements!"

The unicorn blinked and saw the the family of six manticores across the field. She was absolutely terrified, and while she didn't want to leave this stallion, there was something about him that she trusted. She turned tail and fled, shout as she did so "Don't you die yet, i never even learned your name yet!"

Asuya waited for the unicorn to be out of sight, then he turned towards the beasts before him and taunted the largest of the six "Come at me bro."

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Twilight was running as fast as she could to get to Fluttershy's cottage. She was scared to death of those manticores, but that stallion had saved her life from the first one and she refused to just leave him completely. Hopefully Fluttershy knows about manticores and can help him She thought Hell, if nothing else, her knowledge in first-aid will be helpful. She finished her thought right as she reached the door to the little cottage on the outskirts of town. Where she would normally knock elegantly and quietly as not to startle her friend, she knocked frantically, hoping that Fluttershy would be home. Twilight's knocking startled somepony inside enough to make them drop something, causing it to break upon hitting the floor. After a few minutes, probably because the pony inside was cleaning the mess, a yellow pegasus with a pink mane and tail timidly cracked open the door to see who was knocking. Upon seeing Twilight's extremely worried/fearful expression, Fluttershy immediately opened the door fully to let her friend.

Fluttershy was to shocked at her friend's expression to be timid and audibly said "Oh my goodness! What happened Twilight?"

Twilight shook her head "I was just coming back from visiting Zecora, when a wild manticore jumped on top of me!"

Before she could even finish her story, Fluttershy gasped "A manticore attacked you? Are you alright?"

Twilight nodded, but still seemed freaked out "Yeah, I'm fine. But that's not the problem! A pegasus stallion rushed out of the forest and knocked the manticore off of me before it could hurt me too much. Then another manticore appeared from the woods! I thought that I might've been able to help him, but he told me to leave as he fought off both of the manticores before they could get to me. When the fight was over and he knocked them back a good distance, he didn't even have a single scratch on his body."

Fluttershy stood there, mouth agape at what she just heard. A pegasus that can fight off two manticores while defending somepony else and end up without even a single scratch? It didn't even seem possible to her. "Is he going to be ok?"

Twilight shook her head and started shaking a little "I doubt it. He told me to leave and not to come back, even if I brought help. Had it not been for four more manticores showing up, I would've ignored his warnings. I trusted him for some reason and he saved my life, so I decided to come here in the hopes that you might be able to help him."

If her jaw could have fallen off of her face, it would have. Fluttershy had never heard of six manticores gathered in one place at a time. Let alone a pegasus that even thought of trying to fight off all of them to defend an unicorn that he had never met, it just was mind-blowing. Fluttershy snapped out of her trance and nodded to Twilight "Let me go wake up Luna. She's been staying with me to try and change her image around here, and she's really good with healing magic." With that, Fluttershy floated through the house to go find Princess Luna. She explained Luna about what was going on, and they both came outside, with med-kits and everything, and nodded at Twilight, signaling that they where ready.

Twilight nodded back to the midnight blue princess and her yellow pegasus friend and began to run of in the direction of the clear "He's this way! Hurry, maybe well get there in time to help him!"

And at that they all rushed off to the clearing just outside the Everfree.

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Asuya dodged attack after attack  from the alpha manticore, continually countering with his own attacks.  So long as they only come at me one by one, I should be fine. Asuya thought If I'm lucky, I won't have to revert to that again... His thoughts where interrupted as he was tackled from behind by one of the other manticores, and pinned to the ground. He turned his head to see the other five charging at him, vengeance obvious in there features. Asuya sighed Damn. There goes that. he thought as he proceeded to glow with a green light similar to the one from four years ago when he was trying to stop his adoptive father. Asuya disappeared in a flash of light, and reappeared right behind the manticore that charged him. However, he was in full battle mode, and was no longer a pony, but rather a human. (looks like this, and this is just a screenshot from Cabal Online, ESTsoft Corp. http://asuya-syndori.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d32gxlv)

Asuya grinned as he enchanted his sword "Heh, you all really messed with the wrong pony today. I may have gone easy on you a few weeks ago, but not today. You forced me to use this accursed form and you're going to pay for it."

At that, he launched a runic projectile at the largest manticore using his sword, and then closed the gap of a few feet in a few seconds. His sword was glowing an earthly dark green and had a similarly coloured liquid dripping from it as he phased in and out of existence around the manticore multiple times, cutting the beast and reappearing in a new place each time. After a few seconds of this, the elder manticore slumped to the ground with deep gash wounds releasing blood in large gushes.  Asuya then turned and faced the female manticore that tackled him earlier and raised his hand, which then proceeded to glow. After literally a second, five obsidian spikes launched themselves from the ground and impaled the unfortunate manticore, killing it instantly as on spike imbedded itself the the beasts skull. The four younger creatures seemed to understand that this was fight that they weren't winning, so the attempted to turn tail and run. But Asuya had other plans, and commanded the earth below them to insnare them so that he could deal with them once and for all. He silently walked over to the on closest to the edge of the forest and slammed his palm into the ground, causing the earth wrapped around the manticore to pull the poor beast underground, burying it alive. Asuya got up and sheathed his sword in the scabbard at his left hip, he wouldn't need it anymore. As he walked up to the next two manticores, he grabbed onto the side of their heads and electrocuted them right on the spot, the earthen vines retracting to the ground as the charred creatures dropped dead. Asuya was grinning like a madman as he walked up to the last one and decided the last one to suffer a fate that could possible be harsher than death. Asuya snapped his fingers and the last manticore was transported into the middle of the Everfree Forest without injury, but also alone and having to live with the memory of seeing his entire family killed right before his eyes.

After he transported the manticore away and buried the rest of the bodies, as to let them decompose and fertilize the forest, he glowed once more as he reverted back to his normal for: a pony. After reverting back to normal, Asuya decided to inspect himself for any injuries. Unfortunately, he had been hit by a few stray tails after that lavender unicorn left, as well as getting impaled by the tail of the manticore that tackled him, leaving a gapping hole in his stomach. Asuya grunted as he stretched his wings and began to try and fly, but fell immediately afterwords due to the manticore venom finally taking effect on him. As his struggled to stand back up, he saw three silhouettes on the horizon heading towards him. Low and behold, the three silhouettes where three ponies, one of which was the unicorn from earlier. Asuya grunted and turned around, trying to get to the forest so that he could hide from the ponies. The venom however had other plans, s he found it increasingly hard to move.

As the lavender unicorn saw Asuya, she started to run as fast as she possibly could, worry in her eyes. As she reached Asuya, she hugged him, it just felt right to her for some reason.

Asuya grunted as he was hugged and tried to break it "I thought I told you stay away."

The lavender unicorn stopped hugging Asuya and inspected him, gasping at how many wounds he had "Well you should be thankful that I didn't, just look at you!" She looked at the two other ponies as they landed "Luna, do you know an spells to remove manticore venom?"

The midnight blue pony with a mane that reminded Asuya of the night sky simply nodded, and he gasped as he noticed that this pony was an alicorn. "Wh...wh...who are you two?" Asuya said shakily.

The midnight blue alicorn just shook her head as her horn began to glow "That's not important. Right now, we need to get you healed up. Now this will hurt, but it'll remove the venom from your system."

Asuya grunted as the spell progressed and boiled his blood to expunge the venom. It hurt like freaking hell, but he just stood his ground and kept from bolting away from the group of ponies.

While the midnight blue alicorn was tending to the venom, the yellow pegasus with a Pink mane and tail reached into her first aid kit and shyly approached Asuya. She then saw the hole in his stomach and gasped, and immediately started to tend to the wound.

The yellow pegasus looked directly at her lavender friend, concern obvious in her voice "Hey Twilight, ummm... could you come here, that is... if it's not to much to ask..."

The lavender unicorn nodded "Sure, what do you need me to do Fluttershy?"

The pegasus just motioned to the chest wound and said with an air of authority "I need you to help me apply the salve and then bandage him up. Once we're done we need to take him to the hospital as soon as Luna's done expunging the venom."

The lavender unicorn nodded and used her magic to start applying the salve onto Asuya's chest where the wound was while the yellow pegasus was applying the same salve to the wound on his back. Between the pain from the alicorn's spell, the intense burn from the salve, as well as the blood lose from all of his wounds, Asuya just couldn't hold out any longer and blacked out.

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Asuya woke up only to find himself restrained to a bed in a white room with all sorts of medical equipment setup around him. Gee, just like the incident four years ago. Asuya thought. Only a few seconds after he opened his eyes though, a group of ponies all stood up, all with a mixture of emotions. The lavender unicorn from earlier seemed to be immensely relieved that he was awake, as did the yellow pegasus and the midnight blue alicorn. There was another unicorn in the room as well, bearing stunningly white fur and an overly styled purple mane and tail. When Asuya turned to face the white unicorn, she giggled and blushed a bit. I don't know, nor do I even want to. Asuya thought as he looked at the rest of the ponies in the room. The only two left that he'd yet to see was a pure white alicorn with a pastel coloured mane and tail that seemed to move of it's own volition, just like the midnight blue alicorn from earlier. She was a good head or two taller than the rest, and smiled at him reassuringly, which didn't make Asuya anymore comfortable. Lastly, Asuya turned his head to see a cyan pegasus with a chromatic mane and tail. She was looking at him with a raised eyebrow, almost as if she was sayingWho is this joker? Asuya sighed and looked back to the three that helped him after the fight, and they all were obviously worried for him. Asuya then realized that every single pony in his room was female, and that freaked him out for some reason. His eyes went wide and tried his best to hide from his guests, shaking a little as he did so.

The lavender unicorn was the first to react and walked over to Asuya's bed "Are you OK?"

Asuya stopped shivering and looked at the lavender unicorn with a face that said Are you fucking kidding me? She got the hint and sat on the bed, worry obvious in her features "What's wrong? Do you want to talk about it?"

That's when the chromatic pegasus spoke up "Uh, hey Twi? Don't you think it would be best if we all introduced ourselves to the guy?"

The lavender unicorn nodded and stood up, reaching her hoof out as she did so "Good point. My name is Twilight Sparkle and these are my some of my friends"

The midnight blue alicorn nodded her head "I am Princess Luna. But please just call me Luna. The title princess is just too formal for me"

The white unicorn then bowed slightly "Greetings, my name is Rarity." and when she noticed Asuya's mane she kinda flipped into designer mode "Oh darling you just HAVE to let me do something to your mane! I mean just look at it."

Asuya raised an eyebrow at that, but decided to let his though slide in an attempt to be polite to his guests.

Then the chromatic pony walked over to Asuya and posed just a little bit "And I'm Rainbow Dash! I was named 'Best Young Flier' last year and I am the ONLY pony to have pulled off the Sonic Rainboom!"

Before Asuya could even respond to the pegasus, the regal looking white alicorn bowed and smiled warmly "And you should probably know me already. But just incase, my name is Princess Celestia."

And THAT's when Asuya freaked out and tried to get out of the bed. Unfortunately for him, he was bound to the bed. After his futile attempt at escape, he just slumped back into the bed and looked at the yellow pegasus with a raised eyebrow since she had yet to introduce herself.

The yellow pegasus picked up on the attention and hide behind her mane a little and almost inaudibly to the rest said "Um... my... my name is... um... Fluttershy."

Asuya nodded, understanding not to push for more information out of the yellow pegasus, and looked back at the unicorn named Twilight Sparkle quizzically.

Twilight looked at Asuya and leaned in a little bit "So, what's your name then?"

Asuya hung his head and sighed, knowing that there was no way out of this situation "Asuya."

Twilight then raised an eyebrow and tilted her head "Asuya? Well then, that's an odd name." Then she got curious and grabbed the blanket covering Asuya "Hey, do you mind if I take a look at your cutie mark?"

Asuya cringed and looked away, but then sighed and nodded.

After she got the OK to, Twilight pulled back the blanket enough to reveal Asuya's cutie mark, only to reveal a blank flank. This drew mixed reactions from the group of ponies. Hearing something from Asuya's direction, Twilight looked at him only to see him crying. Twilight went over the Asuya and hugged him, apologizing for embarrassing him. Given the fact that he was 1. bound to the bed still and 2. understood that it would be rude to pull away from the hug, Asuya just laid there, getting hugged by Twilight, and decided to man up a little.

Asuya waited until Twilight had finished hugging him, and then looked at Princess Celestia "Would t be too much to ask to be unbound from this bed? But, um... if it's not, then that's fine I guess..."

Princess Celestia nodded as her horn started to glow, using her magic to removing the leather binds around Asuya "There, is that any better?"

Asuya nodded and got up, stretching his wings as he did so. What he didn't expect was the reaction he got. All off the ponies in the room, including both princesses, had their mouths agape as they saw his wings. Noticing this, Asuya quickly retracted his wings and hung his head "I'm sorry... I didn't mean to startle you..." Luna walked over to Asuya and showed him her own wings. They were identical to his, minus the colour of course. And that's when Asuya snapped for like the second time. He didn't know that the lunar princess had wings so similar to his and instantly jumped to the conclusion that the group around him would suspect him of some crime. He bolted for the wind in an attempt to escape. He made it out the window only to be tackled be Rainbow Dash.

"And just where do you think you're going mister?" Dash said during their free fall

Asuya regained his composure and floated midair "I'm going Home!" and he turned towards the Everfree.

But but before he could even go anywhere, Asuya was caught in Celestia's magic and lifted back into the room. She put him down and raised an eyebrow "Now what was that for?"

Asuya's eyes were as wide as dinner plates due to fear and he slumped to the floor "Please don't kill me your majesty..."

Luna then went over to Asuya and hugged him, like Twilight, but longer "Now why in the world would we kill the stallion that saved Twilight?"

At this point, Asuya's mind was racing and he was starting to realize that he had just let fear get the better of him, and he began to cry once more. (Yes, cause he's man enough to cry a lot.) All of the other ponies in the room came into hug him as well. Fluttershy Was on his left while Luna was on his right, Twilight was on top of him to his right, with Rainbow coming back into the room and joining in on the group hug by landing next to Twilight. Princess Celestia did what she always did in such a situation and just bent her head down and nuzzled Asuya, with Rarity doing the same for fear of messing up he mane.

As the group hug disbanded, Asuya just stayed where he was on the floor, utterly ashamed of his attempt to escape. "I'm.... I'm... I'm sorry...."

Rarity looked at Asuya with a bit of confusion "Well what ever for darling?"

Asuya looked away from the group "Well, because I caused so much trouble and tried to escape..."

Princess Celestia smiled "Don't worry about it. Besides, you didn't cause any trouble at all."

A knock heard at the door and Princess Celestia responded "Who is it?"

A male voice replied from the other side of the door "It's us Princess. We got your letter and want to check up on him"

Princess Celestia nodded and opened the door via her magic and let two ponies through the door. One male and on female, both pegasus and both in wind suits. The stallion had a palish blue coat and a darker blue mane and tail, while the mare had an orange coat with a mane and tail that looked similar to fire. As the mare walked in, she turned her head to see Asuya, gasped, and rushed over to him.

She hugged him to the point of strangulation, tears starting to form in her eyes "Oh my gosh, Asuya! What happened to you?"

"Ack! Can't... breath..." Asuya choked out through the mare's death hug

The mare blushed and loosened her grip "Hehe... sorry about that. But what happened to you Asu?"

Asuya sighed and looked  away from the mare "Well... um... l... um.... kind of fought off some manticores..."

The mare's jaw dropped upon hearing this "Well why the hell would you go and do that?"

Twilight came and sat down next to Asuya, leaning on him a little "He was saving me. He fought off six manticores to save me."

This caused everypony to gasp again, everypony's eye's wide with shock. The newly arrived pegasus mare looked at Asuya with a mixture of shock and admiration "Is true Asu? Did you really fight six manticores?"

Asuya nodded hesitantly "Yes, Spitfire. But it's nothing to be proud of..."

The pegasus stallion looked at Asuya as if he were crazy "Wait, wait, wait. Lemme get this straight... you fought off SIX manticores and, although I'm assuming this, WON yet you're not proud of such an accomplishment?"

Asuya nodded "Yes Soarin', that sums it up pretty well." then a thought struck him "Hey... how long have I been out for?"

They all looked away, Luna being the one to break the news "2 Months."

Asuya raised an eyebrow and thought to himself Really? I've only been out for two months? Damn, that's a lot faster than the recovery time on my own and tried to get up, but couldn't because Twilight was still leaning on him and Spit was still hugging him fiercely "Uhh, may I get up now?"

Twilight and Spitfyre both said in no unison and both snuggled that little bit closer to Asuya.

Soarin' decided that Spit would be fine and would probably not leave Asuya alone for a while anyway, so he walked towards the door "Well, I've got a feelin' that Spit will be hear for a while, so I'm going to go work with the Wonderbolts in her absence. Take care Asuya. Feel free to come train with us whenever, it'll be nice to have an old friend to race with again. You can come to Dash, so long as your around that is."

Everyone said their goodbyes to Soarin' and Rainbow, since she decided to take him up on his offer. Princess Celestia said she needed Rarity's help with a design for the next Gala, which Rarity happily agreed too. Luna and Fluttershy came and went seeing as how they were the ponies taking care of Asuya's wounds, but were otherwise off to enjoy the day. Twilight decided to stay with Asuya for as long as it took for him to get better, snuggling up to him whenever possible. Spitfire also decided to stay with Asuya, trying to catch up with the former Wonderbolt and also snuggle with him as much as she possiblly could. They both even slept in his room, despite his argument, each once again trying to snuggle up to him.

After both Twilight and Spitfire appeared to have fallen asleep, Asuya climbed out the window and flew up to the roof and started to sing. He sat up there for a few hours, with two mares listening to him through the window, singing to his hearts content and eventually flew back into the room, Spit and Twilight both still in bed asleep for all he knew, and decided to sleep on the floor. That night he dreamed of one thing

He dreamed of the day four years ago when he lost his sister, and how he vowed to find her one day.

Authors Note: I know that this idea about Asuya's Bipedal form is cliche, but there are some aspects to his character that I want and need to keep, and him being a pony makes it difficult. I'm terribly sorry if it bothers you, but I've already strayed a lot from his original character and somethings about him just don't cleanly transfer over to being a pony. Sorry T-T