Twilight alighted on the cracked cobblestone, releasing the magic keeping herself aloft. She was going to need every ounce of her magic to get through Tambelon, that much was certain. The filly had visions of zombies and other undead abominations rushing her at her position at any moment. She had been working on a game plan for any number of scenarios since she had first begun scheming to move down this path. She had very little that described what Grogar's personality was like, not like Catrina, so it made anticipating what he had in this place that much harder to make contingencies for. The only records about him just described him as various grades of evil and sadistic. It was a shame that most simply could not see the nuance in how sentient creatures operated. They could not see the value in the work of someone who had been an enemy. His work was simply tainted to them, unusable, and not worth recording.

All the more reason to claim his Necronomicon and all the knowledge it contained.

Twilight took a deep breath and stepped forward, only to have her sense of balance waver. The fog flooded in around her before she had time to react, and the voices of her amulet snuffed out into silence. Her vision was now filled only with the dim white of the fog. She could not even see her muzzle in front of her eyes. The fog began to move and form in her sight, taking on blotchy colors that were hard on her eyes after being in a grayed out world for as long as she had. Within moments The fog had moved and shaped into a blurry visage of a throne room. She looked down and saw a tiny, blue creature with two horns barely protruding out of its head.

Sitting on the throne were two Rams, one male and one female, in royal attire. The male was a sturdily built with an air of authority about him. His coat graduated from a deep shade of red to shimmering tips of gold. His body and form was muscular and regal, with a powerful intimidating air about him as he sat straight up on his throne. His golden eyes stared down coldly at the little blue creature before him, snarling in distaste that the feeble creature. The Queen on the other hand had shades of pink and white. Her horns were dainty and curled and distinctly feminine in how she held herself. Sadness and confusion was on her face as she looked between the little Ram and her husband.

Twilight meanwhile was still devoid of color, standing off to the side in this illusion of a throne room and merely watching this scene carry out. She kept magic at the ready, but she felt her ability severely dampened in this vision. She was simply supposed to watch this scene play out.

"You are a mistake. My mistake," The crimson Ram intoned coldly as he looked down at the blue child. The feeble blue thing brought his head low, looking into the finely knit rug as the Ram, whom Twilight assumed as its father, continued.

"Normally I would rectify my mistakes by making them go away, snuffing them out before they sullied my good name," The Ram's voice went on dispassionately, each syllable curling his mouth in a snarl as his eyes burrowed into the tiny creature, "Yet my wife, whom I had hurt by having her find out about your existence, decided that she did not want your blood shed. She is a good woman you see, she cares about life and children. Even though you are nothing more than a bastard, she still believes you should be allowed to live."

The red Ram breathed in deep through his nose, rubbing his temple with his cloven hoof before continuing. "So I am left with a bit of a conundrum. I cannot have my blood sullied by being in some orphanage or out on the streets chewing on garbage, or even living as some commoner. I also simply cannot allow a Bastard like you to be in line for the throne in any capacity either. My dear wife has assured that I will not have you executed for existing either."

A female biped moved in, a pig-like creature with long dreadlocks mingling with her servants outfit. "I have arranged a small Villa on the outskirts of my kingdom. You are going to spend the rest of your days there. You have two lines of destiny before you, little bastard. One destiny is where you stay in your guided cage, making no waves and drawing no attention to yourself as you live a life most commoners would kill for. You would stay out of my sight, and you would keep your name from being uttered in my presence by keeping your actions as quiet and uneventful as possible. If you are lucky, your life will be so uneventful that even my own sons will not care about you and your villa when they take power, after my passing. Your second destiny is one where you squander this gift that my exceedingly forgiving wife has given an undeserving bastard like you, and you step out of these simple boundaries I've laid out for you, at which case all privileges, and your life, will be forfeit, and you will immediately be executed. Your life is a gift, bestowed to you by my kind hearted wife. Thank her."

A small voice croaked out, sadness and meekness etching his voice as he did so, "Thank you, my Queen."

The king waved his cloven hoof dismissively "Vadoma, Take the bastard Grogar to the villa, ensure that I never hear his name again, or it will be your head as well."

The pig-like creature curtsied and led the little child out of the room. Twilight looked down at the little creature and to her surprise the young blue creature had her gaze, smiling broadly at her. His small, youthful voice had an echo to it now as he stared into her with his blood-red eyes, causing her coat to bristle slightly as the words brushed her ears.

"Head's up Twilight."

A fettered creature violently burst forth from where the thrones location, rushing towards Twilight at blinding speeds. She barely had enough time to throw up her shield when it was on top of her. Twilight grunted as the scene vanished entirely and she was back in the cobblestone pathway of Tambelon. The rotting corpse of one of those pig-like creatures was on top of her now, biting and slamming against her shield in a feral rage. It was frightfully strong despite being rotten, and it had no sense of self-preservation. It rammed its face into the magical barrier over and over like a hammer, its long gangling arms pounding on either side like a drum. It was jarring going from the calm scene between Grogar's parents to the grayed out Tambelon with a Zombie ruthlessly trying to kill her.

On top of this sudden attack, the amulets voices had returned in full force, hitting against her brain like a tidal wave and threatening to break her concentration. The pig-like zombie jumped over to a building and rebounded off the wall, slamming both its long arms down onto her shield with an unnatural force behind its swing. The stone beneath her cracked under the force of the attack pushing the filly's shield down.

Now that Twilight had a look at the zombie thing, noting the tattered armor barely hanging onto its body, she saw that it was a soldier of some kind. Now that she had a feel for its attacks she through out her hoof and summoned out a forceful kinetic blast while it was leaning back for the next attack. Its strange feet dug into the stone as it careened backwards, its arms flailing around as it tried to find purchase on something. Twilight didn't let it have time to recover focusing her magic into materializing a ball of flaming acid. She twisted her neck and sent the attack forward through the air near where the creature was. It struck and exploded, dousing the area in corrosive liquid. The creature's festering flesh began to eat away to the bone as it burned under both the acid and the magical flames. It struggled for a few brief moments, then fell apart into a blackened sludge.

Twilight brushed dust from the cobblestone off of her coat as she casually looked around at her surroundings. She recalled the name of these creatures between seeing them in that vision as well as the zombie that had attacked her. It was a species that went extinct some time ago by the name of the Trogals. They were one of the few biped species to have sentience in the world. She had very little knowledge about them aside from the fact that they worked for Grogar. From what this vision had told her, these Trogals were subjects of this Ram kingdom long before Grogar came to power.

That tiny child version of Grogar gave her pause though. She was unsure if this were the work of the spirit of Grogar or some very convincing illusion magic laid down before his passing, but it had a bead on her and it added another layer of danger to this place. It was a thinking entity, not just a place that had a series of traps. It was probably going to gauge her abilities, if it hadn't already, and then build its defenses around her strengths and weaknesses. If this place retained Grogar's intelligence and experience, then she would need to watch every single move she made.

Her eyes caught on a glowing blue creature peering around a run down shop. Twilight had only seen it for a second before its grinning face pulled back. The little version of Grogar was clearly wanting her to follow, and with how maze-like the place was she saw little reason not to indulge him. If he wanted to kill her, he would not have warned her of the attack. Not that this wasn't probably riddled with deadly traps, but her own diligence would keep her safe. She was confident of that much. Still, she had to remain vigilant.

With every corner she turned she managed to just spot the grinning face of the kid Grogar. It seemed to take a certain amount of glee leading her through the foggy alleys and ruined marketplaces. Corpses riddled her pathway as they walked along. Some of them were Trogals, some of them rams, and some of them looked like some strange primitive variety of unicorn. Their heads and bodies were all wrong, and their eyes were far smaller than the modern variety she knew of. It unnerved her how she always seemed to catch his gaze with every turn. His face was in exactly the same juvenile and yet sadistic smile, his eyes glistening with mirth before darting around the corner.

Some part of her felt like this was a game she was playing with someone her age. The youthful part of her, the immature side of her that was held back by the Amulet. She was being toyed with and did not like being on the receiving end of this little game, but she had the distinct feeling that if she stopped following the young Grogar she would find herself accosted by all the bodies she had passed along the way. He wanted her to follow, and she was willing to oblige if it meant getting the Necronomicon in the end.

As she turned around another path she found herself face to face with the blue creature. The Ram was smaller than her, gazing up into her eyes and grinning broadly for a long uncomfortable moment. His body formed out of dense, colored fog, its form moving slightly as it retained the kid's shape and appearance. The world around them began to gain color again as the fog took shape around the two of them. Twilight said nothing, staring the apparition directly in the eyes as she fought to control her heartbeat. It would not due to show fear right now. She knew if she showed weakness right now that this place, this Tambelon, would not be forgiving of it.

Grogar began to move, his eyes snapping away from Twilight as he began to play out a scene in front of her. he wore a cloak now, heading to a graveyard while a figure of a familiar female Trogal. She was stooped over the fresh graves before her with some bells chiming as she moved her hands. The dissonant melody and her faintly glowing body slowly but surely began to coax out the bodies others like her. It was then as the bodies were slowly rising that Grogar spoke up.

"Hello Vadoma,"

The Trogal maid jumped a bit at the use of her name. She didn't turn around, but she put her hands to her side and silenced her bells, halting the undead from its struggles to get out of its grave. She spoke up over her shoulder towards her young master.

"I knew I would be found out one of these days, though I did not think it would be you young master."

"You aren't as discreet as you believe I'm afraid. I do take notice of your absence when you are not in the Villa, and it seemed to correspond a bit to conveniently with those zombie attacks on the outskirts of the villages."

"I see..., did you come here alone young master?"

"Depends, would you try to kill me if I said yes?"

She turned to face the small blue Ram staring at her in the moonlight, her face looked troubled and conflicted in what she should do. Grogar capitalized on this in a way Twilight would have in his place.

"Why is it that you do this Vadoma? What compels you to raise the dead?"

Her face took on a crazed, almost doting expression as she looked down at the rotten dead beneath her, "Undeath, it is the most beautiful form that life can possibly take. There is freedom in it that is just not given to those whom fear deaths embrace."

the young Grogar nodded at this, and Vadoma's face grew almost mournful as she looked at her young master.

"I'm sorry my lord, I don't know if I can let you leave here alive. My work is not done you see."

Grogar smiled at her, a smile that reminded Twilight of herself, "You assume I do not share your vision Vadoma."

The clearly mentally deranged maid seemed to brighten up at this, her voice hopeful as she asked, "Do you, my lord?"

"Vadoma, you know the two paths my father dictated for me. Either I remain, in my quiet little world, doing nothing of importance and fading away without a whisper, or I do something stupid and get my head into the Guillotine. These are the options afforded to me by the King."

Sadness came across the maid as she began to raise her hands and continue her ritual. Grogar continued, "I would like to take option three."

"Option three?" confusion hit Vadoma's face, staring through one of her dreadlocks as she froze in place. The youthful blue Ram grinned towards her as the scene started to fade away. Every step was calculated as he played on his maid's affection for him.

"Yes, The option where I learn your magic and take this wretched kingdom for my own. They want to stifle me, call me a mistake, supplant my brilliance into obscurity as they go about their petty traditions. Your own life is tied to this fate as well, and it is in that sense we are almost like family,"

Grogar moved right up to her as he kept talking, his youthful voice masterfully lowering the Trogal's defenses. The pig-like creature got on her knees next to her undead, and they shared a meaningful glances between them, hers hopeful and unhinged, and his smooth and calculating even in his youth.

"Show me your magic, Vadoma. Lets show them the beauty of Undeath and reveal just how meaningless their status in this society really is."

She nodded, her eyes glistening tears of happiness as she hugged her little lord.

"Of course master, I knew you were like me! A kindred spirit! I'm so happy!"

Grogar turned to Twilight as the scene faded away, his grin sharp and demonic as his red eyes flared, their glow remaining even after the white fog consumed the vision before it faded away. In the place of the graveyard was an ornate Mausoleum, opened up to reveal a steep flight of stairs that went down into a black void. Twilight was now before the entrance of his crypt. She was sure of this.

"I had assumed this would be a test Grogar. Why are you leading me to your crypt? Not that I don't appreciate the help, but this feels a bit too easy."

She stepped back as the blue figure formed again, but this time it was not that of a child. This was him at his prime. His body as tall and muscular as his late father, with twisted horns that radiated with power. Sharp teeth grinned menacingly down at her as he hovered over her. The smokey fog did not see fit to form his legs, gradating his blue into the white of the fog.

"Oh young Twilight, the test hasn't even begun yet. Go on and try to step into the Crypt. You'll see what I mean."

Twilight nodded and did as the apparition said and tried to walk down the steps. Something halted her movements, something that made her blood run cold. While she could put her hooves and other parts of her body past this invisible barrier, there was one distinct part of herself that could not pass through this invisible force. Her Amulet's screams were reaching a crescendo now as she finally grasped what they were so terrified of. If she was going to go any further, she was going to have to leave it behind in this pocket dimension.

A deep laughter echoed through the air from behind her before the large blue head formed right next to her ear.

"If you want to go in and get my knowledge, you are going to need to do it under your own power little filly. Leave the fancy trinket behind and see what your really made of. Or, perhaps, are you afraid that all that guilt and shame that has filled your little pony soul from your actions might be a bit too much for your young mind to handle? Don't think I don't know that his amulet represses those kinds of emotions."

Twilight was frozen in place. Everything she had done, it was because she had the power enhancing and empathy repressing capabilities of the Amulet. She knew that most if not all who ended up taking off the Amulet ended up killing themselves from the onslaught of painful emotions. It was enough to have her hooves shake violently as she teetered on taking it off.

"Let me ask you little filly; Why follow down the path you did? With your brains you could have been any number of notable figures in history."

The fog formed into different versions of her, each one in little vignettes of what could have been. One showed her in a lab coat with a cute ponytail, working happily on her newest breakthrough. Another showed her revealing a new invention to a board room of stallions that had bags of bits waiting for them. Yet another had her in front of a Jury, giving a rousing speech in a dapper suit, pointing at her defendant as she made her case. Still more showed her teaching college courses, or inventing time machines, and a host of many other little windows of the possibilities she had had before this.

" Any number of suitable jobs and passions for one such as yourself. Yet it was a failure of one test," He materialized the testing room where she failed so miserably, showing her flickering, pitiful magic as it failed to open the egg, "of one school, ran by one Alicorn, that drove you into this reckless, wretched path? A bit of an overreaction, don't you think?"

She tried to pull away from the opening, but her amulet remained stuck in place now. The only way she'd be able to move now was if she took it off. She felt vulnerable for the first time since she had acquired the amulet, the power it afforded feeling hollow then.

"It was my destiny." She said, staring straight ahead. "I was supposed to pass that test. I was supposed to be her student."

"And I was supposed to live out my days in some villa, never to be heard from again. Yet while I had distaste for my destiny, you simply lost yours. Now you want to fill that void with something your young pony mind thought was similar. Your conviction is false in comparison to when I had when I stepped down this path. You are just following a childish checklist, grasping for a destiny that no longer exists. Pretending to be a demon when you are actually some lost little filly whom Harmony abandoned, during what was supposed to be the start of her blessed life of friendship and harmonious magic."

"You are wrong. I have conviction." Twilight felt naked before the spirit. Its gaze burrowed through her, reading her as easily as she had read Galia. It was in this moment she felt like a novice before the master.

"Do you? You're not just trying to fill some hole in your soul where that mark should have been? You may be able to trick the feline, but you are an open book to me, little pony. When you take off that Amulet and try to run back sobbing to the kitty, my undead will eat you alive. You will not be able to stop them, because you'll just be a normal little filly then. You won't have his trinket to make you feel bigger than you are. "

His a pillar of fog jutted out and formed into his muscular forelimb "Or, you can prove me wrong, and try to take on the trials waiting for you on your own merit, and pray that little horn of yours doesn't fail you like it did during your first test. That is, of course, if all the emotions that his little trinket is holding back doesn't drive you to off yourself first. Your doting parents and brother must be so worried about their little girl, wondering where she could have gone? I wonder how long it will take before they find out the naughty things their little child's been up to? I wonder how they would handle such news?"

"I don't care! This is the only thing that matters!"

"Then take off the Amulet filly, show me what you are really made of, and not this sham egged on by his trinket!"

Twilight let out a roar of fury and put her hoof to the amulet. She did not want to relinquish its power, not in such a crucial juncture, but she was not going to go anywhere. Every attempt to force herself out of the barrier was swiftly dispelled by the force holding her amulet. The only way she was going to move, forward or backward, was by removing the source of her augmented power. Grogar had trapped her effortlessly. Twilight tugged with all her might, wrenching the amulet off of her neck.

So many sensations happened all at once. The voices that were screaming for her to stop fell silent, and now the amulet hovered immovable in the air before her. In their place was a flood of memories that were lit in an entirely new light. Flashes of bodies and tortured screams filled the theater of her mind, causing violent emotions to rise up inside her. Her throat nearly closed up with a lump in her throat as tears streamed down her face. She was shivering in shock at her own actions, the full gravity of what she had done finally catching up with her as the grinning blue demon looked down upon her. Her mind felt so much younger now, trying to cope with things that someone her age was never meant to see or experience. She wanted to throw the amulet back on, to make these terrible feelings stop, to end this horrible pain that racked her body. She wanted the shame to leave her. She wanted to go home, back with her brother and her parents again.

"Just like I thought. You're just a little filly who thought that trinket would give you the resolve you need to go down this path. You are just a pale imitation, a fake, you do not have what it takes to walk where I have."

"No." Her voice shook as she stared at the ground, counting the cracks in the tiles. The first wave had passed, and while the feelings still hurt worse than even the voices, she did what she could to distract herself from it. She had prepared for this after all. It was on her checklist.

"No?"

"If I can contend with the constant bombardment of thousands of screaming voices, I can handle this!" Her voice was raspy as she screamed out into the air. She glared up defiantly at Grogar, even as her eyes continued to stream tears.

"I will not break! No voice or sense of guilt will drive me away from this! Do you hear me!? I will pass your tests, and I will claim the Necronomicon! With or without the Amulet! Do not underestimate me!" Her voice sounded wretched, filled with unbridled emotion, but it didn't take away from the forcefulness of her statement. Her body was shaking from every feeling that was cascading through her, yet somehow her mind had remained in tact. Perhaps it was the constant tug of war that she had with the voices, or perhaps it was something else even deeper that she didn't understand that held her together where others had given up and killed themselves, but she remained resolved.

Grogar's grin grew even wider before busting into laughter. It was loud and deep, echos distorting it and making it deeper as he continued to cackle. His body faded away as he continued, filling the air with his mirth even as he faded into the white fog.

"You have my attention filly. Proceed."

Author's Notes:

Now the fun shall begin. Stripped of her teacher, her dragon, and now her amulet, Twilight heads into Grogar's Crypt to face the harrowing trials he has in store for her.