I looked at her, slightly confused.

"What do you mean, 'There's a peculiar stallion stopping everypony from renovating it,'? Unless he owns the city, he can't do anything against the renovation," I said.

"Well normally that would be true, but I'm not sure you'd want to cross this particular stallion," Cozy said nervously.

Did Cozy really have to be so cryptic?

"Who is it? Gladmane? Prince Blueblood?"

"No... It's Stygian," she said.

The ex Pony of Shadows and now best-selling creepy, dark, depressing novel author Stygian?

"Why would Stygian be preventing us from renovating a city?"

"Haha... I probably should have told you that the city we would be renovating is The Hollow Shades..."

I gasped and widened my eyes in shock.

"The Hollow Shades? You want to renovate The Hollow Shades? Are you mad?"

She looked at me and blinked once.

"Am I supposed to say 'no'?"

I rolled my eyes.

"Really though, I wouldn't be bringing it up as an option if I didn't think it could work! I know ponies say it's 'cursed by the shadows', or whatever the gosh it is, but I went there myself, and I didn't see anything creepy or suspicious. It just looked like any other abandoned city."

"I don't know, Cozy…"

I didn't really think it was cursed either, but would we be able to convince anyone to live there if it was such a popular rumor? Then again, for ponies with nowhere else to go, anywhere was better than nowhere. For the potential business owners, it might be different, but Cozy was really good at convincing ponies to do things they wouldn't normally, and I'd try to make the city a good place to live…

Cozy could clearly tell that I was still unsure.

"Come on Diamond Tiara! Do you have any better ideas of how to convince your parents that this is worth your attention?"

She was right… The Riches were the type of ponies that would never admit they were wrong unless you literally put proof right in front of their faces.

"You know what, let's do it!"

I took a deep breath, and tried to look calm and collected. Oh, who was I kidding? I had never been so excited! I squealed a little, and gave Cozy a hug.

"Thank Golly! For a second there I thought you'd say 'no', and I may have already set up a meeting with potential restaurant, grocery, library, and antique shop owners for about two hours from now, and it would be pretty embarrassing if I couldn't tell them where the city would be…"

She looked at me innocently. I glared at her for a few seconds before we both burst into laughter.