After his misadventure with Zecora, and every single resident of Ponyville, The Forgemaster went back to his house for some R&R. He changed out of his Drill Sergeant's uniform and carefully hung it up. He then put on his normal clothes, although, he was kind of upset that he lost one of his outfits, he was still happy considering he received an even better uniform in exchange. After changing, he went downstairs to his living room and made himself some lunch. He sat down at the table with his lunch and 3 books, 3 of the only books in Equestria Celestia hadn't already read, and started to eat and read simultaneously. After around an hour, a knock was heard at the door.

"Enter." The Forgemaster said.

In response to his word, the door opened to reveal a very sweaty Twilight Sparkle, still in her military uniform, glaring at him.

Very seriously, The Forgemaster asked, "How was PT with Cpl. Applejack?"

With her angry eyes still locked on his, she said, "You have some explaining to do."

"Is that anyway to speak to your Drill Sergeant, scumbag!" The Forgemaster yelled at her, "Drop and give me 20 push-ups!"

The extremely startled Twilight immediately got down and started on her pushups. After about 5 of them, she snapped out of her daze and stopped. She stood back up and glared at him even angrier than before.

"Stop ordering me around! I'm not a recruit, nor a maggot, nor a scumbag! And you aren't a Drill Sergeant, whatever that is. To be honest, no-pony out there knows what a Corporal is, or what a Private is, or what a Drill Sergeant is!"

He shrugged, "Try living with Spartans for a century."

"Ugh! This isn't what I came here to talk with you about! I came to ask why you don't consider me or my friends your friends."

He glared at her, "Twilight Sparkle, there is a good reason why I cannot be your friend, a very fundamental reason."

"What is that reason, Forgemaster?"

His eyes hardened, "Because friends die!"

Twilight became confused, "So? What does that have to do with anything?"

"I CAN'T!"

She was too shocked to respond.

"Twilight Sparkle, I've lived a very long time, I've had many, many friends. And do you know what I've learned? I learned that friends are great, until the moment they die and you don't. Do you know the feeling that you get when you watch your friends age, wither, and die, while you stay the exact same as the day you met them? It is not a good feeling, Twilight Sparkle. I've found that loneliness is preferable to watching friends die, time and time again." His voice slowly became quieter as he spoke, eventually just becoming a whisper.

He sighed, and then continued, "Twilight Sparkle, I know you wish to be my friends, but for both your sanity and mine, it will never be so. However, there is one thing that you could do that would allow us to be friends."

Twilight had gotten more depressed the more The Forgemaster spoke, so when he said that there was hope for them being friends after all, she jumped at the chance, "What is it, Forgemaster? We'll do anything!"

"It's very simple, actually. If you want to be my friend, you must first unlock the secret to immortality."

Twilight spoke before she could think, "But that's impossible!"

"Exactly, Twilight Sparkle, Exactly." The Forgemaster said, in a very quiet voice.

Twilight stood there, horrified by what she had done. She had destroyed her own argument!

"Leave, Twilight Sparkle, I wish to be alone."

She left, and he shut the door behind her. She left thinking of all the ways she could fix the situation. He stayed thinking about his past, and all the friends he had lost.

The Forgemaster had been moping about his house for several hours, and it was getting dark now. He had turned back all the attempts by the ponies to contact him, eventually resorting to fortifying his home. After Big Macintosh and Applejack forced their way through that, they were surprised to see The Forgemaster and several other of his kind in his home. They were all wearing golden armor and were armed with spears and golden shields. Big Mac and Applejack were pushed back by these creatures and The Forgemaster, wearing the same armor, and they fled the house.

As they left, one of the newcomers spoke to them,"Spartans protect their own!"

Then the one who had spoken and the other newcomers dissipated into a cloud of smoke, the joys of summoning the spirits of the dead must be noted The Forgemaster then turned his home invisible and fortified it some more. He was simply trying to lock himself away from the silly ponies that had never gone through what he had gone through. In The Forgemaster's opinion, only the fires of war could form lasting friendships. But the Forgemaster had had enough; he took off his Spartan armor and put his normal clothes back on. He left his home and turned it visible once more, though he, himself, was not. He walked through the small crowd of bewildered ponies who had gathered to watch the siege and walked off towards the Everfree Forest.

He found himself walking down the path towards Zecora's hut. He needed someone to talk to, and these ponies were far, FAR too innocent to understand. He found Zecora, even though they had barely met, to be much more mature than these ponies. As he walked through the forest he noticed something that seemed out of place; a patch of beautiful, blue flowers. They were completely contrasting with the norm of the forest, and that interested him. He bent down to touch them, and did so. As he touched them, he felt a small jolt of magic go into his hand. Now, that just confused him further: What kind of plant has magic in it?

The Forgemaster put the thought from his mind: surely a tiny blue flower couldn't be dangerous?

He continued down the path to Zecora's hut.

He met with the zebra and she invited him inside. They talked for a while, long into the night. When the time came to leave, Zecora tried to stop him, citing that it was too dangerous to travel through the Everfree at night. He reminded her who she was talking to, then left. He walked down the path that would take him back to Ponyville. He was tired, he stayed with Zecora far longer than he should have.

As he was walking, he became faint and dizzy. He shook it off and continued walking. As he turned around a bend in the path, the dizziness hit him with fervor. He clutched his head and fell off of the path, unable to maintain balance. A bush broke his fall, but he still disoriented. He stood up and tried to get back to the path but actually stumbled farther away from it. He crashed through the forest; all of the animals and predators were frightened of him and ran. He finally stopped when he could go no further: when the faint feeling from earlier came back with a vengeance. In a moment, he was out.

He was dreaming. Any onlooker would have known that it wasn't a pleasant dream. He dreamt that some grotesque, mismatched creature had visited him and spoke with him, but he couldn't remember what had been said…

He awoke with a start.

He looked around, but couldn't remember anything.

He literally, couldn't remember a thing.

He looked down at himself and saw dark red fur sticking out of him. A black colored mane moved to block his view, but he pushed it away with his hoof.

'Hoof? Since when do I have hooves?' he thought. 'Why am I confused? I can't remember anything so why should this be wrong?'

He looked carefully now, 4 legs, red fur, a black mane, some weird tattoo thing on his side. He felt that this was wrong. He felt as though he was in the wrong body, but he didn't have anything to compare it to. He couldn't remember anything, but as he looked around, his mind supplied the names of the things he looked at. Apparently, he was well-learned, but he couldn't remember where he had learned, or if the names that were supplied were even correct. However, that was not what worried him the most about his current situation.

He voiced his thoughts out loud, "Where am I! Why am I here! How did I get here! WHO AM I!