“My guilt is my problem solely,” you reply carefully, “But it’s true that some might think the general texture of my deeds… susceptible.”
“Stop waffling!” shouts Swirl from the crowd. “Tell us straight: how many ponies have you eaten in your life?”
“I’ve lost count,” you answer reluctantly.
“And how many of them you ate just because you could?”
“That’s not really a fair question to–&rdquo

You decide you’ve let yourself to be swindled by these morons for long enough. The arrogant, sneaky bitch evaded your clutches once, but you’ll be damned before letting her fool you twice. When you have travelled for about an hour and, coming a fair distance from the camp, you make your move.
“Still playing a mute, are you?”
She sneers sideways at you. “Still haven’t gotten over it, have you?”
“You’re saying it’s not a fair question to

Biting your lip, you let the medallion be and press your head on the much too uncomfortable bundle of rags that serves as your pillow. It’s not that you’d hesitate to consume the zebra for energy for a heartbeat if your life dependent on it, but something tells you things are not quite there yet. By the morning you’ll be wiser of your situation.
They come to shake you awake at the break of dawn, and can’t hide their surprise when they see you’re already up. You don&

Since you’re clueless about exactly what kind of a lie would spin you out of this the best, you decide for change to taste the rare fruit of truth on your tongue. If nothing else, it’s always the easiest thing to keep track of.
“If you really must know, I barely know the Count. And from the little I know of him I’d rather keep it that way, all things being equal.”
“Then why do you seek to meet him?” demands the mare.
“Because not all things are equ

The brave, beaten gladiator is so downstruck she doesn’t notice you until bumping her hanging head against your chest.
“Good evening,” you greet warmly, smiling at her surprise.
“Good… evening?” she repeats slowly. She looks you up and down with immediate suspicion. Especially your gurgling gut draws a long look from those bright green eyes that would match her aquamarine fur quite nicely, were it not so ruined by dirt. She tries to sidestep you, but stops wh

Crunch, shriek, glorb – and that’s the last call for the two braves in the lizard’s gut, now smushed to broken paste and drenched in acrid acids to dissolve in. The monster gets up slowly, belly heaving and lips sheening with saliva. The cold-blooded eyes turn to the remaining pony who trembles at the end of her pike. Claws like scythes paw the sand, ready to charge; above the audience stretches their necks, ready for the grand gulp ahead. Even Gold’s attention is captiva

The darkness of the tunnel splits as a forked tongue long as a pony’s arm flicks out. The rest of the giant lizard’s head follows soon after; some kind of a varanus it looks like. Aloud you wonder where from such an exotic specimen originates.
“Courtesy of Count Knob,” Gold explains, nodding at the balcony across the arena. A bald, elderly stallion sits there with his chin raised so high it’s almost on evel with his ears. “Surely you’ve heard of his exqu

“And I thought the mountains would shift before you would give up a purse of gold,” you tease. “Or does my company somehow outrate that?”
“Dear, I could never put a prize on your lovely head,” he assures you.
Of course you know he’s lying – Gold wouldn’t shun from bargaining with his grandmare if that stood in the way of steady profit. The fact that he’s more loaded than the dice in his casino matters little in that respect; business is

A unicorn mare extends herself in a round hollow sunk into the tiled floor and filled with scented, heated water. Ponderous steam floats over her, raised from the murky jade-green depths that have swallowed her up to the nearly same coloured neck. A blonde mane spreads all over the floor like a languid sunflower. One who wouldn’t know any better wouldn’t call you a day older twenty. They would be wrong.
The smooth liquid bubbles suddenly around the center, and a waft of putrefaction

You bend over Bronze Ring’s shivering figure, smiling derangedly.
“Countless times I’ve asked myself two questions: why would you cross me and what would I do if I got hold of you.”
You yawn broadly right before her tied muzzle to allow the smell of digesting cherries waft out. Quaint must already be drenched in your stomach juices, thus oozing hairs, feathers and taste. Bronze whimpers, shaking her head weakly from side to side in a hopeless effort to avoid inhaling the

You’re still in part amidst your thought when Quaint Aim thrusts a harpoon sideways against your chest.
“You! Shove that down the beast’s throat! Now!”
The air escaping your lungs tips the decision over the edge. You stomp the weapon down with a hoof, meet Quaint’s gaze head on and say:
“No.”
Within the next dozen seconds the room comes to a grinding halt, everypony ceasing their activities to stare at you and Quaint standing in the middle like statues l

“Of course I did pick them: didn’t you hear how important they are?” you answer. “Hack dropped them, I got them, that’s it.”
“It’s eaten him!” cries somepony from inside the hull. “It’s fucking eaten the captain!”
“Let’s get down there,” Quaint orders, shoving you forward.
You resist automatically. “Uh, but the deal might sour if we tarry–hey hey hey, careful with that!”
Quick as a viper Q

Torn by a plethora of alternatives you decide to do what has the feeling of a golden middle road about it: secure the feathers, then give Hack a fair chance of being saved by his crew. It might be more than he deserves, but you two should have enough history for that much.
“Help… me…” gargles Hack, who’s almost inside the pen now. The coatl’s head stops approaching his when it sees you sneaking closer, the exotic intellect estimating the threat you might pos

“I’m no chicken,” you answer. “But a dove.”
He tilts his head at you, mystified.
You wiggle your rump as a hint, then revolve slowly with the look in your eyes you recall giving his lunacy a pink edge. “Your dove, perhaps. Want me to coo to you again? Ruffle my wings like you used to?”
His neck snaps straight, his wings visibly stirring at the change in your tone. He takes a bold stride forward, right into your raised front leg which pokes him in the che

“Deal,” you utter, compelling your voice steady and your gaze to match Hack’s. It might not be the safest decision you’ve ever made, but at this point safety’s already cast into the wind so long as it delivers Bronze’s head screaming through your sphincter.
“What are we waiting then!” pipes Hack. “I shall escort you aboard myself. My lads and lasses will keep company here until we return.”
Hack rises to his wings, beckoning you to follo

“Hey Hack,” you shout. “What gives? We brought the coin as promised, but you say you’re left sort intentionally. Thought you to be more of a businesspony than that.”
The bright smile doesn’t flicker, but Hack Knee’s fiery orange eyes wrinkle in perplexion. He gazes directly at you over the flames. “Business is business is business, eh? And I thought you were my business? We used to be ‘we’ too…”
“Move with the times l

“You drive a hard bargain, but a bargain you drive. Now get the hell out of these sheets.”
“Not so fast, lass,” he says. “That consent comes awfully quick, especially from a someone as… edgy as you.”
“Us pegasi always be in a rush, remember?” you snap. When his expression doesn’t change, you curse under your breath and toss the dagger clattering onto his feet. “Happy?”
He looks at the blade for a while, apparently taken aba

The effort demands its share of willpower, but you refrain from pulling out the dagger or shouting for help. Still, it’d be foolish to abandon yourself completely at his mercy, for which reason you slip the blade under your wing for more convenient safekeeping.
By the door Ladle thanks the maid courtly and accepts the tray. Before the door closes completely you cross gazes with the girl. You hear slight hurry in her steps as she carries on the hallway. Perhaps there’s enough wits beh

“How’d you figure me out?”
“First answer my questions, then we’ll see if it’s worth returning the favour,” he says.
“That a threat?” you snap.
He shrugs unnervingly. “Could be, could be not. Only one way to find out.”
Your frown at his ambiguities. This doesn’t seem like a standard interrogation, and not simply because the sheets that bind you are still wet from your lovemaking. You decide to take his easy style with a big g

“Alright then,” you say after some hesitation. “If you say you know what you’re doing.”
“Always do.”
His restful confidence rubs off a bit, because you barely tense while he wraps your arms and legs together up your front like you were kettle. What he said about knots turns out to be accurate: wings discounted you haven’t been this immobile since your days as a swaddled foal. A sense of helplessness seeps into your intoxicated mind; perhaps this wa

“You underestimate your looks gravely. Besides, you must have excellent endurance,” you coo. Fawning him has to start working at some point, right?
He gives you a long, unreadable look during which you have trouble keeping up your casual smirk. Your right wing instinctively grows tense over the dagger hidden underneath.
“Heh, been awhile since I heard such sugar,” he finally says. Your body relaxes a couple of winds.
“True every word,” you lie silkily. Your le

You wipe all excess stains of hooch off our chin and groom your mane a couple of times, ensuring it falls just right on your shoulders before lightly trailing over to the stallion. It’s been awhile since your last attempt at coquet, but you’re confident that the knack of it will come back to you like nature intended.
You sit on the stool next to him and say smoothly: “That is so sweet of you.”
The stallion’s head turns to you like an old barn door falls off its hing

It’s midnight in Meteli, the largest portside town this side of Deadend Bay and the centre of global seal fat trade, a fact of which has earned the place its highly accurate nickname “The Blob of North” or more commonly The Blob. They say it’s impossible to get lost within ten miles of the city because of the characteristic stench of boiling fat that dominates the place’s aromatic identity with unenvied sovereignty, seeping into the very essence of its inhabitants u

The air is thick with the crackling of burning sap and the pungent smell of smoke, not to mention the victorious roar of the dragon high in the sky. Underneath the facades of the epic confrontation, the unconscious body of Pine Scarf slides quietly down a grassy slope as you pull her by the scruff of her neck. After a few minutes of exorbitant tension you tugg the filly into the hollow before you as deep as you can, then quiet down your breathing to listen. Judging by the distant wing beats it s

“I have something important to tell you about how I ended up here.”
“Spare me your pathetic yarns,” the dragon scoffs. “There’s but one thing of importance about you, and it’s not your words.”
The sizable chops narrow apart, and the nimble tongue snakes out to slabber your face and ballooned belly. “It’s the fat you’re going to add to my own,” the dragon specifies, quite needlessly in your mind.
“There’s dragon h

“What compensation?” you stutter.
Another puff of tarry fog meets your nostrils and sends you wheezing for fresh air.
“You come from the pitiful heap of mold they call Backbuck. I can smell its stench on you from a mile away. For your concern, I have already collected the settlement for the first failed delivery.”
The dragon grinds its jaws, inside of which you suddenly hear a feeble whimper erupt. The remaining blood flees your cheeks as you realize there’s somepon

“Fine,” you answer. “I don’t have trouble eating somepony who tried to get me killed, whose name I don’t even know.”
 
 
“So you say,” says Aurea. The arrow on your neck flouts back into the quiver on her flank. “Just to make sure though we’re going to help you a bit.”
 
 
Corona lights up her horn again, and a fir aura surrounds the tied-up pegasus, lifting him from the ground. “Head first or feet first?”
 
 
You feel less than comfo

You drop the saddlebags on the ground before warily nearing the pegasus, who equally guardedly lowers the flagon.
“Let me look at that wound. And don’t make any sudden moves, okay?”
“Don’t believe me, huh?” he says with a skewed, pained grin. “Whatever, you’ll see I’m telling the truth when the lads return. And don’t you try anything funny either, pal.”
You glance back at the club resting by your bags. When you’re confident

Half an hour before dawnbreak you set out on the road to Maywell. There’s not anypony here you’d particularly care to farewell, but you definitely do want to arrive before dark. Your two saddlebags are packed with all the food and coin you had, plus some clothes and other useful items you thought to take along. Around your neck you roll a thick woollen scarf against the lingering cold of the early morning.
The shop itself you leave to manage by itself from now on. The few rooms it co

In the hamlet of Buckback a single window spills light into the gloom. Inside there sits a pony deeply immersed in the map before him, the dark shades of his coat drinking the light of beeswax candles not unlike the night outside. The pony’s name is Mint Button. From now on, that’s you.



You rub your eyes tired by all the small print they’ve been reading for hours now. Until finding the map from old Seam Shine’s bedroom yo

Not much is known about the ages preceding the first Heart’s Warming Eve, save the dominant agreement among historians that life in the alicornless land was brutish, nasty and significantly more likely to end in somepony else’s burp than in the present day Equestria. Only stories of this harsh period have survived to cross the veil of time. This is one of them. And it starts with one of three possible ways.


Mint Button is a twenty years old earth