The Rise Of An Empire

Chapter 3

After Twilight stomped out of the castle, the wedding guests started an uproar. But the angriest ponies were Twilight's parents, and the cutie mark crusaders, who were the flower fillies.

"How could you?" asked Scootaloo.

"Ah never thought y'all would've done this," said Apple Bloom. "Y'all put everypony in danger!"

"Yeah!" agreed Sweetie Belle. "That bug thing could have killed everypony, and you didn't even lift a hoof when Twilight warned you! You all just..."

"Y'all just ignored her!" exclaimed Apple Bloom.

"You shouldn't even be the Element of Loyalty, Rainbow Dash," said Scootaloo. "You showed loyalty to an imposter instead of your friend!"

"How was I supposed to know that she was an imposter?" Rainbow snapped.

"Even if she wasn't an imposter, you should have been loyal to Twilight instead of some Princess that you know nothing about!"

The rainbow maned mare said nothing, just looking at the floor and lowering her head in shame.

"Darlings, listen," began Rarity. "Twilight didn't even have any proof with her!"

"She was just yellin' things like a crazy pony," defended Apple Jack.

"That doesn't change the fact that we all could have been pony soup by now," Sweetie Belle told them.

"Or we could have been something worse than pony soup," Apple Bloom nodded.

"Like zombies!" Scootaloo said dramatically.

"If y'all didn't listen to Twilight when she said there was a threat, then how do we know y'all will even listen to anypony?" asked Apple Bloom.

"We've decided that..."

"We're leaving!" announced the trio.

"Goodbye forever! And don't even bother trying to find us, because we don't want anything to do with any of you!" Scootaloo said before they ran out the castle to catch a train that would take them away from Equestria...

Once they had arrived at the Crystal Empire, Spike dismounted Twilight and asked, "Twilight? Why did we come all the way here? There's like nothing here!"

"There used to be a place here, Spike," she said. "I'm going to bring it back."

"Ooh."

"Stand back, and watch," Twilight warned before her horn began to glow. The magic coming from it was black, and she began to chant, "Rise again, your banishment is brought to an end. Rise again, rise again. Your banishment has come to an end. Rise again O Empire, rise from the ground. Rise again O Empire, from the ashes of your town."

As she finished, Spike watched in awe as where there had been nothing but ice and snow, there was now a city. "Let's go," she said and Spike followed her in.

"Wow," he couldn't believe his eyes. "It's beautiful!"

"I know, right? But we can't stay here for long."

"Why's that, Twilight?"

"The book said that there was a ruler of this place- King Sombra. We need to find him, but I don't know where he could be!"

"How about the castle?"

"Why didn't I think of that?"

Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, and Sweetie Belle were sitting in a train. "So where does this train take us again?" the unicorn asked.

"I don't care," the pegasus said. "As long as it takes us away from them, I don't care if this takes us to the border of Equestria."

"Now that Ah think about it, this train could be going to the border of Equestria," Apple Bloom said. "But what is beyond the border?"