Batmare Begins - Chapter 5: Ascent, Part 1

Batmare Begins

Chapter 5: Ascent, Part 1

“You know, it sure would’ve been nice if you’d told me a month ago how much hiking I’d be doing here.  Who knows, with that little nugget of info I might’ve thought over coming here at all a bit more carefully?”

“As I recall I did tell you that you’d have to carry a flower to the top of a mountain.  Was that not explicit enough?  Besides, you were happy enough to do it before.  What’s the matter, not getting cold hooves now, are you?”

“No, of course not!  It’s just… horseapples, why do there have to be so many stairs?”  Panting, Derpy stopped to catch her breath.

“Oh come now Miss Hooves, look on the bright side.  Hiking’s a very healthy activity for both the body and mind, and at least we have stairs to climb.  Or would you actually prefer that I give you a crash course in mountain climbing instead?”

Coming from any other pony Derpy would’ve shrugged off that last query as just some wisecrack, maybe even countered it with a smart-alecky comeback of her own, but from Aucune she could never be sure.  She wasn’t really positive he understood the concept of sarcasm and decided it was best to remain on the safe side of things by saying nothing at all, and so the two ponies continued their ascent in silence.

Where exactly they were climbing Derpy could not say.  It’d been two days since her grueling trial in the Dark Mile, and in all that time Aucune had largely kept mum on the matter.  To be fair Derpy had slept through most of Monday; Aucune had given her the day off and she’d been so sapped by Sunday’s enterprise that she’d ended up confining herself to the comfort of her cot all day, only rising in the early evening to get some dinner.  Tuesday hadn’t been much more eventful; after helping all morning around the castle with a few odd chores, Derpy’s afternoon had been spent gathering food and supplies with Aucune for their trek on Wednesday.  Even then he’d barely shared any details about what was in store for her, aside from the fact that they’d be traveling to a secluded area high in the mountains for the duration of what he’d described as the “forthcoming tribulation”.  Once their preparations were complete Aucune had dismissed Derpy for the day, and after grabbing some dinner the anxious mare had spent the rest of the evening reading, trying to take her mind off of things.

No matter how hard she tried, though, she just couldn’t stop thinking about what she’d have to confront in the mountains.  Fear held her fast like an eagle clutching its prey in its talons, and she didn’t even know what exactly she’d find when the time came.  All she did know was that whatever her demons were, they’d had a stranglehold on her life for as long as she could remember.  Every gaffe, bumble, goof-up, and blunder she seemed to constantly make was attributable to the power they had over her; that fact alone made them a daunting and fearsome opponent, and the thought of challenging such an adversary filled Derpy with dread.  When she could no longer go two sentences in her reading without her thoughts straying back to her anxiety, she’d given up altogether and headed to bed, hoping sleep would grant her some respite.  But all night she’d tossed and turned beneath her covers, and a few times even woken with a start in a cold sweat.

She was almost relieved when Aucune roused her from her restless slumber early that morning.  After wrapping themselves in cloaks and scarves and strapping on saddlebags containing their supplies, the two had set out at the crack of dawn, crossing the boulder-strewn vale until they’d come to an unmarked, secluded stairway at the eastern edge of the encompassing mountains.  All morning they’d been making their way up the mountain path, climbing higher and higher.  By no stretch of the imagination were things easygoing, yet despite her fatigue (and ever-increasing enmity towards stairs) Derpy really was grateful for the activity in general.  Sure the climb was difficult and at times even monotonous, but it did divert her thoughts from her nerve-racking fears.  Well, at least to some extent.

Derpy and Aucune continued their climb in silence for some time.  Periodically Derpy glanced at the ground in front of her, watchful of her footing; these stairs seemed even more archaic and worn-down than those that led to Die Schmiede, and on top of that a good number of them were covered by thin, difficult-to-spot layers of glaze ice.  All it would take was one misstep or slip of the hoof for the accident-prone Derpy to go tumbling a long and very painful ways down, a scenario she rather hoped to avoid altogether.  Occupied as she was with the climb and her own worries, it came as a surprise to her when Aucune broke the silence soon after their last exchange.

“I must say, much as I enjoy a good hike, this is a rather dull affair.  How about a story to pass the time?”

“A story?  Ummm… is this really the time or place?” Derpy asked, unsure if her tutor was getting lightheaded on account of the higher elevation.  Earthbound ponies’ bodies usually had a far more difficult time adjusting to high altitudes than pegasi, though seeing as Aucune lived in the mountains Derpy reckoned it wasn’t altitude sickness.

“Why not?  There’s nothing else to do at the moment besides continue following the path; I’d say it’s as good a time as any for another history lesson.”

“Uh… OK, yeah, I guess that makes sense.  What’d you have in mind Mister Magique?”

“I believe it’s time you finally learned our history Miss Hooves.  By that of course I mean the history of the Order.”

What the hay, we haven’t covered that?  I could’ve sworn we did.  Hmmm, let’s see… Pre-Classical Era, the Unification Wars, Equestria’s Foundation and Classical Era, Discord’s Reign of Chaos, the Rise of the Alicorn Sisters.  We’ve certainly gone through our fair share of ancient Equestrian history, but yeah, I guess we haven’t covered the Order yet now that I think about it.  Wonder why he waited till now?

“Sure thing Mister Magique, fire away, I’m all ears!”

“Very good.  I warn you, ours is not exactly a happy history, but there’s much to be learned from it.  You won’t find it in too many annals of Equestrian history these days either, but not on account of its “obscure” nature.  No, no: we have been forgotten by most because a select few exalted individuals have made the express choice to purposefully neglect us and our contributions to Equestria.  But enough about that, let’s get to the history itself, from the beginning.”

“Harmony did not reclaim Equestria instantaneously after the Sisters’ overthrow of Discord; chaos reigned across the land, and the infrastructure of every region and major city lay in shambles.  Some villages were even completely abandoned, never to be inhabited ever again.  All in all, the Sisters stepped into power with an abysmal national disaster on their hooves the likes of which even they were unprepared to handle, at least by themselves.  Complicating matters was the Crystal Empire to the north, and the role it might play in Equestria’s future.”

“The Crystal Empire?  Wait, what’s that, I’ve never heard of it?”  A million new questions spun through Derpy’s mind all at once, each one vying to be answered.

“Patience Miss Hooves, patience,” Aucune implored, “all will be revealed, just wait and see.  The Crystal Empire was an ancient kingdom older than Equestria itself.  Nopony knows where its citizens, the Crystal Ponies, came from, but we do know that they built their kingdom centuries before Equestria’s founding in what is now the Frozen North.  Once, all the barren, frozen waste beyond the Crystal Mountains was a lush and beautiful land, if that can be believed, on par with Equestria itself.  The three pony tribes discovered and established contact with this kingdom soon after founding Equestria, and over time the two pony nations developed close relations with one another.  When the draconequus overran Equestria, the Empire sheltered Equestrian refugees who fled north, and also granted asylum to Equestria’s government.  They even helped organize the beginnings of what would eventually have been a joint Equestrian-Crystal coalition, which would’ve fought to liberate Equestria from Discord’s grasp.”

“But then Princess Celestia and Princess Luna showed up,” Derpy interjected.

“Quite right, and that changed everything for everyone.  While what could’ve easily been a bloody, drawn out conflict with Discord was averted, Equestria now had two godlike beings whom nobody knew virtually anything about as its rulers.  All anyone really knew about the Sisters was that they were both ridiculously powerful.  And that scared ponies.  A lot of ponies.”

“You’re joking.  But why?” Derpy asked.  “The Royal Sisters are awesome!  They raise the sun and the moon, keep us all safe, and, well, just do the best they can to make Equestria a great place to live.  Why would anypony be scared of them?”

A heavy silence hung in the air for a moment.  Aucune flicked his tail very deliberately from side to side, and if Derpy had been facing him she would’ve seen his standard steely countenance somehow further hardening.  When he finally broke the silence, his words were slow and measured.

“Put yourself in their place for a moment, Miss Hooves.  Try imagining what you yourself might’ve thought of the Sisters without over a millennium of their rule to go upon.  What if you had never seen nor heard of an alicorn before, had no idea what one even was, and then one day, out of the blue, two show up in your home unexpected and unannounced with a bang?  What then, Miss Hooves?  How do you think you’d react?”

“I… guess I’d be pretty freaked out,” Derpy admitted.  “But they still imprisoned Discord with the Elements of Harmony.  I mean, weren’t ponies happy about that?  Didn’t they know they could trust them after that?”

“On the contrary, that’s exactly what gave most ponies cause for concern in the first place.  It proved just how powerful the Sisters were and understandably frightened many.  Before Discord, ponykind had never encountered magical beings of such magnitude.  Things certainly hadn’t always been perfect, but by the time Discord showed up the three tribes had achieved a stable, harmonious balance in the still young Equestria.  Discord and the Sisters, however, threw that balance out of sync.  It’s no surprise then that, with many of their own subjects uncertain what to expect and some even terrified of them, the Sisters put the Crystal Empire quite on edge as well, which finally brings us to the Order’s inception.”

“As I previously mentioned, Equestria was in shambles when Celestia and Luna came to power.  With so much effort required to restore order to the land, the Sisters had neither the time nor energy to personally devote towards building amicable diplomatic relations with the Crystal Empire.  So a solution was devised by the Sisters and the Empire’s Royal Family: an order, our order, was established.”

“Originally called simply ‘the Order’, it was comprised of hundreds of soldiers, scholars, and government officials from both nations, and allotted land in the Crystal Mountains.  It would in effect be autonomous, owing no political allegiance to either Equestria or the Empire.  The intent behind its formation was both political and cultural; while the Order’s express purpose was to regulate and protect the Equestrian-Crystal border, its unofficial function was to build and maintain relations between Equestria and the Empire as ponykind entered a new age.  Self-governing and self-sustaining, the Order would take in any pony willing to join its ranks and devote themselves to promoting harmony, upholding justice, and protecting ponykind from whatever evils dared waylay any in the Crystal Mountains.  Watch your step.”

Derpy’s eyes darted to the ground and she just barely sidestepped a massive gap in a few stairs right in front of her, timeworn by centuries of exposure to the elements.  After recovering from her near slip, she turned her attention back to Aucune’s account.

“So what happened next?”  She was very intrigued by Aucune’s revelation that the princesses themselves had had a hoof in founding the Order, not to mention everything she’d just been told about an empire which up until today she hadn’t even known existed.

“Hoped for and unexpected developments.  Just as the Sisters and Royal Family hoped, the Order quickly proved to be a stabilizing presence along the border, monitoring traffic in the mountains and maintaining law and order, at least along the most important major highways.  It also served spectacularly in its capacity as a diplomatic body, forging new ties between the Equestrians and Crystal Ponies and helping the Sisters gain the trust of the Crystal Empire.  But as it grew, the Order began to change.  For the first few decades of its existence, displaced ponies of every background from all over chaos-ridden Equestria swarmed to the Order.  But as harmony was restored and the Sisters’ rule established, the Order’s ranks noticeably transformed.  The dejected, displaced, and lost continued to join, but they no longer came from just any background.  Instead, those who had no place in either nation came: the homeless, the talentless, the jobless, the aimless, the hopeless.  As more and more came the Order’s superiors began to notice a common thread; cutie marks seemed to be at the center of most of these ponies’ troubles.”

A subdued giggle escaped Derpy’s lips, drawing an irked glance from Aucune.

“What, do you mean that all of them were unsure about their cutie marks and as big of klutzes as I am?  Sorry Mister Magique, it’s just a little funny picturing thousands of clumsy ponies all coming together, everyone blundering this way and that.”

Aucune halted and turned to face Derpy.  His face and body were a picture of calm neutrality, but his eyes told a different story altogether.  Two fiery orbs of icy cold rage glared down at Derpy, and looking down from above her as he was, the sight of Aucune’s withering gaze alone was enough to strike the fear of Celestia in even the most rugged and stalwart of ponies.

“Ah yes, amusing, right?  Countless lost souls with nowhere else to go, nopony left to turn to: what a regular laugh riot,” he coldly retorted.  “It’s sad that your mockery is not too far from the truth; the only thing sadder is that the truth is so much worse.  Some ponies came with cutie marks they didn’t understand, others with none at all, usually well into adulthood.  Oftentimes they’d never displayed any talent or ability for anything at all, perhaps not even held down a steady job at any point in their lives.  Far too often ponies came who’d been flat out ostracized by their own families, especially those who’d been born into noble families that had reputations to worry about.”

“Whoever they were, whatever their past, they were all lost!  Deep down in the pit of their being they had no sense of belonging anywhere, no genuine feeling that they had a meaningful role to play in their home, their country, even their own families.  Surely you of all ponies can appreciate how terrible such a fate is, and know the desperation and suffering that arises out of such a lot in life.”

Derpy paled at the rebuke and felt a knot forming in the pit of her stomach.

Oh… oh horsefeathers, why?  Why did I say that?  Why the hay did I say that?  Dang it, what would she think?  Laughing at ponies like me, maybe even worse off!

“I’m sorry Mister Magique, really.  That wasn’t the right thing to say at all.  It’s just hard for me to imagine so many ponies having so much trouble… being ponies, I guess.  I know I’ve been here with you all for a month, but everyone here seems perfectly normal, that’s all.  Still, that’s no excuse, and for what it’s worth I’m sorry.”

The flames in Aucune’s eyes died down, replaced in an instant by his usual steely expression, and he gave his repentant pupil a curt nod before turning away, much to Derpy’s relief.  His body language as a whole remained neutral, but he seemed less rigid and tense than when he had delivered his reprimand a moment ago.

“Apology accepted Miss Hooves.  I’m sorry as well; my words were true, but I’m afraid I was unfairly harsh.  I know that this is all new for you, and you had no way of knowing just how dire things have been and are.  Sometimes the hardest part of these lessons for me is being reminded how few ponies know the truth: that our nation is hardly the flawless paradise so many paint it as, where everypony has their own special place.”  Sympathy and bitterness simultaneously seeped from his words.

“Was there really no other place for them to go?  Were things really that bad?” Derpy asked, hoping to gently prod Aucune’s mind away from whatever sad thoughts now occupied it.

“Regrettably no.  Nopony else knew that so many of their brethren were so… desperate.  Like I said, we didn’t even realize it until they all started coming, and that was completely by accident.”  Aucune gave a disgusted snort, shaking his head in disbelief.

“Accident?” Derpy asked in confusion.

“Remember Miss Hooves, the Order was self-governing and self-sustaining from the start.  While its members certainly treasured the independent nature of the organization, that independence also meant that they couldn’t rely on the Sisters or the Royal Family to continue replenishing our numbers.  Officially, the Order had no binding legal ties to either government, and so they were in no way legally obligated to reinforce it regularly.  So we did the only thing we could: we opened ourselves to anyone.  Any pony, and I do mean any, were welcome within our ranks.  We spread this word far and wide across the land, but as time went on only the most desperate, forlorn individuals, bereft of talent, vocation, and even home, responded.”

“Well, we couldn’t very well throw these ponies out just because they’d never shown an aptitude for anything else; at the very least, the Order needed them just as much as they needed the Order.  So instead, we adapted; the brightest minds in the Order gathered in council and, after months of deliberation, the beginnings of a philosophy were produced, a philosophy that would completely transform the Order.  They called it Unbegrenzt.  No longer would the Order simply function as border patrol and an unofficial diplomatic body between two nations.  Those functions were retained, but in addition we took upon ourselves a third purpose, a nobler, higher purpose: to show the world that any pony, no matter who they were, where they came from, or what they lacked, was capable of accomplishing anything.”

“It was at this time that our name was changed to its present day title, the Ordo Extraordinarii.  In this brotherhood, there would be no common ponies or ordinary folk; whoever they were, we would ensure that each and every pony who joined our ranks would become the absolute best they could possibly be, not just for the Order’s own sake, but because they owed it to themselves.  No pony should settle for a limited life just because others tell him that his cutie mark will only allow him to do this or that; Unbegrenzt dictated that each and every pony was capable of accomplishing anything at any time in their life.  If they only completely devoted themselves wholeheartedly, all the strength, will, and power they could muster, then they could attain whatever object they desired.”

“That sounds a bit… aggressive,” Derpy noted.

“You misunderstand Miss Hooves.  We had no hidden objects of conquest in mind, nor some juvenile desire to prove in any way that those within the Order were somehow better than everypony else.  The plain fact of the matter is that these desperate souls were the only ones coming to join the Order, but it needed to still function as professionally as possible.  After all, it still had to manage the border, and in those days that was no easy task; even after the Sister’s rule was established the Crystal Mountains remained a lawless, wild region, full of roving gangs of bandits, highwayponies, and all manner of beasts and monsters waiting to waylay defenseless travelers.  So the Order’s superiors simply did what they needed to do to ensure that our members remained the best of the best, more than capable of defending the citizens of Equestria and the Crystal Empire from whatever dangers lay in the mountains.”

“OK, well, that makes sense,” Derpy conceded.  “So did it work?”

“Well, yes and no,” Aucune answered.  “In practice Unbegrenzt, and the regimen that developed out of it, worked like a charm and had an astounding success rate.  But… in hindsight, our leaders should’ve taken things a step further and shared their discovery that there was such a cultural crisis in both countries, that so many ponies were outcasts simply because of the way all of ponykind exalted the role of cutie marks in their lives.  They should’ve presented their findings to the Sisters, the Empire, anyone at all in a position of power, back when they might’ve listened to us, while we still had influence enough that most anybody would’ve listened.  If they’d advocated hard enough, who knows, perhaps dozens of organizations could’ve been built that emulated the Order, giving outcasts as many places to go as possible.”

“But it was so easy instead to simply go on as these ponies’ sole benefactor.  Our regimen and philosophy always worked, always managed to change the lives of the tens of thousands who came to us for the better.  Our members were happy, content, and the Order was growing; what more needed to be done?  They just couldn’t imagine that it could all come crashing down.”

Aucune remained silent for a few long moments before he continued from where he’d grimly left off.  Each sentence seemed strained, as though the mere uttering pained him.

“For 300 years we throve and prospered.  Equestria was restored, relations between the Equestrians and Crystal Ponies flourished, and the Crystal Mountains were kept safe.  As our ranks swelled we began to require even more living space, and so with the wealth we had built through trade and various other business with the two nations, we bought more land in the mountains and built more strongholds, further securing the mountains and the roads that passed through them.  Before we knew it, we’d built an entire civilization.  At our peak, the Ordo Extraordinarii controlled a dozen fortresses throughout the Crystal Mountains, all of them fully garrisoned, not to mention the communities that sprang up near each one.  As the centuries passed, our wealth, our ranks, and our knowledge all grew.  Unbegrenzt continued to evolve, refined and developed by some of the finest minds the world has ever known.  In our free society, we imported ideas, philosophies, cultural practices and lifestyles from all over the world; in effect, we became the most cosmopolitan civilization the world has ever known, a light for all ponykind.”

“That sounds like it was really wonderful Mister Magique,” Derpy remarked, envisioning the bustling arcadia that had once existed in the desolate mountains.

“Yes… yes it does, doesn’t it?” Aucune agreed.

“So where did it all go?  What happened?”  Derpy was dying to know the answer, although judging by Aucune’s tone whatever it was, it was not pleasant.  All the same, she wanted to know.

“A monster happened.  A monster in the north by the name of Sombra,” Aucune spat the name as though it were venomous.  “At the pinnacle of our glory, in an age of peace and prosperity for all of ponykind, the dark-hearted King Sombra came to power in the Crystal Empire.  For reasons unknown evil clouded his thoughts and stained his heart and soul black as a starless sky all of his days.  He lusted after power and delved into dark arts to get it.”

“A few years after he ascended to the throne, troubling reports started coming to our strongholds from the north.  Word of exorbitant taxes, heavily regulated trade, state seizure of private property and businesses, and the disappearance of all who opposed these measures permeated the correspondence of members from their families in the Empire.  Soon the mail came less and less, then finally nothing.  Complete and total silence was all that resonated from the north.  At this point it was apparent to the Order’s leaders that something was terribly wrong, and so spies were sent north.  Out of a dozen sent only three returned, and not a moment too soon, for shortly thereafter Sombra began shutting down every major highway into and out of the Empire, garrisoning the entire border at the northern edge of the mountains.  Needless to say, the report that our spies gave was… disturbing.”

“So how bad was it?” Derpy asked.

“Worse than anypony had even imagined.  Sombra had by then complete control over the whole of the Crystal Empire, ruling with an iron grip.  He’d acquired a frightening amount of command over powerful dark magic, and ruled through fear and brute strength.  The Crystal Ponies had been reduced from free and happy citizens to a state of serfdom, nay, slavery even!  On top of all this, the magical crux of their nation itself, the Crystal Heart, had been stolen away from them, hidden by Sombra through his dark arts.  Famine was beginning to spread across the land, the Crystal Ponies were in no position to resist (for all who dared oppose Sombra were swiftly disposed of), and even the rest of the Royal Family was in a veritable state of house arrest, confined to the Crystal Palace.  Throughout the Empire, there was no hope, happiness, or love to be found: only despair.  It was clear to the Order that something had to be done.  And so it was.”

“First, a daring operation was launched into the heart of the Empire.  A crack team of some of our finest members managed to infiltrate the Empire’s capitol and the Crystal Palace itself; at the cost of many of our brethren’s lives, we managed to extricate the entire Royal Family, including Sombra’s younger brother, next in line to the Crystal throne.  Once we’d secured them, the Order moved swiftly; after gathering together all the evidence we could, emissaries led by the Order’s leader Eisen Huf the Stalwart marched to Canterlot with the Royal Family in tow, to present our findings and their testimony, and devise a plan to stop the madness of King Sombra before it was too late.  It was here that the seeds of our demise were planted and took root, nourished by a betrayal we could never have imagined or foreseen.”

“Wait, really?” Derpy said in surprise.  “What could’ve possibly gone wrong in Canterlot?  Did Sombra have spies there, or, did he attack the Order while the emissaries were away?  Or maybe something else?  What happened?”

“Nothing,” Aucune replied bitterly, “nothing happened.”

“What?”  The gears in Derpy’s head churned, trying to make sense of Aucune’s nonsensical reply.  “I… I don’t understand.”

“The emissaries presented their findings.  The Royal Family gave their testimony.  Every single Crystal Pony that the Order had either managed to extricate, or had somehow escaped on their own from the Empire, at great peril to their families, friends, and themselves I might add, gave detailed, chilling accounts of the horrors they’d witnessed.”  Enmity became more and more distinct in Aucune’s speech with each passing sentence; every recollection seemed to be bitter kindling to an anger that threatened to burst into a wildfire of rage any second now if fanned too much.  “Every single condemnation, damning account, and scrap of evidence that we could possibly bring against that bastard were presented to the Sisters and the entire Royal Court.  The blind could have seen that he was guilty, the truth of our words was evident to even the deaf.  But what did the Sisters do?  Absolutely nothing!”

A pall of shock descended over Derpy.  Unable to come up with anything else, she did the only thing she could and asked the obvious.

“Why?  Why wouldn’t they do anything about a monster like that?  That just doesn’t sound like something the princesses would tolerate in the slightest.  I can’t believe they’d be so… apathetic in the face of somepony as evil as Sombra.”

“A fair question Miss Hooves, a fair question indeed.  In all honesty, I cannot say why they did nothing.  Oh sure, they gave their reasons, our records tell us as much; the Sisters explained that they feared that Sombra would try to escalate any military action between Equestria and the Empire into an international conflict, dragging Griffonia or some of Equestria’s other traditional enemies into the fray through his cunning and deceit.  Sound logic, no doubt about that; after all, the Griffonians were always looking for an excuse to fight with the pony nations at the time, and there was evidence even then that Sombra had already made overtures to the griffons seeking their assistance in the event of war with Equestria.  Any other conflict, their reasoning might have been enough to drop the matter.”

“But for all their logic and practicality, they forgot one crucial factor: the heart of the matter.  Who we wanted to fight for, to liberate from the shackles of that beast’s tyranny.  It was not cows, pigs, sheep, mules, griffons, or even diamond dogs; these were ponies.  They were our kin, brethren, blood of our blood.  We could not simply abandon them to the sick machinations of a psychotic dictator!  The heart and soul would simply not allow it!  Furthermore, it was more than even a question of who we wished to free.  It was a question of doing the right thing, and consequences be damned, the only right thing to do was storm the Empire and topple Sombra from his throne!  What did we get instead?  Political asylum for the Royal Family and a “pledge” that Equestrian authorities would monitor the situation in the north closely.  And so the Sisters betrayal was effected, though nopony realized it at the time.”

By now it was fast becoming clear to Derpy that the Order had certainly not had what could be called a “happy history”; in fact, she had a bad feeling that the ending to Aucune’s tale would be anything but happy.  Still, she needed to know how it all ended.  So she pressed on, same as before, undaunted by the unknown.

“What did the Order do Mister Magique?”

“The only thing we could do: the right thing.  It may not have been the most reasonable or practical move, but from the start our leaders knew that the Order would act no matter what course the Sisters and Equestria took.  How could we not?  Over a third of our members were Crystal Ponies; many families within the Order were even blended, made up of Crystal and Equestrian spouses.  No matter what the rest of Equestria might’ve thought of the Crystal Ponies, by that point they were nothing less than kin to us.  And when our kin were in such dire straits, facing a terror unheard of by ponykind since the chaotic days of Discord, we could not just sit in the mountains and do nothing!  So we acted, when the Sisters would not.  When nopony else was willing to do the right thing, the Ordo Extraordinarii did!”

A strange blend of pride and sorrow simultaneously resonated from Aucune’s speech.

“Before Eisen Huf left Canterlot, messengers were secretly dispatched to all of the Order’s outposts.  When the emissaries returned weeks later, an army had been gathered the likes of which the Order had never assembled.  Over half of our members, 10,000 ponies of all shapes and sizes, were gathered to march on the Empire, while the rest were left behind to garrison our fortresses.  Led by Eisen Huf, the army marched north, intent on liberating the Crystal Empire once and for all.”

“Well did they?” Derpy asked directly.

“They never even made it to the capitol.  The accounts we have are sparse, but from what we do know it seems that Sombra was simply too powerful for us to handle by that point.  While his own military forces were paltry compared to our own and largely comprised of griffon mercenaries, his mastery of dark magic was unparalleled, and against such brute strength our forces were simply no match.  When the Order finally met him on the field our ranks were cut down like wheat beneath the scythe; most, including Eisen Huf himself, were either slain or captured, and only a few dozen survivors escaped the battlefield, fleeing south.  That was merely the beginning of our suffering; from there, things only got worse.”

“Worse?  How could things possibly get worse after that?” Derpy asked, wide-eyed at the thought of so many thousands of lives snuffed out in a single day just like that by one wretched individual alone.

“An outcry resounded from all of Equestria following the Order’s disastrous expedition, but hardly the kind we could have hoped for.  The survivors along with the remainder of the Order presumed that at the very least the Sisters and Equestria would be goaded into action after such a raw, terrible display of Sombra’s power and wickedness.  Instead, for our noble, selfless sacrifice, all we were accorded from Equestria in return was contempt and vilification.”

“The Sisters did everything in their power to distance themselves and Equestria from the Order politically, making it very much clear to Sombra and the rest of the world that they wanted nothing to do with us for fear of reprisal.  Needless to say, Sombra couldn’t have been more pleased by this turn of events; before we could get our bearings he launched a furious campaign into the Crystal Mountains, targeting specifically our strongholds.  Dozens of villages were torched, thousands perished or were driven from their homes, and all of the Order’s outposts were razed to the ground, save of course for the secluded Die Schmiede.  And still the Sisters did nothing!”

Aucune’s anger was slowly starting to make more and more sense to Derpy.  After all, like every pony she’d always been taught as a filly only about the wondrous ways that Princess Celestia controlled the sun and moon and wisely ruled over all Equestria.  And while she certainly didn’t know that much about Princess Luna, she’d seemed nice enough at last year’s Nightmare Night festivities.  It was unfathomable that the regal alicorns, so powerful and committed to doing good and securing justice for all, could simply ignore or, even worse, tolerate the horrors that King Sombra had inflicted upon his subjects.

“When did all that madness end?  It had to have ended, right?” Derpy pressed.  “I mean, there’s certainly no Sombra around today, so something must’ve stopped him.”

“Oh, it ended all right,” Aucune gloomily confirmed.  “It certainly wasn’t on account of anything the Order did; our cries for aid continued to fall on deaf ears until the very end, by which point there was merely a hoofful of us left.  No, no, it was really Sombra’s own doing; after he’d nearly crushed every single pocket of resistance the Order could offer, effectively seizing control of the Crystal Mountains in the process, his power went to his head and he made the boneheaded decision to lay siege to Manehattan itself.  Needless to say, the Sisters didn’t take too kindly to anyone threatening their lands and finally realized that Sombra was nothing more than a crazed, bloodthirsty, power hungry dictator who couldn’t be talked to or reasoned with and would not stop until somepony stopped him once and for all.  After shattering his forces around Manehattan and sending them reeling back north, the Sisters personally stormed into the Crystal Empire all on their own and battled Sombra.  In the end, their combined might was too much even for his dark magic.  However, victory did not come without a price.  With his dark arts so far advanced, Sombra had managed to curse his kingdom prior to his downfall; as soon as he was overthrown, the Empire, and every last Crystal Pony within it, disappeared.  Thus, the Empire was, quite literally, no more.”

“Gone, just… just like that?  It really all just disappeared into thin air?”  Derpy was horrified at the idea that there was magic out there capable of such a terrible deed.

“Indeed it did.  All that remains where it once stood over a thousand years ago are the cold, inhospitable lands of the Frozen North.  Even the Crystal Mountains lost their legendary luster as a result of the Empire’s downfall.  Beyond the scant records of the Empire’s history kept by ourselves and a select few in Equestria, the only other remaining evidence that it ever existed now resides further down the mountain, guarding the passage to our last stronghold and carrying on a sad, forlorn existence.”

For a moment Derpy was stuck trying to make sense of that last sentence, when the answer suddenly hit her like a ton of bricks.

“Wait… are you saying that those ponies who showed me the passage to Die Schmiede are Crystal Ponies?”

“In a word, yes.”  And just like that she had a thousand more questions.

“How’d they escape the Crystal Empire?  Was it the Order?  What about the Princesses?  Did they try to help at all?  What about-”

“Miss Hooves, please, restrain yourself!” Aucune implored, forcefully cutting off Derpy before she overwhelmed herself and her mentor with an endless list of questions.  “I’m pleased that you’re so enthralled by our history, but please exercise some patience and restraint.  To start, yes, it was the Order’s doing; we managed to help some Crystal Ponies escape the Empire before its ruin, while others were members of the Order itself who’d survived Sombra’s destructive campaign.  It hardly mattered, however, when it was all said and done, for a mere hoofful remained after the fall of the Empire.  The whole Order was in tatters, really; Die Schmiede alone survived Sombra’s warpath, and only because it was hidden, unlike the rest of our strongholds.”

“But why don’t they live here then, in the fortress with the rest of the Order?”

“Because they barely have the will to live as it is.  The Empire’s ruin broke their spirits.  Everything they’d known and loved, their families, friends, and homeland simply disappeared like that.  Overnight they went from being members of a proud and powerful race to being the last remnant of a now endangered species.  We told them they were free to go south to Equestria if they wished, where they could join and assimilate into far healthier, stable communities, but they refused, and likewise chose not to remain in the Order.  None of it mattered anymore to them, none of it at all; they were too crushed by such a terrible loss, and they and their descendants have remained that way for the past thousand years.  Today the last of the Crystal Ponies simply drift through life, their spirits as dulled as their coats and the very mountains in which they reside.  The only thing we’ve managed to do for them is hide them from the rest of the world as they wish, ensuring none interfere with their way of life in exchange for their own guarding of our secret stronghold.  I wish we could do more, but I don’t think anything could ever fill the hole in their hearts left by the loss of their home.”

“Didn’t the Princesses try to help at all?  Wouldn’t they have at least tried to see if there were any survivors, from either the Empire or the Order?” Derpy asked, raising a fair question.

“They might have given more than the halfhearted excuse of a search that they did if certain events hadn’t transpired shortly thereafter.  Soon after the fall of the Empire, Luna’s resentment against Celestia came to a head and Nightmare Moon was born.  After their brief but fierce struggle and Nightmare Moon’s banishment to the moon, Celestia was left with double the responsibilities and could hardly be troubled with searching for a small band of refugees.  So we were forgotten: the Order, the Empire, everything, not just by Celestia but, in time, the whole of Equestria.”

“A mere shadow of what we once were, we could not hope to rebuild without the resources and influence we’d once commanded.  More importantly, the bitter taste of our betrayal still lingered fresh in our memory, and so the Order made the decision that it wanted no part of Celestia or her country.  Thenceforth we would carry on with our work from the shadows, and that’s exactly what we’ve done since then; for the past thousand years, we’ve slowly rebuilt, helping as many of the most despondent of ponykind as we could with the limited resources at our disposal.  That, Miss Hooves, is the story of the Order; now you know who we are, who we were, and how we became the shadow of our former glory that we are today, limited but more committed than ever to our noble work.”

Neither spoke for some time after that.  So much had been said, and there was now so much to think about.  So they just climbed, the only sounds the clop of their hooves against the worn stairs and the wind beating against the mountainside.