Nightmare Fuel / The Flash Sentry Chronicles

• How the Alicorn Amulet was created in The Forgotten Darkness. The Tricksters lured the Jackhowls into a trap, and when Sharp Paw told Dark Mist that he connected his aura with every Jackhowl, Dark Mist then reveals that this was exactly what he was hoping for, and uses a connection rune to connect himself to every Trickster, and Sharp Paw, then signals Vile Rune to start the ritual, which kills every Trickster and Jackhowl in existence.
• The flashback in chapter 5 of The Knight of Friendship. It starts out with Cold Steel and his parents tending a greenhouse, but when they exited it, they saw that the village was on fire. The village was attacked by bandits, and everyone, including Cold’s parents were killed, and they were about to kill Cold too. He barely managed to escape, but only by killing them first.
• Gold Hoof's death in "Building Bridges". Even if he completely deserved it, being blown up by a magical symbol put on him by his mysterious ‘business associates’ is still a nasty way to go. It doesn't help that he realizes what was about to happen and begs for Flash and Cold to save him before it goes off.
• The initial nightmare Flash suffers from the Tantabus during "Do Princess's Dream of Magic Sheep". He watches all of his friends die right in front of him, lightning striking all the homes in town and turning his friends to dust before his eyes, and he hears their voices taunting him over how he failed them and couldn't save them. Though things take a major Mood Whiplash when his true worst fear is revealed, it does little to diminish the experience he went through before Luna and Trixie arrive to help.
• "The Day Flash Sentry Died" is easily the darkest chapter in the series.
  • The chapter introduced us to the Flos-Mortem flower. It is a plant with a pollen that is so deadly that anyone who takes just a mere whiff of it will die instantly. Worse, just a minor disturbance of the flower will cause it to release its pollen no matter how small it is, like when a ladybug landed on the thing and got a full blast of the pollen, killing it instantly.
  • To make matters worse, it almost kills Flash. And if that wasn’t enough, not even the Sacred Light can stop it, as all it can do is delay the effects. The fact that the Sacred Light couldn’t stop the poison all but implies that the Flos-Mortem flower is a creation of the Corrupted Shadow.
  • The effects that the thing has on Flash, as the Sacred Light tries to hold back the poison. Flash suffers a Dying Dream, where he was never adopted by the Sparkle Family, and spent his whole life being treated like dirt from everypony, no matter how much good he tried to do. Eventually, he comes very close to just giving up, but fortunately, thanks to his friends getting the remedy in time, as well as calling out for him is able to prevent him from dying.
  • One of the timelines that Twilight and Spike traveled to in "The Cutie Remark", was one where half of Equestria was covered in Flos-Mortem flowers.
• The final part of "The Lost City" officially introduces the showy villain that had appeared several times before and the minions he had spoke of previously. The whole thing consists of them hunting down a single Canterlot guard pony who had discovered their base, with it being not so subtly implied that they had already killed the rest of his squad. Each of them gets a moment of showcasing their abilities and torturing the poor guard, until their master appears to finish the job.
  My name... is Shadow Corrupter. The most powerful pony in Equestria.
• Fire Heart and Shining Soul, two young kids, being stuck in the city of Faust by themselves for three years. They don't even know how they got there to begin with, they just woke up one day and found themselves there all alone.
• Searing Salix being Reduced to Dust during a battle against Flash's team. All of his teammates are shocked by it, with even Shadow staring at the sight in shock. The same fate almost happens to Soarin too, before he finds a strange sphere and touches it, which ends up saving him and winning his team the battle. It is revealed in the next chapter that Salix was actually still alive, but this does little to diminish the actual act, and it still happens to two others before the reveal is made.
• The Cult of Shadow show no problems in harming children, when they attack Shining Soul despite the fact that she’s only a filly. It gets even worse when its revealed that she’s an alicorn, which causes them to become even more determined to kill her.
• Flash's team get a hint of what happened to the City of Faust with a journal Trixie found and Flash translates. The city was ravished by an unknown plague, and everyone was put under quarantine, explaining the bubble around the city preventing them from leaving. Apparently, only children were immune to the disease for unknown reasons and they were sealed away in bubbles and put to sleep to hopefully live their lives in the future when the plague died out. But this also implies that Fire Heart and Shining Soul were the only survivors since they haven't seen any other foals since they woke up in the city three years ago.
• Shining Soul is chosen to fight for Team Flash once again. Things are made even worse when it is revealed that Shadow Corrupter was one of the fighters chosen for his team, and with Terror Card and Searing Salix keeping Trixie and Ruby busy, Soul is left all by herself against Shadow, with her just trying to run away from him and hide.
• A flashback reveals that Shadow Corruptor is the way that he is now, because he was groomed by the Cult of Shadows as a colt to serve as the vessel for the Corrupted Shadow in a sacrificial ritual.
• In the final clash against Flash and Shadow, Shadow says how he wants Flash to stay alive just so he can watch him conquer Equestria, and he will be sure to make sure everyone knows everything they suffer will be Flash's fault for failing to save them. He also explicitly says he plans to slowly drain Twilight of her magic, and if she survives the process he will find other uses for her, like as a replacement for Tempera. This basically means that Shadow was planning to turn Twilight into a Sex Slave, just to spite Flash.
• In "The Next Generation of Aura", Shade has escaped from prison, just like he promised.
• In "Amber Alert", Flash and his team encounter a creature called a Loucarcolh, a giant snail-like monster with razor sharp teeth. Its lair is filled with the bones of its victims, including the missing livestock from New Omniara and several missing ponies as well. It manages to capture most of Flash's team, and would have most likely given them a similar fate if not for Flash's quick thinking.
• In "The Bug and the Knight", Flurry Heart is almost kidnapped by a mysterious assailant in the middle of the night, with her only being rescued because Thorax and Hiveena just happened to be walking by together and hear the commotion, leaping into action to save her. Then not long after this incident, the one who hired that assailant, Hard Sell, attempts to murder Flurry Heart himself, due to believing that she is too dangerous to be kept alive with her powers at her age and could destroy Equestria if she goes down the wrong path. Though the combined efforts of Hiveena and Ruby prevent this, the event reveals to Shining Armor and Cadance that other ponies are also afraid of what their daughter could become, showing what Flurry will face as she grows up.
• In "The Trial of Flash Sentry", Mecha-Flash is this as he was unstoppable and no ones could keep up with him. Doesn't help he had an ability to suck all of Sacred Light from Flash, since it was previously established by Faust that removing the Sacred Light from him could potentially kill him.
• In "To Where and Back Again Part 1", Queen Chrysalis is even more dangerous than her canon self by not only kidnapped Mane Seven, Defenders, and the Royal Family but the entire Royal Knights!
• Malafear, the Big Bad of Dragon's Awakening, is constantly built up as an ancient threat that Flicker accidentally awakened, and quickly takes control of the entire dragon race, brainwashing them to become his army. One of the worst things he has ever done though was seen in a flashback in "The Six Dragons", when he murdered Fira, Silverbolt's wife and Spike's mother, by absorbing her soul, and then mockingly kicks her dead body away right in front of Silverbolt.
• Malafear did one thing that none of villains succeed in: getting Flash to surrender himself and turning him into his brainwashed dragon.
• The first chapter of Grand Hoof: The Legend Begins shows exactly what it is Grand is trying to atone for, which he only alluded to when he previously mentioned his past. When he was young and wanted to be a Royal Knight, he heard about a Manticore in the woods near Canterlot and foolishly led a bunch of other kids into the woods to find it, believing they could get rid of it. The entire group is slaughtered by the angry beast, with Grand only surviving thanks to the arrival of his friend Doom Chaser. We also see where Grand got the idea of his famous "Count up your sins" catchphrase came from, when Doom told him to go to the graveyard and count every single grave that was filled because of Grand, telling him each one is a sin of his he needs to make up for.
• In "Ones Soul Calling", the mysterious plague that wiped out the Lost City of Faust makes a return and infects Ponyville. It is discovered Soul was an unknowing carrier of the disease, and accidentally infected the town. It even managed to infect Celestia, Luna, and First Aid, despite them taking precautions before entering town, showing just how deadly it is. It's a good thing Soul managed to stop it and cure everyone, or else it could have potentially spread all across Equestria.
• During "Reinforcements from the Future", a evil rogue changeling from the future travels back in time using a Time Stone to sabotage the conference the princesses are having with Thorax and Ember. In the future, this conference succeeds and is the start of an alliance between ponies, dragons, and changelings that eventually evolves into a Federation between all creatures and kingdoms, but this one stubborn drone wants to sabotage all of that so the changelings can return to their old ways, believing that is what they are meant to be. When Twilight informs everyone of this at the conference, Ember voices how much time travel freaks her out, since they have no idea if they are living in an altered timeline or what the "original" is even supposed to be like, and for all she knows she was never meant to be Dragon Lord and it happened because someone went back in time and stepped on a bug.
• During the adaptation of "Forgotten Friendship", Human Flash ends up getting kidnapped by Wallflower Blush after she realizes he still has his memories of Sunset being good, and she uses the Memory Stone to make everyone forget about him too. Imagine being kidnapped and nobody coming after you since nobody remembers you.
• While Grubber is carrying Ace after he has been petrified by an Obsidian Orb over to where the petrified Derpy and Mira are, he complains about how he is being forced to do this because he isn't higher up on the authority chain due to Void and Armalum showing up and briefly considers breaking Ace into smaller pieces to make it easier on himself. Thankfully he decides not to, but only after Starlight begs him not to hurt him and offers to move it for him if it is too much trouble for him, but it is still a pretty dark moment for Grubber.
• When Fire Heart removes his bandages in School's in Session, everyone sees that his fur has grown back properly but his hoof now has a long scar. Flash, Twilight, and Spike all recognize it as being the exact same scar as the one his future adult self had, and this is the most Heart will heal from that injury. This also means that the future that the adult Fire Heart told Flash about, where he sacrifices himself to save everyone, is still happening. Flash's fateful day is slowly approaching, and he still doesn't know what he is going to do to change his fate.
• In "A Returning Storm", Storm Blade makes his return. Unlike the rest of his amnesiac teammates, he did not turn over a new leaf after losing his memories, and instead actually seems to have gotten worse.
  • He has suffered a major case of Sanity Slippage. wanting to know who he is and make whoever stole his memories pay, and anyone who can't give him the answers he seeks he attacks unprovoked due to them being "useless to him". He destroyed at least one village in this insane quest.
  • When Flash and his team find the aftermath of one of his attacks, Cold investigates a destroyed house. After moving some rocks out of the way, he quickly drops them when he sees what's inside. We don't learn what he saw, but his reaction and making sure Soul doesn't see implies that it was probably at least one dead body.
  • Storm becomes so unhinged that he causes an active volcano to erupt, all just so the heroes will need to choose between chasing him and letting all the villages in the area die or stopping it and letting him escape.
• Razor Fang is so convinced he is the Jakhowl of the prophecy, the one destined to defeat "the greatest threat the jakhowls ever faced" and lead them into a new golden age, that he refuses to believe he is wrong about any of his beliefs or consider the possibility the prophecy isn't about him. When it seems like the jakhowls and ponies are on the verge of making peace together, Razor refuses to see this as a good thing because he believes the ponies are their enemies who sealed them away, not believing it was actually the Umbrum, and so he murders Sirius and frames the ponies for it as an excuse to make himself the new leader and declare war on Equestria like he has wanted for so long. He doesn't even realize how waging war would result in his entire tribe being wiped out, or that by doing this he has made himself into the threat the prophecy spoke of.
• The Evil Flash from the Season 5 finale, now going by "Shroudheart", returns in Evil's Uprising as Sombra's replacement among the villains. And with his return comes a whole slur of nightmare fuel.
  • He reveals after he was defeated, instead of being blasted back through time, he was blasted outside of it, ending up in a dimension where he didn't age, grow hungry, get tired, or do anything except exist. He was left with nothing to do but watch the various universes play out around him, coming into and out of existence with simple choices. It is a lot like his And I Must Scream moment he suffered in Season 5, but this lasted for several millennia according to him. By the time he is free, he claims to now know everything that has happened in every timeline, including the canon one of the main show and several previous generations.
  • When he goes to strike out on his own, he recruits Mean Flash into his plan. He reveals in every timeline he saw, Mean Flash always dies, either because his existence was discovered, because the real Flash killed him in self-defense, or because the magic that brought him to life completely faded. With this knowledge, and with Shroudheart promising to help him survive, Mean Flash agrees to join him, while simultaneously declaring his own hatred of the real Flash, wanting to live the life he has for himself.
  • Shroudheart's assault on The Crystal Empire includes defeating Sombra and Ruby, and putting Ruby under his control with one of Sombra's mind-control helmets. He later considers turning Amore back to stone, but decides to keep her around so she will be Forced to Watch what happens to her old kingdom. Finally, after he takes Flurry Heart hostage, he implies that he raped Cadance back in his own universe and claims that her motherhood has only made her more appealing with a sadistic lick of his lips, perhaps implying he is planning to make her into a Sex Slave. He pretty much says the same thing to the Mane 6 after he destroys the Elements and Tree of Harmony.
• Armalum is a constant source of this throughout Season 9.
  • A couple of chapters has him appear at the end after the villains have been defeated and seemingly saves them, only to simply ask them if they hate Flash Sentry. When they say they do, he does something to them.
  • "Frenemies" confirms a few things about him. For one thing, he is not using Mean Flash as a new host, cause he no longer needs a host. He has been empowered by Shadow's Corrupted Shadow and is literally being powered by the hatred that Shadow, Shroudheart, and Mean Flash all felt for Flash Sentry. He confirms that he has been draining the hatred others have felt for Flash to power himself, subjecting them to a Fate Worse than Death, and is saving it for his eventual confrontation with Flash. He also makes contact with the Legion of Doom, informing them he knows from Shroudheart's memories that their plan will fail, and he agrees to team up with them in the final battle to help them deal with Flash and the other Royal Knights.
  • Armalum teams up with the Legion of Doom again in "The Summer Sun Setback", needing their assistance so he can infiltrate the Crystal Penitentiary. After learning of the Rune Gates and how Solid Script made them, Armalum sneaks up on him and knocks him out, before using his powers to learn everything he needs to about the Rune Gates. He also notes how he could easily make Script turn the gates into bombs while he had him under his control, but knew this would be impossible to dismiss this as an accident and had to be smarter with his sabotage.
  • Armalum reaches the Rune Gate in the castle and manages to successfully infiltrate the Crystal Penitentiary. His first stop is his old teammate Storm Blade. He restores his memories, and Storm thinks he is breaking him out, even telling him where they can probably find the other cultists so he can restore their memories too. But then Armalum says he's not breaking Storm out and his plans to avenge Shadow don't include him, before draining him of his hatred for Flash too, with his screams filling the prison. He then moves on to every other prisoner Flash helped put away, including Big Score and his cronies, Electra, Banshee, Shocker, even Doom Raizer and his two remaining minions. Unlike his other victims, we actually see the aftermath for all of these, with them having apparently suffered from Rapid Aging, like their life was sucked out of them. What's worse is, Armalum implies at the end of the chapter he plans to find the other ex-cultists and restore their memories so he can do the same thing to them too.
• Lightning Siege begins with a Villain Opening Scene, where we get our first glimpse of Overthrow, the main villains of the story. New recruits are put through a Death Course with only the survivors joining. There are several descriptions of the ponies that don't make it, including being shot down by arrows, trapped in bear traps, cut by trip line wires, other obstacles like holes filled with spikes, nail covered swinging logs, and even a few landmines, and one pony falling into a lake filled with bite-acudas and being devoured by them. Their final test is being trapped in a cave that slowly starts to fill with gas that fills their lungs and "feels like acid", with all of them panicking and pushing against each other to try to get out of the gas. By the end of this, it is said that they started with fourty ponies, twenty five making it to the final test, and only seventeen survivors.

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