You love music, don’t you?
Crimson Beat had just struck the opportunity of a lifetime! At least, the opportunity of a lifetime for most other ponies. One of his friends, Velora, had given him one of her extra tickets to this strange “discovery” trip. Apparently, a group of archaeological diggers had discovered a sprawling city deep underground, right under Ponyville! He was interested at first… before he actually reached the city. The moniker of “the City of Tears” was definitely not a misnomer; this was the saddest area he had ever laid his eyes on. A blue haze hung heavy in this ancient underground metropolis, and the spike-rimmed Gothic of the old, yet still functioning elevators and rooftops made everything look dreary. Worst of all, he was getting drenched; apparently this city had been built under a lake, which was now leaking into the city. His messy red mane hung in front of his eyes, and he needed to place his glasses above his horn so that he had any chance of seeing.
He was getting both annoyed and bored, and Velora must have felt the same, as when Crimson looked around, she was nowhere in sight. Great, now he was soaking wet, bored, and surrounded by ponies that he didn’t know, most of them monologuing to him dully. This was it, he was going on his own; while everypony else was busy monologuing or listening to others monologue, he quickly snuck ahead of everyone else, going past the doors that mysteriously opened up in front of him.
Before long, Crimson found himself in what seemed to be an old… housing area. He froze in place as large footsteps caused the ground under him to rumble. He looked ahead to see… a giant, humanoid insect, wearing maroon armor, with bright orange eyes, and carrying an equally large sword and shield. The large beast of a… bug marched over to him and looked down upon him, sword by its side and shield in front. The giant soldier reeled its blade back, but before it could strike, Crimson panicked and managed to grab the blade with his magic. The soldier grunted with confusion, before Crimson yanked the blade from its grasp and shanked it straight in the chest, seeming to skewer through its armor and causing it to tumble down.
Crimson looked over at the weapon, and decided that, despite its odd craftsmanship, he would bring it with him. He jumped onto the flat part of the blade and used his magic to float himself around on the blade to see if any of the doors looked interesting, looking high and low. A strange sign caught his eye; it seemed to be a white mask, with an open mouth and two-pronged horns. He went over to the door that it was pointing to and tried to open it to find that it was locked; Celestia knows what kind of keys this strange civilization used. On frustrated impulse, he jabbed the blade through the door, causing it to break into many tiny pieces of wood and metal; well, that worked wonders. Finding that the blade couldn’t fit through the door, he left it on the ground outside as he stepped through.
In the room he immediately saw a sight, a painting of what seemed to be another insect person, depicted with large pink butterfly wings, maroon clothes, and beautiful blond hair, with unreadable ancient text beside it. Ahead, he saw an elevator, which, after he shook himself off, stepped onto and flipped the switch to go up, to see if it still worked; it still did, and it seemed to shakily start up and began to rise. It was a long ride up, him almost sitting down, before it suddenly stopped at the top. He saw two large entrances, one that looked very… steamy, with a calm air to it, and the other the seemed to need climbing skill. He decided to ignore the “steamy” area for now, and decided to trek up to the room at the other end.
He clumsily climbed up, before finding an… abandoned stage. It wasn’t a very large stage, but parts near the front seemed to be adorned with flower vases, the flowers having wilted after what seems like thousands of years. He then noticed something strange; there seemed to be some kind of singing resounding through the room, an opera voice, a female opera voice. Crimson braced himself; was somepony coming? He took off his headphones for once, before hearing a melodic voice:
“You love music, don’t you?”
“Don’t worry, I do, too.”
Crimson slowly nodded his head, his headphones rattling around his neck.
“I am Marissa, and I was a songstress of some renown.”
“Was.”
Crimson jumped when she suddenly spoke so sternly.
“I didn’t wish to be abandoned like this, I want to sing again.”
“Could you let me sing?”
Crimson looked at and pawed at the ground for a second, before he nodded again, while chuffing; she seemed to have a very beautiful voice.
In an instant, Crimson was struck with a skull-rattling headache, causing him to hold his head with a hoof. He winced, before stumbling over to a wall to try and keep his balance. His tail fell to clumps of red on the floor as his skin and fur was being converted into… a carapace? His stance was forced upright as his torso structure changed, his body and limbs thinning out and becoming daintier. His flesh was being twisted into a shiny black carapace, with his back legs becoming much straighter, with his back hooves becoming tiny stumps, and his gaining visible joints for his now-plantigrade legs. His waist thinned out, giving him a very prominent set of feminine hips, and lost his cutie mark. He yelped in pain as his sex was quickly changed, soon leaving him- her on the floor. Despite not gaining breasts, she still gained a rather puffed-out chest, especially in comparison to her shoulders.
Her front legs became the same black carapace as the rest of her body, along with becoming thin arms, each with thee-fingered hands, and prominent joints along her arms. Her neck became slightly longer, and her blue-furred face and snout became much more compact, with a small, pointy, beak-like mouth. Her eyes became a pure black in color, and her face color went from blue to a pale white, and lost her pony ears and unicorn horn. Her glasses fell off of her head and shattered to pieces on the floor. Her short red mane became a long silky blond, and began draping over half of her face. From her back emerged two large, ornate, pink butterfly wings that fluttered slightly.
She completely lost her old headphones, instead fancy, ornate clothing forming over her. She gained a large, silken, maroon collar that led to sharp-looking shoulder clothing. On her chest formed a strange segmented grey diamond shape that ended at the bottom of her waist, and the maroon cloth let to a flowing, ragged dress.
Marissa whimpered and groaned; that wasn’t fun. She slowly stood up, before looking at her stage, the flowers still wilted and the room still wet from the endless “rain” from above. She didn’t seem to care, going to the front center of her stage, and after breathing in deep and closing her eyes, began to sing.