A massive, wingless dragon roared fiercely as his clawed paw, which was large enough to crush a small house underneath it, came down with strength at his target. In a flash of white, his prey escaped his attempt, but the dragon whipped his spiked-mace-like tail to eviscerate and hammer the woman he wanted dead.

With a dismissive flick of her right fist, Princess Celestia repelled the giant tail with as much ease as she would flick a sheet of paper. As the tail was recoiling from her, the Sun Princess grabbed one of its spines in her left hand, and flipped above her shoulder, sending the castle-size behemoth flying against the right flank of the valley in which she had teleported herself with the Thanes.

The Terrestrial Thane, Arnbjorn’s dragon form let out a relatively low growl of pain as a few boulders fell from the mountain on top of him. Celestia simply humphed in a disappointed fashion as the Dracan shook his head to recover from the blow. She was about to say something when she was engulfed in a torrent of emerald green flames.

The one-horned, green Dragoness maintained her fiery breath for a good ten seconds. Though, her reptilian eyes widened as white flames appeared within hers. White flames that started to burn her own fire and that coursed along the stream to its source: her mouth. She stopped breathing fire instantly and took off at a speed that shouldn’t have been possible for a creature her size. She witnessed the white fire vanish after consuming her green one with a glint of horror in her eyes.

“I told you that fire wouldn’t work on me, Astri,” Celestia reminded with a frown, from just above Astri’s green, scaly head.

Astri’s eyes barely managed to register Princess Celestia flying down to her level, her fists joined together above her head before the Equestrian Monarch bashed them both on top of the dragoness’ skull, cracking more than a few scales in the process. The strength of the impact was strong enough to cause the fall of the female Thane towards the ground. She bounced back on it a few times, with pained, draconian shrieks and ended her course in the sea at the end of the valley.

Celestia glanced at the fallen dragoness for a few seconds before she backhanded the patch of dark smoke that flew behind her without turning her head. Her fist hit the smoke in a loud clash and a gracile, young looking man with black leather wings was catapulted out of it, his daggers barely kept in his grip due to the strength of the impact.

At the last second, Harald backflipped mid air to land on his feet. He snarled angrily as he wiped the blood that was rolling out of his torn lip. A few feet behind him, Arrogon’s dragon form was roaring in defiance at the Sun Princess, then he started to shrink back to his human size and shape. Or so Celestia first thought, but in the end the latter wasn’t really well executed.

Arrogon had shrunk to his human size and allure, but his features kept a very draconic aspect. His limbs were sturdier than before, metallic scales coursed by purple energy having taken the place of his skin. Where his hands were supposed to be, there were large, clawed paws that looked like they could cut through the strongest armor. His face somehow managed to vaguely keep its human form, though his draconic features were clearly recognisable, and his white hair had been replaced by a numerous set of metallic spines.

“Oooooh,” Celestia let out in an impressed tone as she witnessed the changes in the Thanes’ appearances.

Arnbjorn had recovered from his clash against the mountain, and had leaped over the Princess to join his comrades. Much like Arrogon, he had taken a half-human/half dragon appearance, his spiked scales replacing the armor he was wearing before he first transformed while his strong, but very human like claws tightened their grip on the his large battle axe he picked up next to his Commander.

With a heavy shriek, Hring left his dragon form to his regular human one. The mountain of a man puffed strongly, causing hot steams to pour out of his mouth and nostrils at each breath, his bare, chiseled chest moving up and down to his rhythm as he spun two axes with swift movements of his wrists.

From the corner of her eyes, Celestia could see Astri take her young maid appearance back while rubbing her skull with a pained frown. The Dracan woman glared at Celestia for a few seconds before she blew a small blaze of green fire before herself. When the fire died down, a pair of shiny, silvery swords had popped into existence where it had burned. She grabbed the swords’ hilts and immediately took her stance, her right blade extended toward Celestia while she was holding the other in a reversed grip.

“Ha, a more traditional fight?” Celestia asked as casually as possible. “It’s been a while for me, but I suppose I can make it work!”

With one flick of her finger, her long, golden glaive appeared in her right hand. She rested the end of the shaft on her back while the edge of the blade was facing the five Thanes against her. Celestia’s eyes started to shine brightly as her hair became like a flame and the ground around her started to shake. Vines made of golden light started to crawl on her skin, following her veins, while she lifted her left hand to her opponents. She waved her fingers in her direction, inviting the Dracans to come at her.

Arrogon accepted the invitation immediately. Using his wings, he dashed toward the princess before he clawed in her direction. Celestia moved her palm to rest against the Thane’s wrist and with a soft wave like movement, she redirected his hit far from her. She was about slash him with her glaive when she spotted three axe’ blades coming down on her.

With a yellow flash, Celestia’s glaive, held in her right hand intercepted Arnbjorn and Hring’s axes a feet before they could touch the princess. Celestia flared her wings open and she raised her body a bit above the ground, lifting the three blocked Thanes along with her, one by his wrists, the others by the weapons they were still holding firmly, just before a set of twin blades cut the air where her belly had been a few seconds prior.

With a devious smirk, Celestia wrapped her leg around Astri’s neck while the Dracan’s face disappeared slightly under the Sun Princess’ dress. As a tanned and toned leg was crushing her throat, Astri let out a choked call.

“N...NOW!”

Celestia looked up and saw the fifth Thane’s daggers coming down her face with their owner falling from a patch of smoke. From the corner of her eye, she also saw Arnbjorn closing one of his spiked and scaly fists before slamming it to her cheek, while Arrogon plunged his other claw in her side and Hring freed one of his axes to slash her other side. They all hit their marks with loud clashing, metallic noises.

“....You’re gonna have to hit stronger than that,” Celestia commented softly as the blades, spikes and claws seemed to struggle to penetrate her skin.

Only Arnbjorn had managed to make her cheek bleed a little as one of his spikes had poked a tiny hole in it. A beam of golden light came out of her left finger and hit Arrogon in the face, sending him away in a loud groan. In the mean time, Arnbjorn and Hring freed their weapons from Celestia’s weapon before the latter transformed his head into a smaller version of his dragon one.

The small beak-like maw came down on Celestia’s strangling leg and bit as hard as possible. Celestia loudly hissed in pain and was about to slam her blade on Hring’s neck, but Harald’s smoke held her arm back up before Arnbjorn’s axe came up to her chin.

The impact with the Dracan steel had been so intense that Celestia’s head snapped back up and she was catapulted a dozen meters away from the group. Astri brought one of her hands to her throat as the Princess landed disgracefully in a loud thud, while Harald touched the ground and helped her up.

Arrogon flew back to his comrades, the scales on his forehead cracked and smoking due to the heat of Celestia’s magic, his light-filled eyes focused on the Princess who was now standing up.

"Hold fokus, den kvinde er stadig ikke nede," [Remain focused, that woman is still not down,] he whispered to his brothers and sister in arms who glanced in Celestia’s direction.

Their eyes widened briefly at what they were witnessing. The large chunk of flesh that Hring had ripped off her upper-calf was rapidly regenerating itself as the magic vines on her skin briefly converged to it. Celestia chewed on something during the short time as the deep cut that was separating her chin and face vanished into oblivion before she spat a big patch of blood along with a tooth.

“... Much better...,” Celestia commented softly while her incisor grew back nearly instantly.

Before they could blink, Celestia was standing before the five Thanes and thrusted her glaive forward. The tip of the flame-like blade touched the space between the scales of Hring’s chest too quickly for him or his comrades to even realize, its edge facing upwards. The glaive came up, and along with it Hring’s scales came off.

The red and brown Thane bellowed in pain, his hands trying to prevent the blood from pouring out of his wound while he fell on his knees. As he was facing down, Hring felt a small hand delicately touching the back of his massive, half-draconic head.

“...But, fighting proud warriors instead of hungry beasts suits me better!” Celestia whispered in a cold tone right before she pushed Hring’s head down.

The ground that was already shaking slightly in resonance to Celestia’s power quaked violently after she had slammed the Thane’s head into it, causing a small crater to appear just a few centimeters before Hring’s kneeled body. Celestia’s blade shone brightly before she spun it a bit and buried it deep into the beheaded back. The other Thanes gasped in shock as Hring’s body started to be consumed by intense flames of pure white that came out of the blade.

“.... Shall we continue, then?” Celestia asked as she pulled out her fiery weapon out of the burning, headless corpse.

Before the Thanes replied, a loud series of thunderclaps rang through the skies, causing Celestia to look up for a second. The sky above her and the four living Thanes was covered by massive storm clouds that hid the light of the setting sun and everything above them. Yet Celestia could see flashes of lightning coursing through them as well as a torrent of multicolored flames that revealed briefly shadowy figures of five Dragons chasing or being chased by a small patch of deeper darkness.

Looks like Luna is having fun… Celestia thought before she lunged toward her own opponents her glaive high above her head before she slammed it down, only for Arrogon to grab the shaft before the incendiary blade touched him, matching her own strength.

Then again… So am I! She added mentally with a small smirk before pushing a little harder as Arnbjorn also took the staff in his hands to prevent her from cutting down Arrogon, making the two Dracans slide backwards because of her push.

“...Sombra?” Gleaming Topaz let out in a mix of shock and surprise when she saw her husband entering the throne room, clad in dirty armor and a scepter with a glowing amethyst embedded on top secured in his hand. “What are y… How?...... I… I must be seeing things...” she added in a whisper, rubbing her eyes with one hand.

“I assure you that you’re not seeing an illusion, my Queen,” Sombra said softly, using his free hand to caress Topaz’s cheek when he had walked up to her.

The crystal Queen felt the warmth from Sombra’s hand and knew he was telling the truth. She immediately brought him in a tight hug that was probably breaking all protocolary codes of Royalty, but no one deemed it worthy to mention it at all. As she nuzzled her husband, her sensitive, pregnant woman’s flair took his smell. Sombra was reeking of sweat, sea, ash, and at last blood, and the latter was most likely not his own.

But she didn’t question it, as it didn’t matter. All that mattered now for her was that her king was back after weeks of battle across the ocean, and the need she had to press her lips against his. A need she fell victim to faster than she would have thought she would, and that her raging hormones quickly changed into another one, more reprehensible in the throne room.

“Before you try to bake another bun in a full oven, you should come see this, Sombra!” Daring calmly called as the rulers of the Crystal Empire’s tongues were dueling for each other’s dominance before she pulled a simple, brazen monocle from her pocket.

And, with that the moment was lost. While most of the Crystal guards around decided to spare their blushing queen by looking away, Sombra grumbled a few threats to the Explorer in his beard before he joined Daring on the balcony of the throne room while the two guards he had sent to ring the warning bells had finally reached them.

He glanced at the city before him, noticing almost instantly Shadow, Hindel and Mane exiting the castle with his unit of golems. His eyes searched for Snowdrop, and they found her already landing on the Western gate of the city, seemingly giving orders to the troops on the city walls. Then he looked up to the high hills West of the town, seeing why Daring had called him: a cloud of dust and smoke rising from behind it.

“Look at the top of the hill,” Daring said as she extended her monocle to Sombra. “Just look!” she added with a roll of her eyes when Sombra cocked an eyebrow at the artifact, forcing it in his hand.

While Queen Gleaming Topaz joined the pair on the balcony along with the Crystal Guard’s captain, Sombra brought the monocle to his right eye and aimed his gaze at the top of the hills. Through Daring’s artifact, he could a see a young-looking woman in a finely-smithed Dracan armor as clearly and closely as if she was standing a few feet before him.

Next to the Dracan woman, a furled banner was planted. Sombra saw the woman picking it up and bringing her fingers to her mouth to possibly whistle at somebody. Or something, as a massive wingless dragon slowly made its advance from beyond the hill top.

The beast was around the same height as the city walls, and it was sturdy enough to have been used as a battering ram against said walls. If it wasn’t for the three ballistas strapped on its back, it would probably be its use.

“Sweet Faust,” Topaz let out in shock as Sombra could see the woman jumping on the beast’s back and loading the front siege engine with the banner.

He barely had the time to see her aiming in their direction.

“Topaz, get inside!” Sombra ordered as the Dracan projectile flew straight to the Castle tower they were in, while he focused his red magic.

As a crimson shield appeared to protect the balcony, the banner planted itself with strength in the wall right above it. Sombra maintained the shield up just in case as the banner unfurled itself thanks to the wind, revealing the flag of the Crystal Empire, with a red Dragon Claw painted on above the snowflake in the center of the fabric.

“Tsss, arrogant much?” Daring commented in a sour tone.

“Do you think she’s waiting for a response?” Sombra asked, seeing the Dracan woman hopping down the engine carrying beast.

“Probably not….” Daring commented as the enemy leader observed the few citizens who had houses outside walls running to the gates. “...What is she doing?”

Sombra focused his friend’s monocle on the Dracan leader, seeing her drawing a whip from her belt and cracking it near the dragon’s head. The behemoth shook its head in annoyance, earning another crack of the whip in response. The beast took a deep breath and roared loudly.

The roar of an adult dragon is something quite powerful and terrifying. Even when it was nothing but legends and old fairy tales for the Equestrians, a dragon’s roar was always said to be the call of destruction, and that’s not counting the tales of Elder dragons capable of ripping one’s skin and muscles off his bones with their roars alone. A dragon’s roar had always brought a strong feeling of terror and helplessness into the hearts of most men and women who heard it.

Yet it wasn’t the worst. The worst was something even rarer than an Elder’s bellowing fury, and was by far a more dreadful omen. The worst was when a Dragon’s roar was answered. And such was the case in the hills before the Crystal City.

From beyond the hills, hundreds of draconics shrieks replied in concert to the adult dragon before the ones responsible came in sight of the Crystal Empire’s inhabitants. A horde of drakes that Sombra had seen used as cavalry mounts filled the horizon along with a dozen much larger specimens, also carrying various war engines on their backs.

With the help of the monocle, Sombra could see that only the larger beasts were with a crew of riders that seemed to prepare the catapults, ballistas and other machines alike strapped on their back. All the drakes were without a rider. He witnessed all of them taking leant down postures, much like dogs preparing themselves to fight, all with their maws slightly open, savoring the blood and flesh to come.

The Dracan leader’s whip came up in a swift, flawless move of her wrist.

“.......Faust… help us,” Topaz whispered in terror as all the smaller dragons on top of the hills started their descent after the whip came down.

“ALL MEN ON THE WALL! HURRY!” Captain Sentry called loudly as he and the Jupitarian part of the Crystal Guard flew towards the wall.

The last citizens had passed the gates just before those were closed and locked with the aid of the Circle of Enchanters of the city. Sombra’s apprentices had been summoned to reinforce every defense of the Empire. All eighty-eight of them had answered the call by teleporting to the Western Gate in the minutes that followed the awakening of their master’s golems.

After securing the gate, the Circle scattered through the length of the wall. They were soon joined by the Eponian lancers and archers of the Crystal Guard, while the Jupitarian corp took position above them with their battle-shapes or their bows ready.

“Hold fast, Soldiers!” Snowdrop shouted in her best commanding tone as the lancers stood at attention while the archers behind readied their weapons above their shoulders. “Wait for my command!”

Captain Sentry was about to voice a protest at the blind woman taking charge of his troops when his King teleported right next to Snowdrop, soon joined by Hindel and the other Council Members.

“And, what is your command, Herald?” Sombra asked with a trusty smile.

“Sombra, you join forces with your apprentices.” Snowdrop stated in a voice that left no place for discussion. “As soon as I give the order, give them a taste of Platinum’s children’s magic!”

“Aye!” Sombra nodded sharply before focusing his crimson magic and facing the approaching pack of beasts with determination.

“Hindel, you and Manuella will stand back to strike at whatever seems to overcome the lancers!” Snowdrop continued to her Dracan and Eponian friends who voiced their agreement with a loud “Yes, Ma’am!”. “Daring, you go support the Jupitarian corps! Shadow, you will stay with me to defend the gates!”

“All righty, Snow-girl!” Shadow approved and rested her warhammer on her shoulder while Daring flew up to Sentry’s level.

“...You’re letting a blind girl take command?” Sentry asked Daring with a shocked expression. “Are you serious?” he added when Daring cocked an eyebrow at him in response.

“How long have you been in the Guard, Captain?” Daring asked as she pulled two golden, palm-sized rings from one of her pockets.

“Seven years!”

“And during those seven years, how many dragons or Dracans did you face in battle?”

“....None,” he admitted slowly.

“Hum-hum…Well, you see! This blind girl has been trained by Princess Luna to be her herald for the past ten years, and has defeated nearly a thousand dragons and Dracans alike, be it in face-to-face combat or as a troop commander.” Daring explained matter-of-factly, pointing at Snowdrop. “Do I really need to answer your questions now that you know that?”

“....No,” Sentry sighed in defeat before conjuring a ball of lightning in his hands.

In the meantime, while all troops around her were getting ready, Snowdrop placed her hand on the edge of the city wall. She could feel the soft trembling of the approaching horde while hearing their shrieks and roars as clearly as they were just in front of her. She raised her staff as the first drakes set their paws off the hill and were coursing the plains to the wall.

Immediately after, a strong and rather cold gust of wind seemed to blow from behind the wall while occasional snowflakes were taken by it.

“Aim for the closest ones!” Snowdrop shouted as the archers hooked their arrows on their bow.

While the archers were taking their aims, Sombra and his apprentices focused their magic into different runic circles before them. The Jupitarian corps shaped their own magic into various projectiles, or reinforced their arrows with lightning or a twirl of wind around the tip.

“.....FIRE AT WILL!”

Snowdrop waved her staff forward, causing a wave of frost to fly straight in the drakes’ direction along with a rain of arrows and thunderbolts. The runic circles glowed brightly before releasing their magic, causing streams of light, fire, lightning or water of every color to flow out of them.

The first line of drakes was pretty much annihilated by the beams of Titanian magic that started to sweep among them, taking a huge toll on the beasts massive numbers before they died down. Those hit by Snowdrop’s frost were frozen instantly, only to be smashed to pieces by the ones following them, while others had their faces transformed into porcupines by arrows, be it Jupitarian’s enhanced ones or the ones in resonance with their Eponian owners.

The heavy barrage of magic, projectiles and lightning didn’t stop the drakes at all though. They ignored their losses and simply jumped over their fallen kin, or even stepped on them like it was nothing, roaring fiercely.

An enchanter was re-conjuring his arcanic circle with fast moves of his glowing green hands, when he heard a sharp whistle coming closer. He barely had the time to look up when a ballista bolt pierced his chest and tossed him off the wall.

The lancer that stood close by blinked before he saw another sharp bolt destroying a Jupitarian’s left wing, making him fall in spiral outside the wall in a loud crash. The lancer was about to call a Titanian to levitate his comrade back behind the wall, but was interrupted by a huge boulder that crushed him and the four soldiers at his side.

From the top of the hill, the crewmen on the twelve larger dragons’ back started a barrage of their own with their siege engines, hitting their marks at every shot thanks to the keen sight they had been blessed with since their kind’s creation.

“Snow, they’re bombarding us!” Shadow stated as she thrusted a lightning bolt at the horde of approaching drakes.

“Sombra, can you and your enchanters cast a shield to protect us?” Snowdrop asked in a shout, not interrupting her conjuring of freezing gust of wind for a second.

“It would take too long to conjure, and we wouldn’t be able to stop their charge with a shield on… They would simply have to keep pushing until it would break!” Sombra replied as he sent a dozen red, crystalline spears forward.

“Damn it!” Snowdrop muttered angrily. “Captain Sentry! You and your men must interc…”

Her order was interrupted as a large chunk of blue crystal flew just above her head with a sharp whistle before it crashed against a Dracan boulder, turning them both into dust. She, Sombra and Shadow blinked in shock as other chunks of crystals and rocks were sent right on most of the Dracan projectiles, intercepting them fifteen yards before the city walls and then turned around.

“DON’T GET YOUR HAIR IN TWIST, SNOW!” Mane shouted with a big toothy smile as her wild hair was catapulting chunks that it ripped off the nearby houses and road. “MINE GOT THIS!”

With their own artillery in place, the Crystal Empire’s defenders cheered before maintaining their barrages at the enemy herd of wild beasts. Though, as intense as their defensive fire was, it couldn’t stop the seemingly never ending horde.

They had managed to get a few feet close to the wall before they all lunged on it and used their claws to climb on top of it in less than a few seconds. The first draconic head to have peeked above the edge of the wall was welcome by three thrusted spears. While the weapons barely managed to penetrate the scales of the beast, the strength of the thrusts was enough to toss it off the wall, taking half a dozen of other drakes with it.

With great discipline, the lancers pushed the beast off the walls with minimal effort, all things considered, for a few moments, giving the possibility to the archers behind them to continue shooting. But that ended when one drake breathed a torrent of flames at the defenders before the spears touched it.

Taking advantage of the hole in the defensive lines, the drakes set their claws on the walls and started to attack the defenders right and left while some of them jumped down it to the interior of the city, only to face Sombra’s golems who promptly crushed their skulls when they came in range of attack.

Hindel had immediately ran to where the drakes managed to pass the wall, beheading two beasts with one strong swing of his sword. Then, he singlehandedly drove them off the wall, displaying his strength and swordplay. Each time his blade came down, a drake’s head or limb was sent flying away of its original body.

In the mean time, the drakes were trying to break the Western Gate which was holding up due to the enchantments on it, but judging by the cracks that started to appear on the thick, wooden surface, it wouldn’t last for too long.

“DARING! SHADOW!” Snowdrop shouted strongly, catching her friends’ attention instantly. “WITH ME!”

Without second thoughts, the Herald of the Lunar guard jumped over the edge of the wall’s gate, her shepherd crook spinning in her hand before she slammed it on the ground before the gate, unleashing a wave of frost that trapped the drakes attacking the door in a thick layer of ice, restricting all their movements.

While her weapon laid on the ground, a small dragon growled at her and lunged in her direction, his throat filling itself with a growing fire. He was about to breath its flame at the blind woman when two golden rings carried by the wind itself slammed the right side of his face with great strength, diverting his aim and thus causing his breath to burn everything in front of Snowdrop who hadn’t moved from her landing spot.

While its flames were attacking its brethren, the drake didn’t get the time to turn its head to where the rings had come from, as a thunder-surrounded warhammer head crushed it into the dust. At the impact with the ground, the hammer liberated a large quantity of electricity that struck all the frozen drakes at the door, frying them dead nearly instantly.

The beasts formed a circle around the three winged women before the city gate, while they stood proudly back to back, forming a circle of white, dark blue and dark yellow feathers with their wings. Shadow rested her hammer on her right shoulder casually while Daring pulled out of her khaki jacket’s pockets a dozen golden rings that she spread in her hand as if she was playing cards.

Growling furiously, the drakes attacked the three Council members in unison. Snowdrop hit the throat of the one targeting her with the crook of her staff in which she had focused a very low temperature wind. The frost recovered the scales of its neck then its head before the Herald of the Lunar Guard continued her motion, severing the frozen part off the main body.

Daring conjured the winds that threw her golden rings at the beasts in front of her. The twelve artifacts hit as many draconic faces, scratching their muzzles deeply, before they bounced between their targets, each impact giving them another deep wound, stopping their charge short.

Behind the Explorer and the Herald, Shadow proved that her claim that she could bend anything with her faithful hammer and a bit of lightning was a far cry from being wrong. Apparently, dragon scales and skulls fit into the equation.

From the top of the hills, next to her adult dragons and their crewmen operating the engine on their back, Magic-Eater Freia frowned at the progress of her herd of drakes. She hadn’t thought that breaking the door and passing the wall would be easy, but the five Council Members and the Traitor’s presence was certainly something she hadn’t expected.

As her eyes focused on Hindel who punched a drake off the wall, Freia growled in anger. She snapped her whip at the head of her biggest dragon. The beast roared in defiance before taking a deep breath and blew a massive fireball out of its maw, only to be imitated by its eleven brethren.

As the dozen balls of fiery plasma were flying toward the city, Freia’s hand reached for a small, silver horn at her belt and brought it to her lips. When her fire barrage was approximatively halfway to the wall, she took a deep breath and blew strongly in it.

Tiden er inde, Broder! [The time has come, Brother!] Freia thought as her horn rang through plains before her.

The sound of the Dracan horn resonated strongly in Snowdrop’s ears, briefly disturbing her in middle of the fight, which would have been fatal if the drakes had kept their assaults. But strangely, they stepped back, much to Snowdrop, Daring and Shadow’s confusion. The latter two glanced at each side of the gate, seeing that the drakes kept assaulting the city wall. Only those close to the gate itself were keeping their distance.

“Holy shit!” Shadow let out when she saw the fireballs breathed by the bigger dragons, which had also started their descent of the hill. “Snowdrop, their dragons are coming!”

“....Yeah, I can hear them coming,” Snowdrop softly whispered, hearing clearly the heavy steps of the behemoths under the claims of battles and the flying inferno coming at the wall. “SOMBRA, TAKE CARE OF THOSE FIREBALLS!”

“ON IT!” Sombra replied from the top of the gate before he conjured twelves shards of red crystals before him.

As she heard her friend’s magic growing while he was preparing his spell, Snowdrop felt the ground shaking a little. At first she had thought it was the dragons coming closer, but that small shake was constant, unlike the ones caused by the stomps of the scaly beasts. And its source wasn’t before her at all.

“.......Great Jupiter!” she let out in a shocked gasp when she realized it came from beneath her.

The pebbles next to her started to move in reaction to the quake, making Daring and Shadow, as well as all the defenders on the wall realize its existence. Snowdrop ordered her friends to take off, and with one flap of their wings, all three of them were well above the gate.

Behind the wall, Mane felt the quake of the earth with unease, momentarily forgetting to throw debris at the horde of dragons outside. She immediately turned around as her nose caught a strong smell getting more intense as the quake gained in strength. It smelled like the sea and sort of like a fish, but not entirely. She had smelled something like that before she knew it.

Mane sniffed strongly before the smell pointed toward a well a few feet behind her. The quakes were much more violent, and she had to lean on her fours to not lose her balance. As she heard the water from the well bubbling loudly, Mane came a little closer to it.

Then she blinked in shock when she recognized the smell. It reeked of sea dragon. The well, and a good portion of the ground around it broke in a huge explosion of fuming water that catapulted Mane into a nearby house.

“MANUELLA!” Daring shrieked, completely losing her calm for the first time in years when she saw chunks of stones falling on top of her adoptive daughter.

She immediately flew toward the exploded well to rescue Mane from under the stones and crystals, when a huge, blue, serpentine beast came out of it. The snake-like dragon looked long enough to reach for the top of the Crystal Palace if it would extend itself toward the skies.

Water-Dragon Frey, Freia’s twin brother, lowered his draconic head gracefully, while his eyes were focused on the enchanted gates of the city, ignoring the shocked defenders that had noticed him and that seemed to ignore the dozen fireballs coming in their direction. Something the drakes had noticed and had withdrawn from the wall.

Luckily for the defenders, Sombra cast his red crystals at the balls of plasma before they reached the wall. The enchanted shards instantly absorbed the fire when they touched it. Their king had just saved the wall, but he could have done nothing to stop the Water-Dragon.

Out of Frey’s mouth came out a large and powerful jet of steaming water. Snowdrop tried to conjure a wall of ice to block the jet, but her shape melted in contact of the apparently boiling water in less than ten seconds. The attack of Frey reached the gates that held against the pressure before he opened his maw wider, making the jet larger and stronger than before.

In a loud fracas, the gates were shattered to pieces by the stream of water. Frey roared triumphantly as the drakes were charging through the now clear gateway.

“RETREAT! RETREAT BACK TO THE PALACE!” Snowdrop ordered loudly. “BACK TO THE PALACE!”

Muttering a curse, Sombra cast a teleportation circle around the guards close to him, quickly imitated by his apprentices after he mentally gave the order to his golems to return to the palace at once. In a series of flashes, most of the guards were transported to the center of the city, right in front of the Palace’s four entrances.

Sadly, not every enchanter managed the spell quickly enough to avoid a drake’s attack, condemning many Eponians on the wall to suffer the same fate as them, for there was no hope in trying outrun a hungry drake on foot. Those who weren’t teleported to the keep, avenged their fallen enchanter before forming a last stand, ready to take as many dragon lives with them, giving a bit more time for their comrades to prepare their defenses.

In the meantime, the dragons had reached the plains at the bottom of the hill. Freia stretched her back as numerous Dracan raiders massed themselves behind her. She smiled sardonically before nodding at her closest lieutenant and started to walk down the hills without any care for the world, with her soldiers marching behind her.

Now that the gate was open, and with her brother rampaging through the city along her pet drakes, Freia was certain that the Crystal Empire would fall.

Author's Notes:

And there you go!
The first part of the Final chapters of Dracan War.
Thanks to G3K0771 and GWG for their awesome job at editing and reviewing.

The next should be a in a few.

Hope you've enjoyed it.

Mariacheat-Brony