Twilight had been able to fully convert her recently obtained scale into a necklace thanks to a villager who specialized in jewelry. She now wore it around her neck wherever she went as a reminder to kill the monster that threatened to literally plague the land. It had already been a day since she found the scale in the forest and hunted the Yian Kut-Ku (the latter of which made a surprisingly comfortable cover for Twilight from it's scales), and today, Luna was about to surprise her with an interesting quest.

Luna entered her student's room, where she was currently sharpening her insect glaive and letting her Kinsect fly around her head. To the former princess, Twilight had grown as a hunter in both knowledge and power, and she believed that her pupil was ready to face her greatest challenge yet... at least until high rank.

"Twilight?" Luna spoke as she saw her protege sharpen her tools "May I speak with you for a moment?"

"Hmm?" the lavender Unicorn's head perked up and she smiled at her mentor as she stopped what she was doing briefly "Oh, hello Luna. What is it you want to talk about?"

"I have noticed your growth in skill and strength recently," the blue Alicorn explained to her student "and I have decided that it is time for you to face your greatest foe yet."

"You don't mean..." Twilight was speechless at what her teacher had just said.

"That is exactly what I mean, Twilight" Luna confirmed "You are going to fight... a Congalala."

"Wait, what?" the purple maned mare was confused, but quickly lightened up to the idea "Oh, okay. I thought you were going to say we had to fight the Zinogre or something silly like that."

"Actually, now that I think about it..." Twilight could feel her sanity slowly drain away as the blue mare spoke "That wouldn't be a bad idea. That Zinogre in this forest and Foal Mountain has been causing too much trouble as of late. I would have already hunted it down if I didn't have the job of protecting these poor townsfolk, so why not let me stay here and you can hunt down the Zinogre. What do you say?"

"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh..." was all Twilight could allow her mouth to breath out, her face looked as if she'd seen a ghost.

"Glad that you agree with me, fair student" Luna blissfully hummed her way out of her pupil's room, leaving Twilight in shock, confusion, and slight anger at herself. She just sat there for a good five minutes thinking about what she had brought upon herself. Would she really have to fight the Zinogre only three days since she learned how to even fight? The unfortunate answer to that question was... yes. Yes she would. She eventually came out of her dazed state, though she was still terrified at what she would have to fight very, very soon.

"I can't believe I said that!" Twilight quietly yelled at herself "Now Luna's going to make me go to Foal Mountain and slay the Zinogre all by myself! Stupid, stupid, stupid Twilight! Bad Twilight! You're not... no, have to thing positively... okay... You can do this! You can do this! But what if I can't? No, I can! Luna trusts I can, so I can!"

After her short confidence workout, Twilight grabbed her insect glaive and attached it to her back, the Kinsect flying down and doing the same thing. She then opened her item chest and got out her now Great Jaggi Armour and put it on as fast as she could. Finally, she turned to where her necklace was. After some consideration, she decided to put it around her neck, hoping it would give her luck against the infected electrical wyvern.

XXXXXX

"Twilight, are you prepared?" Luna asked her student at the front gates of Hollow Shades, the rest of the townsfolk there as well to wave her farewell "You should know that if you defeat this monster, you will no longer be an in-training, but a full-fledged Monster Hunter."

"I'm ready, Luna" Twilight nodded in confirmation "After some thought, I think I'm finally ready to take the Zinogre on and save this town from it's terror."

"That's the spirit, Twilight!" her mentor smiled "Now, come back alive, okay?"

"I'll try" the lavender Unicorn joked before hugging her teacher, a gesture Luna was not expecting to have her do. However, Luna slowly returned the hug. After a few seconds, they separated from each other and the villagers cheered the young Monster Hunter good luck. She waved back as she left the village in search of the Zinogre that threatened to destroy everything in the forest, including Hollow Shades.

"Best of luck to you, Twilight Sparkle..." Luna said as the villagers continued to cheer her on while she left their quiet little town "May you do us all proud... And may you do my sister proud as well."

XXXXXX

The trek up Foal Mountain was no doubt a dangerous one. It was filled with crevasses and cliffs as high as the eye could see, not to mention filled to the brim with monsters of all sizes. Twilight even saw a Rathian feed it's chicks as she went by a large cave, which she was thankfully able to go past without being caught by the female dragon or it's mate for that matter. The lavender mare continued to trek up the mountain until she finally decided it was time for a bit of a rest.

"Ahhh..." she finally sat down to rest her legs "Always nice to get out sometimes. You know, I always wanted to go and see Foal Mountain, but I never thought I'd visit it as a Monster Hunter."

Twilight brought out a bottle of water she packed in her saddlebag before leaving town. She opened it up and guzzled a quarter of it down. After a long trip going up the mountain, she was absolutely drenched. The day wasn't hot by any means, but traveling up a large rock would make anyone thirsty. After just sitting there for a few seconds, she decided to take a whetstone she also packed in her bag and sharpen her insect glaive.

As she was doing this, she heard something travel past her with a quick wooshing noise. It was too small to be the Zinogre, so she payed it no mind. That is, until that certain thing decided to attack her. The creature pounced onto her, which surprised her greatly. It began to peck at the Unicorn's armour, so Twilight quickly pushed the beast off her body, grabbed her weapon and stuck her glaive right into the monster's heart, effectively killing it. It was that moment when Twilight realized just what had been attacking her; a baby Rathalos.

"Oh no..." Twilight's face turned from scared to horrified in a matter of seconds. The next thing she heard was a loud screech and the sound of gigantic wings flapping towards her. The Rathian was coming to find it's baby. Before Twilight could even move her legs to run, she saw a dragon head towards her, extremely pissed off. The dragon was red with grey spikes on it's back and large tan wings with black patterns on it. Each of it's two legs looked as powerful as two Yian Kut-Ku's combined, and it's head had two red horns around it's jaw. Finally, it bore a long red tail with spikes on the end. Twilight could easily recognized this oddly popular creature as the fearsome and dangerous Rathalos, the mate to the Rathian and father to the chick she just killed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FNsoHkvCXI

The Rathalos let out a loud and terrifying roar as it set it's sights on Twilight. The lavender Unicorn, finally snapping back into reality, picked up her stuff and began to run away from the enraged monster. She found a tunnel she could escape through and protect her from the fire breathing dragon for at least a short while. However, the beast somehow was able to fit it's head inside and start shooting fireballs at her, earning a yelp from her. Twilight quickly escaped the tunnel and continued to run from the Rathalos while also heading up the mountain.

The creature was quick to follow the lavender mare up the pathway, shooting fireballs at her as it flapped alongside her. Once, it even tried to grab her and take her back to it's nest where the Rathian was waiting. This continued until Twilight, being the somewhat ditz she was, remembered she was capable of fending off the red dragon.

She took out her insect glaive and sent out her Kinsect, which latched onto one of the Rathalos's legs and flew back to Twilight, giving her a speed buff. She used this to run from the creature faster than before. However, the Rathalos had different plans. Before Twilight could reach a tunnel she deemed to be a small checkpoint of sorts, the beast landed in front of her and roared, forcing her to cover her ears from the loudness of it.

"AHHHH!!" the lavender mare winced at the creature's loud call. However, she tried her best to shake off the noise ringing in her head as she engaged the Rathalos. The beast charged at her with a quick motion, but Twilight managed to dodge it and uppercut the dragon on it's face, inflicting pain onto it and turning it on it's side, giving her the perfect opportunity to try and cut off it's tail. She leaped off a jagged edge of rock that was conveniently right next to the creature's tail and brought her glaive down on the flailing body part in a downward thrusting position. Before she could cut it off however, the beast got up and flew back into the air, giving the purple maned mare a chance to flee through the checkpoint.

Once she exited the tunnel, she saw that the creature was waiting for her in the air. It threw some more fireballs at her, which she unfortunately took to her body. She was sent tumbling back down into the cavern she just emerged out of. After the roll, she got up and took out a mega potion she crafted whilst on one of her hunts with Luna.

"That Rathalos is tough..." Twilight thought to herself out loud as she drank her mega potion "There has to be somewhere where I can fight it on equal grounds... Maybe at the top of the mountain? There is a possibility of a flat plateau at the top, so maybe..."

Once Twilight was done formulating a plan, she ran back outside to where the Rathalos was waiting. It once again fired a few fireballs at her, but being ready this time, she managed to dodge them and continue up the mountain. The red dragon followed her up at the same time and continued to attack her with talons and fireballs. Eventually, Twilight found a round-ish plateau at the top of the pathway with a clear 360 degree outlook over all of the mountains and the forest. She could even see Hollow Shades down below as well. Looking to her left, she saw the largest mountain of the Foal Mountains overlooking the plateau, making this a great place to fight the Rathalos. The monster in question finally landed on the ground and roared at her. She held her insect glaive with her magic and prepared to properly fight the beast. But before she could...

(Music stop)

Out of the blue, a hungry and dangerous Zinogre with glowing red eyes and a broken horn attacked the Rathalos, killing it immediately by digging it's large teeth into it and splitting it in half, causing blood and gore to sprawl out all over the place. Naturally, this both surprised and disgusted Twilight. Normally the Rathalos and Zinogre are on equal terms of power, and either one of them could win a battle at any time. But to see a Zinogre so easily rip through the dragon's tough hide and bone was terrifying to the mare. Just what power did the Frenzy Virus give to it's infected organisms?

The electrical beast payed no mind to Twilight as it began to quickly gobble up it's most recent kill's internal organs and meat. This gave the lavender Unicorn a chance to strike it when it wasn't looking. Slowly, she crept up to the feasting monster and brought out her glaive to strike it. However, by a stroke of bad luck, the Zinogre turned around to head back and saw that Twilight was right beside it. It roared the familiar wolf-like howl when Twilight saw it for the first time, forcing her to cover her ears to avoid going deaf. Finally, the thunder wolf attacked the lavender mare.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj17r3djpf0

In a quick motion, the Zinogre swung it's tail, hitting Twilight off to the side and giving her Thunderblight, the ailment which made her more susceptible to getting paralyzed. Knowing this, she tried to avoid the beast's attacks until the blight wore off. But the infected wyvern wouldn't have anything of it. It dashed forward and tried to knock Twilight off the edge of the plateau, an attack the purple maned Unicorn thankfully avoided. The Zinogre continued to do this until the Thunderblight that plagued the female hunter wore off, to which it tried to whack her with it's tail again. Twilight was able to dodge this however.

The thunder wolf finally decided to use some of it's brute strength to smash a crater where Twilight currently stood in an attempt to crush her. She was able to dodge it, but took a bit of the aftershock instead, giving the wyvern a perfect chance to swipe a claw at her, making a dent in her armour and sending her flying right at the edge of the tabletop mountain. However, she manage to pick herself up and face the beast again. It was at this moment when she realized the crater where the infected wyvern smashed itself onto made for a perfect ledge to jump off and strike an aerial attack.

"Alright, you, uh... big, electrical... thing..." Twilight wasn't too good at taunting "It's time for you to die! You've caused way too much trouble for the people of Hollow Shades, and now you have to be put down!"

The beast responded to Twilight's threat by letting out an enraged roar. Twilight began to run around the creature and towards the crater, taking out readying her insect glaive before jumping off the dent of the crater, striking the beast in the side and throwing it down onto the ground. The lavender mare wasted no time in trying to cut off it's tail, which she was eventually able to accomplish. The creature threw itself back away from Twilight as soon as it's tail was severed from it's body and howled upwards. In doing so, it summoned any and all nearby Thunderbugs to electrically charge it's furry back and send shockwaves of energy through it's body. The Zinogre then ran straight for Twilight.

"Oh, this is going to hurt..." was all the lavender mare could say before getting hit by the Zinogre's electricity, paralyzing her and giving the beast yet another chance to attack. The electrically charged monster did a somersault up in the air and landed right on top of Twilight, sending her flying right up against the edge of the mountain again. She actually fell off a bit, but managed to stop herself from falling down the long side of the mountain thanks to a small ledge just a few feet down from the plateau where she could rest for a second.

"That Zinogre is too fast for me to fight up close..." Twilight thought to herself "But what if I try to indirectly fight it? Like confusing it somehow. But how would I be able to do that?"

The lavender Unicorn took a look at her surroundings. Then an idea hit her head. She giggled at how brilliant her plan was before climbing back up to the plateau and trying to get the Zinogre's attention.

"HEY YOU!!" shouted Twilight, getting it's attention "YEAH, YOU!! COME AND GET SOME!!"

The beast roared ferociously before charging right at Twilight, to which she quickly moved out of the way and ran right, to another area. The Zinogre followed her, but before it could reach her, she made another sharp turn right, forcing the creature to slow down. Finally, it turned to face the purple maned hunter and charged right at her again. But this time, she pulled out her insect glaive and waited for the beast to come closer before slashing it left across the Zinogre's face, slicing off it's other horn and sending it tumbling down the mountain. Twilight looked down to see the beast roaring at her as it fell down the cliff. It was finally impaled by some stalagmites at the bottom of the mountain through the chest.

(Music stop)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mv8-Pz0p_K8

The Zinogre let out one final roar before dying on the the now bloodstained stalagmite at long last.

"Wow... That's gonna hurt..." Twilight smiled at her victory "But I finally did it! I beat the Zinogre all by myself! Luna's going to be so proud of me!"

Wasting no time, the lavender Unicorn carefully slid down the side of the mountain in order to carve off the Zinogre's hide and take some back to Hollow Shades in order to prove her victory over the creature. As she got closer to it, she saw some dead Thunderbugs, so she decided to take those with her too. She never knew what they might be good for!

(Music stop)

XXXXXX

Twilight had made it back to Hollow Shades in one piece, bringing back with her the scales of the recently killed Zinogre. The townsfolk had begun hollering and cheering already at her safe return, but it was when she revealed that the Zinogre was defeat that the villagers when full uproar in excitement. At long last, the beast that threatened to destroy their land was gone, and they could finally live peaceful lives.

The second Luna heard the cheering from outside her home, she ran out to see her pupil had returned. She wasted no time in hugging the lavender Unicorn, to which Twilight hugged back without question, smiles beaming on both of their faces.

"You've come back!" Luna released herself from the hug in order to congratulate her pupil "And I see that you have defeated the Zinogre! You have done more than well, Twilight Sparkle."

"Aww, thanks..." Twilight blushed a bit "It wasn't too hard, actually! Well, besides that Rathalos, but other than that, we're all good!"

"Rathalos?" Luna asked "Oh great... Now we must hunt down it's mate and chicks so they won't attack our town..."

"Wait wha-?" the Unicorn was confused and shocked by her teacher's most recent job for her.

"Fear not, fair Twilight; I was making a joke" the blue Alicorn lightly chuckled "Rathalos and Rathians don't go off the mountain unless absolutely necessary, so you mustn't worry about them."

"Oh you!" the purple maned mare giggled.

"Now, Twilight Sparkle," Luna got into a more serious, firm and honorary position "by defeating the Zinogre and saving our village, you have proven yourself as a hunter. From this point on, you are no longer a hunter-in-training, but a full-fledged hunter. Congratulations!"

"Thank you, Luna" Twilight bowed to the rightful princess.

"Um, Princess Luna?" asked one of the female villagers behind her, gaining her attention towards her "Since the Zinogre is gone, we would very much like to ask you a favour."

"Hmm?" Luna asked "And what could that be?"

XXXXXX

Princess Celestia sat in her hospital bed, patiently hoped that Twilight would return in both one piece and as a hero. She had conversed with Rainbow Dash a few times, but only when the cyan mare wasn't engaged in the stories of the great hunter Daring Do. The white Alicorn let out a sigh as she looked out her hospital bed and saw the rebuilding of Ponyville coming along quite nicely. This day had been extremely boring for her... until...

"Celestia?" she heard an awfully familiar voice behind her ask. She turned her head and gasped at who she was seeing. Her sister, Luna, had finally returned to her.

"Luna?" she questioned "Is that truly you?"

Luna's answer was rushing up to her sister and hugging her tightly, crying all the while. Celestia couldn't help but cry softly as well, while also retaining a smile of happiness.

"I-I missed you s-so much!" Luna sobbed as she continued to hug her older sister.

"Shhh... Don't cry, Lulu..." Celestia softly spoke as she stroked her long-lost sister's grayish blue mane "I'm here now... My, my, you've certainly grown, haven't you?"

"You h-have as well, T-Tia..." Luna released herself from the hug and nodded, still looking like a mess as she continued to sob with a smile "It's b-been fifteen y-years..."

In the background, Twilight had already entered the room and sat next to Rainbow Dash. They were watching the heartfelt reunion between the two sisters who hadn't seen each other for a good long time.

"The villagers said they could protect themselves for a while so she could meet up with her sister for a bit" Twilight explained to her rainbow maned friend "I know this kinda breaks the code of the original hunter, but what can you do, I suppose."

"Yeah..." Rainbow smiled at the sight before turning her attention back to the lavender hunter "So, now that you're a full-fledged hunter, where are you gonna go next?"

"Wherever the breeze takes me, I suppose" Twilight spoke "But I'm mainly setting off to find my friends, hunt down the Gore Magala and finally kill it. It'll be hard, but I have full confidence that I can do it after killing that Zinogre!"

"Hate to break it to you, Twi," Rainbow sighed "but you're just scratching the surface as far as monsters go. That Zinogre wasn't even an Elder Dragon for god's sake! You need to be ready for anything, okay? That why I'd actually like you to head off to to Appleloosa. There, they have the latest in armour stuff and some pretty strong monsters as well, if you want to make your own. Okay?"

"I'll think about it..." Twilight nodded before turning to face her mentor "Luna, can you make it back to Hollow Shades on your own?"

"Of course, Twilight" Luna, who had calmed down a bit, nodded in agreement "I have traveled there before, much younger and weaker than I am today as well!"

"Alright" the lavender Unicorn said as she began to walk out of the room "You three have a nice day. I'm going to go and hit the hay for a while..."

"You more than deserve it, Twilight" Princess Celestia spoke "Have a nice nap."

XXXXXX

By nighttime, Twilight couldn't sleep. After a long day fighting not one, but two large dragons, she should feel as tired as a sleepy Congalala. But how could she sleep with questions about the Gore Magala, her friends and the necklace she wore around her neck floating around in her head? She slumped back into the bed graciously provided to her by the hospital and sighed.

"Rainbow's right" she said to herself "There are strong monsters out there I'm not even close to being ready to fight yet. But I have to grow as a hunter! I have to in order to save my friends and defeat the Gore Magala! I'll head out for Appleloosa tomorrow and get myself some new armour."

The purple maned Unicorn's eyes began to flutter shut.

"And if my friends aren't alive, I'll be sure to avenge them twice over."

Author's Notes:

End of Act 1!! Man, this was a fun one! So yeah, if you couldn't tell, this story will go by acts. Each act has 3-6 chapters in it, and at the end of it will be an act monster, like the Zinogre. I won't spoil it from here on out, but just letting you know.

Please be sure to give me suggestions on what monsters you want to see in this story! I'll be sure to add them in regardless of any plans I may have for other monsters! Yes, that's right, you get to control me! Doesn't that sound fun?

Be sure to Like, Comment, Favourite and Follow me, and until then, happy hunting, everyone!