Zangetsu sighed as he watched the mare that started all of this. She had been getting very little sleep in the time she had been with them. Though she didn’t seem to mean any harm, she did seem to be a little too loyal to Celestia. He had tried to sneak into her mind a couple of times but she had some powerful ward set up keeping him out.

They had made it out of the black forest a week ago and had stopped by one town in order to get their bearings and resupply now that they had a new addition to their crew. They made a simple bed for twilight that attached to the wall like one on a ship. They had to convert the storage cart into one that could house her. While Trixie didn’t like the idea of her tagging along she wasn’t heartless and reluctantly agreed to let her stay until they were close enough to equestria for her to get there safely or she left on her own.

“Celestia Damn it!” Twilight muttered as another scroll turned to ash but failed to send to the princess. How the buck did spike do it! She threw up her hands in defeat and slumped her head onto the desk in front of her. She had to admit things could be worse, she had a roof over her head and so long as she pulled her weight she had food in her stomach.

“You’ll never get back to equestria at this rate.” Zangetsu muttered.

“How am I supposed to get back? I'd have to travel through either the black forest to get back to Minotuaria, and then I'd have to find passage on a ship back to manehattan, or I'd have to travel through the frozen wastes around Yakyakistan in order to get to the Crystal empire.” Twilight ranted.

“Ha! Good luck with that!” Zangetsu chuckled as he watched her pull out a scroll that she had been working on. From what he could tell it seemed to be a form of sealing magic, but was not able to figure much else.

“Zangetsu hows our new ‘guest’ doing?” Nick asked through their mental link.

“Oh you know, batshit crazy and plotting something. That scroll she has been hiding from you has started to take the signature of a sealing spell, best use caution in case it's meant for us.” Zangetsu warned.

“Noted, by the way have you had any progress on getting farther out yet?” Nick asked.

“A little, I've been able to extend my range by about a mile, so about five total now.” Zangetsu replied.

“Good, then do you think you could scout out a nearby town for us? This one doesn’t seem to be on the map and it doesn’t exactly look all that friendly.” Nick said.

“On it.” Zangetsu replied and zoomed off.

“Good, now I can get back to work on getting Nick back to equestria without him spying on me.” Twilight said pulling out a gem and proceeded to work on placing a sealing spell on it meant specifically for familiars.

Zangetsu flew past the trees separating the caravan and the new town. He set down on a rooftop near the town wall and started to look around, the town itself was relatively small…. No, it was way too small to be a town, and it's layout was wrong, closer to a military encampment. Even if it was a town, it seemed mostly empty aside from the occasional guard patrol.

“How strange.” Zangetsu said as he noted that none of the guards were griffins, they all seemed to be reindeer of some sort. He proceeded to fly over to what he assumed was the town square, perhaps he could find out something there? He floated through a window and looked around. For the most part it seemed rather empty aside from a few stoic and unmoving guards, both of which were reindeer like the ones outside. What was going on? Did they take a wrong turn? Zangetsu floated through a wall thinking it would lead into the mayor's office. It sort of did….

“General steady aim status report.” A shrouded figure said.

“The griffins are completely unaware of our presents. The artifact you gave us has been able keep our encampment hidden from the sky and the position of the camp has kept us out of site for the most part. A few griffins stumbled acrossed us, but our intelligence agents were able to rid them of any memory of our location” The general answered.

“Good, how are preparations for operation liberation?” the cloaked figure asked.

“Plans are on schedule, we should be ready to move through Yakyakistan with relative ease, they have just as much staked in this as we do.” General steady aim answered.

“Good. In just a few more years the world shall be set to the natural order, and those bitches Celestia and luna shall be put in their place beneath me.” The cloaked figure said, “keep me informed while you're making the final preparations, and before I go…” the cloaked figure said turning towards Zangetsu. That was the last thing Zangetsu saw before being blasted. “General prepare a hunting party.”

Nick jolted from his sitting position as he felt Zangetsu dissipate. What the hell happened?! The only way that could happen was if he went too far out or…….

“Get the caravan moving now! Were not investigating the town!” Nick said throwing Trixie and Silk inside their cart with his magic.

“What the hell!?” Trixie shouted popping her head out of the cart just in time to hit a tree, “son of a!” Trixie said holding her muzzle.

“Something happened, it isn’t safe here!” Nick said turning up the power of the magic engines. While they were now moving at roughly the average speed of a normal train now, the passengers were having a less than smooth ride.

“AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHAAAAAA!!!!!!” Twilight screamed as a wooden spoon decided to land beneath her in just the right angle.

“Nick! Ooof! I! Oof! Am! Oof!! Going to kill youUUUAAAAAAHHAAAAAA!!!!!!!!” Trixie said as a spoon similar to Twilight's decided to follow the trend.

“EEEP!!!” Silk squeaked as she jumped into the sleeping bag that doubled as a hammock in order to have the smoothest ride before zipping it up.

“Nick what the Tartarus is going on!?” Iron said jumping into shotgun just in time for a magic blast to hit the side of the caravan.

“That! Now take the wheel while I take care of these guys!” Nick said jumping out onto the caravan. When Iron saw who was attacking them he did so without hesitation.

“Nick! Aim for the antlers!” Iron said as he made a sharp turn.

“That's only if you don’t crash!” Nick shouted as Iron made a sharp turn nearly sending the caravan rolling. Nick jumped into the gunner seat and readied the makeshift railgun. The caribou kept shooting for the wheels but thanks to Irons driving they missed. Nick tried to shoot the one leading the charge at them but unfortunately just as Iron’s driving made it hard for the caribou to hit them it also made it hard for Nick to get a clear shot.

“Can you keep it steady for like two seconds” Nick shouted as the railgun jerked to the side and uselessly shot the base of a tree.

“No can do!” Iron said as he took a sharp left sending the caravan into a roll down the hill.

“SHIIIIT!!” NIck shouted as the caravan rolled.

“And this is why you put flexibility runes on wood!!!” Iron laughed maniacally.

“You're fucking insane!!” Nick screamed as the caravan rolled to a stop and took off down the road.

“NAILED IT” Iron laughed.

“Iron if you ever do that again you’ll find out why you don’t want to be near me when I have a turnip!!” Nick shouted and ducked when a magic blast just barely missed him, “oh for the love of jimabalushy!” Nick shouted as he took aim at the caribou and fired at the lead one, somehow landing a hit directly in the chest and obliterating it.

“Nick aim for the the antlers!” Iron shouted again.

“I’ll try but I’m not the best shot with this thing without Zangetsu!” Nick shouted. They were gaining ground fast and Nick was having no luck in getting another lucky shot in on them. “It doesn’t look like this is going to work! They are moving around to much for me to hit ever since they lost their buddy!”

“Then get out and fight them!” Iron shouted.

“Oh yeah, I can do that..” Nick muttered and abandoned the railgun. He aimed his horns at the (yes he still had the vasto lorde horns) caribou and fired off a magic blast at them. The blast clipped the third one's shoulder but he ducked out just in time to avoid getting hit in the chest. Nick formed a sword out of bone and leapt at the leader hoping to take him down.

“Mistakes were made!!” Nick shouted as the leader simply moved out of the way and continued chasing the caravan as Nick fell towards the ground. Nick turned and tossed his sword at the now unsuspecting caribou hitting him in the upper back. As Nick hit the ground he rolled with the momentum and made to take after the caravan. As Nick ran he continued to fall further and further behind, he didn’t have the time to adapt his body to move fast enough and Zangetsu wasn’t here to do it for him! He couldn't use magic to teleport, his body couldn’t handle a teleportation spell at the moment, and any sufficient speed spell would cause more damage than his body could take at the moment!

Midnight song sighed looking down at the ground below from the branch she was on. This was harder than she thought. Normally she would do her job without ever leaving a trace of her existence, but the only way she could think of to locate the Gaia fragment was to do the exact opposite and tag along with her targets! What was she going to do? Walk up to them and say “Hey do you mind if I tag along with you by any chance? Yes? Coolio!” There had to be some way she could get in with them!

She nearly jumped out of her scales when her targets caravan came rolling down the hill barely missing the tree she was on. The hell was going on?! She was about to pursue when something that made her blood run cold zoomed past her. Caribou. She couldn’t believe there were caribou this far west! After the last great war they had been banished to their home country under threat of genocide for their crimes! In any event this presented an opportunity.

Midnight zoomed after them as fast as she could making sure to keep enough of a distance so that she wasn’t spotted too soon. The caravan continued to roll down hill until they came towards the bottom, and instead of landing on it's side or upside down like she had expected it to, it landed on it's wheels and roared down the road! She took to flying low to the ground and near the tree line. She was about to jump in and help when suddenly one of the caribou just exploded! What kind of magic was that!?

She kept low looking for a good moment to jump in when suddenly like some sort of idiot the one known as Nick jumped off the caravan towards the lead caribou in the group and proceeded to fall to the ground, she watched as he spun around and threw his odd sword taking down the lead caribou. She followed him as he ran surprisingly fast, not nearly fast enough to catch up with the caravan. This was it!

“Need a claw?” She said flying up next to him.

“What the hell!?” Nick jumped and almost tripped.

“Well do you need help or not?” Midnight asked.

“Uh… sure.” Nick said and looked towards the caravan, “Do you think you could get me back on the caravan up ahead?” Nick asked.

“I can do better than that!” Midnight said picking him up in her magic and taking off towards the caravan. She flew up and shocked the caribou on the left and tossed Nick at the last one at the same time. Nick extended the chitten on the back of his hand into a sharp blade before plunging it into the back of his targets neck.

“EAT YOUR HEART OUT ELRIC!” Nick shouted as he landed using the caribous body as a surfboard until they came to a stop. Once Iron Fist saw that the last of the caribou had been dealt with he stopped the caravan. Nick got up and walked away from his kill before flopping on the ground and laying back “For fucks sake can’t we go one week without people trying to kill us!?” Nick sighed.

“Well we were traveling through the black forest!” Iron said jumping down from the caravan. Nick, while happy that the whole ordeal was over, was rightly ticked at the old bull.

“Are you crazy!!?! You could have got us all killed!!!” Nick shouted getting in Irons face, to which Iron responded by slapping him and saying,

“Yeah I’m crazy!! What made you think I was sane?” Iron asked giving him a critical eye for a moment. “And who's this? A new member of your herd? Faust’s sake lad, your herd is growing bigger by the day, first my little Trixie,”

“WHAT!?!” Midnight said blushing deeply.

“Iron” Nick deadpanned.

“Next is sweet little Silk,”

“Iron.” Nick said a little bit loader.

“Then this new mare Twilight, which honestly needs to get laid-”

“Sompony get this spoon out of my butt!!” Twilight shouted having too much pain in her rectal cavity at the moment to focus magic through her horn.

“Get in line bitch!!” Trixie shouted flopping out of her cart. “Pull it out!!! I think I got a splinter!!!” meanwhile Silks cart was literally shaking while sobbing could be heard.

“And now this ki-....” Iron stopped mid sentence when he realized what this newcomer was. “A KIRIN!!!” Iron shouted happily wrapping the poor girl in a bear hug.

“Oh I give up.” Nick facepalmed while walking over to Trixie and pulling out the spoon with magic.

“Thank you…” Trixie said before promptly fainting. The smell coming off her made him happy they were dating, otherwise he wouldn’t like where any conversation went when she woke up with a new pair of pants and underwear on.

“Heelp…!!” Twilight said as she flopped out of her cart, the handle of the spoon just visible above her tail doc…

“Iron put the poor girl down.” Nick said walking over and pulling out the spoon.

“Can’t breath… see… a light…..” Midnight got out before passing out.

“Huh? Oh I am so sorry miss…. She passed out…” Iron said as she flopped to the ground.

“How many times do I have to tell you Iron, the muscle reconstruction renewed your body with fresh cells. You're body is not only maximized in strength, but you essentially are a young bull now.” Nick said pinching the bridge of his nose and walked over to Silk’s cart.

“Then why does my face still look like an old fart?” Iron asked still confused at Nick’s “bio alchemy.”

Midnight woke up with a start, the last thing she remembered was the large minotaur Iron Fist bear hugging her until she passed out. Taking in her surroundings she found herself in a small room that seemed to belong to a tailor of some sort. She stood up and made her way over to a small window near the back next to a sleeping bag that had been converted into a hammock.

“Welcome back to the world of the living!” Nick said startling her when he walked in, “sorry, didn’t mean to scare you there.”

“No, it’s alright, you just startled me is all.” She said letting out a breath.

“So now that you're awake we do need to talk.” Nick said in a slightly serious tone making midnight nervous. Shit was he on to her?

“Sorry, that came out a bit harsh, what I mean is we have a an offer for you if you're interested. I need a kirin teacher, the magic I make seems to be most similar to kirin magic from what we gathered, and from the scans I did to make sure you were ok, sorry about Iron, he’s a nut and doesn’t know his own strength at times.”

“It’s fine”

“Right, from the scans I did you're magic seems to be made with the same archetype as mine. So I was hoping that we could stick together until we need to part ways, I’d be willing to pay you.” Nick said turning some philosopher energy into bricks of gold.

“Jackpot.” Midnight thought, all it would take is a few choices words and she would be in!

“I’m in! I’m sort of a nomad so if you have a place for me than I’m all for it!” she said happily.

“Perfect! Now then, when would you like to start?” Nick asked.

“How does tomorrow sound?” Midnight asked.

“I think that’ll work, we should arrive in Omskbeak within a day or two, we can make some modifications there and pick up supplies.” Nick said.

“Alrighty then, oh and one thing.” Midnight asked.

“Yeah?”

“I’m not in your herd.” Midnight deadpanned.

“Oh! Yeah sorry bout that, Iron’s a bit of a perv.” Nick said rubbing the back of his neck as he left, missing the smirk on Midnight’s face.

After Silk had finished weaving together a bed for their new tag along they hunkered down by the side of the dirt road for the night. Trixie woke up on her stomach with an aching pain in her but, though unfortunately it wasn’t from something that was worth having in there, yet another inanimate object that was not to be trusted… it was in league with wheels…. Twilight woke up with a similar pain, and found a new set of clothes next to her. She wondered why for a moment until she felt a squishing sensation in her pants and was met with a horrible smell.

Nick spent most of the night comforting the distraught Silk, the thought of the caribou along with the bumpy ride had left her rather shaken up. As much as Nick hated to admit it she was kind of cute. SIlk’s hair was long and well kept, she had a very shy nature to her, and often wanted to please as any as she could, plus she had a bit of a motherly aura to her. She had spent most of the night more or less latched to his side. Currently nick, Iron and midnight were in the field next to the road with Silk watching from the sidelines with a blanket around her and a cup of hot coco.

“Alright, so how much do you know about kirin magic?” Midnight asked.

“Not much, I haven’t been able to find much in the form of kirin magic in books, some culture, but not much else.” Nick shrugged.

“Not surprising, kirin magic is highly guarded, very few know kirin magic other than, well kirin. It’s difficult to master and can lead to… complications if you aren’t ready for certain spells, and there are lot’s of spells that cannot fall into enemy hands.” Midnight said.

“Alright so what can you teach the lad?” Iron asked.

“The first let’s see what you can do, cast a few spells, doesn’t quite matter what, just make them about medium strength.” Midnight said floating away a bit. Nodding he aimed his horns into the sky and fired off a magic blast, the beams sliced through a few clouds before detonating. Next he channeled arcing lightning through his horns and fired of a bolt at a nearby boulder, finally he clapped his hands together and formed a tiny black dot, he shot the dot at the bolder and caused it to crumble along with the surrounding ground and form into a large round boulder floating a few meters of the ground.

“How’s that?” Nick asked.

“Not bad, a contained gravity spell is especially impressive. However, you're wasting too much magic with each spell, how you're still standing after using up so much magic is honestly worrying, while not the most impressive display i’ve seen, it certainly used a massive amount of magic.” Midnight stated.

“Wait, wasting magic? What do you mean? I’ve been using those spells for ages., well not on a regular bases, but I’ve known them for a while now.” Nick said slightly confused.

“It’s not the spell, but how much magic you're pouring into them for less than satisfactory results. Think of it like using only water to clean off a dirty wall, it doesn’t matter how much you use if there is no pressure behind it. Try using less magic, but squeeze it through a tighter channel.” Midnight said.

“Alright…” Nick said. He channeled magic again, but this time tightened the channel in which it traveled to a tenth the size it was before. The results were substantial… “OH SHIIIIIIT!!!!!!” Nick screamed as the magic blast was about 2 meters wide and shot off far into the sky before detonating into massive explosion.

“Better…” Midnight says with pupils the size of pipricks.

“Thata boy!!!” Iron cheers.

“Oh fuck yess…” Nick said with a mad twinkle in his eye as he thought of the possibilities if he tightened the channel to it’s max and poured as much magic as he could into it.

“Nick.. I know that look… what are you planning?” Trixie said walking out with a bag of ice on her ass.

“Nooothing.” Nick said smiling.

“Oh dear…” Trixie sighed praying that it didn’t involve another turnip.. She shuddered at the memory of when he pulled one out at the restaurant back in kevil…

“Welll.. .ahem… anyway, so that is very good, though you forgot to town down how much magic you use. I want you to practice on proper magic control, once you can cast a spell on the same scale as when you demonstrated those spells before with barely any magic than we can move onto more advanced stuff, for now i’ll teach you a couple of spells that should be about on your level. The first is levitation.”

“Wait what? I could teach him that, and he already knows that one all too well.” Trixie said glaring at Nick who laughed nervously rubbing the back of his neck.

“Not like unicorn levitation, we call that telekinesis. Levitation like i’m talking about is like this.” Midnight said floating a couple of feet of the ground.

“I’d like to learn this as well.” Trixie said mystified by the display.

“Actually I have to ask you to leave. This is kirin magic only, and I can’t have unicorns learning this, magnus knows you cause enough problems with what you have.” Midnight said.

“But-”

“No butts. As long as you're here I’m not teaching him anything.” Midnight said firmly.

“Fine…” Trixie grumbled walking away.

“Alright, now than, it’s actually not all that difficult, all you need to do is make an aura of magic around you and use it to carry yourself. This is where magic control comes in, if you put too much magic into it on a tight enough channel, you could go too fast to control, likewise if you don’t keep a tight enough channel you won’t be able to maintain it.” Midnight said landing.

“Alright, tight channel, control magic, aura of magic.” Nick said, as he completed the steps he had a white aura visibly surrounding him.

“Good, but far from perfect, try dropping the amount you're using until the aura is no longer visible, if you try flying like this you're going to break the sound barrier before you even leave the ground” Midnight warned. Listening to her advice Nick powered down the aura until it wa clear.

“Alright, now how do I get off the ground?” Nick asked

“All you have to do is move you're magic in the direction you want while keeping it around you.” Midnight said standing back.

“Alright…” Nick said following her directions, slowly he moved the magic upwards while making sure to keep it skin tight.

“Alight, I think I should let you to get to it, I’ma go make lunch.” Iron said walking away.