Chapter 12: Breaking Point

Celestia had been the ruler for so long now… perhaps… there really was time for a change. So many horrible things happened during the past month, so many innocent died because of her incompetence.

The divine ruler was not concentrated enough for the court, there were many ponies waiting just for her… and she sat on her comfy throne, thinking about her life. Just as she was about to close the court for the day, Thunder Flare rushed into the long, decorated throne room.

“Princess! Something bad happened!”

“Go on.”

He panted slightly, it seemed like he had sprinted all the way, “The division stationed in Ponyville… is dead, every last one of them.”

“I presume that... Twilight is responsible for this?”

The white unicorn nodded, “All four of them were there, as well as minions from Capone, they managed to free Silent Flare too. Currently they are fortifying the entire city, changing it into a giant fortress.”

The princess gave him a long sigh, filled with despair and sadness, “Now they even start conquering our land? That could prove troublesome indeed… I would have never thought that Silent would join Nightmare Moon, willingly.”

Thunder didn’t react to her statement, how could he? He was just a captain, the best of course, but still. Celestia continued, “Thunder… tell the royal messengers to send a letter to all of my allies, we’re in need of help, this can’t continue like this.”

“If you mean ‘all’, you surely don’t m—”

“I know what I said! Now go!”

That couldn’t be happening, now she had to rely on more help from others… to fix her own mess. That her once so promising student had been infested by the Nightmare was bad enough, but now ponies from her elite started to join her…voluntarily?

Twilight and her friends worked extremely hard in the past four days. Every last one of them, plus the rebels fortified the entire city. The biggest project was a two meter high, and one meter wide stone wall around the town. The unicorns did most of the work, cutting the stones into symmetrical pieces and levitating them into position.

After that was finished, Twilight and Luna placed various enchantments upon it as well, making the stone hard as steel, protecting it against enemy telekinesis, giving it deflecting characteristics, canon balls and other ballistic weaponry would simply ricochet off of it. Numerous other traps were set around the city, magical elemental mines which could either freeze, burn, explode or cause a poison cloud to appear.

The rebels were equipped with the remaining weapons of the guards that had been stationed in the city, they surely wouldn’t need them anymore. Luckily two stallions of Flare’s rebels proved to be quite crafty and were able to use a forge, now they even could repair and craft new swords. Through slits in the wall, they were able to fire their heavy artillery, special cannons, enchanted to have a much bigger firepower.

All of the rebels stood in an organized pattern, before them the four mares responsible for that. Twilight began her speech, “Okay, listen up! First of all I want to thank all of you, we changed the city into a citadel in record time, but there is no time to lose. Celestia has many allies which won’t be waiting for us. I’m sure they will attack us in the span of the next month, since we will be greatly outnumbered, we have to fight with a clever tactic. They can’t siege us, since we can grow our own food here and have sufficient reserves, so they will try to attack us with full force. I have a plan how to turn them against one another, but in order for that to work, we will have to survive the first wave.”

Luna continued, “As you all know, Celestia’s elite consists of five captains, and two generals in duty. We received information from a reliable source that the leader of the archmages, Dr. Specter is planning something as well. They, as well as her allies, who are currently unknown to us, are our main problem. The cannons and the protective spells on the wall will be sufficient for an average soldier, but not for her elite. If the situation gets out of hoof, Twilight will call our ally as well.”

To everypony’s great surprise, Pinkie began to speak, her hair still straight, but in a calmer mood, “Heya everypony! I know the situation is not very promising, but we can to it! You all just give your best, then we can defeat those Grumpy McGrumpyPants!”

Twilight cleared her throat, “Yes… those were indeed, true words of inspirement. All of you, give your very best, our victory will change history! Together, we can build our own future!”

The crowd broke out into a loud cheering, making clashing sounds with their weapons and armor. After the speech was concluded, everypony dispersed into the different sections of the inner town, preparing more traps, forging ammunition or swords or tending to their fields, they needed food after all.

The lavender mare noticed a slow clapping sound from above her, Silent sat on a nearby roof, his hooves crossed like he was meditating, “What an inspiring speech from our future ruler of Equestria.”

“Co-Ruler. Neither Pinkie nor Rarity want to rule the country, they believe in me and think that it is right, even though we’re a bit… overly efficient, but hey, we can’t make everything perfect. We will rule the land even better than Celestia, nopony will have to be a tool for our enjoyment.”

The beige stallion nodded slowly, “Truly wise words at such a young age, I hope you will fulfill your promises.” He jumped down without hesitation, landing smoothly besides the lavender mare. “Because you’ll have a problem keeping your followers if you lie to them about your true motives…”

Cold… so cold. Where was she? Surely not in Equestria… everything, was just so cold…

Three days and three nights had she been stuck in this… strange spell. It took her here and disappeared without any explanation… not that magic could talk. Now she was nowhere… stuck between endless plains of white, a frozen and dead landscape. A permanent blizzard tormented the land, making life near impossible, she had hear about it. Well, nearly every last pony in Equestria had heard the stories…The ancient demons, the windigos froze the first home of the old pony race. Was that where the mare was?

She struggled to stay awake at such low temperatures, the mare needed a shelter. Then she wanted to get back to Equestria, her friends were worrying about her, she was sure of it. The lost pony couldn’t be sad now… not even as she remembered her best friend getting killed by another friend.

So many innocent ponies dead… because of reasons that eluded the mare. The faces of so many hovered before her eyes, all bloody and dead… the words of their killer, still in her head. The biggest question was, ‘Why wasn’t she dead?’ Why was she allowed to live when the other ponies were not?

It was too much for her, the traveller broke down. Barely awake she laid in the snow, slowly freezing to death in this freezing hell. The last thing she saw, was a tiny black figure on the edge of the snow storm, approaching her rather quickly, then everything went black...

The mare woke up in a comfortable bed, it took her a moment to realize that she was still alive. As she looked around, the traveller saw that it was some kind of small wooden cottage, decorated with shields, different kinds of strange weapons and countless animal hides… She immediately screamed in shock as she saw that.

A brown stallion, dressed also in animal fur, rushed through the door, apparently searching for the source of the scream, “What happened?”

The mare screamed, “G-get a-away from me! You m-monster!”

The stallion relaxed visibly, “Ah, you saw the animal hide.” It was hard to read him because he wore a very ‘rustic’ looking iron helmet. It had two, she hoped false, horns on its side, probably because it was more ‘intimidating’.

She was shaking madly and couldn’t get herself to speak up.

“You must be cold, let me give you one of these furs.”

“N-no! I-I don’t w-want to touch that,” she muttered, it was wrong to kill animals.

He removed his helmet and looked at her in annoyance, the deep blue eyes staring into her, “If you want to die, that’s fine, but if not I strongly recommend wearing these.” The stallion pointed at his garb for emphasis. “In this harsh land we have to do this, wearing hides, eating meat, it is the only way to survive.”

The mare reluctantly accepted a hide and wrapped it around her chest, she had to admit that it was quite comfortable, still incredibly gross and wrong, but warm, “T-Thank you…”

The stallion smiled faintly, “It is hard at first, but you’ll get used to it. Some of us rely on even more brutal methods to survive out here.”

“Why are you staying here then? Equestria is a much better place, also much warmer…” She shivered again.

“Equestria… Strange name. Anyways, we can’t just leave, our ancestors remained in this land, they were the strongest warriors of our tribes. Now we are continuing their legacy.”

“O-okay, I-I’m Fluttershy… w-what is your name?”

“... Rost. Now I have to ask, how did you get here? I’ve never seen other ponies from outside the borders, from beyond the frozen mountains.”

“I-I don’t know either… I was… on a b-battlefield and then…” She started to sob uncontrollably, the memories were to hurtful.

“I see… Well, if you want to get back to your land… then you’ll have a problem.”

It took the timid, yellow mare several minutes to calm down again, “W-why?”

His deep blue eyes stared at the shy pegasus, not really sure if he should speak any further, it was always dangerous to speak with strangers in this land. The brown stallion had no idea if he should trust her, then Rost just sighed and replied, “Because you wouldn’t survive even five minutes in those mountains. The reason for that, is a volcano… well, a glacier now. Every year we perform a ritual at the lake before it, causing it to erupt and bringing warmth and prosperity over our land.”

Fluttershy listened carefully, forgetting about her worries and absorbing his tale. Rost continued, “That changed five years ago, as our High Priest was about to end the ritual, the sky suddenly darkened, engulfing our land with shadows. Usually at the end of the ritual, the sun would shine high above and a glorious explosion would bring another year of prosperity. On that particular day however, it did not. For just a few minutes everything went as dark as night and a bone-chilling screech could be heard. Followed were the heart-rending screams of our own people, they were filled with so much agony…”

The timid yellow mare looked at him, shocked by those horrible events, “W-what happened after t-that?”

“High Priest Kemu protected me, fending the danger off. At the time I had no idea what was happening, a lesson I had to learn the hard way…” He looked genuinely hurt, but Fluttershy was not sure how to help him. “As the darkness vanished… everypony was dead, an entire village simply… dead, sliced in half, laying in deep, smoldering craters or turned into a living ice-statue… The entire lake, plus our sacred volcano was completely frozen. I saw what caused it, flying towards the shrine of the sacred mountain, two owl-like demons, one silver... and one golden, we called them Lechku, and Nechku, the twin-demon gods. Since that day... the volcano has not erupted again, our land is going to be completely frozen in one, maybe two years, everything will die.”

“S-so y-y-you want m-me to k-kill them?!”

Rost looked at her again, “If you want to return to Equestria, then yes, that is your only choice. I don’t know why or how you got here, but I’ll help you kill those demons. Only that way I can get revenge for my fallen brothers.”

Fluttershy calmed visibly at that statement, “I don’t have a weapon though…”

“I’m sure we can arrange something… So, will you help me?” He stretched his right forehoof out, inviting her to take it.

The yellow mare hesitated for a moment, then she thought about her friends, they were in danger. She shook his hoof and said, “Alright, I-I’m not a good f-fighter, b-but I will help you a-as best as I can!”

Celestia sat in the center of command of the castle, discussing… the attack on Ponyville, with the general of her army and her allies.

Dawn Comet was still recovering in the hospital, Mistral and Law sat on her side, arguing like usual. On the opposite of the round table, sat Taka, General of the Griffon-Empire, a very young and very aggressive personality, his countless scars testified experience in battle, most significant was the one straight over his left eye. The princess wasn’t sure how he got that high rank at such a young age. Last of the bunch, was Queen Himiko, emperor of the Saddle Arabian kingdom.

Taka slammed his claws on the table, seemingly irritated, “What are we waiting for, Celestia? They have a hundred ponies, I alone could defeat them, my division consists of five hundred elite soldiers!”

Himiko nodded, she was known for her hard and brutal style of ruling, “We cannot afford to let them live a minute longer! Our combined forces outnumber them by a margin, and they have nowhere to run. Furthermore… I know for certain that the Griffon-Empire has the lead on advanced weapon technology.”

The Princess of the Sun silenced them with a single movement, “We can not let our guard down, it would be foolish of us to underestimate them. Just four of Nightmare Moon’s warriors killed at least four hundred ponies of the Equestrian military. The entire city of Ponyville has been changed into a citadel, nothing will leave, nothing will come in, without a plan.”

Before anypony could speak further, the heavy wooden doors swung open, a cloaked pony stepped calmly into the room. The unknown troublemaker emitted some kind of black smoke, like it was producing… shadows?

Celestia did not relax in the slightest at the sight of this cloaked pony, “You are late, Blight.”

A low chuckle erupted from her, it was definitely a feminine voice, making everypony present feel uneasy, “Celestia, good to see you again, but you know, I come and go as I please. You wouldn’t have summoned me if you didn’t need me.” She continued to linger in the shadows, easily becoming one with them, nearly invisible.

Law regarded the princess, “You summoned her?! Celestia, this… creature can’t be trusted, sooner or later she will stab you in the back!”

Blight chimed in, “That would be fun, wouldn’t it? Or I could slit your throat you insolent, little colt!” She appeared behind the fiery stallion, a massive shadow-like sword held at his throat.

“Blight! Law! Stop this foolish behaviour at once!” The princess ordered.

Blight vanished again, “My apologies, Celestia.”

“I’m sorry, princess.”

The white alicorn summoned a big and incredibly detailed, magical map of the immediate area of Ponyville. Everything was on its place, even the tiniest bushes or stones were in their respective position. Celestia let the east end of the town shine in a bright red.

“Taka and Law, you will each lead a division, consisting of one hundred ponies, you will initiate the fight at the east end, use everything you have, the important part is, that you breach through their defenses.”

Next the hills and fields far in the west shone brightly, “Himiko and Mistral will do the exact opposite. Only about fifty soldiers will be there to offer protection. Your job is to offer constant distraction, every last one of your soldiers will be an expert in ranged combat, in addition to that, you will get a small unit of extremely competent cannoneers. Your shared group will not engage in direct combat, and will retreat if the opposing group will try just that. In the unlikely case that they are trying to retreat, you job will be to intercept, defeat and capture them or their leaders.”

The mysterious, cloaked mare manifested herself right next to the princess, “What will I be doing, Celly?”

Mistral slammed her hood on the table, “You dare to mock the princess?! I’ll—”

Celestia interrupted her general, “Calm yourself. There is no need for that, I’ll make an exception… for Blight.” She looked at her directly, “You will get a special task, more on that later.”

Without the need of any more words, she vanished.

The Princess of the Sun cleared her throat and continued, “There are five ponies that are particularly dangerous, they function very likely as the leaders and main combat force. Nightmare Moon, wicked alicorn and unstable behaviour. Twilight Sparkle, tactician, extremely intelligent, more magic versatility than most likely everyone of us combined, do not attempt to confront her directly. She has the ability to hit and injure elemental magic users, the same goes for Nightmare Moon.”

Himiko asked, “Twilight Sparkle? The ‘Deathbringer’ or the ‘Reaver of Souls’ my people started to call her?”

Everyday she had to be reminded of that fact… the princess nodded sadly and continued, “Yes… exactly. Then we have, Pinkamena D. Pie, former prisoner of our dungeons, now a leader of the rebels, unpredictable, seemingly split personality, indicated by her hairstyle and martial art-like style of combat. Next up, Rarity, fashion designer, cares a lot about her looks, possesses dangerous crystal-magic, do not touch those crystals under any circumstances. Lastly they have Silent Flare, a deserted captain of my armies, his main weapon in combat is the sword, due to its high conduction of enchantments, he is able to charge it with almost any form of magic to improve his abilities.”

“A traitor? Amongst your ranks? That is very uncommon, my dear Celestia,” Taka said, almost mocking her.

“It is… he had other goals then we had. Nonetheless Silent is very dangerous, as all these ponies are. Let me clarify something, I do not accept the death of any of them, those five ponies will be captured, not eliminated. Did I make myself clear?” Her tone was dead serious, almost off for a pony like her.

Everypony present nodded, this concluded their meeting. Now they had some last preparations to make, soon the rebellion would be over.

The raging blizzard grew ever stronger with no hope of improvement. There weren’t many villages anymore… not since that day five years ago. Rost was the last of his line after all…

The stallion was a lot nicer than Fluttershy had originally made him out to be, still the mere thought of eating meat sent shivers down her spine. Other than that the situation was not as bad as before. The yellow mare’s temperature was relatively normal, her belly was full and she had a friend to talk to. As far as she could tell, Rost was a pretty good story teller, the history of their land was actually pretty interesting. All the rituals, gods, and beliefs they had, their daily lives were filled with praying, sacrificing offerings at certain shrines and a strong self discipline.

They made their way to the next village, to stock up on weapons and food, would still take them a while through the snow storm. Rost just asked right away, “How is it?”

Fluttershy looked at the brown stallion in mild confusion, “H-huh? What do you mean?”

“Your land… How is it to live in Equestria?”

“It is… nice, everypony there is just so friendly and accepting. The seasons are pretty fair and we hadn’t had a war in a very long time, all thanks to our princess,” The yellow mare answered, she hadn’t thought about that before, but living in Equestria had its advantages.

“Do you believe in gods?” He had to admit, their land sounded wonderful. Especially since ponies like this mare lived in it.

“Well… Princess Celestia is some kind of demigod, an immortal alicorn, she’s ruled for over one thousand years now. We don’t have the need for any other beliefs.”

“Sounds… unbelievable, still a bit of faith can really raise the moral and gives the feeling of safety, even in dangerous times like this,” Rost said, sunken in thought.

Through the everlasting blizzard the first roofs of a village could be seen, all of them were brightly lit with torches, to make them easily noticeable in these harsh environmental conditions. “Ah! We’re almost there. Only a short while, then we can get some supplies and hopefully a good weapon for the two of us.”

“Y-you don’t have one?”

“No… I had no need for them in the past five years. That’s why I lived so far outside the village, they didn’t agree with my pacifistic lifestyle.”

“O-oh…” That surprised the timid pegasus, she met the presumably only nice stallion in a land full of brutes… Perhaps Twilight had planned all of this?

The ‘village’ only consisted of five relatively small, wooden houses. The outside was just as dead as the icy planes of the landscape, nopony dared to leave their houses during this raging blizzard. They entered the biggest of them, Rost knew that it also had a small shop.

“Welcome! Warm up in our lovely—” greeted a gray-haired stallion, his white fur looked pretty kempt and well cleaned, despite the conditions.

He stopped as he noticed who has entered his house, “Look who came back… The town’s pacifist and traitor, Rost. I thought we sent you into exile…”

“I’m not here for dumb arguments, Echo. It is urgent, we need food, water and two weapons.”

“You? A weapon? Hah! That I get to experience this day… Anyways, who is your marefriend over there? Never seen her before.”

Rost blushed and stammered, “I…how, you know... she is… She’s not my marefriend!”

“I, uhm… I’m Fluttershy, it’s nice to meet you.”

“Just making sure, Rost,” He turned his head to face the yellow mare. “Well, it is nice to meet you too. Now that we got the formalities out of the way, why do you need new supplies, especially the weapons?”

The brown stallion looked dead serious, every last bit of joy vanishing from his face, “We’re going to slay the twin demons.”

Echo blinked, “I’m sorry, I think I didn’t quite get the last part. It sounded like you said something about slaying the twin demons, that would just be—”

“You heard it right, we’re going to the sacred mountain and kill them.”

The stallion came to the front of the store with wide eyes and a shocked expression, he grabbed Rost by his shoulders, “Are you crazy? You won’t survive a minute in the Kamui shrine.”

“I have to try… It could be my chance for vengeance. Also, this mare wants to go home, for that she’d have to take the mountain pass.”

“Ah, I see. Look’s like I can’t stop you, but let me at least help you two out a bit. You can have all the food and water you like, plus, I have some special weapons for you two.”

Echo walked into the back of his little store. After a few minutes he came back, alongside a giant crate, full of supplies, “The entire food I have in stock, if you really want to kill the twin-demons, then you can have it, all of it.”

Rost blinked, the look of confusion on his face was priceless, “T-thanks, but we’re just wandering for about a week… not an entire year. The weapons are a bit more important.”

The white stallion’s expression darkened, “Yes, of course. For you Rost, I have this.” He unpacked a beautifully crafted broadsword, the steel was coloured entirely in a deep, rich crimson colour, the double-edged blade broke out in seven different positions, creating a branch-like look. Golden symbols were etched into it, Fluttershy couldn’t decipher them though. “This… this sword is called ‘Seven Strike’, an ancient sword of our tribe, demons fear this blade, use it well.”

He carefully presented it to the stallion, who strapped it to his back, using a strong leather belt. Echo then faced Fluttershy, staring at the timid mare, “For you, I had something different in mind, you don’t look like a sword fighter. I think something with a bit more… finesse will suit you much better.”

“O-okay, if you s-say so,” the yellow mare was obviously nervous, never before had she fought a demon or even a pony.

Echo carefully lifted some kind of rosary, it consisted of countless red glowing curved jewels. Apparently their tribe had a thing for the colour red, it had the same strange runes and symbols etched into each of the little jewels. “The Life Beads… a tool used to banish the evil, when you wear it, it offers protection and if you swing them like a whip, it’ll produce holy energy that will cut even the strongest demon into pieces. You will see it yourself, hard to use, but very rewarding.”

Fluttershy wore the rosary like a necklace, instantly the tiny beads began to glow. They seemed to fit perfectly and hovered around her neck slowly, never quite touching it. She looked like some sort of saint with this glowing thing around her neck.

Echo cleared his throat to gain their attention, “I entrust you two with these powerful artifacts, follow your path and destroy those who plague our land.”