A group of conscripts were standing in line in front of the barracks. Sergeant Sharp had awoken them early in the morning, but everypony was used to getting up at such an hour — such was a farmer’s life. The sky was brightening, but no sun could be seen yet from behind all the other barracks around them.

Applejack was standing along with the rest, watching the sergeant walk back and forth in front of their line. He had his armor equipped this time, but his weird gait — the stallion kept his hindlegs spread wider than normal — had nothing to do with it. It seemed like her buck hadn’t gone without consequences for the poor stallion after all.

“Today is the first day of your training, conscripts,” Sergeant Sharp spat out, glaring at the line of ponies in front of him. “Don’t think it’ll be easy for you. Weaklings like you are going to have a hard time until I bring you up to our standards.”

A murmur of discontent went through the line, but it died out after the sergeant stomped his hoof.

“We will move onto the training field where you will run laps for as long as you can,” the sergeant continued with a tiny smile. “Without any equipment for now, I just want to test your endurance as is.”

Sergeant Sharp levitated a scroll from his saddlebag, unrolling it before his eyes.

“But first we need to do a roll call,” the stallion said, throwing a quick glance at Applejack. The mare sighed. “Pumpkin Field—”

The sergeant quickly went through the names. Applejack wasn’t surprised in the slightest when he discovered that five out of the fifteen names had been made up — after all, she had written the list in the first place. Turning his attention to the mare, Sergeant Sharp grinned with the tips of his mouth.

“You did a piss-poor job with that list, conscript,” Sergeant Sharp said, walking to stand in front of her.

Applejack suppressed a sigh. She had been expecting this issue to arise, but she’d been too angry at the sergeant for making her do his paperwork to bother with any details. Besides, everypony had been asleep by the time she’d been doing that, so she had simply made up some name if she had forgotten somepony.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Applejack met his eyes. “Maybe next time you could find the time to do that yourself.” She didn’t add the “instead of getting your flank drunk” that was rolling on her tongue, but the sergeant frowned at her answer anyway.

“When I give an order, I expect it to be carried out perfectly, conscript,” he said coldly, leaning his face forward. Their eyes were mere inches away from each other. “Is that clear?”

Applejack looked back at the sergeant, not affected in the slightest by his close proximity. “It is clear. Sir.”

The sergeant’s eyes narrowed.

“I don’t think it is, conscript,” he said. “To prove my point, you’re going to run in full armor today. One hundred laps.”

Applejack flickered her tail, giving the sergeant a curt nod. She’d been expecting him to give her a hard time, but she was ready for anything. The mare was sure he wouldn’t go overboard this time and not only because of her painful buck.

When Applejack had returned to her barracks last night, the sentry inside had been surprised to see her back so soon, having read the sergeant’s intentions as they had left together. Being true to her word, Applejack didn’t share any details, so the pony had assumed the worst.

Being a good pony, he gave her a bit of advice.

Applejack could report such a case to the camp’s command, but if the other sergeants found out about that, they wouldn’t look at it favorably. They preferred to deal with issues like that without involving the higher officers.

However, the same rule applied to Sergeant Sharp himself, Applejack figured. He wouldn’t dare to report her and even if he did, he would certainly get in trouble when the circumstances came to light.

Applejack could have alerted the other sergeants about what Sharp had tried to do, but decided it wasn’t worth the trouble. She had punished the pony anyway, so unless he tried crossing that line again, the mare was going to keep silent as she had promised.

“Let’s move, conscripts,” Sergeant Sharp said, leading the way.

Applejack followed him along with the rest, thinking about the upcoming exercise. Back in the village, she used to pull a heavy plow alone through the fields, so running with some weight shouldn’t prove too difficult for her.

Feeling confident, Applejack took in the morning scenery – the camp was much more active than when they had arrived. The ponies were going about their business, despite the early hour.

Applejack noticed a couple of groups just like her own, being led somewhere by a sergeant. Those were probably the conscripts from other villages. The mare idly studied their faces and cutie marks in case she recognized anypony.

“You – with me,” the sergeant threw, pointing at Applejack. “Everypony else wait here.”

Having said that, Sergeant Sharp entered a seemingly random barracks to their left. A flashback from the last night flickered through Applejack’s mind, but she dismissed that right out, especially after she’d read the sign over the door – armory.

Entering the building a couple of seconds after the sergeant, Applejack found him waiting for her in the company of two heavily armored stallions. She noted that they were unicorns. They paid no attention to her except for flickering a bored glance.

The sergeant led Applejack further inside to the storage, where they met the quartermaster. After the sergeant had explained the situation to the pony, Applejack was given a full set of armor.

The mare looked at the pieces laid out in front of her, having no idea how she was supposed to put them on.

She raised a sole eyebrow at the sergeant.

With a sigh of exasperation, the stallion picked up all the pieces with his magic. It took him a whole minute to secure everything onto Applejack, locking every hook and nook firmly.

As soon as he was done, the mare took a couple of steps back and forth to make sure that it wasn’t restricting her movements, but the armor was sitting on her well. In fact, Applejack could barely feel its weight.

“Here’s your military saddlebag,” the sergeant smirked, throwing a heavy bag onto her back.

Applejack took it with ease. The mare flickered a grin, noticing the sergeant’s scowl. If he had hoped her knees would buckle under the weight, he was severely underestimating her. Huffing in annoyance, he trotted away, not bothering to see if Applejack was following him.

As they got outside, Applejack joined her fellow conscripts. Her armor was clanking slightly as she moved, but otherwise it was pretty comfortable. The ponies regarded her with curious looks, checking out the armor from up close.

“Is it heavy?” one of the mares asked.

Applejack shrugged dismissively. “Well, not for me at least.”

“Quit your yapping,” Sergeant Sharp interrupted them. “We’re wasting daylight.”

Having said that, he marched forward as the rest trotted behind. They didn’t have to go far; soon, the sergeant stopped at the edge of the line of barracks, where a giant field stretched out before their eyes. A few obstacle courses could be seen there which some poor souls were struggling to beat, but mostly the field consisted of large patches of flattened dirt.

“Give me the laps,” Sergeant Sharp said, turning to the group and pointing at the field. “Now!”

Exchanging quick glances, the ponies started into a full gallop around the field as the sergeant had told them earlier. Applejack was able to keep up with her comrades without trouble, even though the heavy saddlebags were beating at her sides as she ran.

As they finished the first ten laps, most of the group was holding together, but some of the ponies began to fall behind. By the twentieth lap, about a third of the conscripts had given up, crawling back to the sergeant dragging their hooves and panting. Those who were still running were visibly struggling, but forced themselves to move lap after lap.

However, even the sturdiest of ponies had given up as they crossed the fiftieth lap. Except Applejack, that was. She had lost count of the laps she had already made, but she kept going anyway. Her breath was heavy but steady as she galloped around the field.

But even her stamina wasn’t enough to keep her running for much longer.

Her legs were aching, begging Applejack to stop, but the mare refused to obey, pushing herself forward relentlessly. She would have made a couple more laps if not for a sudden crash into an invisible barrier. Her body rammed through it, but she lost her balance, stumbling and rolling on the ground, until she came to a stop.

“I said enough, you deaf fool,” the sergeant’s voice sounded from above.

Cracking her eyes open, Applejack saw his figure towering over her. To her surprise, he lent her a hoof to help her stand up.

“I was expecting you to give up before thirty,” Sergeant Sharp admitted, giving her a look of respect. “You’re surprisingly strong for a mare.”

Applejack managed a shrug.

“You’re freed from any exercises today for your impressive performance. I don’t want you to die from exhaustion after all,” the sergeant said, much to Applejack’s surprise. “But don’t think it’ll change anything between us.”

Giving the sergeant a nod, Applejack dragged her hooves to rejoin the group of conscripts. The ponies around her were looking at her with awe at her abilities.

“I knew you were a strong pony, but I didn’t know you were that strong,” somepony whispered.

Applejack blushed slightly. She didn’t usually like to show off her abilities, but the awe in that pony’s voice sure felt good.

She didn’t have to push herself as hard as she had done, but if Applejack promised something, she was determined to keep her word. And she had promised to herself that she would take whatever the sergeant threw at her.

Two weeks had flown by in the blink of an eye.

True to her word, Applejack had successfully passed through every obstacle Sergeant Sharp had put in her way. He had never stepped outside of the rules, but every tiny mistake on Applejack’s part was followed by some punishment that usually consisted in a double round of some heavy exercise.

As Applejack was having breakfast in the mess hall — a big room with dozens of tables filled by hungry ponies — she reflected on how the camp had changed lately. While it had been practically empty when she had gotten here, it was brimming with thousands of new arrivals now.

They were mostly earth ponies just like her, but a sizable number of them were unicorns. Those had mostly been conscripted from low-class citizens in Birminghoof. As Applejack had learned from some conversations, those unlucky unicorns were being trained along with earth pony troops because they didn’t possess high enough magical abilities to justify having them trained to be proper battle mage.

Not a lot of unicorns did, apparently.

“You look gloomy, Jackie,” a feminine voice said.

Applejack scrunched her muzzle, flickering her ear as if to get rid of an annoying fly.

“That’s ’cause I knew you were comin’, Flare,” Applejack grumbled, giving the unicorn an eyeful.

Despite her azure mane being cut short like a typical stallion, it would be hard to confuse her with one because of her petite stature with a round flank. The mare’s dark purple coat was slightly damp from her morning shower, making her cutie mark of two crossed knives look like a pair of crooked sticks.

“How funny, Jackie,” Flare snorted, squeezing herself between the two ponies to join Applejack’s table.

Applejack let out a heavy sigh. This mare had been trying too hard to be her friend since the moment they had met when she — along with dozens of others – had been assigned to Applejack’s barracks. Unfortunately, Flare had gotten a bunk right next to Applejack’s. It had happened just two days ago, but it already felt like an eternity.

“Why didn’t you tell me you have a brother and a sister back home?” Flare asked in an accusatory voice.

“You didn’t ask,” Applejack answered flatly.

“I’ve always wanted to have a sibling,” the mare smiled, watching over Applejack’s shoulder with a dreamy stare.

“Good for you,” Applejack grumbled.

“Well, I had some great friends instead though,” Flare continued, her smile dropping. “But not anymore.”

Applejack glanced at the mare in surprise.

“What?”

“Eh, forget about it.”

Applejack shrugged, returning to her meal. She was trying to finish her wheat porridge as quickly as she could, while Flare was busy talking about her home city Birminghoof. She didn’t seem to like it much, not that Applejack cared. Glancing at Flare’s plate, she made sure it was almost untouched by the chatty mare — it was her chance!

Jumping off her chair, Applejack grabbed her plate in her mouth and dashed to the counter for dirty dishes. Leaving her plate there, she hurried to the exit, glancing at Flare. To Applejack’s dismay, the mare had finished her meal in one big swoop of her tongue and was trotting after her, launching the plate at the counter with her magic.

Damn unicorns.

“Hey, wait for me, Jackie!” Flare yelled as Applejack exited the mess hall.

Admitting defeat, Applejack stopped and waited for Flare to catch up. Together they made their way through the camp back to their own barracks, with Flare filling the silence with her blabber. She was still droning on about Birminghoof.

“Can you imagine that even the king was killed by his own student?” she said, rolling her eyes. “It’s typical for that city. Just typical.”

“Yep,” Applejack nodded.

Soon they had reached their barracks.

A dozen of armored conscripts were already hanging around near the entrance, but the sergeant wasn’t there yet. Soon he would arrive to do the roll call and announce their daily task, but Applejack assumed that she had time to suit up until then.

She trotted inside, with Flare right behind her. Applejack walked past a bored sentry — it was one of her co-villagers today — and approached the armor racks. Each conscript had been issued a set about a week ago. It was required of them to be wearing the armor at all times while on duty.

Taking a set from under her name tag, Applejack began the chore of putting it on. While she was struggling to hook everything up with her teeth and hooves, Flare simply used her unicorn magic.

“Need some help?” Flare asked, securing the last belt.

“No, thank you,” Applejack grunted through her teeth.

In a few minutes she was done. It was actually a much better result than when she had tried it for the very first time, but it was still far from perfect — according to the sergeant, she needed to do it twice as fast.

The two made their way back outside, joining the rest of the conscripts. Applejack sat on the ground and glanced at the clear sky above. The weather was promising today.

“Hey, aren’t you excited?” Flare poked her.

Applejack raised her eyebrow. “Excited about what now?”

“We’ll start training with weapons today!”

“Ah, that,” the mare shrugged dismissively. “A bit, I guess.”

For the last two weeks since they had joined the camp, the sergeant had made them go through countless exercises, not to mention the obstacle course they had to finish on a daily basis. But yesterday, he had announced that they were ready to move up to the next level.

“I wonder what kind of weapon we’ll get,” Flare said, pacing around Applejack. “What do you think?”

The mare flickered an ear.

“Probably a sword,” she said flatly. “Every soldier I saw here has a sword.”

“Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of,” Flare sighed. “I’m hoping for something cooler. Like knives!”

Flare began to describe the superiority of a good knife over a sword, but Applejack was barely listening, simply enjoying the fresh morning air. More and more conscripts were gathering in front of their barracks — and every other barracks in the camp — with each passing minute.

Soon afterwards, their sergeant finally showed up.

Flare shut up when everypony hurried to take their position. The whole unit had lined up in three even lines in less than ten seconds, facing Sergeant Sharp while he watched over them with a tiny smile of approval.

“You’ve learned something after all,” he nodded. His face turned serious again. “But that’s not nearly enough — you’re still just fodder for the enemy.”

The conscripts didn’t seem to react to the sergeant’s harsh assessment, simply staring forward with stony expressions. They knew that the sergeant hated it when anypony interrupted one of his speeches.

“As I’ve already told you, I’m going to train you to use a weapon in a fight,” he continued. “We’re going to spend the whole day today covering the basics. However, if you think I’m going to call off our usual obstacle course, you’re a fool. Any questions?”

Flare shot her hoof up, but the sergeant ignored like he usually did.

“No questions, good,” he shrugged. “Follow me, conscripts.”

Flare sighed in disappointment, but walked in a line along with the rest. The sergeant led them to the armory nearby. Their unit had to wait until the ponies who had gotten there first had been issued their equipment — simple swords.

“Aw, it really is a sword for everypony…” Flare said, drooping her ears.

Applejack rolled her eyes.

Soon they got their turn. The ponies entered the armory in small groups of five, where the quartermaster handed out a sword to each of them. Applejack took one with her hoof, quickly putting it away into her sheath, while Flare just stared at her own sword with a look of sadness.

“I don’t like swords,” she told Applejack. “They’re too clumsy. A good knife is much easier to control.”

“Of course it is” Applejack said, flickering a glance to her cutie mark. “Have you ever actually used it in a real fight?”

Before Flare could answer, the quartermaster shooed them out. They complied, but as soon as they got outside, Applejack repeated her question.

“Oh yes, I had to use them pretty often back in Birminghoof,” Flare answered flatly. “Not that it helped much…”

The mare fell silent after that, poking the ground with her hoof, but Applejack didn’t enjoy the moment of peace. Flare was clearly upset and despite her being a pain in a flank, Applejack wasn’t happy to see her like that.

Before she could come up with something to console her, everypony had finished getting armed and the sergeant led the group to the training fields. A whole lot of conscripts were there already, but their unit had a part of the field designated just for them. They formed up in three lines as per usual, waiting for Sergeant Sharp’s instructions.

“Before we begin, I’m going to show you how you would compare against a trained fighter,” the sergeant said, grinning. “Split up into pairs and prepare your swords.”

The ponies were surprised, but they had learned not to question their orders.

Applejack and Flare got to be in a group together. They drew their swords and Applejack touched its blade with her fetlock. It was blunt just as she had suspected. She hoped the sergeant had a blunt one himself — it would have been pretty crazy of him to cut them down for a demonstration.

“You,” the sergeant pointed his hoof at a seemingly random pair, “Try to take me down.”

The two ponies exchanged glances, taking an uncertain step forward and then lunged at him. Unfortunately, one of the ponies stumbled over his own sword, faceplanting into the ground. His partner looked back at his fallen comrade, allowing the sergeant to jump at him, landing a buck on his chest. The poor stallion was sent back flying with a yelp of pain.

Sergeant Sharp shook his head, scrunching his face like he had smelled something bad.

“I didn’t even draw my sword,” he told the two conscripts as they slowly got back on their hooves. “If that had been a real fight, you would be dead. Get back in line.”

Having said that, he took a scroll from his saddlebag, making some notes.

The next pair was dispatched by the sergeant almost as easily as the first one. He knocked the sword off the pony’s hoofgrip right away, punching his partner in the muzzle. The fight was pretty much over after that.

“Pathetic,” Sergeant Sharp spat. “I knew you would be bad, but I was hoping for some challenge at least.”

He looked over the line of conscripts, stopping his eyes on Applejack. The mare had guessed what was about to happen before he pointed his hoof at her, inviting Applejack to step forward.

Resigned, Applejack did so. It wasn’t difficult for her to walk on three legs, since she was used to carrying instruments back at the farm; the sword wasn’t even that heavy compared to them. But having never held a sword before, Applejack doubted she would beat the sergeant with it. If only it had been a hoof fight…

Flare seemed much more competent with a weapon, despite her earlier complaints about swords. She was holding it with her magic in front of her face, ready for anything. After exchanging a glance with Applejack, the two began encircling the sergeant.

That was when he made his move.

Unlike Flare, Sergeant Sharp held his sword like an earth pony. Dashing at Flare, he knocked her sword to the side, following it with a hoof to her face. Her reaction proved to be quick, however, as she jumped backwards to avoid the punch.

As the disarmed mare stumbled backwards, Applejack rushed at the sergeant from the side, hoping to catch him by surprise. Unfortunately for her, the sergeant had anticipated her move.

Turning to face her, he blocked Applejack’s clumsy swing with ease. Grabbing her hoof holding the sword, Sergeant Sharp pulled it with force, dropping Applejack onto the ground. Without giving her time to recover, he rolled her onto her back and dropped his armored elbow onto her belly.

That was a weak spot in the armor. Applejack was left gasping for air, curling up on the ground in pain. She didn’t want to admit defeat, but she never denied the truth when it was staring into her face.

Flare, however, wasn’t ready to give up. While Sharp was dealing with her partner, she had recovered her sword. She advanced on the sergeant as he just stood calmly, watching her every move.

With an improvised war cry, Flare jumped at him, swirling her sword madly. The sergeant simply stepped away, managing to score a hit into her head as she flew past. Following her, he kicked Flare’s legs from underneath her, making her fall with a loud thud.

“You’re dead,” he stated matter of factly, holding the sword to her neck. “Now get back in line.”

He waited until she and Applejack scrambled to their hooves to rejoin the others.

“That quick demonstration showed you what would happen if untrained rookies like you went up against a veteran,” the sergeant said. “I don’t expect all of you to reach my level, but I’m going to teach you how to use a sword and show us some basic moves that would make you somewhat useful in a battle.”

“But first let me address some of the mistakes you made. Flare, forget about using magic to wield a sword. It’s dangerous for your own allies in close quarters. As for the others…”

While the sergeant continued to break down the short brawl in detail, Applejack tried to pay attention, despite her aching stomach. No matter her personal feelings for the pony, he was a competent fighter that could teach her a lot.

“I’m sorry about what happened, Jackie,” Flare whispered; Applejack had to swivel her ear to hear her. “If only I had my knives…”

“And then what?” Applejack glanced at her slightly annoyed. “You think it would have gone differently?”

Flare shrugged, drooping her ears. “I don’t know…”

Applejack said nothing to that.

When the sergeant had finally finished with his speech, he ordered the ponies to face each other in pairs. Then he demonstrated a number of basic moves to the future soldiers and stepped away, observing the ponies repeat it.

Later that day, Applejack and Flare were sitting together in the mess hall. Flare was exhausted after hours of training. Even Applejack herself felt tired, not to mention a dull ache in her belly that was bothering her whenever she walked.

“I hate that guy,” one of the conscripts grumbled.

Applejack ignored the pony; her attention was focused on Flare instead. The mare seemed pretty down after being beaten by the sergeant. In fact, she had barely said a word after they’d been finally released.

“What’s wrong, Flare?” Applejack asked with genuine concern.

The mare flashed an obviously fake smile. “Nothing’s wrong, Jackie. Don’t worry about me.”

“I can sense a lie from a mile,” Applejack shook her head. “Are you that upset that the sergeant beat us?”

Flare flattened her ears; Applejack felt like she’d just hit the spot.

“Well, yes. I had always assumed that I was good enough to take care of myself,” Flare admitted, her smile gone. “But… maybe I’ve just never had a decent opponent.”

Applejack sat quietly, thinking of her answer.

“I was beaten, too,” she said, trying to console the mare. “We just need to train harder, that’s all.”

The unicorn shrugged.

“Don’t worry about that,” Applejack continued. “Besides, I know for a fact that Sergeant Sharp is not as tough as he looks.”

“What do you mean?”

Applejack shook her head, falling silent.

After the two mares had finished their meal, they went back to the barracks. Applejack found herself worried over Flare’s prolonged silence. She’d been wishing for her to shut up since she’d met her, but now when the mare was brooding inside, Applejack would actually prefer to hear her talking.

“So what did you use to do before being conscripted?” Applejack asked to break the silence.

A frown flickered on Flare’s face.

“I used to sell flowers,” the mare said evenly. Too evenly.

Applejack had a keen ear for catching lies and right now she felt like Flare was lying pretty clearly. Whatever she used to do was certainly far from what she had stated. Applejack narrowed her eyes, but didn’t challenge her statement just yet.

“Flowers are nice,” Applejack nodded.

They went the rest of the way to the barracks in silence.

As soon as they had gotten inside, Applejack happily took off her armor. She had never worn clothes in her life and it was hard to get used to the constant feeling of the armor around her body. It was so constricting compared to a natural coat.

Of course, Applejack had no objections to wearing a cloak if there was some rain or wearing some warm garments if the weather was particularly nasty, but she would never understand those ponies who liked to cover themselves in fancy clothes just to make themselves look better. She knew the nobles in the big cities did that; what a weird bunch.

In fact, the only piece of clothing Applejack owned was her old hat. Too bad she had to leave it back at the farm. The hat had been very useful for saving her from a heatstroke after having worked too long under the blistering sun on the field.

As the mare lay down in her bed, she thought about her old life on the farm. Eventually, she drifted off to sleep.

Parring a high blow with a sword, Applejack jumped backward, making her attacker lose his balance, and smashed her hoof into his face. The pony was thrown to the ground by the force of the punch, where Applejack finished him off by severing his neck.

Or at least, that was what would have happened if that had been a real fight. Fortunately for her opponent, it was just a tournament, so Applejack simply touched the pony’s neck with the tip of her sword, signifying his defeat.

Putting her sword back into her sheath, Applejack grinned.

The crowd of ponies around her erupted into cheer. She had just won the camp’s tournament! It had been set up for all the new conscripts. Applejack had joined to test what she had learned in the last two weeks of rigorous training that Sergeant Sharp had put them through.

As it had turned out, quite a lot.

“Keep it up, Jackie!” a familiar voice could be heard among the others.

Applejack searched for Flare with her eyes. The mare herself had decided to skip the tournament, much to Applejack’s dismay. She seemed to have lost faith in her fighting abilities after the sergeant had wiped the floor with both of them.

Giving Flare a little nod, Applejack raised her hoof in victory, invoking a new round of cheer from the crowd. Not only conscripts were in it, but also a number of regular soldiers, as well as officers. The soldiers could be distinguished by a blue stripe on their foreleg’s armor, while the conscripts’ armor was blank.

“The winner is—” the announcer squinted his eyes to read the name on his list, “—Applejack!”

The mare bowed her head.

There was no actual prize for the winner, of course, but Applejack hadn’t sought one in in the first place. Having received a blue ribbon from the hooves of the camp commander, an officer whose name Applejack didn’t remember, the mare was dismissed along with the rest.

She made her way through the crowd, nodding towards the ponies congratulating her on the victory, until she reached Flare.

“Congratulations, Jackie,” Flare grinned. “I knew you had it in you.”

“Well, thanks,” Applejack smiled in return. “Though I’m sure you would have done just fine yourself.”

Flare’s grin dropped a little. “I don’t know about that.”

The two walked through the camp, which was unusually active for such a late time. In fact, everypony was supposed to be in bed already, but the curfew had been extended to allow the tournament to be finished in one day.

When they had finally entered their barracks, Applejack found most of her unit gathered there. They cheered loudly as soon as she appeared.

“You were so cool, Applejack!” somepony yelled.

“Aw, shucks, everypony,” she blushed at receiving so much praise. “Thanks, I guess.”

When the wave of praise had died out, Applejack took off her armor as usual, finally being able to relax. She had been participating in the tournament since early in the morning, having endured five different brawls to get to the finale, so she wished for nothing more than some good rest.

Unfortunately, sleep hadn’t prevented Applejack’s body from aching all over in the morning. She may have won the tournament, but she hadn’t gotten through it completely unscathed, despite everypony wearing armor to protect them from the worst of injuries.

So when their unit had lined up in front of the barracks, Applejack was expecting it to be a bad day. When the sergeant showed up, her expectations even worsened. Instead of doing his usual roll call, he just stood in front of the line, eying the conscripts with a heavy stare.

“The high command has ordered the camp to speed up your training,” he stated, spitting on the ground in disgust. “Obviously, you’re not ready, but they’re still planning to deploy you to Stalliongrad on the eastern border.”

An excited murmur went through the crowd. The city’s name was well known to every earth pony. For most of them, going there would be a dream come true, despite the city being right on the border with savage griffons. Applejack was excited along with the rest, though the fact that they were being sent there in such a hurry was a bit disturbing.

“I’m going to be deployed there as well,” Sergeant Sharp continued, suppressing any disturbance with his glare. “So, the following week is going to be much more intense if I am to make you somewhat ready. Some of you have made good progress in one-on-one brawls, but a serious battle is not the place for a lone hero. You’re going to be trained to fight in a proper formation.”

Applejack kept a frown off her face, but she was disturbed by the news. There was a rumor about an upcoming war and these events supported that theory. Though if Applejack had been the one making the decisions, she would have thought twice before sending a barely trained force into battle.

“I don’t want whatever commander gets you in their unit to think that Sergeant Sharp is a bad teacher, so I’m going to try my damnedest to knock something into your little heads,” the sergeant promised. “Do your best, everypony. Your lives may very well depend on it.”

Applejack’s thoughts flashed to Big Mac, Granny Smith and Apple Bloom as she tried to imagine their reactions to her death. It wasn’t pretty, so the mare furrowed her brows, determined to learn everything she could to survive a possible war.

She would see her family again.

Have another chapter, everyone.
It's a little short, but I hope it's still okay.
Enjoy it.