The night was peaceful, hardly a sound to be heard as the land rested and relaxed. The stars shone brightly down on fields of long waving grass that swayed gently in the cool winds. It was almost completely uneventful.

Almost.

Fires burned brightly in the town, towering infernos of light. From a distance they appeared as mere pinpricks, but up close they were pillars of crimson, shining beacons of hope for all around. Upbeat music, almost tribal in nature, blared from the musicians crowding the streets, which themselves were overcrowded to the point of insanity.

But nopony cared. This was a time for celebration, not common sense. In times when the spirits of the average pony were lifted so far as to be above the clouds, they would only dance and drink and make merriment, enjoying themselves in whatever way they could before the sense of elation faded.

And this was one of those times. Adversity had been crushed in the face of the community, and they had reigned triumphant in the end. Something had tried to destroy all that they held dear, but they’d succeeded, and eradicated the threat.

That’s not to say that the townsponies hadn’t experienced their own troubles. Death had visited the household of almost every inhabitant, and had done so more than once on many occasions.

Evidence of these hardships became even more apparent when one was to look at the fires; Many of them had bodies in them, burning fiercely in the searing flames. Thick plumes of ash and smoke spiralled into the sky, rising above the rooftops to disperse among the clouds and beyond. Some might think that this was horrible, that this was disrespectful, to celebrate and dance and kajol around the dead, but those that were of that opinion were misinformed.

These ponies were celebrating the lives of their deceased, and the dancing was their own way of sending away their friends, and lovers, and family members - their own personal way of saying goodbye, of saying that although they might be leaving, they’d meet again in time, and that there was no reason to be sad.

The song changed, and the dancing rose to another level of frenzy, shadows being thrown around in the wide dirt streets, bouncing around the newly built houses of Canterlot, into the tiny alleys and around the treeline only a short distance away. It had been built at the foot of an enormous mountain, one which the pegasi,
Earth ponies and unicorns alike loved. Even the leaders of the ponies, the Alicorn princesses would use it to help in performing their astral duties.

Small snippets of laughter and conversation could be heard, but nothing large. At one moment you might hear someone mourning with a friend, at another you might hear cries of elation and happiness.

And the party wasn’t even limited to ponies. No; Many buffalo could be seen dancing in their own lumbering way along to the music, which was more similar to their own traditional tunes that those of the ponies’. Zebras were weaving among the crowd in their own style, their superior agility lending a hoof when it came to dancing, and their stripes wove a mesmerising pattern in the heated air, their jewelry jangling as they moved.

Perhaps the strangest addition was also the most unexpected. The occasional burst of emerald green fire lit up darkened patches as the strange visitors fooled around. The Changelings had joined the party, but no one cared at all. The Changelings were there for the same reason as everyone else. Even the Queen herself, Catarat, was present, sticking to the edges of the firelight and having quiet conversations with ambassadors and friends alike, a small and withdrawn smile on her face.

Indeed, beings from every corner of the globe were massed in the small town. And it would soon be like this all over the country, if not the world. Absolutely everywhere that you could go, there would be some sort of rambunctious appreciation of the peace and success.

But there was also a sadness. For there to be so much cooperation, there must have been some terrible occurrence, and for there to be such mass conjoining of nations, then the event must have been near-apocalyptic. More than one nation had fallen to the force that had plagued the world for so long, the once mighty Changelings themselves only barely escaping from their once beautiful homeland, leaving it a scarred waste.The Buffalo had nearly lost theirs, but it had survived, though it would too be barren for many years to come.

One of the least devastated places had to be the pony homeland, and even it had gone through some rough patches - so difficult that to emerge victorious, all three species of pony had banded together to fight for survival. Even so, they had still lost their original homeland, and so they moved on to a new place.

They were going to call it ‘Equestria’, and it was going to be free. It would be a place for any race and any breed to come together and live in harmony. It was by the two young princesses’ instructions that this would happen, but no being alive would dare dispute that anyway, as all of them agreed that they could and would live together.

But the message of acceptance hadn’t originated from the princesses. Instead it had come from a far more powerful and influential source.

That was another reason for the undercurrent of sadness that ran through the crowd. They may have won, but at what cost? They had lost their biggest asset, their flag bearer, and the one that they all looked up to, even in death.

Their leader.

She had been a pony, often called the most beautiful that would ever live. Of course those stories were all told by the colts, but that was to be expected.

But what was accepted as fact and agreed on by all was the idea that if she hadn’t been there, all life would have been lost. When death had come knocking, she had answered, and then retaliated with gusto. She might not have been intimidating, and may not have been the most fearsome in battle, but all respected her.

She had sacrificed herself for the good of all, and for that, they would never forget her. They were celebrating in her honour more than anything, as well as for all others that had fallen to the evil entity that plagued them.

But she was only the leader, and the leader is only as strong as the rest of her group. And she had gathered the best, the strongest, the most reliable of beings. It was they who had made the final push.

And it was that effort was remembered, the ultimate sacrifice made by so many, for the good of the greater mass and no other reason.

But even in the bliss of victory, the inhabitants of the entire land, and even those of distant nations, knew that they had to be wary in future. Even though the crisis had been averted, it might not be gone forever. And so there was a common understanding that they would never forget, and that the races of the world would live together in harmony, never fighting one another. They would never know when it might return, but if it did, they would be ready for it, even if that happened thousands of years in the future.

If they weren’t...

… All life would be utterly lost.