Chapter 8 of 'Demon Slayer' Is in Production · 1:33am Jul 16th, 2014
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Now here's a version of My Little Pony I could get into.
Um . . . I lost my train of thought here. I'm distracted by Magical Girl Megan . . .
Oh, right, I remember. Thanks to everyone who commented recently on our discussion of the future of A Mighty Demon Slayer Grooms Some Ponies, I believe I know what I want to do with the last chapter. I think it will round out the story nicely.
By this time, of course, A Mighty Demon Slayer Grooms Some Ponies has been jossed three ways: we have an expy of Tirek in the season 4 finale, we have the backstory on the magic mirror in the "Reflections" arc of the comics, and we have the founding of the Crystal Empire described in the Journal of the Two Sisters. All of these are vague enough that I could probably handwave them if I were of a mind to, but I don't think it's worth the effort, as it would only needlessly complicate the story. I do, however, plan to use material from these sources for the final chapter.
As I see it, Demon Slayer is, you might say, frozen in time: the story takes place after Equestria Girls, so I intend to take no account of any of the events of Season 4. However, I do intend to incorporate some of the flashback material that has developed Equestria's early history, because I'm lazy and don't want to have to make up my own stuff. What I can't easily incorporate, such as the Crystal Empire's founding, I'll ignore.
Some of the material is too good not to use.
To that end, I'm currently re-reading Demon Slayer to remind myself of what the heck I wrote. As I go through it, I may take the liberty of altering a detail here or there to bring it into line with what I'm planning for the denouement, but these alterations, if any, will be minor. This of course has precedence: I previously altered Chapter 6 at readers' suggestion and retconned Twilight Sparkle's princesshood, which I recognized would make for a more effective climax.
Once I release the final chapter, the story will be set in stone, as I have no interest in making this an exercise in endless fiddling.
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Also, even if this version goes over poorly, you're stuck with it.
I doubt I will fire off every Chekhov's Gun on the wall, since the original plan was to write a sequel. I no longer have the intent to continue the story beyond Chapter 8, though I confess I am tempted by the challenge of writing a grand martial epic in which the grooming theme keeps going: I envision a wild and wildly violent tale in which our ever-shrinking band of heroes stands against the endless armies of darkness, in which they know they have no hope to succeed but nonetheless strive to the uttermost as one by one they are taken by malevolent and nameless beings from beyond the stars and subjected to petty torments, their souls plucked forth and destroyed in the depths of the House of Silence, all while the Abquestrians, the race destined to replace ponykind upon the face of the Earth, stalk the last of the ponies with a hatred so cool and calculating as to seem almost courteous. Then at last the walls are breached, and Canterlot falls; the lords of shadow sit enthroned over the rubble while the smoke of her burning goes up forever; the dead ponies lie in the streets, their bodies unmourned and unburied; and the greater servants of the evil one feast upon the lesser servants in an endless bacchanalia. Over it all, upon her throne of bones, Princess Skyla rules the kingdom of darkness forever and aye.
And Megan still grooms a pony in every chapter.
Pray to me, Kirk.
Um . . . where was I? Oh, right. I can't tell you much about what the chapter will contain, but I can say that it will probably have a lot of gratuitous scenes of Danny and Pinkie Pie totally making out, mostly because I recently found out some girl on some internet forum was complaining about my story because she's a diehard Danny x Surprise shipper.
To that I can only say . . . DannyPie forever!
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In your face! IN YOUR FAAAACE!!!
It's nice to see the story finally have a conclusion.
I'm glad to see it continuing.
I said it way back when, but I loved the story, and I enjoyed the direction that the story was going in, but all of the plot points were just heaped up one on top of the other far too quickly.
Needed to spread it out!
2289581 No, no you are not.
How about a magical lever action carbine instead?
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Am I responsible for this perception of the character? Remember, the canonical Megan has only a locket that shoots rainbows for her weapon.
I may have gritted her up for the purposes of this story, but I will always think of Megan as my first magical girl.
Good to hear this won't be on hiatus forever.
I do hope you can find an agreeable compromise between the story you wanted to write and the story that I and many of your readers (incorrectly) assumed you were writing. Fulfilling the first criterion really is the most important, though. If you're making changes to the story, I think everyone here hopes that you, above all, are happy with them.
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Look, Twilight agrees with me.
Sort of.
I really need to catch up on the comics. These Reflections revelations seem important.
I don't normally read the books, but if there is some canonical explanation for the founding of the Crystal Empire, then I will need to know about that too. (I had this crazy idea to write a spinoff story myself, wherein Derpy and the Doctor encounter the Crystal Empire in Equestria's past, perhaps a century or two after its founding, and it is ruled by Mimic, the only one of the original G1 cast left because her horseshoes gave her unnaturally long life. But that will all be moot if canon gets in the way....)
Even if it is a done deal that there will be no sequel after the horse show. I will be happy to see Demon Slayer get some final closure.
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The founding of the Empire is described in just a few sentences. The first princess of the Empire, Princess Amore, found the Crystal Heart and infused it with her love to protect the crystal ponies.
This does not necessarily conflict with what I depict in Demon Slayer, as it could be supposed that the Crystal Heartstone was lost and got found again, or something along those lines. Amore could be a descendant of Galaxy.
The biggest problem, really, is the expanse of time I used. I rather wish I hadn't made it 5,000 years, but I had always supposed that Equestria had a longer history than it apparently does, and that Celestia and Luna didn't rule until some generations after the characters in "Hearth's Warming Eve." Equestria herself is only about a millennium old.
The book also confirms, without much detail, that Celestia and Luna did not transform into alicorns, but came from a race of alicorns about which we are given no details. I'm currently speculating that they are the remnant of the first inhabitants of Argyte, who perhaps brought Celestia and Luna to the fledgeling Equestria to fulfill their destiny.
The book also confirms that Equestria, as I had always supposed, is indeed an empire, encompassing several kingdoms and nations, although there's some hippy-dippy stuff about Celestia and Luna being "guardians" and not rulers exactly, because we can't go having actual princesses in our princess stories. I'm going to just assume they figured out at some point that you can't run an empire that way.
I'm gonna go ahead, I think, and take someone's (forget who) suggestion that Star Swirl used shards of Majesty's mirror to create his own interdimensional portals. That pretty much solves my jossing problem, really.
Also, one additional note of slight interest, Commander Hurricane is confirmed to be a stallion. I guess Rainbow Dash gets stuck playing dudes the same way beardless boys in Shakespeare's day got stuck playing chicks.
In my humble opinion, they should have also made Pansy a dude, but whatever.
I really hope you can keep the part about Celestia secretly being Grogar, but also fit in Celestia's torrid and passionate romance with GoodGuy AltSombra. That would be AWESOME!
God, ain't that the truth.
Hey, as long as Celestia and Luna don't turn out to have been truly evil all along thus negating everything we have ever known, I'm cool.
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It's canon that Celestia is Grogar. They started hinting at that around the same time they started hinting that Twilight Sparkle is pregnant with Princess Skyla by human Flash Sentry.
So Celestia and Luna are from outside Equestria. That means they essentially bioformed Cadence and Twilight.
Personally, Equestria's history has gotten so convoluted I don't want to say anything definite about its past. If G1 does have a connection to it, it's a parallel with perhaps a common history at some point (like some force abducted ponies to save them from Discord and dumped them on a planet where species under threat of extermination are brought so they can be preserved).
Please do.
Glad to hear you have a plan. I look forward to the execution.
I'd read it.
You know, again.
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Perhaps something that could be explained in that spinoff story you mentioned you might write. *hint hint*
Would you consider it an intrusion if I "tweaked" certain details of the narrative for the sake of the comic?
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I'm considering reducing the timespan to 2,000 years.
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That's right. I'm giving you two Chapter 8s for the price of one, so there's no cause for complaint.
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A better answer: I don't really want to exert original creator control over your comic. I did that once when I asked for Megan's duster, and I later regretted it because I don't think I have such a right to intrude. I will therefore hold my peace if you choose to change the timespan or put Danny in a marijuana shirt, or whatever.
I suppose the question is whether the readers, rather than I, would care. I know that I have been annoyed by tweaks in adaptations that I didn't find necessary. Of course, then again, this is fan fiction.
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I actually ended up agreeing with you about the duster. If I had not, rest assured, I would have left it out, but it made too much practical sense that Megan would wear a duster, and I have it included in the initial sketches I have already started for this comic. So I am always open to feedback, though I will weigh it carefully.
Do you not like the marijuana shirt? XD
I have been surprised, and amused, by the cold responses I have gotten from some commentators, especially on Derpibooru, about that. I think some people out there need to lighten up a a little bit.
It's just a political statement. It's not like I'm suggesting that Danny is a "pot-head" or something. He's not, BTW. But I think it fits well with his somewhat rebellious personality, and I enjoy the opportunity to fill in some character blanks for him.
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The commentators on Derpibooru may not realize that you're illustrating a character I already depicted as a slacker and a philanderer, so they should be blaming me rather than you. I agree the shirt fits him as I've depicted him.
In fact, he might actually be a pothead.
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Oklahoma, man.
He does meth.
It's been a while since I read the existing chapters of this thing, but when are we going to get the scene in which the groomed ponies are formally "presented" to the rest of the human world? Or has that already included, and I was simply too clueless to pick up on it?