Discord’s departure left eerie silence in its wake for about a minute. Then ponies slowly came out from hiding, and Luna addressed her sister, who was floating in the air, and scanned the horizon in all directions.
"I have to admit, I didn't expect that. A god of mischief just popping up? But it was indeed not some ponies misusing the Teardrops. You were... you were right about that."
Celestia seemingly didn't notice Luna even said something. She said semi-loudly:
"What did he mean by that?!"
"What are you talking about? Who meant what?"
"Discord." Celestia responded, not looking down "He said he will "give you something you can actually kill". What is that supposed to mean?"
"Oh, you took that seriously?" Luna scoffed "Surely, he was just bluffing. Nothing will come of it."
"I'm not so sure." Celestia glanced down "He sounded pretty serious when he said that."
"At any rate, we should return to our primary task. We can worry about Discord later."
"Luna, don't you think our priorities should be shifted?" Celestia scowled "A god of chaos is terrorizing Equestria! Remember the ancient role of our kind: we should protect these ponies first and foremost."
"I'm aware, but we also have very definite orders. And it's my job to keep the mission on track. Even if there might be... difficulties at the moment."
Luna expected an answer out of Celestia, especially considering her bossy and slightly stuck-up tone (of which Luna was partially aware), but Celestia's attention was focused elsewhere, much more intensely than before.
After a good ten seconds, Celestia called out her sister, worry in her voice:
"Luna, they're coming..."
"Who?"
"Monsters."
Luna furrowed her brows, but took flight, and positioned herself next to Celestia to take a look.
And indeed they came. A duo of horrifying beasts, resembling a spider and a scorpion, studded with spikes and tentacles. Something straight out of a telltale book of horrors.
"These sort of insectoids populate the deepest bowels of Tartarus." said Luna, the combat expert, also knowledgeable of every potential hostile an alicorn could face "They might prove... somewhat challenging."
"But they can be killed, right?"
"Absolutely. I'm only baffled by the fact that jester was actually not bluffing."
"You can ponder that later. We should engage these horrors before they reach the village. These ponies have suffered enough. Let's not turn their home into a battlefield."
Celestia took one last glance at each of the creatures.
"Mine's the one with the tail. Let's go, Luna!"
With that said, she dashed away, already lighting up her horn.
Luna's mouth was left open. She only muttered, but it's not like her sister would have heard it. She was already too far.
"I hope you know I'm still in charge..."
Regardless, she bolted towards the spider-demon, while looking at Celestia.
"And of course, she's chosen the more difficult fight."
☼✶☽
Celestia soared towards the beast, and when she was close enough, brought up a form-fitting, full-body magical shield, as per alicorn fighting customs. Usage of any sort of physical armor was frowned upon by the tribe, but Celestia liked to believe this tradition actually had practical origins besides pride. Like, adventuring in a full set of armor would be tiresome, if their mission was any indicator.
The demon-scorpion was much bigger than it seemed to Celestia from afar. About the size of three village houses put together. And as it noticed the alicorn flying towards it, let out a piercing, almost otherworldly screech.
Celestia landed in front of the horror, to see at first what it's capable of. The demon lifted its tail, and shot a constant beam of magic at Celestia. She dodged by taking a quick loop in the air, then fired off a few spells of her own. Her basic magic bolts had little effect on the beast, except making it angrier.
Now the alicorn knew she was facing some real tough adversary. The demon's attacks intensified, and its tail shot a spread of bolts at Celestia. Once again, she quickly took flight, but one of the bolts hit her. It merely caused a ripple on her shield, and didn't give it any attention. Instead, she flew higher into the air, and charged up a beam spell. As she wanted to release it, several more scatterbolts flew her way, but she flew in unpredictable patterns to dodge them. Finally, using a momentary lull in the monster's attacks, Celestia released the beam, and the monster roared up in agony. The carapace on its back got badly scorched, but it was still pretty much alive.
Celestia got concerned for a second. Keeping up her shield, attacking with spells, all the while flying and dodging split her concentration just enough that she might make a mistake, and this creature might just take her down. Of course, she knew it well her own magical resistance was massive, so even if hit, she would stay alive. But as it seemed, the demon was some real tough stuff too.
So Celestia landed, and tried her luck on the ground. She blasted the creature's face with magic bolts, but the golden colored magic once again had little effect. And sharing the ground, the demon quickly scurried towards Celestia, who backpedaled, keeping on the attack.
When the distance between them got reduced to just a few dozen feet, the monster clawed at Celestia with its pincers, but she skillfully dodged all attacks with wing assisted leaps, as if she was just the partner in some deadly dance choreography.
As the battle took on a more kinetic approach, and also realizing the monster must have had some magic resistance of its own, Celestia was concerned their battle would reach the village. Something she explicitly wanted to avoid. She couldn't prolong it much more, she had to finish off the beast quickly.
She started to think real fast. Although she wasn't a combat master like Luna, she studied all the battles alicorns were ever involved with thoroughly. She remembered their last big battle against the changelings, where the hive was protected by a particularly strong magical shield. Actually, that one wasn't much of a battle. All the changelings died without firing off a single bolt of magic.
Kinetic...energy.
Celestia was sure she found the solution to defeat her adversary. Although she didn't have to drop a whole mountain on it, she was sure she could grip something in telekinesis, and clobber the scorpion-demon to death. But on the dilapidated wheat field, there was nothing Celestia could use as a physical weapon. She could've flown back to the village to find something, but that risked endangering its inhabitants.
But...
As the creature lifted one of its pincers for another strike, Celestia grabbed it in her telekinesis, and began to twist it. The demon resisted, and tried to counter the motion, but Celestia channeled all her magic into the spell, and the chitinous carapace started to crack around the pincer's arm. The alicorn gritted her teeth, and with one sudden downwards motion, she tore off the appendage.
The creature recoiled, alongside mad screeching and wailing, with a black liquid pouring from the wound. But a moment later, it fired off a bolt from its tail, but Celestia was on the nose, and with the same motion she dodged, she struck the monster with its own cut off pincer. It was hit in the face, but it didn't penetrate, and Celestia's next attack was blocked by the creature's remaining pincer.
Seeing that gave Celestia the idea it was time to rid this demon of it's remaining attacking arm, and using the one in her magical grip, she made a quick slicing motion with it. The pincer got embedded in the chitin armor, then she forced its jaws together, cutting through the chitin, then in a split-second, the flesh underneath.
Now that it lost its second pincer, the demon turned tail, and hurriedly crawled towards the nearby forest. Celestia picked up her second makeshift weapon, and followed the creature to finish it off for good.
☼✶☽
Celestia cringed as she followed the trail of destruction through the forest. It fleshed through her mind what damage this monster could have caused to the village were they to battle it out there. Not that Discord's damage was anything to scoff at, but at least that was reversible.
Celestia quickly caught up to the scorpion-like creature in a small clearing. Unable to shake off the alicorn, it turned, fixating its deeply seated glowing eyes on Celestia. Celestia glared back, squinting, knowing their confrontation had come to its endgame.
The demon, probably well aware it was cornered, let loose a powerful spell, the red beam sizzling through the air. Celestia, guided by a sudden idea, cast her own beam, and the two met in mid-air. In a magical tug of war, the two combatants tried to overpower each other, but the golden purity of the alicorn's magic persevered, and the demon's unstable beam violently dissipated. That hurt its stinger, and the beast recoiled, while letting out a painful roar.
Feeling that was her chance to finish it off for good, Celestia dashed through the air, and with the dual-wielded pincers, quickly cut off two legs from the creature. Now it roared up even louder, almost making Celestia's eardrums rip, but she didn't let that distract her, and struck again.
The scorpion-demon, now truly defeated, tried to limp away on its remaining legs, but Celestia, using one of the pincers as a leverage, flipped the monster on its back, and stabbed multiple times at its relatively soft underside.
The creature's piercing screech became a wet gargle as Celestia stabbed, and stabbed, and stabbed until there was no movement anymore. The bile and bug juice poured out from the wounds right before Celestia's hooves, and only then, when the stench started to become noticeable, she realized she won.
She dropped the pincers, and looked upon the corpse. She was breathing heavily. It was a tough fight, but she won.
Celestia walked around, and she looked at the monster's face. Its mandibles were left open, and its fluids were still dripping from the oral cavity. Also, she noticed a few twitches still, but she knew they were just final death throes. Also, as it was usual for an insectoid, it was somewhat curled up in its dying position.
The alicorn, just in case, let loose a final combat spell, but as it struck the beast, no reaction came. That was good enough for her, and circling around it, she looked for a way back.
But then, she heard something moving in the leaf litter. Celestia looked back. It was the tail of the scorpion, curling up and back a little. As if it was still breathing.
She walked back to the head. The eyes lost their red glow, the mystical magical energy stemming from Tartarus didn't empower the creature anymore. It was dead, for sure.
Celestia made a little frown. She looked back at the tail. All movement stopped there again.
"Nothing to do here anymore. Time to find Luna. I hope she didn't have any problem with that spider."
But the moment Celestia lifted a hoof to walk away, the scorpion's eyes flared up, with such intensity that it momentarily blinded the alicorn. It shot its tail forward, and the stinger ended up right in Celestia's chest. The strike prompted a pained gasp from her, and she tumbled back, feeling her heart pumping blood right unto her coat.
Not losing her cool, she cast a shield spell, albeit a weak one, and also began healing her wound. But she was losing blood quickly, very quickly. She knew a heart wound could prove fatal, even for an alicorn. And she needed more concentration for the high-level spell that could close what she thought was a ruptured left chamber.
The forest started to lose its many colors. Celestia first knelt down, then she couldn't help it, and fell to her side. Her vision was just a greyish blur now. Her blood pressure dropped significantly. Finally, her magic fizzled out, and she lost consciousness.
Not far from the creature she just killed, Protector Celestia was lying on a blanket of fallen leaves, stained red by her own blood.