The Rite

by bendelsohn

The Rite

The Rite
By Bendelsohn

Celestia walked out onto the ritual grounds. As she had requested, the place was devoid of any life. Now all she could do was wait for Twilight Sparkle to arrive. She sat there, mentally preparing herself for what she would have to do. She had started the rite many times before, but it never got any easier. It was just so unfair! She was nearly all powerful! How could a student ever hope to defeat her? Some had come closer than others, but for the most part, every student who had accepted the rite had died by her hoofs in one way or another.

As she kicked at the ground, she felt a powerful source of magic approaching the area. She already knew who it belonged to. Twilight Sparkle entered the area with an expression as grim as any. Celestia drew a deep breath, and began the ceremony. She seemed to grimace with every word.

“Welcome Twilight, to your rite of ascension. You are here today to prove to the world that you are more able than I, and therefore more fit to rule the kingdom. You must come here knowing that you may never leave. I will not hold back my strength, and you must do the same. You must come here knowing that this ritual was practiced as long as equines have recorded their history. It is a great honor to come here and be part of our history now as it unfolds. Finally, you must come here knowing that the prize for victory is total power and near-immortality. My soul will be yours and you may use it as you please. Do you understand what it means to come here?”

Twilight stared at Celestia. “Yes, I understand.”

Celestia looked into her eyes, and saw that Twilight was shaking. She was scared! She would have to be quick about this. She would never forgive herself if this took any longer than it had too.

“Then let us begin.”

Almost as soon as she had said that, she pointed her horn towards Twilight. Instantly, a beam of fire shot out of it, hot enough to vaporize almost anything it touched. She felt something die inside of her as she watched the spot where Twilight once was instantly turn to ash.

As the smoke cleared, Celestia approached Twilight’s ashes. She leaned over them to pay her final respects. As she moved, she realized something was wrong. The ashes she was standing over emitted no magical energy at all. They could not possibly be Twilight’s! Then that would mean-

Something slammed into Celestia from the right. She flipped onto her side and turned to see what had happened.

Twilight was panting as she revealed her self from the shadow she was hiding in. Her hair was singed, and it appeared that she had narrowly teleported out of the way of the inferno. She shook her head to reorient herself, and then vanished into thin air.

Celestia looked at the massive boulder that had been tossed at her, and realized this fight would not go the way she was hoping it would. She searched the area, now fully alert. She was not going to make the same mistake twice. She searched the area for any magical sources that would indicate Twilight had reappeared. It wasn’t long before it did. Twilight sparked into existence in a secluded area next to a stair case. She launched a bolt of magic at Celestia, hoping to catch her off guard again.

Celestia created a magic shield around herself, which the bolt bounced harmlessly off of. She turned to Twilight who was then cornered.

“I’m impressed, Twilight. You seem as powerful as ever. I’m very proud that you were my student. I’m so sorry it has to end like this.”

Twilight did not respond, but only concentrated as Celestia went on.

“You know it causes me great pain every time I have to go through this. I’ve been on these grounds more times than even I can remember. Yet you are something I haven’t seen in a long time. Very few of my students even make it this long. You should be very proud of yourself.”

Celestia had walked closer to twilight. Although Twilight was probably baffled by why Celestia had taken so long to talk to her, Celestia felt she had good reason for doing it. She wanted to see what Twilight would do next. She saw how twilight was concentrating, and noted how she was obviously using her time to prepare a difficult spell. Now she only needed to know which one.

Twilight finally released her concentration and began her plan. She vanished once more, Celestia felt her presence again only a half second later. Twilight appeared just behind Celestia on her back hoofs. The reason she had taken so much time was immediately apparent. Twilight had conjured a sword from magical energy, and was going for a deadly blow to Celestia’s back. Unfortunately for her, Celestia would no longer fall for her teleportation. Before she could give any momentum to her blade, Celestia’s legs shot out at a blinding speed. They smashed into Twilight’s exposed midsection, with an audible cracking noise. Twilight was blasted backwards several meters.

Celestia glared at Twilight. Her attack had been disappointing, and poorly executed as well. Twilight seemed only then to realize her mistakes. She could have attacked from the side, or above, for a much more effective attack. Twilight cursed in both frustration and pain as she began a minor healing spell on her broken rib.

Celestia had hoped that the buck would go right to her skull, but that had clearly not been the case. She knew she had to stop waiting around at some point. It was her turn to take the offensive. She summoned her own blade, which was significantly larger and more dangerous than Twilight’s. She approached her and finally assumed a dueling stance.

Twilight did not meet the challenge, but simply surrounded herself with a magical field. She then telekineticly picked picked up her sword, but backed away from Celestia.

Celestia did not wait for Twilight to seem ready. She charged at her with a flurry of deadly blows, but they were all somehow avoided. It seemed that Twilight’s field was making her dramatically faster, almost to the point where she was hard to see at times.

By now, Celestia was angry. She just wanted to kill Twilight and be done with this damned ritual. She began to feel fatigued as she swung ever faster at Twilight. Suddenly, Celestia realized she had just figured out how to win.

Although Twilight’s magical power was vast, it was certainly not infinite, or even close to Celestia’s for that matter. Based on how much Celestia had already expended, she realized that twilight must be near exhaustion. She could see the magic field around her beginning to falter. Reinvigorated by her epiphany, Celestia’s attacks became more and more brutal.

Celestia finally got the break she was looking for. Twilight’s dodge was too slow, and Celestia’s sword embedded itself in Twilight’s shoulder. Twilight screamed as a hoof sweep quickly knocked her off her feet.

“You are defeated, Twilight.” Said Celestia. “If you have last words, say them now. I will make sure they are remembered.”

Twilight gave the same smirk she had before. Celestia leaned over her to hear her response. Had Twilight not been in immense pain, she would have laughed.

Twilight said weakly “Everything went according to plan.”

Suddenly, Twilight’s horn glowed red. Celestia tried to pull back, but was too slow to avoid what was coming. There was a bright flash, and Celestia was flung backward. When her vision cleared, Celestia tried to get back on her hoofs. This once easy task now, for some reason, seemed incredibly difficult. She felt... weak.

Twilight stood over her, looking more powerful than ever. The wound on her shoulder was gone and she practically radiated magical energy. There was something wrong about it though. It was familiar, yet the magic she felt didn’t belong to Twilight. The magic coming from Twilight belonged to herself. Celestia searched her own power and found that what little of it was left matched Twilight’s magical signature.

Celestia could only watch, completely defenseless, as Twilight moved her sword over Celestia.
“It’s my turn to ask you- any last words Princess?”

Celestia thought for a moment.

“Yes Twilight. Thank you.”

Before Twilight struck the final blow, she paused for a moment. She didn’t like what she was about to do, but she had come much too far to turn back. She looked away from what she was about to do. She simply couldn’t watch.

The blade fell, and with it, did the old kingdom and way of life. The rule of Twilight Sparkle had begun, and only time would tell for how long.

Comments

[banjo2E]

Why is this happening?

What caused events to come to this point?

Why the HELL would Twilight fight CELESTIA of all ponies? For ANY reason?

You need to answer this before this story can be good.

[Sweetie_Belle_Derelle]

MOAR@ Make a prequel and sequel!

[Gypsy]

Imust save this to my list. This sounds incredibly heart-breaking and awesome

[Zooty]

Reasonably written but without any prior explanation or leadup to the battle there really isn't much emotional involvement. Nor is it explained why it is necessary to perform this ritual other than the 'it's tradition' excuse.

[rocking]

just one word WOW

[sgtnolisten]

Why *click* won't *click* this *click* story *click* LOAD!?!? *clickclickclickclickclick*

[Vargras]

Interesting, but as stated before, we don't have much of a reason to even care about 'the rite' or anything else involved because we don't know why it's even around in the first place. 'The rite' is never explained and just seems to be there, and Celestia fighting Twilight just seems incredibly unlikely.

A noble effort, but it'll need more in the future.

[rar1ty]

Great concept but it is missing any sort of build up that would of made it a five star story otherwise. Perhaps this should be a start of a story where in you go backwards to tell the actions resulting in the intro. I always love those but even if you do not follow up on this I must say it was an enjoyable read and concept I have yet to see done. I quite enjoyed it and you will receive a solid 4 star rating from this reader and many wishes for the fiction to continue. I look forward to your future efforts!

[Br2nd66]

im sad noe I hate you

[Fasaloft]

Bit too sudden and out of character without explanation to be engaging, but a decent enough read for someone with a minute or two to spare. Since it only takes that long to read :P

[Arcanum Symphonis]

Okay, good show. That was well-written, and I only noticed the odd mistake.

As others have said, some elaboration on the events leading up to the rite of passage would be welcome, as would an epilogue.

Considering, as you said, that this is the first non-trollfic you've written, it shows that some trolls actually do have skill, and I'm glad this troll has chosen to try something serious.

Good effort, but it lacks the elaboration and build up necessarily to make it truly effective. Keep writing!

[Lunarassasin]

you celestias dead ...... oh and what the others said

OOC, nuff said.

Still a good read however.

This is horribly horribly OOC and has absolutely no reason to take place. There's absolutely no context or explanation given, and it doesn't fit properly with a great many elements from the show. It's not even particularly well written. This story simply doesn't need to exist.

Are you sure this isn't a trollfic? It's certainly bad enough to be one...

[bendelsohn]

Thank you all for the feedback (even you, HtMD, even if that last bit was uncalled for)! I wrote this mostly as an experiment to see if I actually had any talent for real writing. I have to say, I think the result could have been much worse. Most likely, some kind of prequel will happen at some point. It might take a while though. Because of how OOC this is, coming up with a logical back story could be a challenge.

[datdamnface]

I like it but I have to agree with HtMD you really need to expand on this.

But its a change from all those confounded happy go lucky pony stories :3

[Wilhelm]

????
WE ARE CONFUSED BY THIS.
TWILIGHT YOUR TAKE: