The Thunder Wolf's Retribution

by Pinkie_Fatalis

Final Preperations

Twilight began her search for anything useful in the upcoming battle against the Jinouga in her library. She has a whole shelf organized with only books by or about StarSwirl the bearded. She immediately dove in and, two days later, she had read every book in her library that would help. She found no information that would even mentioned anything that would be useful. She went back to Raiju's home to see if he had any ideas on where to continue.

"Raiju, I've exhausted every book in Ponyville on or by StarSwirl and I don't know where to go from here. Have you figured anything out yet?"

"No I haven't...I'm still struggling to remember. All right, so there wasn't anything useful in Ponyville. You said there are library’s dedicated to him all across Equestria. Where is the largest source of books by him?

"Well...The Canterlot archives have a whole wing dedicated to him."

"That seems like the most likely option, but please slow down we have almost a year before they attack. You don't need to over exert yourself, take your time and make sure you don't miss anything important."

She agreed and, after spending the rest of the day talking with Raiju, went home for some rest. A week later, after much preparation, Twilight set off to Canterlot. She left Spike an incredibly long list for him to follow while she is gone. A week later Twilight had still not returned and Raiju realized that he was running very low on food for both himself and Thundercloud and has to go into town and get some more. He walked into town and headed straight for AppleJack's stand knowing that if anypony was going to help him, it would be her. Everypony around either wouldn't look at him at all, or stared furiously at him. He finally reached the stand and started talking to AppleJack.

"Hello AppleJack, long time no see."

"Well howdy Raiju. How yall doin'?"

"I've been better. I just need to get food for the two of us and head back home. Everypony seems to be quite upset with me and I’d rather not be here long." He paid for his food and, before leaving, he asked her one more question. "So have you heard anything from Twilight? She left for Canterlot a week ago and I haven't heard anything since then."

"Sorry but I ain't heard anythin' either. I hope everything turns out better for ya."

"Thanks AppleJack, I really appreciate it."

He then left to get the food for the filly. Upon paying for it, the shop owner forced him to pay double. Raiju knew this of course, but just wanted to go home, away from all of the ponies who were angry at him. Once he made his way back home, he sat down to enjoy a quick meal, when a knock at the door interrupted him. He opened the door and was greeted by a small group of ponies who immediately began throwing fruits at him while laughing. He slammed and locked the door astonished. He couldn't believe what just happened. He knew they were mad at him, but to openly show it like that was unbelievable. Meanwhile, in Canterlot, it has been three weeks and Twilight was still searching for the spell with no luck. One day Princess Celestia shows up in the archives and sees Twilight, with her face in a pile of three different books, and begins talking to her.

"Well hello Twilight. What brings you here? Last time you were here like this you had saved that monster."

"He's no monster princess. I'm here because of him. There was a spell used to get StarSwirl the bearded out of the Jinouga prison and that could be the only thing that can save us."

The princess stood there for a moment until she began walking out of the room and asked Twilight to follow her. While walking down the princess began speaking again.

"Twilight...You won't find anything in there about what happened after that war. When he got back after more than twenty years, he only lived for another year. The spell he used to extend his life had faded while he was imprisoned."
They came to a door in the back of the library and the princess magically opened the door.

"This is my private collection. If you really think there is something in here that will help...take it." As she walked away she turned around and said. "Do not trust that creature Twilight. He is not like us and could easily turn on anypony, and I don't want to see you get hurt."

Twilight immediately turned around and dove into the books. A few hours later she found StarSwirl’s Personal diary, and on the last page she found exactly what she was looking for. The spell was right there in extreme detail. She took the book and, after closing the door which then magically locked itself, she ran directly to the train station to head back home. She made it back home in the morning and ran all around town and gathered up her friends, before heading to the Everfree forest. Once they got there, they found a massive wall of electricity surrounding the entire forest, and blocking their way.

"What is this?!" Twilight asked.

"We don't know." Rainbow Dash responded. "He put that up over a week ago and hasn't come out since. The five of us have tried everything to get him to talk to us but he won't even come out to see that it's us."

"Well we have to get him I've found something that is going to help but we need his help too."
Twilight began trying to bring him out by attacking the barrier with magic. After a short while, Raiju's voice could be heard in the distance.

"Who's attacking my barrier? Leave me alone!"

"Raiju it's us we need to talk...now!"

After a few moments of silence, the barrier slowly faded until it completely disappeared. The ponies then ran as quickly as they could to his house were they found him sitting in a corner, alone.

"Raiju what happened to you?! And what's with the barrier around the forest?"

"Things have changed since the princess got that letter Twilight. In the almost five thousand years I've been alive, I have never been so hated."

"Hated? What do you mean? I know the other ponies are a little mad at you, but that doesn't mean-"

"Yes it does Twilight!" He turned around reviling that he had been crying. A large chunk of one of his horns was missing and he looked as though he hadn't slept for days.

"Oh my goodness! What happened to you?"

He turned back around and continued. "A Rajang attacked fillydelphia two weeks ago...I went there and fought it away and, after taking quite a few big hits do you know what the ponies did to thank me? They said 'Why even bother showing up? nopony even likes you.' After a Rajang attacked! I know that nopony knows what it is, but still, if I hadn't show up that thing could have leveled the entire city in less than five minutes...If it was feeling happy that day.” He sighed and, after calming himself down, said. "So what brings you here. Have you found anything that could help?"

"Better! I found the spell!"

"Really?!" He said turning around with a smile on his face. "That's great! We need to teach it to as many ponies as we can."

"That...Might be a problem. This spell is incredibly advanced and I not sure we can teach it to almost anypony. I’m not even sure if I can learn it by next year."

AppleJack then interrupted. "Well...can't yall just use the spell with the elements of harmony? After all, one of the elements is magic. Why couldn't ya just use yer magic with em’ after ya learn it?"

"Hey yeah that could work."

Raiju then interrupted. "Wait I'm confused...The what now?"

"The elements of harmony! The most powerful magical artifacts known to pony kind. We used them to turn Nightmare Moon back into Princess Luna, as well as to defeat Discord when he almost took over Equestria."

"Well...I'm not really knowledgeable on magical artifacts...but I don’t need to be! If you are sure that that will work than we’ll go with that. But first, we need to teach you the spell shall we begin? Oh! But before we do...Thundercloud, Fluttershy is here!"

All of a sudden the filly came flying in, and ran straight into Fluttershy, almost knocking her over, and gave her a big hug while saying. "Miss you!"

"She can talk now?" Fluttershy said in surprise.

"A little...She really missed you Fluttershy. She has a bunch of toys in her room if you wanna go play with her."

The two went into the other room as Twilight began to give her first attempt at the spell.
She gave her best but after a huge flash, Raiju could still move around.

"Don't worry about it Twilight we have until the summer solstice. We'll try as many times as we need, just don’t overdo it and take a good long break in-between tries."

They spent months trying to use the spell until finally, in mid-autumn, Twilight finally got it to work. An hour later, the spell wore off and Raiju began congratulating her.

"Yes that was perfect! You have perfected the spell, good thing too my hibernation starts not to long from now. Now...I really don't want to face her, but I think that we should have Princess Celestia learn the spell too. It would be a good as a just in case sort of thing, and allowing her to have that much power over me could hopefully build back a little trust."

"That's a good idea. I'll talk about it with her during the winter."

Winter went by and a few days after Raiju woke up, Twilight met with him to let him know what the princess said.

"Hello Raiju how was your hibernation?"

"It was good. I really needed that to calm me down from everything that's happened last year. Did you talk to the princess about the spell?"

"Yes I did. She has been looking over it for a while and she said to meet with her as soon as possible."
Raiju made his way to Canterlot, and the palace. Once inside he was met with guards and Princess Celestia.

"Princess...How are you?"

She said nothing but led him into another room. They began with little success and Raiju tried starting a conversation again.

"That was good...it took Twilight Months to get it perfect. I'm sure you will learn it just as fast if not faster, and we still have a lot of time before the summer solstice."

She walked out of the room and said. "Meet me here every day until I can complete that spell."

Raiju did exactly that. The day before the solstice, Raiju tried to meet her as usual but the princess didn't show up. He began walking around the palace until he finally found her in the throne room.

"Princess Celestia. We need to practice that spell again. Tomorrow is the solstice and you still haven’t mastered it."

"There isn't any point...I doubt it will even be useful, and I have much more important things to attend to."

"More important?! I'm sorry princess but you learning this spell could be the one thing to save Equestria."

"We will be just fine without it."

"How is that?!" He said starting to get angry. "You couldn't hurt ME if you wanted to, let alone on army of twenty thousand of my species."

"I said we will be just fine now leave. And I don't want to see you at all tomorrow."

Raiju was angry but didn't want to say something he might regret. Instead he simply left, but he didn't go home, he went back to the field between Canterlot and Ponyville. He found a hill that over looked the area and sat still staring off into the distance until he fell asleep early so he could be ready before anypony else.

Comments

[Romniki]

lol after reading a couple chapters of this i cant help but think what there reaction would be to seeing lao shan lung
oh monster hunter how i love thee

[DesertRose]

I only read the first few chapters, but there were a number of grammatical/spelling errors, poorly worded sentences and moments where the dialogue brings the ponies out of character (or what I would consider as such), especially for Celestia.
Its a very interesting concept that could go a long way if a number of the paragraphs were re-written to a higher standard.