Another Year Gone By · 5:25am Aug 30th, 2018
Yeah, it's been a while. Again. A little over a year since the last chapter to Filly Fluttershy: Uprising was posted. As much as it shames me to say, and despite at least two of you in the comments being glad when you thought Filly Fluttershy was back, I haven't been able to make any progress after publishing Scorched Feathers. There were a couple of reasons for this. Real life gets in the way, other interests take priority, and in the end, I'm afraid that the creative spark that drove me to put out The Chaos Vortex in record time has already come and gone.
For what it's worth, all those other interests made for quite an interesting year. The Nintendo Switch has been on a roll ever since it came out (and that might actually deserve its own blog post, for those of you who are interested in my two cents), I actually took some time to read the A Song of Ice and Fire books (also a long story), and I even looked into the TV series The Expanse. But in all that time, my presence and activity on Fimfiction has been languishing, both as a reader a writer, and I'm truly sorry for that.
To be honest, I'm not sure when I'll be able to post the next chapter, Lord of the Underworld. I'm not even sure when I'll be able to start writing it. There are parts of it, especially original content, that I'm genuinely interested in writing. But being the 23rd chapter, there are also points where the game itself gets pretty stale. But for now I was hoping to do for the most recent chapter, Scorched Feathers, what I did for Celestia's Temple and The Chaos Vortex, and that's to provide a sort of recap blog post for what I wrote. To be fair, this would've been much better if I had done it a year ago, when the chapter was still fresh in my mind as well as all of yours. But like I said before, stuff gets in the way, and at this point, it's either now or never.
Princess Celestia, You Have Failed This City! And Yet No One Seem to Care...
I was genuinely surprised by this. When I used a track that wasn't from the original Kid Icarus: Uprising OST as the music link for the intro section, I thought for sure someone would've noticed. I mean sure, my story doesn't have a huge following, but does everyone here either ignore the music links or just not watch Arrow? But apart from that, choosing a track from Arrow was a bit of a personal touch for me. Filly Fluttershy started out more than anything as a love letter to Kid Icarus: Uprising, but with a touch of pony from the first 2-3 seasons of FiM. Over time, some influences from the show Arrow had seeped into my original idea (particularly the first two seasons), and using this track was a tribute to that.
Regardless, I thought the track fit well for what Rainbow was going through in the intro, and being the original content it was, I was happy with how the intro turned out. Rainbow Dash gearing up to fight, getting in just a little practice with every weapon she plans on bringing. On one hoof, she's got a debt to pay to Fluttershy. On the other, she's trying to do the right thing. She's not entirely sure which one matters to her more, but to her that doesn't matter. I'm sure I've said this a couple of times before, but I was always looking forward to this chapter as a chance to delve further into the Rainbow Dash (Dark Shy) of this story: what drives her, how she feels about other characters like Celestia, Luna, Fluttershy, and Discord, how she fights, and what she's willing to do. It was about both fleshing her out and a chance at some character development, and that's one of the things that first excited me about writing Scorched Feathers.
On a smaller note, you might recall that even though Rainbow stashed all of those weapons, she really only ever used the Pandora Claws. It's the same with The Chaos Vortex, where Fluttershy took both the Beam Claws and the Saggitarius Bow with her, but only ever used the Beam Claws. Like I said with Fluttershy in The Chaos Vortex, I'm building up to something.
Rainbow's Finest Hour
I'm sure none of you remember the recap blog post for Celestia's Temple, but in that one, I had framed the chapter as "Fluttershy's darkest hour." It was the moment in her life and in her mission where all her sins, her failings, and her personal struggles all catch up to her. It was meant to break her, even as she tried to push through and carry out one of the most personal and seemingly impossible missions she'd ever been on. In much the same way, Scorched Feathers is meant to contrast that, to be Rainbow Dash's finest hour in the story. It's the moment in Filly Fluttershy where the story's most morally gray character actually steps up, risking so much of herself to do the right thing, and with such utter clarity in what she's doing. She's venturing into the depths of the Underworld, taking orders from two of her least favorite ponies in the world (more on that later), and risking both her life and her personal freedom just to save Fluttershy. Sure, she may have had some personal, even selfish, reasons for going through with all this, and in the end it's hard to separate the selfish reasons from the selfless ones, but in the end, it's got to count for something.
Princess Luna, You Have Failed This City!
Okay, so this moment in Scorched Feathers might be the single most important in the entire chapter. It's the reason this was my favorite chapter in the game, it's the reason I was so looking forward to writing this chapter for about three years, and it's the part of this chapter that I really wanted to get down perfectly. This was Rainbow Dash's 'rage against the gods' moment after they discover that Discord is using souls to create his armies, where she blames Celestia, Luna, and all of the gods for throwing the world into chaos.
I've had one person tell me that they like how I wrote this part, at least in the way Rainbow Dash tells off Luna, and that they wish Dark Pit had said the same thing to Viridi in the game's version of this chapter, so I'd like to think that this scene turned out great. Though truth be told, although this scene is an expanded version of what Dark Pit says to Viridi, the original spat between the Kid Icarus characters is what made this my favorite chapter and Dark Pit my favorite character in the game. Throughout much of Kid Icarus: Uprising, we're led to believe that Dark Pit turned out to be an anti-hero because the Mirror of Truth, which was supposed to make him an evil version of Pit, didn't finish the job. But this moment in Scorched Feathers made me rethink his character completely, and it inspired much of what I thought motivated Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash in the Filly Fluttershy version.
Rainbow/Dark Pit had already told off Fluttershy/Pit as early as Chapter 6 for being Celestia/Palutena's lap dog, so we already know that freedom means a lot to the two of them. It's the reason that these two give to Nightmare Moon/Medusa for not serving them to begin with, and the fact that both of them have unlimited flight without the help of some goddess giving them orders, unlike Fluttershy/Pit, further underscores the independence that these two enjoy. But in the original Scorched Feathers, when Dark Pit shows his revulsion at Hades for converting the souls of the dead into Underworld troops and tells off Viridi for all the chaos and bloodshed the gods have caused, it suggested to me that Dark Pit does in fact care about defending humanity. He is, after all, a reflection of Pit. Rainbow Dash would certainly feel the same way. Even though she has her reasons for not allying with Fluttershy or taking orders from Celestia for most of the story, she still wants the same thing they do.
Princess Celestia, You Have Failed This City. No Really, I'm Serious This Time.
I want to turn away from the Rainbow Dash/Dark Pit character discussion for a minute and talk about Celestia/Palutena. After all, Rainbow doesn't just launch a tirade at Luna in the Filly Fluttershy version. She also takes aim at Celestia, and Celestia spends a decent amount of time in this chapter in personal thought. This was also something I really wanted to nail down when writing this story, because, well, it's not that I don't like Palutena, but I do have a bone to pick with her in the games. There are times in the games when Palutena drops Pit off unreasonably far from the target at the beginning of a land battle section, making the chapter/mission longer and more dangerous than it should be. There are several even moments throughout the game (especially chapter three) when Palutena puts Pit's life in jeopardy for no good reason. It leaves me with the impression that Palutena takes Pit for granted, and it takes her until the end of the Chaos Kin arc for her to realize it.
And to top it all off, Palutena just doesn't seem to have been doing her job. We learn in chapter 2 of KI:U that the Underworld has been launching attacks against humankind for years, even without Nightmare Moon to order the attacks. We know that because Magnus is said to have lost a child to Underworld troops. We know that Magnus and Gaol were both monster-fighting mercenaries for years until Gaol was captured and brainwashed by the Underworld. At one point, Magnus even tells off Palutena for either not doing enough or doing nothing at all to protect humanity from the Underworld. Rainbow Dash accuses Celestia of the same thing in the Filly Fluttershy version of Scorched Feathers, and Celestia seems to internalize much of it during her inner thoughts.
For what it's worth, Celestia realizes her mistakes by the end of the chapter, but a lot of this also factors into Rainbow Dash's (and by extension Fluttershy's) character. As I've said before, Rainbow, Fluttershy, and Celestia all want the same thing: to protect ponykind from the Underworld and from any belligerent gods and goddesses. But because Celestia isn't doing enough and is taking Fluttershy for granted, Rainbow distrusts and actually resents the Goddess of Light. Rainbow would much rather keep her own freedom and protect ponykind her own way than take orders from Celestia, and if that also gives her a chance to feed her ego by fighting Fluttershy and proving that she's stronger than the "original" she was created from, then that's even better. On some level, Fluttershy knows all of this too about Celestia, but because of her utter faith and devotion to the Goddess of Light, she's in a constant state of denial about it. All these things were brought to the forefront when the Mirror of Truth created Rainbow Dash. She's not an incomplete copy of Fluttershy, as Celestia and Nightmare Moon posited back in Chapter 6.
When you look at Rainbow Dash in this light, then her refusal to fight for any goddess makes sense. If she resents Celestia for not doing enough to protect the earth ponies, then she must loathe Chrysalis and Nightmare Moon for trying to exterminate them. And it's for this same reason that she would never join Luna's side. For quite some time, this was also my headcanon for Dark Pit and Kid Icarus: Uprising. Unfortunately, Super Smash Bros. 4 happened:
Yeah, that's unfortunate. But that doesn't mean I should let a perfectly good piece of headcanon go to waste. I've been planning this sort of character dynamic between the central characters of Filly Fluttershy for years now. I'm not going to throw it away just to conform to a KI:U sequel that isn't even being made. Speaking of which, all of this character interpretation has actually made me want a Kid Icarus spinoff game for Magnus, but that's a topic for another forum. Maybe I'll make a thread in the Kid Icarus group.
So is it Chrysalis or Cadance?
Surprisingly enough, I don't have much to say about the boss fight in this chapter. It might just be the longest one in this entire story, mainly because it wound up being a three-phase battle, and part of me was worried that it dragged for too long. As for Chrysalis' transformation, I did need a new role for when Pandora jumps into the Rewind Spring and turns into Amazon Pandora, and I figured a season two callback was my best bet. Also, the Pandora Claws as Rainbow's weapons for this chapter just seemed right.
What Comes Next?
Like I said before, I don't know when I'll be able to post another chapter of Filly Fluttershy: Uprising. I don't even know when I'll be able to start writing it. For now, I can at least tell you what you can expect from Lord of the Underworld, based on the previous chapters. For one, as you could probably tell from the title of the chapter, Discord is next. The Chaos Kin is gone, the Forces of Nature are allied with Celestia and Fluttershy, and there's no random alien invasion. No more distractions, we're going after Discord.
As far as characters go, I think the three characters to pay the closest attention to will be Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, and Celestia. In Fluttershy's case, the war against the Chaos Kin may be over, but it left her with a considerable amount of trauma, and it's worth seeing how she moves forward with it. With Celestia, she's been under the Chaos Kin's control for the last three years. The world around her is a broken mess, and she is going to have to pick up the pieces, and that's going to be a little more complicated after what Rainbow said to her in the last chapter.
As for Rainbow Dash? Well, I've mentioned before that her ability to fly partly meant that she was free from the gods, and she doesn't have that anymore. Her rivalry with Fluttershy to prove that she's better than the "original" doesn't matter anymore, now that she knows that her life is inextricably linked to Fluttershy's. And to top it all off, she's effectively trapped in Luna's domain, and the two don't exactly get along. It's somewhat of an existential bind for her, and she'll have to ask herself not just what she's going to do next, but what can she do.
dang i really enjoyed the story i loved uprising and was so hyped to see a pony version of it im kinda sad that spark you had is gone but not every spark is there forever i understand
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That doesn't mean I've given up on the story entirely, or at all. In fact, since putting up this blog post, I managed to get some progress in on the next chapter, and there are certain scenes that I've been thinking about for a long time. Unfortunately, it's a matter of finding the time and the drive to write. Also, writing each of these chapters involves meticulously playing and replaying the corresponding chapter in the game, and as much as I love Kid Icarus: Uprising and the 3DS, both of my 3DS's have seen better days. Still, I plan on continuing the story. I just can't promise a timetable or a deadline.
In the meantime, shortly after this blog post, I also posted a thread in the Kid Icarus group asking what people wanted to see in a hypothetical sequel to Kid Icarus: Uprising. Sort of a "what would you want to see improved or expanded on from Uprising." Unfortunately, the Kid Icarus group actually is dead. I guess when you don't appear in any new games except Smash in six years, most people move on.
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writers cant be rushed so take all the time you need to 
i understand take your time