//------------------------------// // Chapter 52 - Battle of the Gods // Story: The Cosmic King // by Theyellowninja13 //------------------------------// Malicious started it off with a bang, fired a sizable beam of purple and red energies, which Connor responded to with a punch, shattering it instantly. The second the beam was stopped, Malicious appeared in front of Connor, his only usable arm pulled back. He punched Connor in the face, pushing him back, before moving in with rapid fire punches to Connor's chest. After a couple hits, Connor's energy form spread apart and reappeared behind Malicious in the air to give a sharp kick to the back of his head, blasting him through hundreds of buildings. Connor quickly flew after him, causing debris to fly everywhere. Murphy knocked Celestia out of the way of one, before falling to one knee. "I don't know how much longer I can last. Even when my power comes back, what good is it in a body that can barely stand?" Blood was dripping everywhere from Murphy, and he tried to stand back up, only for his legs to give way, and he falls backwards. Before he could hit the ground, Celestia caught him, gently resting him against her, as the three of them all caught their breath. "What happened to Connor?" Luna asked out loud, as explosions filled the sky. "He looks and feels differently." Murphy spat out some blood. "I think Connor got a power-up. Something happened to him mentally and he unlocked some of the latent power of the Cosmic King. He should be able to win this fight easily now. Malicious is slowly running out of the energy he stole from both of us." True to Murphy's word, as Connor quickly avoided several of Malicious's attacks, the scientist was starting to breath heavily. Connor spoke up as he stood across from Malicious. "You're losing Malicious. I'm full on energy, and you're already tired from battle. Give up. There's no way you can win." Malicious just took a deep breath and disappeared, causing Connor to do the same as he smashed him back into the ground before he could get any farther. Connor pressed his foot down, snapping his spine and then grabbed his leg, throwing him into the mountain Canterlot rests on. Malicious stopped himself in the air, right before hitting the mountain, and quickly went through his thoughts for a plan. He saw some movement out of the corner of his vision, and went on guard, thinking it was Connor, when he realized it was Murphy and the Princesses. A smile came across his face as he appeared in front of them, grabbed the closest princess's horn, and absorbed the magic from them. This princess just so happened to be Luna.. Murphy tried to stop him with a couple shots, but Malicious just kicked him into the rest of the castle, causing it to fully collapse on top of him. Celestia was effortlessly held back with a wall of energy. By the time Connor go to Malicious, he already absorbed enough magic to leave Luna in a coma, on the verge of death and Celestia was a weeping mess. "NO!" Connor yelled, tackling Malicious to the ground, and sending punch after punch into his face. Malicious took the blows for a second before he blasted Connor in the stomach, sending him flying through the mountain. Connor stopped himself by the time he got to the other side, and pointed his right arm at the mountain, grabbing the entire rock formation, and throwing it at Malicious, destroying a huge portion of the city, and smashing Malicious into the ground miles below the city. Malicious kicked the mountain off of him, and received a punch in the throat, and a knee to the stomach from Connor. Malicious fired several large blasts of energy at the location of Celestia and Luna. Connor quickly appeared in front of them, taking the damage. Malicious used this distraction to fire almost all of his energy into Connor. Connor tried to block it, but felt his body burning and being ripped apart by the energy. He was able to hold up his defense, until Malicious blasted him in the back, causing Connor to be blasted into orbit. Connor snarled, and wiped some blood off his face. "Fine. I'll just use my last resort. He's too low on power for this to fail." He flew back down, stopping a couple miles in the air and looked down at the exhausted rival. "I'm done with this fight Malicious!" He yelled. "So I'll finish it with one last move. I dare you to stop it!" Connor snapped his arms pointing out to his sides, and his legs pointing diagonal from his torso. He started screaming as a rift in reality opened behind him, showing another universe. Then, the energy from the the other universe flooded into his body, slowly destroying the universe he's taking it from. A small purple orb of energy floated in front of Connor. "What are you doing?!" Malicious yelled. "You'll destroy this universe with that kind of energy! Everyone will die! Everyone! Including... you..." Malicious realized something. "No. You'll survive. And the only way I can survive is to stop it." He chuckled. "Clever boy." Malicious started to flood all of his energy into his body, preparing to block the attack. "A beam won't work. It'd take too much of my energy to only slow it down. I have to catch it and force it into my body. A small chance of survival, but it's better than none." The orb of energy in front of Connor was getting bigger, as big as his torso right now. He pushed the energy from the universe he already destroyed a quarter of into the orb. "I DON'T CARE IF YOU DIE! NOT ANYMORE! THE UNIVERSE WILL BE SAFE FROM YOUR DEATH! NO MORE PARADOXES! YOU'RE GONNA DIE!!!" The orb held half of an entire universe in it and was still getting bigger. "YOU'RE PUTTING A LOT OF FAITH ON ME STOPPING THIS!" Malicious yelled back. He already got all of his energy into him, forming a nearly unbreakable barrier around himself. "THEN I GUESS I'LL HAVE TO GO ALL DEFENSE!" "WITH THIS BLAST I WILL END YOU!" The orb held 75% of an entire universe in it, becoming bigger than Connor's entire body. The orb was on the verge of holding an entire universe in it. An incalculable number of lives being used to power one attack. As the orb was finishing charging up, Connor whispered to himself. "I'm sorry Mother. Please forgive me for this attack." The orb reached 100% and the rift behind Connor started to close. Connor's eyes shot open as he glowed with godly power. "COSMIC CANNON!" The energy in the orb was getting restless, spasming violently "FIRE!!!" In that one moment, reality altered itself. The orb of energy shot forward and time seemed to slow down. The beam made it's way through the air, scarring reality permanently in that area. The sky glowed purple with energy as lightning streaked across the sky. It didn't take long for the beam to hit Malicious and the struggle began. Malicious screamed in pain, his unbreakable defense shattering nearly instantly. But he held on. He held on as all the godly energy he stored in his body was destroyed trying to stop the beam. Malicious was getting pushed back as he ran out of energy and the beam began to destroy his body. 'I have one thing left! I won't day today!' He activated his suit's energy absorption function and started sucking the energy of an entire universe into himself. He screamed as his very body was destroyed over and over again, but the energy in the beam was fading. His very soul was being rewritten, as he died over and over again from the power of the beam. Eventually, Malicious succeeded, the beam trickled down to nothing and he collapsed on his knees, his body heavily destroyed, and glowing purple from the radiation. Connor landed in front of him, and walked up. Malicious could barely look back up at the god, but when he did, he just chuckled. Malicious was horribly and permanently disfigured from the beam, never to once look or be the same again. Connor though was barely scratched, the universe's energy flowing around and into him. "I guess this is the end." Malicious spat out, along with a lot of mutated blood. "The point where you finally kill me. I've been waiting for it for years. I guess the only reason you didn't was because of the paradox it'd cause if I died before younger you battled me. But now we don't have to worry about that anymore. You bested me. I had the power of two gods, and incredible technology, and I was defeated by a young child with mental issues." "I'm not a child. I'm a teenager. And yes. I defeated you. But you won't die today. You survived the beam, after you absorbed it into yourself. The odds of that happening were not in your favor. Mother has plans for you, so I'll let you live. but not without punishment." Connor said, bringing his hand up as it sparked with electricity. "What kind of punishment? Gonna make me learn the magic of friendship? Turn me to stone? Send me to another universe. I'll be back regardless of what you do." Malicious taunted. "Yes you will. But never the same. Especially with this punishment. I'm sorry I have to do this, but you earned it." Connor put his hand on Malicious' head and began to force his energy into Malicious' head. Before the punishment began, Malicious chuckled and said one last thing. "It's funny. We both were two guys just trying to get back home, forced to be enemies due to fate. And it's even funnier when you think of how we were from a similar universe. I'm just from a couple decades after an infamous shooting. Together, we could have gotten home. But we're forced to be enemies." He laughed again. Connor let out a small chuckle. "Yeah, it is funny. We would have made a great team. I'm sorry." Connor finally got his energy into Malicious' head, and began to alter his brain. Malicious screamed in pain. "What is this?! What are you doing?!" "I'm the Cosmic King of Lightning, Crafting and References. I'm destroying all the references in your brain. You're brain is still the same, it's just that nothing connects anymore. You look at a chair, and your brain will no longer be able to identify it as a chair based of references to other chairs. You'll be basically a vegetable." Connor said with remorse. Malicious could already feel it happening. His memories getting fuzzy as he lost recognition of his learnings. He lost recognition of machines, of Equestria, of Earth, of his soldiers and experiments. "NO!" He yelled in between screams. As his mind became more and more like a vegetable, his memories of his precious family were fading and no matter how hard he tried to hold on to them. "No..." He started to cry, but he didn't know why. All he knew was that his head was feeling weird. Memory after memory faded, until there was one left. Cosmic King Connor, his biggest rival. It started to fade to, but as he was finally reduced to vegetable state, he managed to hold onto one last thing. Connor's face. And all he knew about it was that it made him feel weird emotions he didn't understand. Connor removed his hand, leaving Malicious there to collapse and begin drooling on himself. The fight finally finished, Connor walked over, through the rubble, to where Luna and Celestia were. He crouched in front of Luna and rubbed her cheek. "She'll be alright. She's just gonna be resting for a while." Luna's body glowed a little bit as her wounds mostly healed. Celestia sighed. "Thank you Connor." She almost passed out herself from all the stress of the previous days, before Connor caught her. "Careful there." He said in a soothing voice. "You need to rest as well. It's been rough couple of days." He gently laid his ward next to Luna. "Yes it has. Yes it has. But I can't just rest yet. The ponies need me to be there." Celestia tried to say, before she passed out. Connor rubbed her side gently, restoring her wounds as well. "I'll take care of everything. You two need to rest." He stood back up and looked at the ruins of the castle, just in time for Murphy to come crawling out in a pile of blood. He fell off a big piece of rubble, and decided to rest against it once he got reoriented. Connor walked over to the red-head, and sat down next to him. "So... what now?" Murphy asked. "I was thinking on repairing the city. Making New Canterlot. I could use your help on that. Lots of rubble that needs to be destroyed." Connor responded. "But... aren't we enemies?" Murphy replied. "We were more like rivals I guess. But I always considered you a friend. Distan did to. I was just waiting for you to get it all out so we can begin to make up for what happened. You were one of my closest friends." Connor said with a smile. "But I killed you! I ruined your life! How can you just forgive me?" Murphy asked, eyes starting to water. "Because you lost control of yourself when it happened. I saw your eyes. You weren't in control. I can see it in your eyes. You are tearing yourself up because of it now. Besides. Having godly powers is pretty fun. Life was boring, and now it's unpredictable. And if we work together, we might be able to find our home. Maybe bring Distan here. Make it a party." Murphy began laughing at that, before he coughed up blood. Connor held his right hand out, glowing with the purple energy of his Cosmic Form, which he had yet to come out of. "Cosmic Brothers forever?" He asked with hope in his voice. Murphy looked at his own hand, and barely managed to make it flash red with his energy, before shaking the hand. "Cosmic Brothers forever." He affirmed, before collapsing, taking heavy breaths. "So..." Connor began. "Wanna get some pizza? I think Cosmic Pizza is still open." Murphy was quiet for a moment. "Yeah... I'd like that."