Lovey dodged left and right to avoid getting hit by anything. To her, this whole thing felt like a game of deathly dodgeball. Scarlet and the ashen one were still locked in combat, with the two exchanging hits, blocking others, and the ashen taking damage every time because of Scarlet's lava gloves. He slid in between two punches, getting right in front of red dragoness, allowing him to headbutt her hard. The dragon followed up by thrusting his elbow into her sternum to push her back and have her keel over, facilitating his job of lifting her up and slamming her back down.
Sure of his success at knocking the dragoness out, the Ashen One waltzed over the crater. That was a bad idea. Scarlet hopped out of the whole, landing in front of a surprised dragon. She swung her arm around swiping him via his torso into a lariat lock. She spin around, jumped in the air, and, with hand on neck and on leg, performed a backbreaker with the dragon. She repeated the first movement, doing another backbreaker, and then followed by spinning high into the air stopping with her up top and the Ashen One below her, and body slammed him hard from the air.
Scarlet laughed and crossed her arms multiple times for her stretching. "I got him good," she chuckled.
The Ashen One groaned in pain, incapable of movement. "Sssstupid dragons!" he yelled. "I'll show you what I can do!"
His body became engulfed in the warping and twisting smoke of ash and cinders. This did something to his body, removing whatever pain and damage had been caused, and allowing him to fight Scarlet to his fullest potential.
"I told you I didn't want to fight with you!"
"Well that's too bad!" Scarlet shouted. "You brought this on yourself!"
The Ashen dragon growled and charged at Scarlet, feinting a punch for a sweeping maneuver followed by an uppercut into her back and a breath of fire that engulfed the dragoness, although it wasn't enough deter her from fighting.
"You're going to have to do better than that!" Scarlet mocked. Her opponent preferred keeping silent than answering in any way. Scarlet shook her head and readjusted herself. "Why are you even doing this? You seem to be in the know more than the others."
Emboreale landed next to the two dragons on a large group of smaller ones and moved her lower jaw left and right. "That's because he's part of the Red Sun."
Scarlet nodded. "I thought so. He knew way too much and was doing quite a few 'precise' maneuvers uncharacteristic of regular dragons."
The ashen one looked insulted. "So? What if I was a lovie dovie? You'd have never known."
"Don't be absurd," Scarlet waved the notion off. "Lovie Dovies are only female."
The gray dragon became puzzled. "What? Why?"
Scarlet and Emboreale's eyes shot open and made no eye contact while only humming 'Uuuuuhhhhh' for the longest time.
"It doesn't matter anyways. What's done is done," he said. "And you can't stop it, sssstupid dragons!" he hissed.
"Stupid dragons, huh?" Emboreale mused.
"Yes! You all behave the same way! Brats with poison in their mouths!"
"Then you don't see yourself as a dragon?" the serpent wondered. "You seem more than capable of convincing these dragons to fight on behalf of your group."
"Because they're idiots!"
Scarlet put an arm in front of the serpent, surprising her briefly. "Don't get too close to him. He's dangerous."
"Oh please. There's more happening here than you think." Emboreale body started pulsating with magic, creating an increasingly loud shriek over time. "He's been slandering the dragons instead of the ponies, which he was fighting earlier. He hasn't once mentioned them during his rant there, preferring to stab our species."
"What are you doing?" the Ashen One asked.
"Just this."
Emboreale's body shone brightly and with bits of color, blinding everyone in the immediate vicinity by the sudden expansion of light. When the light faded, there was a large cone of burnt land expanding away from the serpent.
"Where did he go?" Scarlet asked. "Did you kill him?"
Emboreale looked at the dragoness with an insulted expression. Lovey's need to dodge everything was improving her reflexes and timing, but it didn't prepare her for the body flying at her. She instinctively brought her arms up, but it served no purpose. The figure landed on the ground and slid in front of her. Lovey was awestruck by what she was seeing.
"What the hell is that?!" she shouted.
The silence created by the blinding light allowed her verbal shock to reach most people around and look towards her. There was a pony around her size right in front of her, but it was...off. It turned to look at her, face filled with absolute rage. There was a horn coming out of the right of its head in a short arc leading to a straight point. He had another, smaller horn right next to it and surrounded by the short-curve. This one had a spiral design on it, strangely. His body was an exchange of red scales and purple and red fur. His right eye was pony-like, but the left had a reptilian slit and was surrounded with scales. His snarling mouth showed a random assortment of horse teeth and groups of two or three sharp dragon teeth. His forelegs ended in hooves with sharp claws growing out of them, splitting the material. The hind legs were mostly equine, if not for the scales and right hind leg having a single claw growing out of the hoof. His mane and elongated tail were very unkempt and mostly purple with small streaks and patches of red. His left flank was but scales, and one of the ponies fighting pointed out something curious.
The three spies had climbed onto the wall to have a better look of everything happening and assess the situation accordingly, but Redflare noticed the entity and raised an eyebrow. "That's the pony from the night when the warehouse exploded."
"Look! He's got a red sunset on his flank!" the mare yelled.
"And that's the idiot who kept spewing hatred towards the dragons."
"No it's not!" the Ashen One shouted. "It's just scales!"
Redflare shook his head in disappointment.
"Betraying so easily after months of doing this for her group," Flossy Cotton grumbled. "Just because the thing you were following wasn't a pony. Pathetic."
Cornwell looked around and scratched his head. "How long has this been going on? Two hours?"
"About," Redflare answered.
"It's over, crossbreed," Scarlet said. "Or would you prefer the name 'Red Sun'?"
The small crossbreed's scowl turned to a smile. "I wouldn't be so sure about that."
Fighting resumed across the land, although many of the previous participants, be they pony or dragon, stopped altogether. Lovey looked around confused.
"Why don't they stop?"
"Because the idea of the Red Sun won't be extinguished so easily!"
"You say that," Emboreale started. "But what will you do now that we know who the leader of the Red Sun is?"
"I'll--"
"Both sides know now that you're neither dragon nor pony. You've lost the trust of both."
The crossbreed was fuming with rage.
"Why would you start something like this?" the serpent asked.
"So that you all know what it feels like!" Everyone looked at each other, confused. "Even now you judge me by my appearance alone! I still remember my mother and father! A pony and dragon! They conceived a child: Me! But they never let me out. Not like you!" he pointed at Lovey accusingly. "YOU know what it's like to have people care about you. I only had my parents, and they were killed by their own! I was waiting in my home for my mother to come back, but other ponies came instead. They were supposed to help me, but they all looked at me with abject horror and disgust." The claws on his forelegs folded into the dirt. "They literally tore me out of my own home and threw me into the streets, eventually throwing the things in my house at me. They thought I was a monster taking up refuge there!"
He pounced on Lovey, rolling them around then throwing her far away angrily. Scarlet was going to intervene, but Emboreale stopped her.
" 'Ew, what is that thing?' They would say. 'Get away from here, mutant!' others would spit."
"That's no reason to take it out on me!" Lovey said.
She blocked a few hits and kicked the crossbreed. "I learned I wasn't a pony, and thus was chased out of where I lived, just because of my appearance. Stones, clubs. ANYTHING could be a weapon against me."
"And so you went to the dragons thinking they would be more accommodating to you, but you discovered--" Lovey started.
"That they were just as bad. I learned then that they were the ones who killed my father. They recognized me as his child and beat me around. I was left for DEAD HUNDREDS of times! The only ones who ever ignored me were the lovie dovies, too preoccupied with keeping the peace between all of them."
The Red Sun's right eye began to glow red, followed by his smaller horn channeling magic into his draconic one, leading to him creating a veritable cyclone of fire. Lovey narrowly dodge but still got her whole left arm burnt.
"That's why he wasn't interested in fighting us," Emboreale noted.
Scarlet stomped the ground angrily. "He's killing her!"
"Be patient. I'll intervene when the time is right," Emboreale explained.
"I never gave up, hoping to AT LEAST make one friend, but it was just like with the ponies! Different reactions with the same outcome! No friends and no family! No home and no food! I fled once again, somewhere deep in the dragon lands and found solace. A place that took me in and took care of me."
"A shadow, you would say?" Emboreale interjected.
The Red Sun looked at her and nodded reluctantly.
"I thought so. I thought he was dead.
"He is."
"Then how?"
"Death only kills the body. It doesn't kill the spirit."
"What are you talking about?" Lovey complained.
The Red Sun ignored her and faced the serpent.
"I'm afraid I'll have to get rid of you," she sighed. "It's not something I want to do."
"Why? Because I'm engulfed in shadows?"
"Mainly," she answered dryly.
"Ssssstupid dragons! Darkness is not the epitome of evil nor is light the representative of absolute good. With just enough darkness you can hide and stay safe in its embrace, but if there's too"much light, you become blinded and cannot see!"
"Very poetic," Lovey noted.
The Red Sun turned to face and her and pointed towards her. "And you! Why do you stay with them?"
"What do you mean?"
"You could come with me!"
"And why would I do that?" Lovey asked with a raised brow.
"Because we've lived through the same things."
"Elaborate."
The Red Sun's angry voiced became a little softer. "I saw you when you went to the dragon lands on your own, and I've been watching you the whole time through the darkness. We were both torn from our homes and forced to live lives that we despise. We are in bodies that aren't ours, and have people who patronize us and mock us every day! Even if they've 'helped you' in some manner, that will just lead back to them trying to get rid of you or change you against your will." He extended a hoof and smiled. "We could be friends and live our own lives. I could even find a way to get you back to your old life eventually."
Lovey looked at him and then the sky where pegasi and dragons exchanged fire and blade and she herself bared her teeth.
"No."
The Red Sun became saddened, a sad frown gradually forming as the realization of Lovey's words hit hard. "Wh-why?!" he asked. "We lived through the same things!"
"No we aren't. Don't do the 'We're the same, you and I,' speech unless you're absolutely certain of your statements."
"But--"
"I'm learning to live with this body, and I'll eventually be able to go back to my home, but in the mean time, I'm staying with the weirdos. It's still a dragon's body regardless of its sex and appearance." She crossed her arms, and tapped her claws. "I'll still hate them for forcing me to do this, but I'm adapting to the situation. I'll endure the name they gave me, for what it's worth," Lovey grumbled. She looked to the hybrid. "But, from what I heard, you had someone to take care of you despite all of your problems." She shrugged. "Likely one who loved you considering how adamant you are at destroying everything. Why didn't you just live with them if you wanted a friend or something? You could've ignored us all and let us kill each other."
"It doesn't change what they did!" he yelled. "Then maybe YOU can tell me what I am. I'm neither a pony nor a dragon as both rejected me, but I have the appearance and genes of both. Tell me then. WHAT AMI?!"
Lovey opened her mouth to answer, but found nothing.
Red Sun spat at her silence. "I thought so," he spoke with disdain. "They'll suffer for it. They brought this on themselves anyways. All I wanted was to live with my mother and live in this world comfortably. I didn't even need to destroy anything!" His anger subsided and he recovered himself. "I just have to watch," he chuckled softly.
Oliver's entire dragon body became engulfed in darkness that spread across the battlefield like a fog. During this time, Celestia's chariot arrived above the wall, the mare witnessing the ash-filled fields below. She noticed a single object burst out through the smog and rush towards the horizon where a few mountains were. Ignoring the minor inconvenience, she spread her wings open and spoke with the Royal Canterlot voice.
"Enough of this fight! There has been no reason to start this apart from the incitement by scared ponies and dragons!"
The ponies and dragons ignored Celestia and continued on their merry way, emphasizing how this had become a war, albeit one of attrition.
"Hey look, it's that colorful horse-thing from the meeting when I first got here," Lovey pointed out.
Scarlet rolled her eyes. "That's Princess Celestia of the ponies."
Emboreale scratched her chin. "Does she speak for the king and queen?"
"No. The ponies are ruled by princesses."
"Wait...I'm confused."
"We all are," Scarlet sighed. "She's one of their rulers is all you really need to know."
"That means I can have a discussion with her and try to sort this whole thing out."
Scarlet watched the serpent fly upwards towards the white alicorn while Lovey walked towards the red giant. The mare was reluctant at first, but Emboreale explained the situation to her, prompting her to dismiss the guards.
"I see. I also didn't believe any of your dragon species still existed. I must admit, you still look as spectacular as the murals and paintings depicted."
"I can also see you took some color lessons from us," Emboreale joked.
"So what should we do? They're still fighting," Lovey said.
"Well," Scarlet started. "We had some of our faster fliers going around to try and find the current dragon em--"
"THEY WHAT?!" a booming voice exploded through the lands.
It was strong enough that it blew everyone back a few centimeters from the wind. Loud flapping noises started out very quiet in the distance, but they became louder the more a figure closed the gap between it and the battlefield.
"Oh..."Scarlet stammered. "T-that's the ex-emperor of dragons."
"And?" Lovey brushed the fear off.
"He's not exactly 'calm' and 'collected'."
Lovey's doubtful turned to curiosity as she watched the massive dragon slam violently into the ground. While he yelled at the dragons, he would pluck them up and throw them off into the distance to vanish.
"I DIDN'T SAY ANY OF YOU COULD DECLARE WAR ON THE PONIES! WHAT ARE YOU EVEN DOING HERE?!" He looked around and noticed Scarlet and Lovey. "AND WHAT ARE THE LOVIE DOVIES DOING HERE?!"
"Calm your tits, you giant potato!" Lovey bellowed.
The titan leaned over towards the two dragons and narrowed his gaze. "ARE YOU THE ONE WHO SAID THAT, RED DRAGON?!"
"FOR THE LOVE OF EVERY GOD, STOP YELLING!" Lovey shrieked. She walked out from behind Scarlet's legs with her hands against her head. "How can YOU even think what with you being so damn loud?!"
"I--"
The ex-emperor felt a slap on his back and turned to see the Pueric Mother wagging her fingers at him in her way of saying 'hi'.
"O-oh. It's you..." he looked away.
"Why yes, it's me. I thought you would miss me more than that," she pouted.
"I didn't...How did you sneak up on me?"
The Pueric mother sprinkled sparkling dust whilst moving her hands to the side. "Magic."
The ex-emperor facepalmed and looked around. "Where is my daughter? Where is Ember?" he asked.
"At our gardens," the Pueric Mother asked.
"What in the world is she doing there?!"
"Giving a good thrashing to the ones who attacked us as part of a declaration of war."
The ex-emperor laughed wholly. "That's my daughter."
Lovey leaned towards Scarlet. "What are they talking about? What's going on?"
"I have no idea, but I say it's for the best. I just want to go back to our home and sleep."
"That reminds me," Emboreale said. She slowly descended next to the two dragons. "Lovey and I need to have a talk with the lovies as soon as possible concerning an important bit of information about her."
The tiny dragoness clenched her fists and bared her teeth. "Don't call me Lovey," Oliver growled quietly.
"Really now?" Scarlet wondered.
"We should first have a discussion concerning this whole...event, and see what we can do now that the Red Sun is out in the open," the Pueric Mother explained.
In a cave system deep in the ground, the Ashen One stomped around the damp floors, throwing droplets of water everywhere. Mushrooms and moss would glow light blue and deep purple with every tremor they felt, but their luminosity paled in comparison to torches adorning the walls. These sculpted receptacles of stone lit up with intense purple flames, illuminating the whole tunnel system.
The cross-breed slid down a natural slide, landing in what was his first true home after his...'removal'. He took a dented metal pan taking in the drips of water from the ceiling and rank some of its contents, relishing the flavor. He walked up to a destroyed statue thrice his height depicting what should be a sitting dragon, but a large chunk of its upper torso had been lopped off diagonally. All that remain of the upper torso was the left shoulder.
"What should I do?" the crossbreed asked it. "I tried being cautious and sneaky, but I still got caught."
"But you still nurtured the seeds of doubt and hate growing everyone," a male voice said from the caves. "Yes, but I was caught, and the lovie dovies ruined everything."
"I did say that you should have either left them alone or found a way to kill them all at once," the voice stated in condescending tones. "I told you they were more interested in dragon-dragon relations, not dragon-pony. Even if the princesses were going to them for discussions, it was only to talk with the new empress."
"But I--"
A large, transparent hand made of black shadows formed in front of the statue and pet the crossbreed's head. "This was a learning experience. If I were to chastise you for every error you made, you would be too afraid to do anything and become too incompetent and fearful to pursue your dreams." The voice became a bit more serious. "I'll only get mad if you repeat the mistakes."
Red Sun nodded. "I understand."
"Don't forget that you have no obligation to do this. I can keep you safe until you feel you have grown sufficiently in physical, magical, and mental ability."
The cross-breed tried to say something but held himself back.
"What is it?" the voice asked.
"I think that I need more training before I can be properly competent enough for all of this."
"Then let us play a few strategy games, then. Teach you a few more complicated maneuvers by using other people this time. Then you may dine. It has been a long and grueling day, I can imagine."
The cross-breed put a clawed hoof to his back and bent it, creating cracking noises. "Yeah. I met a rather...gruesome dragoness with weird fighting techniques."
"Do tell. I might find it to be 'cool'."