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// Pure Titanite 
// Story: Sunset Shimmer - The Princess of Lordran 
// by ratedoni 
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As the sounds of hammer and steel clashing against each other echoed upstairs, there was but one road that Sunset could take, at least in her mind. After all, she had made a promise to a dying man, a desperate gamble in a lost and forsaken place, one that looked less forgotten as time went on. Sunset knew that this land was devoid of most hope, but still, at every turn she met more people like her. Sure, they haven’t trapped in Lordran like her, but they all had their promise or mission to accomplish and they all refused to fall into despair.

It’s a dark world, but one filled with secrets, powers and history that truly called for her in a way that Sunset haven’t felt in a long time. Maybe the last time had been when she set foot on the human world.

The technology humans had created vastly outpaced anything ponies had ever created, with monuments, constructions and discoveries that made ponies look like barbarians that had barely discovered fire. It was that same feeling of things undiscovered, of secrets yet to find that also pushed Sunset this time, but she knew that it was just something to distract herself from the fact that once again, she had left behind her world.

For the second time, she had been pushed from the place she had been living. It may not had been as glamorous as the Canterlot Palace, but it was hers, and in just a blink, she had lost everything, all due to her pride and jealousy. She had the chance to start all over, but she couldn’t let things be, so she pushed too far and once more had been found guilty, this time by harmony itself.

It hurt. It still hurt in her heart, like a knife that had plunged in her darkened heart, but she knew that the elements were still working on her. Why else would she have promised to complete Oscar’s pilgrimage?

Whatever the case may be, traveling through Lordran was the only way in which she would be able to find a way back, if not to Equestria, at least to Canterlot. But what would she do when she arrived there? Ask for forgiveness? Plan some revenge? She didn’t know. She was just tired of all that planning for revenge or the idea of becoming an alicorn. Everything seemed so childish now. Guess that happens when you are fighting constantly for your life.

So it was with those feelings in her heart that Sunset, accompanied by both Madeleine and Solaire, walked downwards across the hall, into the new road open to them from Andre’s working station and found themselves in a new place, an underground hall with broken pillars and only one resident. A creature that looked as if it had been carved out of a stone was guarding the hall and the door at the end of it. It had no head and one leg was missing and Sunset wasn’t sure how such a creature could exist.

“So that thing is a demon?”

“They come in many different forms, but I think this is a Titanite Demon, made of that stuff.” But as they talked, the demon, even without a head, knew that new enemies had arrived at its home and from its pole, a light began to emanate, quickly becoming a bolt of lightning that traveled across the sky. With a yelp, Sunset had to throw herself to the side. As she rolled away from the danger, her body felt the energy moving through the air, the static traveling through her body even though she wasn’t touched.

“Why didn’t you tell me they could use magic?!”

“Because I didn’t know!” Then, the demon clearly prepared his next attack. With a movement that caught everyone by surprise, the headless creature vaulted into the air while aiming his pole to the place Madeleine was. Fortunately, the knight quickly ran and slid underneath the attack as the pole crashed on the ground and got stuck on the rock. “Well, didn’t we come here to let you practice?” Madeleine’s smile was all Sunset needed to understand what was the purpose of the fight and with a glare to her companion Sunset quickly got herself out of the range of the demon.

As she did this, Solaire, who was the one who didn’t have his weapons being repaired, took the position as the front line, quickly gaining the attention of the demon. How the creature could follow their movements was a question for later, but for now their attention was completely on the monster attacking them, crawling across the floor, waving his pole around as both Solaire and Madeleine fought the creature.

Using only her shield, Madeleine began moving it around herself, shifting the weight of her body to let the pole slide over her powerful shield as Solaire struck quickly against the demon’s side, but instead of blood, the sword only made pieces of metal fly around, signaling how different the creature was to anything living on Lordran, how alien and corrupted the power that created them truly was.

As they kept on taking the creature’s attention, Sunset once again tried to concentrate on the power she felt before on the roof of the cathedral. For someone that never felt magic, it would take a long time to understand that kind of power that could grow inside the body, but for a unicorn, it was second nature. There was just one problem. When she was a unicorn, she already had a tool to focus the power and release it. A unicorn’s horn was a true miracle in itself, a tool that had evolved with years of usage and refinement, until all unicorns were able to use magic. But now she had to figure out how to find that energy as a human being.

When she created that fireball against the gargoyles, she had been working on instinct and adrenaline. Now, she tried to conjure the magic that apparently was inside of her, but she needed more because right now she was searching in the dark. Darkness… that was it! What did Madeleine had said when she explained magic? That it was a flame inside oneself, so that was the route, to feel the flame that was inside of her, like the witches, because everything was light, fire.

Sunset had always been proud of how close her magic was to fire, because fire was close to the sun. In the end it was just something she told herself to make herself be more important than she really was, but what if she hadn’t been mistaken back then? Or at least looking at it in a much more positive way, what it meant was that she had a higher affinity with flame than normal, something that was completely destructive in Equestria, but in Lordran? It was basically the thing that started it all.

In this world, fire was everything. It was what initiated the age. It was the Age of fire after all, although more like Age of Cinders currently, but if she was right, then the flame was already inside of her, ready to burst into the light, ready to turn her enemies into ashes! And like that, she felt the power of fire grow in her hands, turn from embers into a flame, making her hair fly backwards as if it were another fire that had been ignited. Opening her eyes she smirked at the fire that was dancing on her hands and as if she were a pitcher, she took aim and let the flame fly, catching the demon in the back, sending pieces of his body everywhere. As the body wriggled in pain, Solaire took aim and hit the demon right in the chest and like that, the demon stopped, as if a puppet had had his strings cut down.

The trio of warriors stood a second watching the mighty creature become nothing but a statue, immobile once more, as if it were a statue that had been left unfinished and then, they heard it, a slow, almost mocking clapping coming from the stairs leading to Andre’s smith. It was none other than Oswald who had his same smirk and was clapping at their success.

“Bravo. It was truly a magnificent battle and show of courage.”

“I think that sarcasm was way too thick, even for someone like you priest,” Madeleine fired back, but Sunset was simply ecstatic of finding the power inside of her, magic that she thought she had lost, or at least twisted with her own ambitions and disgrace. Now, she had found it, the fire that lived inside of her. How fitting for a world that had been born out of fire that she had gained that same ability. She just hoped she wouldn’t end like the witches of past.

“What do we have here? A mountain of titanite,” Andre’s face had such a big grin that it was startling to see so much white, his teeth basically gleaming among all the soot and ashes. “These demons are basically moving slabs of titanite… I told you about repairing your stuff. To cinders with that, I’ll make you new armor with all this, just you wait.” Hearing that was nice, but her sight was still on the other door, leading somewhere else and she could hear… a whisper, something calling her, or was that just her imagination?

She was probably just tired after all the fighting. What she needed right now was to rest, maybe find some information about the next bell, maybe even ask about Madeleine’s own quest and what she was looking for.

Unbeknown by Sunset Shimmer, in a tower deep in the forest, an ember box began to light up among the ashes. The trees and vines casted a shadow, but the wings of an almost ethereal butterfly dwarfed the ancient trees as it began to basically vibrate, feeling the awakened magic in the forest. Without any orders, without any master, the butterfly kept on guarding the forest, without knowing the power that it was guarding.

Close to them, a woman wearing a deep red armor with her mouth hidden by a piece of armor that looked like a demon’s mouth watched the forest, waiting for her next customer. She could wait. After all, she knew her sister was close and with her, the woman that could mean the end or revival of the kingdom.