Dancing to the side, to avoid a fireball flashing past close enough to let me smell the superheated air.
Flinging my chakram and a dozen illusionary copies on different trajectories back at Sunset, I teleported a couple of meters to the left, avoiding a spear of fire cutting a shallow trench in the dirt of the training ground.
The moment I appeared, I ran in two directions at once, my illusion going left as I ran around her to the right.
For a second Sunset were busy blocking the chakram and the illusions.
She learned quickly that unless you are a hundred percent sure which is real, you block them all. Or better yet, not be there.
Sunset collapsed all illusions in the area in a large burst of magic, same like Twilight did. Triggering another teleport before she could follow up on the dispel, I folded a invisibility spell over myself as two copies of myself cast different spells towards her.
Force and Ice. Blocking one would make blocking the other difficult. To block both, you needed a powerful spell that blocked both physical and energy spells.
Snagging the chakram from the ground with my magic, I flung it towards her, so it would arrive the second her shield dropped.
But she wasn’t there, she teleported across the field as far away from as she were standing the second the shield dropped, scanning the training ground.
Which was the exact reason to why I had been running there.
The moment she appeared I jumped, tackling her out of invisibility.
Going rolling across the ground, we kicked up dust of cloud and snow as she tried to kick me, her horn lighting up in a shockwave spell to throw me away.
Twisting around, I rolled off her, avoiding the energy blast before I jumped her again, pushing her down against the dirt covered training ground, “Give?”
Sunset panted and collapsed back against the frozen ground, nodding as she tried to regain her breath, “T-that was cheating.”
“S-so wasn’t,” I countered and relaxed against her trying to get my breath back, “Didn’t say any rules.”
“We were using magic!” she complained and raised her head to look up at me, “So there is no way earth pony strength was fair!”
“Oh? I could have just as easily have blasted you,” I said with a grin down at her, “Go to stop being predictable, Sunny. I knew where you would end up before you threw that shield up.”
She glared up at me, “Nobody else would! We have been practicing together for years.”
“True enough,” I admitted stretched my wings, moving to lay next to her instead, “But we’ll need more than to get to Sunshine.”
“You’re not dragging me into that!” Sunny complained, “You’re going to get your tail kicked!” as she rolled over onto her stomach and leaned against my side as she tried to brush the worst of the dust of herself, “Let’s face it, she has experience.”
“Pretty much all the Experience, which is why I want you by my side for this,” I agreed as I brushed some dust of her back with my wing, “Going to need you for this one, Sunny.”
Sunset groaned and shifted to lean against my side, “…That’s so not fair.”
“To bad,” I told her, giving her a hug with my wing with a grin, “As best friend, you automatically get ‘Volunteered’.”
She sighed and shook her head before she groaned and relaxed again, “Just so you know, you’ll owe me all the spa visits. All of them.”
Frowning slightly, I eyed her, “…Don’t I already do that? I keep getting bills from spa facilities, but I don’t think I ever been to one.”
“Well, there is that,” she admitted with a smile, “Okay, fine. I’ll help you. But I’m not getting involved in that entire bet thing.”
“Oh yeah, that,” I grumbled and sighed, “I really don’t want to lose this one, I’m kind of afraid where that one will end up, especially after what I told her.”
Sunset turned to look at me with a frown, “What?”
“…I may have accidentally threatened that if she loses she is going to be my maid for a day. Uniform and all.”
Sunset made a small choking out before she laughed and rolled onto her back, “You are so bucked!”
“…Don’t need to enjoy it that much,” I grumbled and glared down at her a bit before I poked at the ground with my hoof, “So yeah. Kinda don’t want to lose this one.”
She stuck her tongue out at me, “You know that to even have a chance, we are going to need to cheat hard.”
“Oh yeah,” I agreed, “We’re going to need to be the cheatiest cheaters that ever cheated to even get close. But I planned on that no matter what. Going up the Solar Guard in a straight up fight would be stupid, that’s where they are the best.”
Sunset nodded and rolled onto her hooves, floating her scarf over to wrap around herself against the cold. The wind were picking up a bit, “When’s the meeting?”
“This afternoon I scheduled a meeting with Commander Bright Glow,” I said and got up, stretching, “I’ll announce it to the Legion then and then we’ll start preparations. I want you there for that if you can.”
She nodded, “Awesome, I’ll have time to get warm and clean again,” she said and picked up her bag with a smile, “Hey, guess what?”
“I’m about to get another bill from a spa?” I suggested with a smile, “Have fun.”
“Will do!” she agreed happily before she paused and glanced back at me, “…Why don’t you come along?”
“I’m not sure it’s my kind of thing.”
“What? Relaxing in a hot bath after a massage and having heated up in a sauna after coming in from the cold isn’t your kind of thing?” she teased, “It’s not all girly mudbaths and hoof-filings you know.”
That… that actually did sound rather nice right now.
“…Okay. I suppose I should have a look at what I have been paying for,” I said and picked my satchel up.
Might have as good or better resistance to cold as a Pegasus but going somewhere warm right now sounded really, really nice.
“Prepare to have your mind blown, wing-boy. Celestia know you need to learn to relax sometime.”