The few days following the letters were rather uneventful for Sweetie Belle, which was not a bad thing. Outside of her now daily routine consisting of training and passing good times with her friends, nothing really special happened, not even in the castle. The only interesting thing that happened had been when Mirror Kirby came to warn her that someone had stolen the Great Mirror. She had spread the message to everyone else, but so far, they hadn't found it or the thief. Sweetie suspected the Squeak Squad, but good luck to find those rodents.
The day she gets her hooves on them, they will have a bad time.
She also learned that Dedede put the cursed chest in the royal treasury among all the other treasures. She couldn't help but facehoof at that. What if the Squeak Squad comes to steal the treasures, and takes the chest, thinking that it contains something of value? But after that, Sweetie Belle had gotten an idea. Now, if the Squeak Squad tried to steal anything in the treasury, especially the cursed chest, they will have an explosive surprise. She sneakily laughed thinking about that.
Gosh, Dedede was really rubbing off on her. She should stop listening to him forming plans to defeat Kirby.
She didn't tell anyone about Discord. The Draconeequus was clear that he will do nothing to interfere with her new life and her new friends, and will only do something if she was about to get killed, and they would probably be weirded out knowing that they were watched by this unpredictable being. With that, Discord only talked to her when she was alone. At least, when they talked together, they had really animated discussions. He really loved having somepony talking to him (almost) at his level.
Right now, she was strolling around Dream Land, taking some cool fresh air. The stroll was also an excuse to train her shield-claws, climbing trees to sit on their branches and take the view, or even have a quick nap. It was as she was sitting on a branch that she saw Kirby coming, apparently strolling around too.
When the puffball was walking beside the tree where she was, she raised her hoof and shouted, "Hey! Kirby!" Hearing her, Kirby looked around, trying to spot her. She laughed. "Up there!"
He looked up and finally saw her. He smiled and wave his arm. "Hii!"
"Hello! Taking a stroll too?"
He nodded. "Poyo!"
She jumped from the branch and landed beside him. "Can I come with you? I won't mind some company."
He nodded again.
"Thank you." As they started walking together, she continued talking. "You know? I have been able to find a way to contact my family and my friends in my homeworld."
"Poyo?"
"Yes. It was so nice to talk to them, even if it was just by letters. I told them everything I could think of, and in return, they told me what happened in Equestria."
Kirby bounced in joy at hearing that. His friend had contacted her homeworld! He was so happy for her! To congratulate her, he hugged her.
She hugged him in return. "Thank you Kirby. It has been important to me. I really miss them."
Kirby rubbed her back at that, before letting her go with a big smile. Sweetie Belle returned his smile before she spotted something weird in the sky behind him. Focusing on it, she could see that the clouds looked... different. They looked like they had been painted.
"Kirby? Is it normal?"
"Poyo?" He turned around and looked at the clouds. Seeing their state, he raised an eyebrow in confusion. "Poyo?"
As they watched, they saw that more clouds were suddenly taking various colors. Not only them, but the sky above them was changing color too, with some red, purple, yellow, or orange adding to the blue, all the colors swirling around in a chaotic pattern that Discord was probably finding of his tastes. Whatever phenomenon was causing this, it was spreading rapidly, and soon, they could see the earth, the trees, the rocks, and everything else starting to change color too. The whole landscape was becoming like a giant painting made by some painter of one of those artistic movements that liked to put colors everywhere to 'exprime their feelings' or whatever.
Sweetie Belle frowned. "That's new."
"HEEEHEHEHEHEHE!!!"
A sudden, very high-pitched laugh was heard coming from the sky. Both Sweetie and Kirby looked up and spotted some being flying, a paintbrush floating beside them. With one swing of the paintbrush, and another high-pitched laugh, the landscape around the two of them underwent the same transformation than they saw previously, turning into a mess of colors. From where they were, they could already see that the being was a female in some purple robe with a purple witch hat.
"Bad guy spotted," Sweetie Belle said. She started to charge a beam while huffing. "She seems to have fun, but turning the landscape into Colorland is a little too much. Sorry for her, but her fun must stop."
"Poyo."
She looked at the color witch, took her time to aim, and just when the witch stopped to swing her paintbrush again, she shot her charged beam at her. The beam took the witch by surprise and hit her from below, the force throwing her a few meters up. The witch quickly recovered and spotted them.
Both Sweetie and Kirby prepared themselves for a fight, thinking that the witch will come at them, but to their surprise, the witch flew away.
"Hey! Come back here!" Sweetie Belle shouted at the witch, in vain. She turned toward Kirby. "Quick, Kirby! Jump on me!"
"Poyo!"
Kirby did as she asked, and once he was on her back, Sweetie created a shield-platform and jumped on it. With the platform, they chased the witch in the sky. The chase didn't last long, because they saw the witch disappear in a rainbow-framed swirling canvas. Sweetie looked toward Kirby, both of them gulped, and they flew through the portal.
The portal led them... they were not sure where exactly. It seemed to be a painted land that looked like Dream Land, with hills and small mountains everywhere. Green was clearly the main color of this place.
They looked around in wonder. "Do you recognize this place Kirby?"
Kirby shook his head.
They quickly spotted the witch not far, still flying away. Not wanting to let her escape, Sweetie enveloped both her and Kirby in a round shield and charged at the witch at great speed. The witch only saw them coming at the last second when she looked above her shoulder, and was not able to avoid being rammed from the back. Sweetie didn't stop her charge, and the three of them crashed in the green land below, leaving a small crater with them at the center, Sweetie standing beside the witch as she started to fly again, this time facing them.
With the witch this close, Sweetie had no problem seeing her in more details. She couldn't see her face, the witch hiding it behind some pink cloth, letting only her yellow eyes visible. She had long blue-gray hair, and what seemed to be a purple body that she could barely spot under the robe. She could also spot a yellow thing under the robe, but she was not sure what it was. Her robe, while purple, possessed blue and yellow parts at the bottom, and white and yellow zigzag patterns at the center, where it opened to show a small part of her body. There was also a pink fabric at the base of her hat, and golden shoulder pads at both sides of the pink cloth covering her face.
"Alright, witch!" Sweetie Belle shouted. "Bring Dream Land back to normal, and we will let you go. If you refuse..." She took her whip. "then we will force you!"
"HEEHEHEHEHEHE!!!"
"That's not funny! We are serious!"
"Poyo!"
The witch suddenly showed her underside, where the yellow body part moved, revealing it to be some mouth, while the body itself seemed round. The mouth opened and shot some purple energy ball toward them. They easily dodged the ball with a jump, and Sweetie counterattacked by shooting a beam, hitting the witch in the face. It clearly hurt the witch, but despite that, she continued laughing.
"Will you stop laughing?!"
"HEEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!"
A framed canvas appeared beside the witch, and with the paintbrush, she painted a bomb with a parachute. The next instant, half a dozen of these bombs appeared above Sweetie and Kirby. Taking the occasion, Kirby inhaled some of the bombs before spitting them at the witch while Sweetie destroyed the remaining bombs. The spit bombs stunned the witch, and Sweetie Belle took the occasion to attack her with her whip multiple times before finishing with a charged beam that greatly hurt the witch.
"HEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!"
"Shut up!"
"HEEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!"
Taking the paintbrush again, the witch charged toward them. Then, with a swing of the paintbrush, she splashed colors on them, forcing them to close their eyes. A second swing of the paintbrush, this time directly on their bodies, caused a weird feeling to Sweetie Belle. When she was able to rub off the paint and open her eyes, she looked at her body, but saw that nothing seemed to have happened. She then looked at Kirby and gasped.
Kirby had lost his limbs, turning him into a simple pink ball with a face!
"Poyo?" Kirby tried to move, but it only caused him to roll a little, ending with his face upside down. "Poyo..."
"HEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!"
Sweetie looked back at the witch, anger filling her. "Turn Kirby back to normal!"
"HEEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!"
"And stop laughing!"
Sweetie Belle decided to attack again, and shot another beam at her. But strangely, no beams were shot from her horn. Confused, under the witch's laughter, she tried again, with the same result. Annoyed, she put a hoof on her horn to see what the problem was, only for the hoof to touch nothing.
...
...
...
"YOU TOOK MY HORN?!!"
"HEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!!!"
At this instant, the witch flew away.
"HEY!!" Seeing that the witch was not stopping, Sweetie Belle looked at the Kirby ball.
"Poyo?"
"Sorry Kirby." She took him, tossed him up, jumped after him, and kicked him violently. Kirby found himself flying toward the witch very rapidly.
"POYOOOOO!!!"
"HE?!"
The witch heard him and looked above her shoulder only to be hit in the face by Kirby. Unbeknown to her, Kirby bounced from her face and hit the paintbrush, knocking it away. The witch however quickly recovered from the hit and rammed Kirby with her body, sending him back beside Sweetie Belle before flying away, laughing again.
"COME BACK HERE!"
But it was no use. Before long, the witch was just a speck in the horizon. Defeated, Sweetie Belle sighed and sat beside Kirby, both of them looking down. That witch! Taking away her horn and Kirby's limbs!
She looked at Kirby in determination. "Don't worry Kirby, I don't have my magic anymore, but I can still fight. I will go after her, and force her to bring everything back to normal, including us."
Kirby nodded, before sighing. "Poyo..."
She rubbed him. "Sorry Kirby, seems like you will not be able to do much this time..."
Before Kirby could nod in understanding, he spotted the witch's paintbrush not far. Rolling, he approached it, and turned toward Sweetie Belle. "Poyo!"
Sweetie Belle joined him and looked at the paintbrush. "You think we could use it?"
He nodded, and Sweetie touched the paintbrush to see if it did anything. Just after touching it, the paintbrush started to float before coming beside Sweetie Belle, floating at her left. She then felt in her mind a connection appearing.
"Uh?"
Testing this new connection, she was able to swing the paintbrush with just a thought, creating by the same occasion a rainbow colored line in the air. The line disappeared a few seconds later. She looked at the paintbrush, then at Kirby, and painted another line, starting from the floor before making a slope going up, and walked on it. To her surprise, she started sliding in the same direction she had painted the line, making her go up, until reaching the end where she fell back to the ground. Once on the floor, she saw that Kirby had been able to follow her on the line. At that, she smiled.
"Maybe you will not be forced to remain on my back, finally."
"Poyo!" Kirby shouted in joy.
She looked at the paintbrush. "Thanks to this paintbrush, it will be easy to chase this witch, even without my magic!"
At this moment, the paintbrush floated away and started to paint something in the air.
"Poyo?"
"I don't know Kirby, I'm not the one making it move this time!"
The paintbrush finished painting, revealing to have actually written with rainbow colored lines DRAWCIA.
"Drawcia?" Sweetie Belle tilted her head. "Is it the witch's name?"
The paintbrush bounced up and down in the air, as if to nod.
"Wait... You are alive?"
It bounced up and down again.
"Nice... to meet you... You are going to help us?"
It nodded again.
"But isn't Drawcia your mistress?"
This time, it went left and right, saying "No."
"Oh. You were forced by her?"
It nodded.
"Well then, nice to have you in the team."
At that, the paintbrush returned at Sweetie's left. Sweetie then looked at Kirby, and they smiled at each other before walking/rolling in the direction where Drawcia had flown away.