"Bwahahahahahaha! Did you see that?! She smacked that giant octopus like it was nothing without even looking at it! I would have SO loved seeing its reaction to that!" shouts Rainbow Dash as she bends in laughter, not caring about Twilight correcting her about the 'octopus' being actually a squid.
"I know right!" replies Pinkie. "It was all 'MWA HA HA! I'm stronger than you!" and then SLAP! 'Go in your room and let the adults talk!'"
"Yeah! I would love to see her do that to Tirek!" says Scootaloo.
"Oh Celestia! His face if it were to happen!" shouts Rainbow as she falls off her chair from the laughter.
"I can't believe that this filly is now strong enough to slap something so big and knock it just with that," says Applejack in disbelief.
"Her slap was boosted by her soul energy," informs Discord. "She's not that physically strong."
"But that's still impressive," says Starlight. "When you can knock out a squid this size with just one slap, almost nothing can resist you."
"And I think we haven't seen the end of her progress yet," says the draconequus.
Everypony shudders at this. That filly could probably fight a hydra by now, so to think that she can still become stronger...
Blue Sky Palace. That's the next world. And as its name indicates, it's a sky world full of clouds with a big palace surrounded by smaller ones, floating planetoid-like rocks, and other structures. Upon entering it, it's not hard for the heroes to guess that the big palace is where they have the highest chance to find the guardian of this world, so with the help of Elline and her rainbow rope, they slide in the sky between the clouds and many enemies, either flying, walking on the clouds, or hanging from balloons, toward it, while still doing some exploration just in case. They're often helped by strong updrafts, easing their ascension toward the top of the palace which is very high, and nothing slows it, not even a brief encounter with a Hand on some structure.
Frankly, why do they even still try?
Then, explosive bullets suddenly comes from behind, the bullets bursting into flames when impacting with something. One of the bullets manage to hit, and badly burn Sweetie Belle while the others are barely missed, but this causes the rainbow ropes on which they are to be destroyed, and everyone quickly flies/jump to the nearest clouds to recover and look at where the bullets came from.
Approaching from behind is a colossal pink and purple bell-shaped flying battleship with a neck and a head wearing, of all things, a blue beret. An actual living battleship with a total of seventeen cannons, one big at the head to make a mouth, and sixteen at the body's sides by rows of four.
When seeing the battleship, Elline gasps, but before she can say anything, it fires from its mouth cannon a barrage of bullets at them, and the heroes quickly go out of the way toward whatever can be used as platform, Sweetie Belle grabbing the fairy with her magic before she's hit by one of the bullets.
"Claycia sent a battleship? We must be scaring her," comments Sweetie Belle.
"That's Bastron!" shouts Elline. "But... But... We designed it to be for pleasure cruise!"
"Well, seems like Claycia did some redesign just for us," replies Bandana.
The ship fires another barrage, and as the heroes do their best to avoid it again, Sweetie Belle shouts "I will destroy it!" before she flies toward it on a shield.
"Poyo!" screams Kirby after.
"She's crazy! How can she expect to face this battleship?!" shouts Elline in fear.
Bandana sighs. "With lasers, more lasers, and bigger lasers."
"But... It's a battleship!"
"Yeah, but believe it or not, this is not Sweetie's first battleship. The Halberd was much bigger, better armed, and protected by a strong crew. Compared to it, this battleship is a joke. Well, she didn't face directly the Halberd, she destroyed it from inside helped by Kirby, but after that, and with how powerful she has become since, she has no reason to be scared." The Waddle Dee then looks in determination toward his friend now circling the head of the ship while firing a barrage of attacks, mainly lasers, at it. He gulps and says "But it would be nice to, somehow, help her!"
"Poyo!" agrees Kirby.
"I know how! Wait here!"
Elline quickly leaves the two and flies to Sweetie Belle. The filly charges a big laser beam and fires it, destroying one of Bastron's cannons at its sides, before dropping to avoid the following rain of bullets that Bastron sends at her in retaliation. The ships tries to ram her, and the filly surrounds herself in a shield before she charges at the ship while spinning, doing a bigger version of the Fire ability's comet attack. She succeeds in damaging Bastron's hull, but her shield gets destroyed, and Sweetie Belle is projected as a result. But she quickly recovers with an air-jump, then uses a shield to rapidly ascend to avoid another barrage.
She is then joined by Elline. "Sweetie Belle!"
"Watch out!"
Sweetie Belle jumps at her just in time for the both of them to avoid more bullets. The filly quickly puts the fairy on her back before she starts circling the ship again while firing back. "Rest on my back!"
"I can't! I have to return to Kirby and Bandana Dee! But I need your easel!"
"I see. Wait a moment."
Sweetie Belle materializes a shield, then gives it the form of a giant fist that she uses to punch the ship on the face. Creating such a big fist drain her quite a big, but at least, this destabilizes the ship enough for her to quickly return to Kirby and Bandana. There, she invokes an easel, and Elline rapidly starts painting something on it while she returns fighting the ship just in time to avoid it firing at her friends with another Giant Fiery Comet at the neck, followed by a Giga Shield Uppercut at the chin and an Explosive Balls Rain at its side, only to be rammed again by the ship.
And Bastron is then rammed on the head by two rockets, which are none other than Kirby and Bandana turned into rockets by Elline. The two then start flying around the ship, avoiding its bullets while ramming it again and again. Taking this, Sweetie Belle surrounds her horn with her ten cannons like she did in her fight against Sectonia, charging her (for now) ultimate attack that she calls Ultimate Doom Laser, and sweeps the surface of the Bastron with it, badly damaging its hull and destroying many cannons. Meanwhile, both Kirby and Bandana manage to destroy Bastron's right eye.
Another Ultimate Doom Laser destroys the remaining cannons as well as some important part causing the ship to start to drop. The heroes stop attacking it and simply look as Bastron eventually disappears among the clouds below, ramming one of the smaller sky palaces in its fall, causing more damage. Since this world doesn't have any ground, one can wonder where this ship will fall.
They land on a structure where Elline gives Kirby and Bandana their normal appearance while Sweetie Belle recovers her breath. Firing two Ultimate Doom Lasers one after another is definitely not something she will do everyday.
"That was AWESOME Sweetie Belle!" suddenly shouts Elline. "You were able to fight Bastron all by yourself! But this was so scary! I thought that you would be killed! But you were all voush and voush and VLAM and it could barely hit you and you were firing hundreds of lasers and bombs and that big fireball-thingy was amazing and-"
"And you were awesome too," Sweetie cuts her friend with a giggle. "Good idea turning Kirby and Bandana into rockets to attack it." She turns to her aforementioned friends. "Thanks to you, I could fire my most powerful laser and almost destroy it. Thank you."
"Poyo!"
"Yeah, that was nothing. Battleships don't scare us anymore. We could face an armada of Halberds without problems," says proudly Bandana.
Sweetie Belle taps him on the side with a giggle. "Stop it. You're becoming like Rainbow Dash. You know perfectly well that an armada of Halberds would be too much."
"Come on. Knowing you and Kirby, you would find a way to win."
She rolls her eyes without replying.
The party eventually reaches the top of the big sky palace, one of the most beautiful palace Sweetie Belle has ever seen. Upon landing, they look around, and not spotting anything, they start exploring, taking in a few of the various structures forming the palace suspended on pillars. The exploration doesn't last long, as they quickly spot who they guess is the guardian, and recognizing who he is, they can't help but groan.
"Ugh... Again?" almost shouts Bandana.
In front of them is... Clay Whispy Woods, patiently waiting for them to approach to start the fight, seemingly assured of his victory.
"What is he doing here?" asks Sweetie Belle to nobody in particular.
"Poyo," answers Kirby with a shrug.
As they approach the tree, Clay Whispy suddenly becomes metallic... somehow, much to everyone's surprise before Sweetie gives a deadpan look.
"That's it?"
The Clay Whispy's jaw drop.
Bandana looks at her in surprise. "What do you mean 'that's it'? How will we be able to attack him with his metallic trunk?!"
In answer, Sweetie Belle looks at him with a raised eyebrow without saying anything.
"Oh, right, that's no problem for you. But what about us?"
"I'm sure Elline can find a way. Maybe with the Tank transformation? But wait, I know something that will be more fun. Elline?" says Sweetie as she rises a hoof at the fairy with a smirk.
Understanding, Elline takes her paintbrush form as an easel appear beside Sweetie Belle, her smirk growing.
"Let's show this fake how much he's inferior," continues the filly before she starts painting.
The Clay Whispy starts sweating.
Rapidly, Sweetie Belle finishes her painting, then shows the result to him, showing that she has painted Whispy Woods. The painted tree then comes out of the canvas in his full glory, with an expression of superiority.
"Whispy, shows this fake what the real you can do."
At her command, Painted Whispy doubles in size before he smirks at Clay Whispy, his roots menacingly coming out of the floor around him.
Despite this, Clay Whispy drops a few dozens mines, only for Painted Whispy to huff before inhaling all the mines. It's at this moment that Clay Whispy knows he's screwed.
Painted Whispy spits the mines at the other tree, their explosion enough to hurt him despite his metallic body. Without losing time, Painted Whispy jumps and starts spinning in the air with his roots, making him fly. Clay Whispy spawn a few spiked ball in front of him, but Painted Whispy's roots are able to get them out of the way before the tree of clay finds himself continuously slapped in the face by those same roots until Painted Whispy decides to do something else. So Painted Whispy does a few turns until he goes just above Clay Whispy before he stops spinning. Rapidly, he places his roots below him to make them form a spike before he falls on the tree of clay, almost piercing and crushing him, but his metallic body is able to force Painted Whispy to bounce away. The tree of paint then lands just in front of his clay counterpart, raises his roots, and starts using them to do a series of fast jabs on his face, punching again and again without stopping to the point that Clay Whispy's face becomes deformed. Painted Whispy eventually assembles some of his roots and uses them to finish this series of jab with a big uppercut strong enough to send Clay Whispy flying. This causes the rainbow seal to drop from his branches, and Sweetie Belle destroys it.
The filly then shouts at Painted Whispy "Finish him!"
Grinning, Painted Whispy sends his roots at his fallen counterpart and grabs him from the base and the top before he starts pulling in opposite direction with all his strength. More and more roots wrap around Clay Whispy until...
Rrriiiiiip!
The tree is ripped in two. Victorious, Painted Whispy throws the two pieces beyond the edge of the palace before he roars.
Sweetie Belle pats him, saying "Good job. I knew he was nothing to you."
"Poyo poyo poyo!"
"Yeah! You're the best!"
"You were amazing!"
Painted Whispy smiles at them before disappearing.
"Best idea ever!" shouts Bandana. "Watching Whispy destroy that fake was fun!"
"Poyopo!"
Sweetie Belle nods at them in thanks with a giggle. "And it let us rest a little before we continue. After Bastron, I needed that. But really, bringing back that fake Whispy was a terrible idea. What was Claycia thinking?"
They all shrug. "Claycia probably thought that the metallic body would surprise us and work," says Elline.
"Or, if she's possessed, the thing possessing her is an idiot," says Bandana.
"I'LL SHOW THEM IF I AM AN IDIOT!!!"