-The Volcano, Upper Tier, Coliseum, stands, Pom-
I just stared at the devastation and saw the medics carrying away that scary Pegasus, he was strong enough to injure Arizona and he kept getting up despite how many blows Arizona dealt to him.
I’m actually kind of scared of Arizona now to be honest, I wouldn’t want any of my beasties to mess with her even on her worst day ever.
Arizona might be walking away with a few injuries, but everyone clearly saw what happened to the other guy and I know for a fact that she didn’t like him. Also that pegasus had to be clinically insane to keep getting up and attacking Arizona, his wings didn’t look too good after that last attack.
“…Canine queen’ Lambchop, but before that we will be taking a short break.” I turned back to the announcer, had I been announced for a fight? Oh dear.
“Looks like you get to fight Dispel Grace, Pom!” Flamberge shouted to me.
I got spooked and fell onto my back while making wild sheep noises and flailing my legs at the air, it was a second later that I understood what he had said. I had to fight the armored pony with the big glowing sword?!
The same one that wanted to outright destroy Skelly’s soul? Skelly might be a little bit scary at night, but she doesn’t deserve that!
“Do you think they will let me forfeit early if I ask nicely Ollie… Ollie?” I cowered, where was Ollie and Fred? Why are all of my beasties growling happily about my upcoming fight? They really didn’t expect me to put up a fight did they? I really didn’t want to fight or possibly have my soul destroyed, my last few fights had been flukes more than anything else!
Was I hyperventilating? I was hyperventilating! Breath in and out, nope, can’t slow down my breathing. I’m going to die… before the match even started too!
“Would you be wanting some advice Pom?” My ears perked up and I looked to Fortitude. I nodded rapidly at the big yak. “You should fight with honor and pride, you are a strong individual even if you cower quite often. For you are braver than you think!”
“That advice wasn’t very helpful at all!” I shouted at him, then immediately curled up into fetal position.
Fortitude smiled and patted me on the head. Why weren’t my beasties warning him off? Why wasn’t I running out of this stadium screaming my head off like any other intelligent and sane lambkin would actually do in this situation when faced with a deadly opponent like Dispel Grace?! Was I too paralyzed to run for my life? I was…
“I think you’d be pretty good at ‘Fleet Cunning Doe’ style of fighting, it was made by Spruce Lea.” Jumping high up into the air and flailing my hooves away from Velvet, I eventually came down on my face clutching my hooves to my chest feeling like my heart was going to explode. Why is everyone sneaking up on me when they all know I’m easy to freak out?! “Well, it’s more of a philosophy, but I’m sure it’ll help you Pom. Do you want to know about it while you have some time before your match?”
I saw Arizona resting her head on a sleeping Paprika’s back and nodding off, Velvet was looking to me with a friendly smile so I was definitely the one she was talking to. Said Reindeer beat one of her wives into the ground and was really strong.
“I… yes…” I caved in immediately, I needed all the help I can get after that saxophone wielding longma came at me in the squid costume.
It was only luck that I made it this far and I definitely didn’t have any more with the armored knight that took down Jacky.
“Okay, even if your fluff will never be quite as magnificent as mine or Paprika’s, this is what you need to know...” Velvet started off.
-Fifteen minutes later, Pom vs. Dispel-
Dispel’s armor didn’t have a single dent in it from when Jacky hit it with a sledgehammer, he stood proud and tall with his sword planted in the ground in front of him.
Pom, on the other hoof, was a cowering nervous wreck that didn’t look like she wanted to be out there at all. Not when she was against such a dangerous armored opponent with a powerful sharp pointy sword that fired blast of channeled holy energy, she was a small and quite pathetic looking thing next to him.
Pom closed her eyes steeled herself and looked at her opponent, then went right back to cowering a bit. She tried to stay strong in the face of the insurmountable obstacle that was an earth pony with impressive amounts of strength and holy powers, alongside the knowledge how to use both with lethal intent. How else would a pony swing around a sword of that size if they didn’t have the physical might to do so?
The fight was started by the announcer and Dispel swung his sword for Pom.
The lambkin leapt backwards and didn’t approach or even try anything aggressive, it looked more like she was trying to psyche herself up to actually just stay in the arena at his point.
“This will be a poor fight.” Commented Dispel dryly as he pointed the tip of his large blade at Pom. “I would rather fight one of those monsters you call familiars, at least slaying one of them would be worth more of my time than you. That or the strange pole thing that attacked me during the fight with that parrot. Don’t honestly know why the referee didn’t call the match when a monster wandered onto the field.”
“Le…m… sties…lone.” Pom mumbled as she cowered a little less.
“Stop mumbling you yourself and let’s get this farce of a fight over with quickly shall we?” Dispel raised his sword in both his forelegs as he to standing on his hind, he leapt forward and brought it down on Pom’s position.
The sword landed and blasted out a pressure wave. Even when it wasn’t charged with holy energy the blade generated a powerful shockwave just from Dispel’s strength alone.
Instead of taking the blow while cowering. The whimpering Pom dodged the strike well enough that she was only just launched a good ten feet up into the air by the shockwave and right over Dispel’s body, that was just how lightweight Pom’s currently flailing body was.
Pom floated down to the ground and almost landed upright on her hooves, instead she went into a roll to bleed off momentum.
“Did I disintegrate her, is that my victory?” In answer to Dispel’s question, the referee pointed at Pom standing behind him. “Ah, you are quite swift to get behind me, I should take you more seriously!”
Pom sent as nasty a glare as she could manage towards the referee, coming from her it wasn’t very scary or intimidating at all. The referee still looked a bit sheepish about giving away her position and giving her opponent the advantage of knowing she still breathed.
“Can we just pretend to fight or just stop fighting to talk this over, please?” Not listening to Pom or her pleas for a peaceful solution, Dispel charged his blade up with a mass of energy and brought his sword into a horizontal swing sending out a wave of death towards her. “I’m willing to for… EEP!”
Pom leapt above the crescent wave of energy and as it passed below her, she shot higher into the air and her fur started to sparkle a bit.
“Neigh, I say! I will not let you speak or plan a way to defeat me while my guard is down you sneaky lambkin!” Dispel swung the sword upwards launching a second wave of energy for Pom.
Pom waggled her legs as hard as she could, mostly out of desperation and fear and altered her trajectory so the wave of holy energy passed by her.
The energy, for some reason despite not being anywhere close to hitting her directly, sent Pom spiraling away and slightly higher, until she once more found herself rolling on the ground and came to a stop. Her fur started to glitter slightly more afterwards, but she didn’t have time to really think about it as Dispel was already coming at her with thrust of his sword.
Dispel’s thrust went over Pom’s form sending a spear tipped beam of energy out as she squashed herself to the ground and tumbled forward underneath Dispel.
Dispel looked around in confusion and Pom took note of one thing about Dispel that may keep her alive, she carefully crept out from under him. The referee thankfully didn’t acknowledge her position this time when Dispel looked to him for guidance.
Crawling shyly away from Dispel, who was charging his sword again, Pom tried to quickly get the referee’s attention.
“There you are!” Hearing Dispel’s voice, Pom’s eyes widened in horror and she leapt forward narrowly avoiding losing half of all her legs. Dispel hadn’t release a holy wave of power that time, which confused Pom, because his sword was definitely charged. The armored pony leapt into the air and yelled something as he brought the tip of his sword towards the ground, Pom was already moving out the way with a leap. “Rising Light!”
A huge blast of holy energy ripped its way upwards towards the sky starting from where Dispel struck the ground. The pillar of light spread outwards and upwards, expanding fiercely in a destructive force of holy energy that shook the whole arena.
Instead of being killed by the attack, as it erupted from the floor of the arena towards Pom who was in the air. The energy instead launched her higher into the air before it could actually hit her directly.
The many beings watching were unsure if Pom could survive a drop from at least two hundred feet up in the air where she found herself falling away from the quickly waning pillar of light. The lambkin herself wondering why she wasn’t dead yet and why her fur sparkling even worse now.
Dispel raised his sword to the sky and charged it up as Pom started falling.
“Bright stabs!” He thrust his sword towards Pom and she seemingly dodged it in mid-air by rolling at out the way. Five more thrusts and the results were the same, before the attacks could land Pom always seemed to float out of the path of danger before it struck her.
Pom was being involuntarily thrown around in the air, but there wasn’t much she could do about it or her opponent that really seemed intent on hurting her. She was just happy with still being relatively uninjured and only dizzy from the way the blasts of light pushed her around.
“She’s quite the wily opponent!” Dispel charged up again and quickly slashed his sword twice skywards, then stabbed it at the center of where his two swings intersected. “Holy Cross!”
Pom gave a cry of alarm as the large X shaped wad of energy nearly struck her and sent her flipping sideways fifty feet from the arena’s floor. She fell twenty feet before another crescent wave of energy juggled her two feet up and in the opposite direction as it passed under her. Her white puffy fur started to glow a bit oddly and gave off a strange crackling noise as she landed on top of one of the last standing pillars in the arena.
Pom crouched down on the pillar in the center of it and whimpered as Dispel looked to be readying another beam, blast or what-have-you of holy energy. At this point Pom could care less as Dispel Grace seemed really intent on ending her.
Dispel approached the stone pillar at a two legged gallop and swung his blade at it taking out a large chunk of it.
The entire pillar shook and Pom almost fell off, she got one hoof up onto the edge and held onto it as if her life depended on it and it started to topple in Dispel’s direction.
Dispel looked like he was about to swing his sword upwards to cut the pillar in half, only for Pom to leap away causing him to focus on her instead of the pillar. Said pillar proceeded to fall on top of him.
Pom looked back to see Dispel’s armored legs poking out from under the stone pillar and then they started to move. With one quick blast of holy energy, the stone rolled off of the badly dented and battered armor and the pony that was possibly beneath it.
“I will destroy you monstrous blank with... the long legs!” The earth pony stood up and started to stumble about looking delirious, he shook his head and focused on Pom and started to approach her. He didn’t charge his sword up and seemed to be struggling with its weight now.
He swung it for Pom’s tiny form with his right hoof. Pom ducked under the blade and barely avoided his left hoof coming for her face. Pom then tried to grab Dispel’s left hoof to try and keep him from swinging his sword at her again.
Upon touch the metal of the armor a huge blast of energy erupted from Pom making Dispel fly across the arena. Pom stood twitching a bit, as her body discharged something close to lightning and a few small rays of light.
Dispel got up once against and his armor looked rumpled all over, but there weren’t any holes in it, he came at her again brought his sword down in an overhead swing.
The confused Pom rolled to the side and performed her first attack the entire battle, she thrusted her right hoof at his side while closing her eyes and frowned when something gave from her sloppily thrown attack.
“Argh!” Upon hearing Dispel, gasp out in pain, Pom opened her eyes and watched as he stumbled away from her with a sharp dent in the side of this armor.
Dispel wildly swung his sword low and Pom leapt up and flailed her legs at his head and chest rapidly, when she landed there were several dents in his helmet and armor the size of limes and he had dropped his sword.
Dispel seemed to be swaying on his feet and Pom looked at him questioningly with worry, she then turned around and brought her rear legs up and roughly bucked his helmet. Dispel toppled onto his side with two large dents where his forehead should be.
“Winner, Pom!” The referee announced.
Pom looked shell-shocked.
-Pom-
I… I won?
Did... did that just happen?!
That static magic explosion thing really helped, no idea how that happened. I also didn't think I really did that much to hurt him
I should thank Velvet.
-Hours later, The Grand Time, Dispel-
“So you lost… to a lambkin. How droll… some holy knight you are! You need to remember that you are most certainly not invincible, I told the officials I’d see to your needs.” Teatime, it seems I owed you for keeping my secret once more. “I'm already quite busy as you know! I will get to your armor later, be glad that I quickly fixed your helmet."
I silently watched as he went to work, my gaze turned to the floor from the shelf I sat upon.