//------------------------------// // Chapter 7 - Twilight // Story: Rising Fire // by Chengar Qordath //------------------------------// I tried to keep working as the sounds of battle echoed through the palace. It wasn’t easy to concentrate as weapons clashed and ponies shouted, and the periodic explosion caused the floor to tremble. I desperately wanted to drop trying to break Rising’s spell and go help my guard fight off the invaders, but Storm and everyone else insisted that my current work was the most important thing for me to be doing. Getting a call to Canterlot would definitely help, but part of me wondered if my guards were using that excuse to keep me out of the fighting. Right from the start it had been terribly tempting to go out and confront Rising, and that temptation had only grown as my friends had been hurt or captured by Rising’s forces. Now the invader was in my home, threatening everypony here that I knew. These were not the best conditions for concentrating on highly complex arcane formula to say the least. Despite the less-than ideal-circumstances, I did my best to break Rising’s spell. If we could just get word to Celestia, she could rush to Ponyville with a rapid response force and stop this. I was in the middle of hammering out one of the finer details of my counterspell when Twinkleshine came running into the Map Room. Soot marred her normally normally pristine appearance, and her coat glistened with sweat. “Twilight! Storm’s hurt!” The chalk fell from my grip, the arcane formula I’d been in the middle of working out completely forgotten. I spun around to face her. “What happened?!” The words came out fast and frantic. “There was a fight with a vampire leading Rising's forces. The vampire tried to set up some explosives to collapse the palace in on itself and they nearly succeeded.” Twinkleshine pulled her helmet over to wipe some of the sweat from her brow. “The captain drove the vampire off, but she got pretty seriously hurt doing it. She’s being taken to the medics right now. It’s...” She took a deep breath and seemed to swallow a lump in her throat. “It doesn’t look good.” “Where is she?” I needed to see Storm. “Take me to her.” Twinkleshine hesitated. “Very well, Your Highness. But we need to make this quick. There isn’t much time left.” As if to punctuate her point, another explosion rocked the palace, making the both of us wince. The both of us galloped through the palace halls until we arrived at the medical room. My guard had set up the room when they first moved into the palace with beds, medical equipment, cabinets, and other items spread around the room to deal with a variety of medical needs. Today, it was to help treat the wounded from the battle. We passed at least a dozen ponies bandaged up from wounds sustained and a dozen more waiting to be treated or being given basic treatment until they could be properly triaged. It felt like I should stop and do something to help them, but they were already being attended to. There was a system in place to help the wounded, and I would probably end up messing with it if I interfered. So I just kept focused on finding Storm. It was pretty easy to find Storm, since she was surrounded by several medics urgently tending to her. Her neck was heavily bandaged, which instantly caught my attention considering she’d been fighting a vampire. Had she been bitten? Was she going to be okay? The medics were in the middle of carefully removing the Armor, and Storm jerked slightly as they removed each section. She seemed to be a bit disoriented, so I stepped in to do what I could to help. The medics gave me a sour glower as I interrupted their work, but I ignored them as I took Storm’s hoof and squeezed it. “It’s okay. I’m here, Storm.” It seemed to at least calm her down a bit so the medics could do their work. I cast a medical analysis spell to see if I could find out anything to help them. The information that came back felt like a kick to the stomach: Storm was suffering from internal bleeding, broken bones, and severe blood loss. Blood loss ... so she had been bitten. I wasn’t a doctor, but I’d studied biology and anatomy along with everything else. Storm ... wasn’t doing good. With something that felt like the world crashing down around me, I realized why Twinkleshine pulled me away from working on the spell to come to the infirmary. She wanted to make sure I would have a chance to say goodbye. I felt like I was going to throw up. None of this would have happened to her if she hadn’t been trying to protect me. I should’ve tried negotiating with Rising directly instead of just sending out Rarity to meet her envoy. I should have stuck with Storm and helped with the battle instead of hanging back and working on a spell. Would that have kept Storm or anypony else from getting hurt, or would that just have made the situation worse? Not that hypotheticals mattered now. Storm was dying, and that had been a result in no small part due to my decisions. Maybe I should’ve just gone out and faced this Rising Fire all by myself. We probably could have avoided the whole battle if I just challenged her to single combat. Everyone said it would’ve been stupid to do something like that, and I knew they were right. But ... it was a lot harder to think about all the logical reasons I should let the others do the fighting when I stayed safe in the palace while my friends were getting hurt or captured. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to blink away the tears threatening to form at the corners of my eyes. Storm opened her mouth to speak but one of the medics interrupted her. “Don't speak, Captain. It could reopen the wound on your neck.” “It's okay Storm, I'm here.” I continued holding Storm’s hoof with my own, and she squeezed back. I desperately wanted to do something, but what could I do that the medics weren’t already doing? Likely I was just going to get in their way. I was a princess; I was supposed to be capable of doing anything. Except I didn’t know any spells that could make this better, all I could do was stand by and watch helplessly as the medics worked to help my friend. Maybe it wasn’t as bad as it looked. Sure, my spells said I would probably lose her, but doctors who’d spent their whole lives training probably knew things I didn’t. There had to be a chance they could save her, right? I felt somepony squeeze my shoulder, and I jumped in shock before I realized that it was Twinkleshine. She was grimacing and she leaned in to try and keep the conversation between us. “Twilight, about the evacuation plans...” “I can't just abandon everyone, Twinkleshine!” I realized belatedly that I had shouted that, and everypony was staring at me. I could feel shame twisting inside my stomach when I realized I was making a scene in the middle of a hospital. I was supposed to be an inspiration to everypony, and instead I was crying and screaming at my advisors about evacuation plans. That couldn’t be good for morale. Painfully slowly, everypony in the room turned their attention from me and pretended to be very busy with something else. One of the medics cleared his throat and addressed me with that patient but firm tone all doctors used when dealing with difficult ponies. “Princess, sorry, but we need room to work.” My ears wilted. He hadn’t rebuked me for my outburst out loud, but it was still there. Twinkleshine spoke quietly to me again. “Perhaps we should speak outside?” “Right, sorry.” I forced myself to let go of Storm and let the medics do their work. It felt like I was betraying Storm somehow by leaving her. I knew it was foolish. There was nothing I could do for her, and if she was capable of speaking she’d tell it was my duty as a princess to look at the big picture instead of spending all my time worrying about her. Shame those perfectly logical arguments didn’t do much to make me feel better. It was all I could do not to run out of there as tears welled up in my eyes. Twinkleshine lead me away and to one of the offices that had been set up in this wing of the palace. There was nopony there, since all non-essential staff in the palace had taken shelter in the palace’s basement. The stillness in the office was made all the worse by the sounds of battle no more than a few floors below us. Twinkleshine closed the door behind us to make sure we wouldn’t be overheard. She took a deep breath to gather herself. “Twilight, we seriously need to think about evacuating the palace. If we don’t do it soon, we’ll lose too much ground and we won’t be able to do it at all. With the shield down we can’t hold the palace against so many undead. They’re about to overwhelm the breach, and they’ve pushed through the gate.” I couldn’t bring myself to look Twinkleshine directly in the eye. I didn’t want to think about the idea of evacuating the palace, not after everything that had happened, but I had a duty to protect everypony. So I forced myself to push aside my emotions and everything else on my mind and look at it logically. Everypony was depending on me to make the right decision. Twinkleshine was right: the palace had never been intended to fight off an army like this. The shield had been intended to hold off any attacker long enough for relief to arrive, but with it gone the chances of holding off an entire army with what we had wasn’t good. Unless Celestia got here with a relief force soon we were going to be overrun, and as far as we could tell, Canterlot didn’t even know we were under attack. If the palace was going to fall then we needed to get everypony out of here. “Are the tunnels under the palace still clear?” I asked, my throat tightening as I spoke the words. There were several tunnels running under the palace that we could use from the basement. We had been slowly exploring the tunnels and at least one of them led outside. It was just about the only viable way to actually evacuate everyone now that Rising’s army had the palace surrounded. Twinkleshine nodded. “Everything seems good so far. None of the alarms have gone off, and the patrol we sent down there didn’t spot any of Rising’s forces.” “Oh. Well ... that’s good.” It still felt wrong to talk about just abandoning my palace. This was my home. Running away and letting Rising Fire steal it from me when I’d never run away from any of the other monsters who’d threatened myself and my friends felt like giving up. But at the same time, I couldn’t ignore all the civilians who’d fled to the palace for safety. If the palace wasn’t safe anymore, I owed it to them to help them get somewhere else. Of course, that brought another issue to mind. I know Twinkleshine and the rest of my guards wanted me to evacuate along with all the civilians. I was a princess. Keeping me safe was their job. However, would they be safe if I evacuated with the civilians? Everything Rising said and Starlight confirmed indicated that the lich was only after me. If I fled the palace along with everyone else, wouldn’t I be painting a huge target on the refugee column? I took a deep breath. “We’d better get started. Do you think we can get everyone out before it’s too late?” Twinkleshine nodded, determination burning in her eyes. “I’d like to see them stop us. We’ll start with the children, families, and wounded. I’ll see if we can get any of the able-bodied civilians to form up for basic militia work. I don’t want to throw armed civilians onto the front lines unless we have no choice, but if we can have them organizing and escorting the others we’ll have more troops up front. We’ll hold the line for as long as it takes.” She took a deep breath, and I could tell she was steeling herself for something she knew I wouldn’t like. “It would probably help if you went with the first group out, to help keep things orderly and provide some leadership. Not to mention keeping you safe is our top priority. Did you want to pick your guardians, or should I handle it?” I scowled and shook my head. “Don’t be ridiculous!” Twinkleshine flinched, and I realized just how mad I must have sounded. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, trying to at least calm down a little bit. “I’m not going to be the first one to run away from my own palace. How will it look to everyone if I put myself ahead families and kids? What will everyone think if I say my safety is more important than theirs?” Twinkleshine grimaced. “Twilight ... it is. You’re a princess. I know you don’t like to think of things in those terms, but you are objectively the most important pony here. We’ll be putting Applejack and Rarity at the front of the line too. We need to keep all the Element-Bearers we have safe and secure.” She had a point. I didn’t like the idea of placing myself ahead of anypony, but I couldn’t discount my importance as a princess. Thought there were several facts I felt needed addressing. “What about morale?” I pressed. “How will everyone feel if I run away?” Twinkleshine met my eyes. “We’re your guards, Twilight. Keeping you safe is the most important thing for all of us. I can’t think of many things that would help our morale more than knowing you’re going to be alright.” “And as a princess, it's my duty to make sure everypony else is safe.” I slapped a hoof to my chest. “Rising is after me. If I evacuate with everypony else then I put all of them in danger.” “Then we get you out of the palace and separate from everypony else as quickly as we can,” Twinkleshine countered. “We give you a pegasi guard, and once you’re through the tunnels you make a run for the shield. If anypony can break through that thing it’s you. Once you’re out you can run to Canterlot and get a relief force to Ponyville.” I shook my head. “Rising’s bound to be ready for that. I know I would be if I were her.” “You still might be able to break past her.” Twinkleshine stepped closer to me as she pleaded with me to see things her way. “And if not, then you can always hide. You should know plenty of spells to keep yourself hidden. All we need to do is buy time. As soon as Celestia arrives with a relief force she’ll ruin Rising’s plans. Rising knows this—it’s why she’s been acting so fast.” “I understand that.” My ears wilted as I felt a great weight press down on my heart. “But I’m not comfortable just abandoning everypony.” “I know that.” Twinkleshine placed a hoof on my shoulder, her face tight with worry. “You’re important to everypony too. You need to think about how your safety affects everypony else. Please, evacuate the palace. There isn’t much time.” So these were my choices: stay here and wait for the undead to overrun the palace, run for it to try and get reinforcements, or flee and hide. This is what it meant to be a princess: that I would have to make the big decisions that might determine the fates of everypony around me. Spike, Applejack, Rarity, and so many others needed me to make the right decision, whatever I felt about myself. I took a deep breath as I made my decision. “Proceed with the evacuation. Get everypony out as fast as we can. I’ll be staying until we finish the evacuation.” Twinkleshine stiffened. “Your Highness, I must insist—” “I’ve made my decision,” I snapped. I hated taking that tone of voice with a friend, but I needed her to do as I said. There wasn’t time to waste. Ponies lives were on the line. “Rising’s after me. As long as I’m in the palace, she’ll keep her attention focused here. If it comes to it, I can fly and teleport. Those options can let me move a whole lot faster than the walking speed of a column of refugees. If I have to, I can lead Rising away from everypony else. That seems a whole lot better than having me escape with everypony else and drawing Rising’s forces to them.” Twinkleshine lips thinned in disapproval. “Running would work a whole lot better if you were the first to go.” “We can’t say what Rising will do once she’s no longer focused on the palace. Once I leave she might do anything, including attack the civilians. As long as she’s tied down attacking the palace, we know what she will be doing.” We couldn’t afford to debate this any longer. The sounds of battle still rang out, and it was only a matter of time until my guard got swamped. “Begin the evacuation. I’ll evacuate once everypony else is safe. You’ve got your orders, Magus. Go.” Twinkleshine didn’t immediately go. I wondered if she might keep arguing with me, but then she snapped a stiff salute. “Yes, Your Highness. Right away.” She moved swiftly to begin the evacuation, and I could only hope that I had made the right decision. With the evacuation underway, I returned to my work to try and counter Rising’s spell. I couldn’t help but chastise myself for letting my work get interrupted, but I needed to see Storm to keep focused. Or at least that’s what I told myself. No, that had been a mistake given the circumstances. Only I could break Rising’s spell, while there were medics perfectly qualified to treat Storm. Valuable time had been wasted. Not that I had been making any progress before Twinkleshine interrupted me. To get my mind back on track and off the battle raging within my home, I reviewed my work. Maybe the break had been the right call, because within two minutes I saw something that I had missed for the last hour. My mind started racing as I grabbed a fresh scroll. “Of course! I need to modulate the transharmonic frequency of the sending spell! Why didn't I see that earlier?! If I trick Rising’s spell into thinking my message is just a part of its own spell matrix by using the shield’s frequency as a carrier wave...” I scrambled to work out the spell formula as quickly as I could. Complex arcane formulae flowed into one another as I imbued the paper with magic. Another explosion rocked the palace, nearly ruining my work, and one of the Map Room walls cracked. I kept at it. I couldn’t afford to let anything stop me when I was so close. Before long I had a scroll ready to send to Princess Celestia. I cast a spell and the scroll disappeared with a flash as I sent it to Spike. He would know what to do with it, and if everything worked the way I thought it would, a message should get to Celestia in a matter of minutes. I had done it. I had gotten the call for help out. The cracked wall exploded, showering the room with crystal shards that pounded against my hastily erected shield. Undead soldiers marched through the rubble to enter the Map Room. I lit my horn, and my heart started racing as the skeletons spread out to cover the room. Had they penetrated the castle so deeply already? The sounds of battle hadn’t felt that close yet. But as I looked behind the skeletons I saw that multiple holes had been blasted through the walls of the palace, and sunlight showed through the hole. The cause of those holes made itself apparent as the skeletons parted for their master. Rising Fire strode forward, presenting herself to me in all her glory. She towered over me as she stared down at me with her green flame eyes. “Twilight Sparkle. At last, we meet. If you have any shred of decency left in you, surrender and put an end to—” I didn’t care about whatever villainous speech Rising wanted to start blathering. I shot a blast of pure destructive energy at the monster who had hurt my friends. The beam struck Rising in the chest, the shockwave from the impact shattering the skeletons near her. Rising went flying out of the room. I teleported above her as she flew and blasted her again, not holding anything back. This time I blew her through the floor, and she disappeared beneath a cloud of shattered crystal and dust thrown up by the impact. I glowered down into the dust and debris, ready to cast another spell the instant Rising showed herself. As soon as I saw a hint of green fire showing through the dust I struck again, but this time the lich somehow managed to deflect my attack. When the dust cleared I finally got a good look at her. There were large dents and several small cracks on her chest and back where my blasts had hit her. I suppose it was too much to hope I could’ve taken down the lich with my first strike. She probably had a ton of passive defensive spells up. I know I’d cast several on myself as soon as the battle started. Still, I’d damaged her. If I could hurt her, I could beat her. The lich stared up at me with her metallic visage. “So much for diplomacy, then.” She had said it so casually, as though bored by everything. My breath started becoming heavier and faster as I thought about the type of being who could be so casual about the devastation they caused. Was this all a game to her? After all the ponies she had terrified and hurt, was I just some trophy for her to scoop up? Did she think she had a right to be so calm and collected after all she had done? “Diplomacy? Diplomacy?!” My body trembled as I thought about everything this monster had done to the ponies I card about. “I gave you the chance for diplomacy when I sent Rarity out to talk with you! You gave us an hour to surrender unconditionally! Then when we weren’t willing to just roll over for a lich we hadn’t even known existed just a few hours ago, you invaded my hometown, assaulted my palace, captured and hurt several of my friends, attacked my guards, and threatened the rest of my friends and family! Your revenant assaulted my student, and your vampire nearly killed the captain of my guard! And now you have the gall to chastise me over diplomacy?! After everything you’ve done?!” Rising opened her mouth to reply, but I didn’t care what she had to say. I fired another blast, though this time she got up a shimmering green shield in time to block my attack. Still, the blast was powerful enough to smash the floor around her, and she spread her bat-like wings to keep from falling into the fresh hole. I wasn’t going to give her a chance to recover. I transformed the crystal under my hooves into a dozen spikes and threw them at Rising. They shot through the air with a sharp, almost deafening crack that hurt my ears. Rising flapped her wings and dodged to the side with surprising deftness for a creature as large as she was, and the crystal spikes flew harmlessly past. “Did you think you would get away with your crimes forever?!” the lich demanded as green fire began flowing around her. “Today justice comes for you!” “Justice?!” I snapped at her, scarcely believing my own ears. “You attacked Ponyville! You hurt my friends!” I fired off another blast of raw kinetic force. Rising smacked the attack aside with a hoof wreathed in power. There was something oddly familiar about the gesture. “Yes, I did. Your friend Starlight is every bit as foul as you are, and the others chose to stand beside you despite your crimes. I have healed the ones my forces captured and I will restore the others once the battle is done. If you truly care so much for them, surrender and put an end to this.” I wasn’t going to play her game. “Oh yes, you’d like that wouldn’t you? Do you really expect me to give up? You're hurting innocent ponies!” Rising scoffed. “Oh, you have no right to lament innocents coming to harm with the oceans of blood on your hooves. If you truly cared for them, you would have surrendered to spare them this battle rather than send them out to fight for you.” That got to me more than it should have. “How could you possibly think any of this is my fault?! You’re the one who came here and attacked us! None of this would have happened if you’d just left us alone! You tried to collapse my entire palace! Do you know how many innocent ponies are in the underground shelter?” “Who put them there?” Rising shot back. “You knew your palace would be the epicenter of the battle, and you grabbed as many innocent equine shields as you could to try and stop us. Not that it would have worked. We were only going to collapse the top levels. Your basement was quite safe. Even if it wasn’t ... billions are dead by your hooves, and who knows how many more will die if you aren’t stopped?” She somehow thought I’d murdered billions? Starlight was right: Rising Fire really was completely insane. “I don’t know who you think I am, but I haven’t murdered anyone, let alone billions!” I snarled and fired off a lightning bolt at the crazy lich. Rising conjured up a solid wall of ice to intercept my attack. When my lightning bolt struck the wall it exploded, filling the area with hot misty fog. “I know who and what you are. Your days of hiding behind a fantasy of your own making is over!” Rising threw a wave of green fire up at me that instantly vaporized the mist around her. Once again I morphed the crystal around me and turned it into a shield that intercepted the fire. But then a layer of frost formed on the inside of my shield, and then a dozen razor-shards of ice shot at me. It was all I could do to teleport out of there before they skewered me. No more than a couple seconds passed before I saw a fireball coming right at me, and I needed to teleport again. The fireball exploded and sickly green flames began consuming the supply room I’d just been in. Rising was casting pyromancy and cryomancy at a speed I’d only seen one other pony do. It was a difficult trick to pull off, where the caster manipulated heat energy to allow them to easily create fire and ice in a continual cycle. I’d only read of a couple of other ponies ever being able to pull the technique off, so the fact Rising was able to do it was another fact in favor of some of the things I had been told about the lich. Though more practically, I was going to need to counter that ability if I was going to win this fight. Getting into an evocation brawl against an opponent who could fling energy faster and more efficiently wouldn’t end well for me. Rising rose up from the hole I’d blasted her into and threw several ice javelins right at me. I could’ve gone for a straight block or dodge, but doing that would let her keep her offensive momentum going. I’d learned exactly how badly that could go the last time I’d faced a spellcaster who used that style, and this time I wasn’t in a friendly mock-battle. I took advantage of all that fire stirring up the air in the supply room to make it a bit easier to pull off some aeromancy. I created a blast of air that tossed the javelins away from me, shattering them against the walls. I didn’t want to get caught within the confined spaces of the palace when Rising was bound to blow up every room I was in, so I made for the hole Rising had created in my palace. I was sure I could beat Rising, but it wasn’t going to be easy to pull off. Rising flew after me and shot a burst of flame at my back. I’d known the attack was coming, and I shot through the opening in the side palace before casting a spell to seal the hole up behind me with more crystal. The flames hit the newly formed crystal wall with an audible thump. I knew that wouldn’t hold Rising back for long, so I flew up and quickly cast a series of spells. I created a crystal shield from the crystal of the palace, and cast several wards of protection and resilience on it, as well as a couple spells to protect myself from Rising’s flames. My duel with Sunset had given me a pretty good idea of what I needed to be ready for. My time ran out as Rising blew a fresh hole into the palace and came out after me. I immediately fired a lightning bolt at her. Rising saw the attack coming and conjured up another ice shield in time to catch the attack. The lightning shattered the shield, but it had borne the brunt of the attack. Rising was quick to go back on the offensive as she launched another fireball at me. I flew to the side, only to find that Rising had set me up for her next attack, sending all the shards from her broken ice barrier flying at me. I brought my shield up, and it deflected the shards. Rising’s mixing of pyromancy and cryomancy had it advantages, but there was a drawback—or more accurately a consequence to its use that I could take advantage of. The constant moving of hot and cold air around build up static electricity, and I could use that against Rising. I seized upon the electricity in the air and turned it into an even more powerful lightning bolt. Instead of making another shield to try and block it, Rising teleported out of the way to dodge the attack. Okay, that almost certainly proved it. Teleportation was a spell only a student of Celestia would know. Well, I’d taught it to Starlight too, but I’d learned it from Celestia. The point being, given the abilities Rising Fire was showing off, I could pretty confidently confirm who she was. “So you are Sunset Shimmer!” Rising’s burning eyes narrowed in hate. “That's a name I haven't held for a long time. Not since you destroyed everything that made me Sunset Shimmer. My friends, my family, my nation... All of it lost, and all because of you!” I groaned at what felt like bashing my head against a metaphorical wall. “For the love of—how many times do I have to tell you, I didn't do anything like that! Alternate realities are the sort of thing that only shows up in science fiction, I had no idea they were even real until you showed up! I’m friends with the Sunset from this reality! Why would I want to do anything like that to you? It doesn’t make sense! Nothing like that ever happened!” Rising snarled and lashed out with a dozen whips of bright green flame. “Stop lying! Don’t tell me it didn’t happen! I was there the day our world burned! I spoke to witnesses who saw you do it! Have you destroyed so many worlds you forgot about ours?!” “I haven’t destroyed any worlds!” I screamed back at her. “How many times do I have to tell you that before you listen?!” “ENOUGH LIES!” Rising roared out in a pretty good equivalent to the Royal Canterlot Voice. Flowing greenish-gold light started flowing out of her to one side, while rippling black fire left the other. I knew that spell intimately, considering my world’s Sunset used it to beat me during our little sparring match. Naturally, I’d studied the spell feverishly after I’d lost to it. Combining anima and anti-anima, then channeling their mutual annihilation into a blast of raw destructive force made for a horrifyingly dangerous and powerful spell. Once I’d figured out what Sunset did, I’d been amazed she would even dare to use a spell like that, let alone have enough control to use it safely in a mock battle. She must have come up with that spell on the fly, because if she’d done the math on it first she would’ve realized how easy it would be to blow herself up if she got the slightest thing wrong. It was probably one of the only non-dark magic spells I’d ever come across that I never wanted to try casting myself. The good news was since I knew exactly how dangerous that spell was, I also had a pretty good idea of how to mess with it. I summoned my own anima, its golden light gathering in front of me as I prepared my counter. I waited carefully until I saw Rising start to move her masses of anima and anti-anima together. I shot my anima at her, hitting her gathered anima and causing them to merge. The reaction knocked the careful balance of the spell out of equilibrium. Rising blinked in surprise as she saw her spell start catastrophically unraveling. Despite the fact she effectively had a bomb right in front of her face, she kept a cool head and got to work siphoning off energy from her spell and separating the anima and anti-anima so that they would harmlessly dissipate. It was an amazing display of magical skill. While a corner of my mind told me I should attack her while she was distracted, I couldn’t help but watch on as she broke down her spell. There were but a hooffull of ponies near that level of skill in all the world, and watching Rising really drove home just how good of a spellcaster she was. Once she was done, Rising narrowed her eyes at me. Her horn lit up, but she didn’t cast another spell. Or at least, not one I could see. “How did you know to do that?” “Like I said, I know the Sunset of my world. She's a friend of mine.” Technically this monster was Sunset too, but I reminded myself that this lich was nothing but an insane, twisted mockery of the Archon of Freeport. She might have been a fantastic spellcaster, but that was just because she’d unnaturally lengthened her lifespan. “She showed me the spell herself, and once you know what you’re dealing with it isn’t that hard to figure out how to counter it. Really, I’d say the spell is too dangerous to even use.” Rising started at me for several seconds. Her metal skull was completely expressionless, and made it difficult to tell what she might be thinking. “I suppose I should've known the other Sunset wouldn't believe me. It seems that even she has been fooled by your lies.” “Or maybe because you're wrong,” I countered. “Have you ever considered even once that you might have gotten your facts wrong?” Rising snarled and shook her head. “No, they just can't accept how horrible you are! Maybe it shouldn't be so surprising. Your crimes are simply too monstrous, the scale of them too inconceivable.” I shot the lich a flat look. Despite Starlight’s warnings, I’d only just started grasping how insane Rising must be. “That’s your rationalization? That seems like a pretty big stretch to explain how I’ve somehow managed to trick everyone into overlooking a crime this big. I mean, do you even know me? I’m not that good at lying and manipulating ponies. Have you even thought about how ridiculously huge and complicated the conspiracy to cover up a global genocide would have to be?!” Rising still refused to see reason. “Nobody but you and Starlight know what you did. You’ve duped everyone in this world. Tell me, how many worlds did you purge before you finally came across one where you were a universally beloved princess? Small surprise you decided that was the world that you would allow to keep existing.” “What are you even talking about?!” This entire conversation felt like I was bashing my head against a brick wall. I should’ve known it would go that way, there was no point trying to reason with crazy ponies. Facts and logic don’t work against someone who makes up their own facts and doesn’t even pretend to follow any kind of internally consistent logic. Judging by what Rising said next, that was just about the only thing we agreed on. “I grow tired of this pointless blather.” “Then why do you keep doing it?” I snapped back. “A dim hope that you might see reason. Failing that, to buy time.” I took a closer look at the lich, and realized that the damage I’d done to her earlier in the battle didn’t look as bad as I remembered. So that was what she’d been up to! The whole time we’d been talking she’d been repairing herself. Okay, even trying to talk to this monster in good faith was just a losing proposition if those were the type of games she was going to play. I teleported above her and fired a beam of magic at Rising, but she flew forward and away from the shot. I took advantage of her distraction to get a head start on flying away from her, but before long she was right on my tail, screaming after me. “You won't get away, murderer!” “You’re starting to sound like a broken record!” Drawing on a bit of pegasi magic in addition to my unicorn magic, I created a gale-like wind that I launched at Rising. Not having anywhere to dodge to this time, the violent wind buffeted the lich and sent her tumbling. Rising tucked in her wings to protect them from the wind and teleported beyond the spell before I could capitalize on her distress. “Impressive.” Rising unleashed a dozen reddish-black tendrils of energy that whipped out at me. I dived to the side, twisting and turning to avoid the tendrils in a maneuver Rainbow had taught me. I avoided the worst of it, but one of the tendrils grazed my back-leg. I cried in shock as the spell sapped a portion of my life-force right out of me. For all of Rising’s talk of wanting to capture me, she sure was doing her best to try and kill me. I tucked my wings and dived faster to try and give myself a moment’s respite to recover. I cast another ward on myself to protect myself against similar life-draining spells. I had a feeling Rising was going to switch tactics now that I had turned her heat manipulation and anima and anti-anima spell against her. That guess proved right when Rising teleported right next to me and unleashed a blast of raw kinetic force. There wasn’t any time to dodge, and a sledgehammer-like force slammed into me and sent me tumbling towards the ground. Before I could recover, I smashed through the side of a house, through its floor, and then into its basement. I groaned in pain as I rolled on the floor, the world still rolling in my vision despite the fact I’d come to a sudden and very painful stop. I knew I needed to get up, and I worked to get my hooves under me despite what I really wanted was a good lie-down. Then I heard a sound I really didn’t want to hear. A child near me spoke up. “Momma, what’s happening? Why’s the princess destroying our home?” I turned my head to see a mother and father holding their little colt as they huddled in the corner. Oh no, this was not something I needed to be dealing with right now. Didn’t they hear the evacuation order? A burst of green magic announced that things were about to get much, much worse, and Rising teleported in front of us, her eyes burning fiercely as she lit the basement. As I feared, she started casting a spell, leaving but a brief moment to do anything. I cast a shield over the family, consigning myself to what would no doubt be a world of hurt Rising was going to inflict on me. Only Rising didn’t cast an offensive spell like I’d expected. A second shield formed around the family in the green of Rising’s magic. That ... wasn’t what I expected. Rising snarled and took an aggressive step towards me. “Leave them out of this!” “Me?! I'm not trying to hurt them!” I shot back. “You’re the one that blasted me into their home!” “What’s happening?!” cried the mother, hugging her child so close that he started groaning in protest. “Why are you in our home?!” I jabbed a hoof in their direction. “Why are you even here?! You were supposed to have evacuated to a shelter!” The father winced, and somehow managed to curl tighter into the corner they were in. “W-we didn't want anyone to loot our house during the evacuation. My stamp collection is—” The mother glowered at her husband. “I told you this was a bad idea! But did you listen to me? Nooo! This is just like that time in Manehattan! Now we're going to get into trouble for not evacuating. I heard it was a hundred bit fine!” The father narrowed his eyes as his wife, and I got the sense that these two had been arguing about this and other things for some time. “We would have lost a lot more than that if our house had been looted! And will you please stop bringing Manehattan up! It was ten years ago!” My eye started twitching. “Your lives are in danger! You’ve put your son’s life in danger!” “Am I gonna get grounded?” asked the son, his lip quivering. “Stop threatening them!” Rising placed herself between me and the family. The twitching in my eye intensified. “Oh, you’re one to talk! You’re the one that attacked the town and started this entire situation!” “If you’d let them evacuate to my refugee camp instead of using them as equine shields they would all be perfectly safe!” Rising shot back. “Oh yes, I can’t imagine why I didn’t tell everypony to trust the blood-sucking vampire and the evil insane lich that wants to kill me!” I rolled my eyes. “How thoughtless of me.” “Could you two please take this fight someplace else?!” the father demanded. “You’re scaring my family, thank you.” The mother stroked her son’s mane. “Yes, our son is probably going to have nightmares for weeks after this thanks to you.” The son blinked owlishly as he looked between his parents. “Momma, Dadda, can we watch the fight when they leave?” I shuffled in place as I felt more than a little guilty at that moment. Sure, they should have evacuated to start with, but I still didn’t feel good about bringing a fight to their home. I felt pretty rotten about the damage done to my own home, and the ponies that had been hurt there. A low growl rolled out from deep within Rising’s throat. “Are we going to move this fight voluntarily, or do I have to make you move?” I frowned up at her. “Moving sounds good.” Wondering if an opportunity was presenting itself, I asked, “You want to take this outside of town?” That would work a whole hay of a lot better for me for several reasons. First and foremost I would feel a lot better being someplace where the two of us weren’t liable to hurt anypony else slinging around spells. Then if I could just get to the right place to fight Rising... Thankfully, Rising surprised me by silently nodding her agreement. So the two of us carefully, and more than a little awkwardly given neither one of us wanted to take an eye of each other, climbed out of the basement and headed outside. We both took flight, and I guided us towards the Everfree Forest. I wasn’t sure how far Rising would let us go, but the longer the unofficial truce held, the better for me. Of course, she’d probably start repairing the damage to herself as well... The two of us flew in silence for a time, each of us keeping a wary eye on the other. Trust was in short supply, to say the least. It had to be terribly tempting on Rising’s part to suddenly attack me, especially once we flew past Ponyville’s border, but I wanted to keep this flight going as long as possible. To stall for time, I decided to start a conversation. As long as we were talking we weren’t fighting. “Where are you keeping my friends captive?” Even if I managed to defeat Rising, or at least drive her off, we would still need to rescue everypony. The vampire was still around, as well as the revenant, and they probably wouldn’t take it well if their master was defeated. Knowing where we needed to go to rescue everypony would be a big bonus if I could get it out of Rising. “In a secure location far from the battlefield,” Rising said extremely unhelpfully. “Their wounds are being treated.” My teeth clenched together. “How generous, considering you’re the one who hurt them.” Rising tilted her head. “They chose to fight for you instead of staying out of the fight. If you cared so much for them, why did you send them to fight your battles for you?” I couldn’t help but wince at the question, and my ears wilted as I looked down at Sweet Apple Acres. Applejack’s farm looked like a warzone. The fight that had taken place there had pockmarked the fields, and fences and farm equipment lay in ruin all about the farm. How many ponies had been hurt trying to protect me? Too many, it felt like. I never asked for this, I didn’t want ponies fighting and getting hurt because they thought I was that important. “Well? Are you going to answer?” Rising demanded. “They wanted me to stay back. They said I was too important to just throw myself into the middle of everything. So I worked on trying to counter your spell, trying to make myself at least a little bit useful while everypony was fighting.” The excuse felt weak and rehearsed. I’d gone over that discussion with my guards half a dozen times in the time since Rising showed up. I knew all the reasons why I needed to stay off the front lines, all of which were perfectly logical. That still didn’t make it feel right. I sighed. “I don’t like hanging back while others fight for me.” Rising stared at me for several seconds. “Surrender. End this before anyone else gets hurt.” The words caught me off guard. I guess I should’ve known, she was just trying to talk me into giving up. “You know that’s not happening. You’ve already made it pretty clear you want me and Starlight dead, and I have no idea what your other plans are.” “My only plan is that the two of you will be put on trial of your crimes,” Rising answered. “You will face justice for everything you’ve done.” I scowled. “I don’t have a great deal of confidence that I’ll get any sort of justice from whatever court you set up. After all, you’ve already decided I’m guilty, and you’re going to be judge, jury, and executioner.” Rising shrugged. “I would love to have enough ponies left alive to turn into a jury. Pity you didn’t leave us that much.” I wanted to argue the point, but that would just lead to more back and forth about whether or not I’d done any of the things Rising seemed absolutely certain I was guilty of. I opened my mouth to tell her just that, but she spoke over me before I could say anything. “Why did you do it?” Rising cast a heavy duty privacy spell over us. “It’s just the two of us. Nopony can overhear us. I don’t have any recording device on me, no tricks. All I want to know is why you and Starlight did it, and to hear it from your lips. I don’t want to risk you dying before I’ve heard the truth with my own ears, and you owe me this much after all you’ve done to us.” I shook my head. “I can’t help you there, because. I. Didn’t. Do. It.” Rising’s eyes narrowed. “Fine then. I've given you plenty of chances to do the right thing. I suppose I was a fool to even try. Let's end this.” So much for the cease-fire. At least we had gotten about as far away from Ponyville as I could have hoped for. We were flying over the outer edges of the Everfree Forest. That placed us a long way from any civilians, and a lot closer to where I wanted to be. I’d promised Twinkleshine that I would run when the time came, but if I’m being honest, that was a lie. With Storm and Starlight out of action, I was the only one left who stood a chance against Rising. I wasn’t going to run away and leave everypony to Rising’s mercy. I was taking her down, whatever it took. “Fine, let’s do this.” I fired a thunderflash spell at Rising, but she teleported out of the way of the blinding and deafening blast. The only warning I got about her location was the was the sudden shadow that fell over me. A metallic foreleg wrapped around my chest, and a hoof wreathed in reddish-black magic hammered into the side of my head. Getting punched with a hoof made out of solid adamantine hurt a lot, but that paled in comparison to the spell. It must have been some sort of necromancy, because it felt as though it was tearing my soul out of my body piece by piece. I struggled against Rising’s adamantine grip, trying to break free. There was no way I could break her hold, but she was so focused on keeping me from doing so that she didn’t notice when I managed to tuck my horn under her chin. A kinetic blast shot from my horn, and Rising’s head snapped back as though the heavyweight boxing champion had just hit her with an uppercut. Rising’s grip loosened, and I put my rear legs between us and kicked off of her to free myself. I pivoted midair and sent a raw blast of magic right into Rising’s center. The purple beam sent Rising twirling uncontrollably through the air. I moved to capitalize on my advantage, but then the world started spinning. That spell must have hurt a lot more than I’d realized—not to mention getting punched in the head couldn’t have been healthy for me. The good news was that Rising needed a moment to recover from what I’d hit her with as well. I tucked in my wings and dove, partly to dodge whatever spell she was about to send my way and partly because if I was going to fall I might as well be in control of it. I managed to shake off the vertigo in time to pull out of my dive and slip beneath the trees. I’d hoped I would be able to lose her in the trees long enough to double back and catch her by surprise, but the lich was hot on my tail. I tried a spell I’d learned from Zecora, making tree branches spring to life and go after her. Her counter surprised me, because instead of using fire or necromancy she countered with the same sort of spell I’d used, except better. “You’re no dendromancer!” Rising called after me. “But one of my ancestors was, and I’ve had a lot of time to go over her old books!” Normally I would’ve been excited to hear about Evergreen Shimmer’s old journals considering the major role she played in Equestria’s campaign against the Necrocrats, but it was hard to appreciate ancient spellbooks when they were being used against me. After the third time I got smacked in the face by a tree branch, I would’ve been perfectly happy if nopony ever got the chance to read that particular book “Well as long as we’re using our ancestor’s spells...” Midnight Sparkle had come up with something that was just perfect for my current situation. My horn lit and unleashed a wave of dark shadowy tendrils that latched onto the branches, making them all slowly wither and die. As an added bonus, some of the energy being drained out of those blighted plants transferred back into me. It didn’t heal my injuries, but they were bothering me a lot less than they had been. Rising snarled and unleashed a blast of bright green fire. Considering I’d just drained all the water out of the trees along with everything else, all the nearby wood was about to go up like a tinderbox. I teleported clear of the impending firestorm, but Rising must have been expecting that, because as soon as I popped back into existence she formed a sphere of razor sharp ice shards around me. A minute ago that might have been a problem, but I felt refreshed after my last spell. A quick kinetic blast scattered her sphere, and then I had a great idea. My current position had me almost perfectly placed between Rising and sun, which made it all to easy to tap into the sun’s power for my next spell. “Since we do have Sunbeam Sparkle as a common ancestor, this just feels so wonderfully appropriate!” I unleashed a beam of pure concentrated sunlight at the undead abomination. I must have caught her off guard, because she didn’t manage to put up any defenses before my attack struck home. The blast of pure sunlight hammered into the lich, and she let out a startled shout as she went crashing down into the trees below. I had to admit, that had been very satisfying. Normally I didn’t like hurting anyone no matter how much they deserved it, but Rising had really gotten under my skin. I gathered up more sunlight and started preparing another blast. “Well well well, looks like I found out what you’re weak against.” I unleashed a second beam at her. Rising snarled and conjured up a wall of darkness to intercept the blast. “Congratulations. You can hurt me with concentrated sunlight. I can hurt you with fire, ice, lightning, necromancy shadows, dendromancy, kinetic basts, and ... need I go on?” “Let’s try bigger and better!” I conjured up several crystals around Rising, then fired off more sun blasts, bouncing them off the crystals to get around her shadow field. I managed to land one more hit, but after that she teleported clear. I quickly put up a bubble shield, but a second later I felt an adamantine hoof slam into my back. I’d been so busy preparing for a magical attack I hadn’t expected her to get point-blank and smack me with her bare hooves. The hit smacked me out the sky, my wings flailing as I tried to stabilize myself before I hit the ground. I’d gotten a lot better at flying over the years, but recovering from getting hit in mid air was hard. I wound up crashing into the trees, but luckily I only hit the lighter branches that cushioned my fall instead of slamming into a trunk. I didn’t have very long to enjoy my survival, because a second later Rising sent a huge Blightfire blast towards me. I didn’t want to test my luck trying to block an entropic anti-anima attack like that, so instead I teleported clear. I stole a page from Rising’s book and put myself right behind her. A normal punch wouldn’t have done much good considering she was made out of solid metal, so I quickly gathered up some sunlight and infused it into my hooves. Rising turned around just in time to catch one of my hooves slamming into her face. Hitting her still stung, but from the way the lich’s head snapped back, it hurt her a lot more. I followed up with a couple more hits Shiny taught me years ago, finishing up by slamming both hooves down onto the top of her head. As satisfying as that was, I’d made one big mistake. I’d been so focused on hitting her that I hadn’t been paying attention to where her horn was. Right before I spiked her down to the ground she fired a blast of energy straight into my chest from point-blank range. Even if I’d seen it coming, I wouldn’t have had time to stop her. As Rising spiralled towards the trees, my vision blurred and every muscle in my body clenched up. I didn’t know what exactly it hit me with, but I felt more exhausted than the time Rainbow Dash talked me into trying to keep up with her daily exercise routine. Probably an energy draining spell of some sort. That wasn’t good. Rising was undead and made out of solid metal. She wouldn’t get tired like I would. I’d landed some good hits, but so had she. I needed to do something big and dramatic to really change the course of the battle. Otherwise she was going to wear me down. I took a deep breath as I centered myself and focused my magic. I thought of my friends, everypony Rising was threatening, and how I wanted to protect them. The Magic of Friendship flowed through me, and I weaved it into a spell. A prismatic bubble formed around me, the warmth coursing around me felt as inviting as a cabin fire in the middle of a blizzard. I finished the spell, the rainbow barrier was fully in place, and I was ready. Rising hadn’t been idle either. More Blightfire gathered around Rising’s horn, and malevolent power radiated from the lich. Aiming myself, I flew to the side and then shot up right at Rising. The lich launched a great torrent of Blightfire down at me, and the black fire slammed into my shield. Magic cracked as the two forces collided, and my shield shook as the Blightfire tried to push me back. But I pressed up and forward, pumping my wings and pouring on more magic as the Blightfire rolled over the shield. Rising thought she could get away with hurting my friends, and I was going to show her why she was wrong. I broke through Rising’s ceaseless wave of Blightfire and I slammed into her like a locomotive. Magic sparks shot off in every direction as my shield drilled into Rising, the friendship magic of my shield and the necromantic magic coursing through Rising’s body interacted violently. Rising’s scream was like twisting metal, and her metal body started cracking as my magic tore at her. I kept it up, determined to destroy this lich for good. I grinned as we hurtled towards the shield surrounding Ponyville. I flapped my wings as hard as I could, and then we slammed into the sickly green shield. Rising cried again as I sandwiched her between the two magical forces, and more cracks split along her frame. Rising’s shield pulsed and then shattered around us as we continued plowing forward. I did it—I broke Rising’s shield, and had her against the ropes. Then Rising’s eyes burned all the brighter, and her hoof once again became wreathed in blackish-red fire. Rising smashed her hoof into the shield, causing magical sparks to fly at the impact. She did it again and then again as the shield started flickering. I realized that between hitting Rising and the shield my friendship shield had weakened, and then Rising’s hoof smashed through the shield. The momentum carried her hoof, and she struck my horn. My world flashed with pain as my magic reverberated through my body. I blinked as I tried to get the spots out of my vision. But before I could recover, Rising wrapped her legs around me, and a black and red-tinged aura and black fire surrounded her. I screamed as unbearable pain wracked my very being as she started draining the life from me, and the flames cover her burned me. “You’re mine now you monster!” Rising yelled. I thrashed about as I desperately tried to get out of her steel grip. I attempted to cast a spell, but Rising merely swatted my horn again to disrupt my spell. My body was in so much pain I almost didn’t register the hit. Then I spotted Rising’s own horn, and decided to give her some of her own treatment. My hoof shot up and hit her horn. Rising jerked in pain, and her grip loosened. I needed to escape or Rising was going to kill me. So I cast the quickest and messiest teleport I could pull off. The world became nothing more than a tumble that very swiftly ended in a sudden and violent stop as I slammed into something. I coughed in pain as I lay on the ground as the world refused to stop spinning. My stomach revolted on me, and a moment later I lost my lunch. I don’t know how much time passed before I was able to concentrate on my surroundings again. One of the Everfree Forest’s trees stood over me, and the bark had been smashed off where I had hit it. A quick look at myself told me I was a mess. Scorch marks covered my armor and coat, and several of my feathers were damaged or outright missing. A corner of my mind told me it had been profoundly stupid to do a blind teleport like that. That had probably been the cause of my nausea, as well as some of the burns I was suffering from. But while the cool and rational part of my mind was busy chastising me, the rest of my mind was a chorus of ‘ow.’ And really, it wasn’t like I had any better options. And then my extremely terrible day got a little bit worse when I heard Rising’s voice. “Are you quite done now? As much as I’ve enjoyed giving you a start on your well-deserved punishment, I am on a schedule.” “I... I’m not...” I tried to force myself to my hooves but I merely collapsed back to the ground, my chest heaving to try and catch my breath. Rising slowly and methodically stepped towards me. “What you are is done. You can’t stand, I’m pretty sure you’ve lost some of your primary flight feathers, and even your magic should be mostly drained by now. Give up.” She cocked her head to the side as she glowered down at me. “Or do you think you can actually accomplish something in your current state?” Panic welled up in me, but I closed my eyes as I pushed it back down again. I needed to think, to concentrate. Rising was right: I wasn’t in any condition to continue this fight. I’d given as good as I got, but she didn’t get tired or feel pain, and I was pretty sure she’d used the time while I was recovering from my teleport to repair herself again. The difference in endurance between our bodies was too much for a protracted fight. But then, I hadn’t gone into this planning to beat Rising in a contest of endurance. “Actually, I do have one little thing I wanted to show you.” Now that we were on the other side of Rising’s shield, I concentrated and felt out with my magical senses. Then I sensed what I had been searching for: a deep, powerful source of magic. The Tree of Harmony glowed with power within my senses, and I knew if I could get to the Tree I could end this fight. Despite everything hurting, I smirked up at Rising. Before Rising could stop me, I teleported again, following that source of magic, but then I popped back into existence exactly where I had started. Something like a scoff echoed out of Rising’s throat. “Did you really think I wouldn't cast a dimensional lock on you after the last time you teleported? I learned that spell from Celestia too.” My body groaned with pain as I pushed myself up onto shaky legs. “Well considering you’ve been teleporting all over the place too...” “It is a useful spell.” Rising stepped close enough to loom over me. “But I don't need you running away right now.” I breathed in ragged gasps as I tried to think of a way out of this situation. My plan had failed, Rising wasn’t going to let me get to the Tree of Harmony, I couldn’t teleport, and I was hurt and exhausted. Still, I couldn’t just give up. “I'm not going to let you hurt my friends, no matter what happens.” Rising raised her chin. “Your friends, other than Starlight, are of no interest to me. I’ve healed their wounds, and even saved your version of Rainbow Dash from a close brush with death. In the future, tell her that headbutting solid mithril is a terrible idea.” It was good to hear they were okay, though finding out Rainbow almost died because of this monster... I hadn’t known it was possible to be even angrier at her than I already was. The worst part was that not only was she hurting and nearly killing my friends, but she still seemed convinced she had the moral high ground. “And what about Storm? The captain of my guard? She was badly hurt by your vampire.” “She chose to fight us,” Rising said, slowly stretching out her leathery wings. “But if you truly care so much about her, let me offer you a bargain: surrender. Turn yourself in, and order your forces to stand down. I will see to the wounded.” I wobbled in place as my legs trembled beneath me, but I planted my hooves and refused to show any weakness. “You honestly think I can trust you after everything that’s happened?” “I could ask you the same question.” Rising’s horn lit up. I tried to do the same, but my horn only shot off sparks for a couple seconds instead of lighting right up. She got her spell off first. I winced as a psychic static made my head fuzzy, and it suddenly became very difficult to concentrate on casting any kind of spell. I tried to bring a spell together anyways, but the process was painfully slow due to my exhaustion and pain. “You have to know that spell isn't going to make it easy for you to cast spells either.” “True. But then, without magic you're just a feeble little false alicorn while I am made out of solid adamantine.” Rising charged me to close the distance in but a moment, and her hoof lashed out at my head. I’d learned a few self-defense moves from Storm, but my body responded sluggishly to my commands. I managed to block the first hit, but against a hoof made of solid metal even a block hurt a lot. I tried to counter, but I think the punch wound up hurting myself a lot more than it did her. Rising’s next attack got through my defenses. An adamantine hoof slammed into my cheek and sent me staggering. I stumbled, but I hadn’t even had time to recover before Rising’s other hoof struck me across the jaw. Stars flashed over my vision and the blow sent me sprawling down into the dirt. Before I could rise, Rising planted a hoof on my back, crushing me down into the ground. She released the psychic static spell, and her horn started glowing as a sleep spell formed. I took the brief window of opportunity to fire off a quick blast of magic into her chest. It was enough to knock her off of me, though it wasn’t enough to do more than enough to scorch her adamantine shell. Rising tossed her head, her fiery mane shooting off green embers. “You have nothing left.” I tried to get up, but my body wouldn’t respond. I was nearly done, but I couldn’t lose either. My options nearly gone, I could only think of one other way to stop Rising and save everyone I cared about. I really didn’t like it, but I liked the idea of leaving my friends at the mercy of this monster even less. “I still... have one option... left.” Rising snorted and flicked her hoof for me to continue. “By all means...” I gathered up what power remained within me, all my magic, my life force, even my soul. All of it went into a new spell intended to stop Rising for good. Rising saw that I was in the middle of casting a death curse, and her eyes flashed with green flames. “No!” she cried as she rushed forward. She was on me before I could complete the spell and she slapped my horn. My vision flashed as I lost my grip on the spell. Rising’s hoof came down on my head as she ground my head into the dirt. She started casting a fresh sleep spell as she growled down at me. “Clever. A death curse might have been enough, and even if you didn’t destroy my body I doubt I would be in any state to prevent your death. But no, you won't get out of this that easily.” I tried to get up, cast another spell, but I couldn’t actually do anything. I was just exhausted, and my body ached so terribly. Was this really the end? “Why are you so determined to capture me?” “To make you pay for your crimes.” Rising unleashed her spell, and the world slowly drifted into nothing.