Twilight Gets a Puppy
Season 4
By TDR
Twilight's Kraken,
Part One,
Part 1
[Crystal Empire, early summer, 1 week after the Equestrian Games]
“Pleeeeeeeeeeeeaseeeeee!?!” Princess Celestia begged.
“No.” Twilight said flatly, her wings folded against her sides. “I did that crap in an emergency, and hated it. I am not becoming a princess just so you can have a vacation. Why don't you have Luna take over for a while, while you run off to a beach?”
“The last time I left Luna in charge while I took a quick beach trip, she set fire to the school board.” Celestia turned and glared at Luna who shrugged.
“S'truth. They refused our request to put out new school books informing students that there were two Princesses now, and an Empress.” Luna offered as she gestured at Cadence. “We then proceeded to destroy their building and then deny them their funding when they came to request money to rebuild Apparently their insurance caught wind of their refusal to accept me and thus, since I didn't exist in the history books, they would not cover damage caused by a non existent entity.”
“That sounds like something I would do.” Twilight pointed out.
“To be fair, Luna didn't ask them, she just blew up the building after only one exchange of letters.” Cadence added. “But they did change the books.”
“Of course they changed the books rather than not have their creature comforts and that stupid meeting room.... I need to deal with them at some point. But uprooting ponies like that is like pulling teeth on a highly caffeinated, and annoyed, cragodile.” Celestia sighed.” Besides I would expect you to come up with a less violent way at first Twilight. You usually don't start at explosions, you just slowly work up to it.”
“Not my problem. I have no interest in this delegation of yours, nor sitting on a balcony and waving to dignitaries or what ever else you would want me to do here.” Twilight huffed.
“Well, that wouldn't be all you would do.” Celestia rolled her eyes.
“Whatever. There's a library here I have yet to read all the books from and if this invite up here was just because of some stupid meeting with a duke and duchess, then I have plenty of free time to raid said library.” Twilight grinned then paused. “Wait. Where's Chrysalis? Shouldn't she be here meeting dignitaries to the Empire?”
Celestia smirked.
[ In the Crystal Empire Hive throne room.]
Chrysalis stared at the metal pillar before her, the device was wrapped in a wire fence and glowed a soft blue.
She frowned as she stared at the device and shook her head.
“I don't know what's worse, that Celestia expects me to fall for a bug zapper, or that I am.” Chrysalis growled as she poked the device with a hoof.
BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZTTT!!!!!
“Well, whatever. I've got enough tasks with out adding politics on top of it. I need to finish the Familiar spell. ...” Twilight ranted.
“Please.” Cadence added.
“.. then figure out the Breezy Gate and how to fix it....”
“Really. That would save quite a bit on resources every year.” Luna considered.” Not to mention our own stress from waiting for Teacup to lose it one year.”
“... and there's still that stupid box harmony left, and. AND! The damn names left on the prophecy.”
“I am working on those myself Twilight. Particularly as we are not sure if the Sirens counted towards it. Or if the Magic part really meant you.”Celestia sighed.
“ Well. Thank you for that Celestia. “ Twilight sighed. “At least I don't have to focus on everything. I just hope whatever Rahs is doing doesn't come up as a problem.”
“And what might your brother be doing?” Luna asked.
“He says there's some Moon Dogs reporting that a number of the ones they are connected to aren't dreaming and thereby not producing and food that they can eat.” Twilight explained. “Being their god he's gone to look into it.”
“Ahh. That has happened before on small scales. Either a tantabus or tapir is in the area, or there's a constant late night band practice.” Luna nodded. “Perhaps we should inform him not to worry. He seems to be able to deal with Tantabus' rather well. And tapirs just eat all the dreams and can easily be driven out of a town or village with loud noises. The band practice.. well... that depends on those stuck listening to it.”
“Ehh, better let him figure it out for himself. His harem is almost tolerable when he's not around. At any rate I have a lead on the box and I'm gonna go for that first. I'm hoping to find something here in the...” Twilight trailed off giggling.
“I told you it was a good Hearth's Warming present.” Cadence grinned at Luna who rolled her eyes.
“... the Twilight Sparkle Central Library of the Crystal Empire.” Twilight continued to giggle and prance around in a circle before she recalled there were others there and quickly stopped.. “ Ahem sorry, but yeah I'm hoping they have something about the box.”
“Well …. I suppose if I can't convince you to be more diplomatic....” Celestia sighed.
“No.” Twilight stated flatly.
“ … I suppose I should wish you luck on finding what you are looking for. I will keep you updated if anything is figured out about the prophecy.” Celestia sighed.
“Alright, thank you Celestia. Enjoy your...... well, what ever it is.” Twilight offered with a wave of her wing before she vanished in a pop of teleportation from the room.
“We told you it wouldn't work.” Luna offered as Celestia rolled her eyes.
“If you want some pony to watch over Canterlot so you can relax somewhere, perhaps you should start teaching Sunset.” Cadence pointed out.
“I have tried, but she's far too interested in Rahs right now and helping Twilight with the Familiar spell to do anything. Plus Granny said her help will be needed for the Zap Apple harvest this year, and I flat out refuse to miss getting a picture of Sunset dressed up like a cute little bunny hopping over water pails.”Celestia explained.
“Fair enough.” Cadence nodded.
[ Northern plains.]
Tirek chuckled as he watched the herd of buffalo collapse and tumble across the dirt as their charge's momentum kept them moving forward as he drained their magic. The process was a little more of a power sink than he would usually bother with. It wasn't as if the stupid creatures had the sign of their magic printed on their ass ripe for the picking like ponies.
Still he wasn't there for the buffalo themselves.
“TIREK!!”
There he was, as if the sudden snow fall in summer wasn't giveaway enough.
“Hello Iinii.” Tirek smiled, as he turned to face the massive towering buffalo god, the centaur having to look up to do so. No matter how big Tirek got when he gained power, some how this damn bulky cow god managed to remain larger than he was.
“I do not know how you managed to get out of Tartarus this time, but I will be sure to fix that problem once you are sealed away.” Iinii snarled, the snow swirling around him building into a blizzard.
“Really, five members of the council and you are the only one to come. Disappointing.” Tirek sighed.” I suppose I will need to hunt down the others for their wrongful imprisonment of me later.”
“Wrongful imprisonment!?”Iinii snarled as the blizzard increased, the snow turning to hail as it pepper Tirek making the centaur flinch as it slammed into him. “You killed thousands on your last rampage!”
Tirek could tell the talking and the 'attack' were simply a distraction. The movement half hidden in the snow showed a number of non drained buffalo darting around and dragging off those he had sucked dry of magic. Tirek simply let them go, after all in a few months they might regain some strength so he could drain them again, he had no plans to go a full scorched earth.
Unless he could do that with Teacup, that breezy needed to die, permanently this time.
“All I did was drain their magic, that they died from that is hardly my fault. After all they fulfilled their true purpose, which was empowering me after all.” Tirek grinned. “Just as everything with magic will this time as well.”
Iinii didn't respond, but surged forward, with a thick armor of ice and snow coating his form.
Tirek shifted as the buffalo god charged. Predictable, though despite that Iinii was not one to be taken lightly, he was surprisingly agile for his size and if he managed to connect with a hit the blow would likely tear what ever was hit off of the centaur, even if it was his center torso.
That had happened before and it was not pleasant.
“I expect you are aware of all my tricks then.” Tirek offered darting to the side only for the buffalo to change course on a bit and continue to rush him with no loss of momentum. Clearly Iinii did have some new tricks himself. Though the word of several wars in the last few thousand years would of course mean Iinii had to keep in practice for combat. “Though, you should ask, who the last god who's power I drained was.”
The buffalo god didn't slow, the quick movements of the centaur just barely keeping him ahead of the charging buffalo god. Iinii however had not yet worked up to full speed and every second that passed Tirek lost ground. The massive god of snows also didn't respond, though the expression changed from anger to a hint of worry.
“ oh I suppose I'll tell you. No one important really. Just Grace.” Tirek grinned.
Iinii's eyes shot wide open in his armor as Tirek swung his fist, smashing into and through the ice on the side of his Iinii's jaw, a black energy covering his fist as he did so.
The massive buffalo stopped suddenly, crashing to the ground with a thunderous boom as the centaurs fist connected to his flesh. The blow was barely felt in truth, protected by the armor of ice, but with the stolen power of Grace, the goddess of death, all Tirek needed was a touch to kill.
Not that he escaped unscathed, as the ice reformed as he broke through it, trapping his arm and ripping it bloodily from the socket as the massive buffalo fell to the earth.
Tirek snarled. That ability cost him way too much of his magic. Even having devoured two gods, one utterly, the only reason he even managed to drain Grace was she hadn't seen him and was distracted by the death of a god and the draining of Forgescale. He had hid rather than flee and when she came to investigate he had drained her. He could hold onto the stolen power of the god he had most recently drained, but the use of said power was often far more wasteful than what he gained. Hence why he had hoped the whole council would have come to him so he could have gotten them all at once.
Of course even he wasn't willing to risk facing Troph in his own domain after he took down the God of Tartarus and Rages wife. Hence why he fled Tartarus very quickly after that.
Ripping though the ice as his arm regrew, Tirek exposed enough of the buffalo to begin draining him as Iinii came back to life. Even the power of death itself wouldn't stop a god for long.
Draining Iinii would remove his ability to use the death touch, but it would be worth it as his next target was Kaz, and what better power to deal with fire, than ice.
With the buffalo god down and weakened without his magic Tirek smirked. The rush of power from one of the council was better than a legion of mortals. Not like he would stop draining mortals of their magic after all, he needed their power to be strong enough to drain gods. So long as he maintained his power level, he could simply farm the gods for more energy as they recovered keeping himself rich with power. But if he ever wanted to drain the prime three he was going to need more power than this.
His attention turned to the north feeling a large collection of power emanating from there.
A rather strong energy from such an isolated place. He didn't recall any gods residing in any of the places this far north save Iinii.
He glanced down to Iinii as the buffalo god groaned. A grin crossed his features as he reared back a leg, letting loose a kick that sent the massive creature soaring over the landscape to smash into the side of a distant mountain. The impact shook the landscape starting a multitude of avalanches and rock slides, burying the buffalo god in thousands of tons of debris as the mountain side partially collapsed on top of him.
Tirek let out a sharp laugh, eager to crush the bugs of the council and to see if one could drown a sea pony.
But first, it was time to see what was going on in the Crystal Empire.