There was a faint ringing in the ears of both girls as they slowly began to recover from the deadly blow they were dealt. Having their skulls bashed into each other would have absolutely decimated a normal human, but thanks to their Equestrian biology, they survived without any major lasting injuries.
“Ugh…what…?” Sunset muttered as her eyes fluttered open. “What’s hap…huh…?” Her vision was blurry, but it eventually began to settle as her nervous system started to re-activate. That’s when she started to see what was happening in front of her…
“...over my dead body, witch!” Keiji shouted while attacking the elephant demon with his katana, delivering a series of wide-angle slashes and moving so fast that he seemingly teleported to the beast’s opposite side without using extra magic.
For the moment though, the boy’s sword did little to pierce the outer shell of the pachyderm as it seemed to have created a magical barrier with its bare hands to ward off each attack. Just how was it managing to match the vamp-kid’s speed?
It had grown extra faces and arms.
Three in fact. It was able to see his attacks coming from all directions no matter where he struck from.
“Pitiful,” said the feminine demon, “And here I thought the Rosangio family was worth something. Turns out it was all talk.”
Keiji performed a backflip to avoid being struck with a punch from three fists. “I…I don’t give a shit about that family!” he yelled through his shortness of breath while gritting his teeth, “You’re dealing with…Ketsuki Keiji. Nobody else! Got that?”
“Fine then,” said the multi-faced elephant beast, “You can die here. Alone and powerless!”
With one hand behind his back, the boy created a small secondary blade, and stabbed himself in the abdomen with it. “Ggrh! Mmff…as if!” The small blade disappeared, and his ether slowly started to overlock itself, causing his heart to beat faster, and thus, pump more blood through his body.
“Now just what is this…?” the pachydemon muttered with a mildly interested sense of curiosity.
By this point, Sunset had risen to one knee. She looked at Keiji and could see the veins on his body pulsate beneath his skin to an unhealthy degree. Her eyes grew wide the instant she knew what sort of spell he had cast upon himself--a highly forbidden one. “Wh…no! Keiji, don’t--!” she reached a hand out, but could barely stand due to her slightly delirious state of mind.
“AAAAAEE!” Keiji let out an inhumane--almost demonic roar as his body started to take on more bat-like traits--his teeth turned into fangs, his fingers turned into claws, and vampire bat wings sprouted from his back. It all took place over the course of about ten seconds and once his enhancements took over, he rushed forward, and immediately disappeared from view, bending the light around his own body in order to make himself seem invisible…
SLASH!
With a swift strike, he swung his katana upwards with enough force to send the beast a few feet into the air. Then, his katana disappeared as he jumped into the air and grabbed the pachyderm by one of its faces.
“I will break you!” he roared as he threw the beast back down to the earth, forcing it onto its back. Without hesitation, he followed this up by taking out his katana once more, and aimed it downwards, allowing gravity to take control with the blade prime to stab the multi-faced creature through all of its heads. “DIE!”
But just before he landed…
SWOOP--!
Keiji was forcefully stopped dead in mid-air, halting all of his inertia as he was now essentially frozen in place, barely able to move his lips. “Ghhh….h-how…hhhh--!” All the sudden, his body started to slow down by force, losing consciousness by the second,.
“Blood-clotting curse,” said the pachydemon as it stood up, “Don’t worry. It’ll all be over soon.”
In a bid to desperately get back in the fight, Sunset tried to fight off her headache and attempted to make her fire-sword reappear by snapping her fingers. “Ugh! Come on…come on…!” Unfortunately, all she could generate was a measly spark.
This was also right around the time that Adagio started to regain consciousness, rising to her knees. “What…what’s happening…?”
Sunset’s mind was still frazzled which led to her being unable to focus hard enough to cast any magic. But she didn’t let that stop her from fighting for what mattered to her. “Screw it--!” she grumbled in frustration as she charged at the demon full-force and leapt at her with whatever magic she could muster while preparing to tackle it. “Let him go!”
CHING!
Sunset bounced off of its body and hit the grass on the campus grounds nearby. The pachydemon had cast a high level magic barrier that reflected all physical attacks!
“I don’t think so,” it retorted, “I’m merely carrying out the will of this girl. She’s the one who wanted those bullies and her abusive family member to suffer. This is all for her. Don’t you dare interfere with me! Don’t you agree that someone who routinely beats their child and tortures them with grueling punishments should be dealt with?!”
That revelation caught Sunset off-guard. For a moment, she paused and stopped to consider what all of this was about. “...Wait…what? You mean Sour Sweet has problems at home?”
The beast gave a hysteric laugh in response. “OH! Now you give a damn?! Only when the chips are down and your own well-being is threatened do you actually start to consider the perspective of others. I knew it. You’ve been tainted by the overwhelming selfish stench of the humans that live here. Well that’s all about to change…” It turned one of its faces in Keiji’s direction…
The boy was sweating with his pupils dilated. Extreme panic had begun to set in once he realized he was at the mercy of this creature. All he could do was stare at it with his teeth clenched tightly, silently begging to be set free…
“Wait--!” Sunset yelped as she did her best to reason with it, “Explain to me what her problem is. I can help. I swear! Just put him down, and let’s speak about this more calmly, alright?”
But the pachydemon had a sadistic trick up its sleeve. “I think you have bigger things to worry about.” With a spark of magic, the spell over Keiji’s body was lifted…and the accelerated blood began to rush through his body at such a fast rate that his heart couldn’t bear it all.
“GH….NAAAAAGHHH!” His body started to turn pale as his eyes rolled towards the back of his head, all sense of feeling went numb as he let out a scream of death. His body returned to normal and he fell to the ground, clutching his chest while shivering and twitching uncontrollably.
In short? He was having the most painful heart attack in history.
Back at Canterlot High…
And as the events unfolded on screen, the entire Sophomore-grade class gasped in unison once they witnessed what happened.
Diamond Tiara in particular ran up to the television and screamed, “KEIJI! No…c-come on…get up. Please!”
Silver Spoon had no such reaction. Instead, she simply scoffed and muttered under her breath. “Hmph. That’s what he gets…”
A few of the students that heard her comment, including Applebloom and Rumble, turned to stare at her with blank expressions on their faces.
Silver Spoon had put her legs up on her desk, sitting back while tapping on her phone. She felt the looming gaze of the others and responded with a slightly annoyed, “...What?”