Soon the company of guardponies emerged from the wooden fort. Many had dried blood covering their armor, and all of them had mud painting their gold armor brown. They all respectfully adverted their eyes as they marched past the main six. Captain Grapefruit left last, his horn igniting as he left.
A streak of fire burned towards the fort’s wall, bursting against it with a fiery aggression. It hungrily licked at the dried wood stacked high as walls and spread rapidly across the battlements. Burning high, burning fast. Burning all. Flames licked the sky, igniting the early morning dawn orange. The now compromised walls caved under the weight of stone soldiers. Crashed and crumpled. The shattering of stone echoing through the clearing.
By this time the company was gone though, marching in the direction of the village. Twilight headed the march, with Grapefruit just behind her. Behind him Rarity, then Pinkie, Applejack and Dash were quietly arguing beside each other, and Fluttershy was last in line.
Their march was slowed by a lack of any clear road, the group forging their way through brush and branch. Twilight and Grapefruit pushed and pulled as much out of their way as possible, the rest simply being pressed into the ground by their steady hoofbeat.
Their march brought them nearer and nearer the frail trails of smoke rising from the village. The forest seemed largely peaceful, snow and ice coating everything. The occasional white colored bunny, or white fox, would dart around them and scurry off into the woods. A gentle breeze wound through the trees, chilling the ponies to the bone.
As they marched another crunching step sounded a short distance from Twilight. She stopped, her head snapping to whatever made the noise. Grapefruit followed suit. And then the rest of the company. Everypony stood silently on their hooves, waiting for the captain to continue the march.
“Twilight, you and I are going to check that noise.” The captain began, looking directly at Twilight before turning to address his company, “All of you stay here. Be careful and silent. Twilight and I are going to check out the source of the footstep.”
Twilight nodded. She carefully began to walk towards the source of the sound, Grapefruit just in front of her. Even with them trying to make as little noise as possible, their hooves softly crushed snow and pine needles beneath them. Slowly they walked, looking around and silently moving leaves and branches out of their way with magic.
In the silence they could hear a ragged, wheezing breath emanating from somewhere behind a tree or two. Grapefruit nodded his head in one direction around the tree. Twilight silently, or at least as silently as she could, crept around one side while Grapefruit the other.
As Twilight slowly rounded the tree a hand, splayed against the bark and inside a fur glove. She continued around the tree, more and more of this bipedal thing becoming visible as she did. Its arm was covered in a linen coat, along with its legs. It wore some kind of boots over its feet, insulating against the snow. The eyes of the biped were squeezed shut, and its lips pressed against each other, trying to mask noise.
Captain Grapefruit was just on the other side his horn glowing softly. He nodded at Twilight again. Her horn glowed softly in response. As one they launched sleep spells at the cowering biped, sending a light purple and dark purple hue of magic vibrating across his body.
The young man immediately dropped face first into the snow. With little effort, the Captain lifted the bipedal thing up and draped it over his back. The two unicorns trotted back to the column and deposited their new prisoner into a cart. And then the company was back on the move.
The march continued towards the pillars of smoke drifting lazily into the sky in this early morning. As the drew nearer too the source Twilight could hear the sounds of wood being chopped, and construction. Hammers banging against wood, axes splitting logs. The crack of a tree being felled echoed across the forest.
The march entered a large clearing unimpeded. Twilight looked around and could see a large variety of these bipeds going about their day, not noticing the ponies at first. She could see children throwing snow balls, shouting—in a language she couldn’t comprehend— and running around. Several adult bipeds were working on building houses and chopping wood, thick beards and mustaches coating much of their faces.
Other adults trotted about cleaning clothes, taking care of young children, and cleaning. These ones all distinctly lacked beards, but a had much longer mane on top of their head. These ones wore dresses, while the bearded ones wore pants and shirts.
Twilight looked at this idyllic scene, and then turned to Captain Grapefruit. He looked back, his face set in stone. He nodded at her, silently reminding her of what she must do. She nodded and turned to her friends. They too were gazing at the peaceful scene ahead of them. Fluttershy looked back at Twilight with tears in her eyes, before every pony silently stepped up into another semi-circle.
At this point a couple of the adult bipeds noticed the armored company of ponies, and were curiously walking over. They all carried the different tools of their trade with them. Once in front of the company of ponies they stood in a loose line.
In response Grapefruit brought his soldiers into a solid wall of flesh and gold in front of the elements. One of the bipeds turned and shouted at the rest of the little village, “nienih tim rednik eid eis nemhen”
In response all of the bipeds wearing dresses gathered up all of the children and began taking them into their homes. The doors were shut and barred. The shutters were drawn closed. The once lively little settlement rapidly became the field for a standoff between an under equipped militia and well trained pony guard company.
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Crystal Fir was having a wonderful time in strange land she awoke and found herself in a month ago. The Prussians, which is what she learned the bipedal things called themselves in their native tongue, were helping her learn of their language and culture. The language was oh so confusing to her, not only did they use completely different words and spelling systems, but it seemed to her as if she heard the words in reverse of what they said. Even more confusing was the different grammar structure, vexing her to no end.
Her condolence was that they were having the same troubles learning her language as she was learning theirs. There were daily sessions of Crystal and ‘Karl’ trying their best to learn of each other’s language. While there were often successful sessions there were also frequent failures to translate things between the two languages.
When Crystal Fir wasn’t in the vexing language exchange classes she was permitted to trot around and look at the small port town she resided in at the time. As long as an escort of one Prussian learning her language and one ‘Musketier’, which is what they called their normal foot soldiers. These soldiers dressed and behaved very differently than the ones she would see in the Crystal Empire. They never wore any metal armor, instead wearing a dark blue waist coat and white trousers. Instead of a gold helmet a fabric ‘shako’ was resting on their head.
Another difference was the lack of a full spear. Instead they carried a ‘Muskete’ which apparently used a small explosion to propel a metal ball and strike something. It could be turned into a short spear with the attachment of a bayonet, which was a long knife that could be attached to the barrel.
The city itself had roads made of stone brick lining every street, and stretching off into the distance. Snow swept trees dotted park grounds that were scattered about and between the houses. Large government buildings could be seen everywhere, many operating as administrative center for the region. A barracks was used to train new soldiers nearby, and a foundry built cannons and ‘howbitzen’, which was like a cannon, but fired indirect shells that could explode or disperse ‘quicklime’. Crystal didn’t ask what ‘quick lime’ was.
There was also an opera house, which was lovely looking and had frequent foot traffic too and from it. It was surrounded by many businesses that were also frequented by the people of the city. A constant flow of raw and produced goods moved through this city’s port, wood and gold going out while things like iron and stone came in, along with a number of contraptions Crystal couldn’t understand.
All in all, she was liking this place, and hoped she could continue to translate the language. These ‘Prussians’ seemed to be very eager to learn her language. Crystal thought it was so they could trade and befriend more of her peoples.
She couldn’t have been more wrong.