Shortly after Poached Eggs
The underwater kingdom of Seaquestria was in ruins, the castle along with all the lantern buildings were destroyed. The ruins themselves were on the ocean floor and some had fallen onto rocks. There was nothing left on the ceiling from the lantern houses but there was barely anything left on the ceiling from the castle. Every seapony in the area seemed to have been crushed by a piece of rubble.
A seapony who had been crushed under a boulder only its fin sticking out and started moving trying to wiggle out from underneath the boulder.
Another seapony who was buried under a pile of broken wood managed to get herself out, she had gotten a black eye, a few scars and lots of splinters. Once she got up she stumbled over to a piece of rubble and lifted it up revealing 2 male seaponies underneath who had been badly bruised each with 2 black eyes.
They would find and save another seapony and that seapony would join the search party. Eventually once they were able to find and save every civilian seapony they tried to sort out the rubble and after a while gave up due to the huge amount of it.
Skystar managed to climb out of the castle rubble not long after all the civilian seaponies were found, with a bunch of bumps, 2 black eyes and a broken fin.
"Wow these seaponies work fast" she thought spotting the whole population of Seaquestria swimming around.
"Guess i should better start rebuilding this place and hatch a plan to steal those dragon eggs so this doesn't happen again" she thought before putting on a coconut helmet
A Few Months Later
It's been a while since the hippogriff's first defeat against Twilight and her herd, they took a pretty bad beating especially Silverstream, Princess Skystar and Queen Novo and not only that Seaqustria itself also took a pretty bad beating.
Turns out the underwater volcano from their first attempt to steal and eat the eggs set off a domino effect which set off a bunch of other hidden underwater volcanoes.
Inside Queen Novo's throne room were a few seapony guards were there along with Princess Skystar who was serving her mom some seaweed and cooked sea creatures. Queen Novo had a fin to her forehead in disappointment pondering about the first encounter with the herd and not really focused on the food her daughter was serving to her.
"Look mom i know you're still upset about both the dragon eggs and the destruction of Seaquestria, well guess what we managed to rebuild the place and then maybe we can discuss stealing the eggs from those land dwellers." Skystar informed her mother before sliding another plate of sea food onto her throne.
"Princess Skystar it's more than losing the eggs to those land ponies and Seaquestria getting destroyed there was also the injuries i and many other seaponies and hippogriffs faced i got 2 black eyes, bumps all over my body and they even bent my antennas which i'm pretty sure the land dwellers thought was a crown which is why they bent it." Novo responded in an annoyed tone pointing a fin at the bandaged up set of antennas.
"You know a crown doesn't sound half bad" she stated breaking her annoyed tone, putting a fin on her chin.
"And plus not to mention the multiple broken bones and injuries, many hippogriffs and seaponies faced from those collapsing structures, we lost almost half of all our guards! And guess what Silverstream is still recovering from her battle injuries. The reason why she is still recovering but me and you are already healed is because since we're royalty and have these lights above our heads we heal faster." the Queen continued on
"And adding to the destruction of Seaquestria, since all those underwater volcanoes destroyed not only the castle but also all the lamps houses and due to all the support strings on them snapping, you decided to rebuilt the place with all the houses connected to the castle."
"And since you used all the glass, wood and stone materials on those now destroyed structures the houses are supported by weak material which could cause structural problems." Novo concluded swatting a random plate of sea food off her throne, the plate shattering when it hit the rocks below.
"Okay look mom i know the material i used to rebuilt the houses was weak but it can't be weak enough to cause-" Skystar was suddenly interrupted by a table crashing through the roof of the throne room and landing in the middle of the floor surprising every seapony in the room "Sorry about that" a random seapony said from above.
"See what i mean!" the seapony queen said pointing a fin at the fallen almost broken table.
"To be honest Skystar i don't really think you did a good job at making this room sturdy." Terramar cut in leaning against a stone pillar only for a part of the pillar to collapse a few seconds later catching him off guard and almost getting him crushed by the rest of the stone pillar.
"I think it might be a bad time to discuss the dragon eggs" Skystar said nervously followed by a nervous laugh before sliding her one last plate of sea food onto her mother's throne before swimming out of the throne room.
Meanwhile on land Twilight's herd was still working on making the shiny crystal tree they found their new home. They found the tree a while ago not a few months after their first encounter with the hippogriffs/seaponies behind a throne bush wall, part of a throne cube.
"Looks like were gonna need more wood" Rainbow informed the others noticing the lack of progress being made on the rooms of the treehouse.
"I'm already on it Rainbow" Applejack said walking over to a tree "I've always wanted to try this" she mumbled before bucking the tree but as soon as her back hooves hit the tree her ponytail fuse ignited and when it reached her mane she blew up turning the tree to ashes. "God bucking damm it!" she said facehoofing herself before trying to sweep away the ashes of the tree.
"Alright everpony as forepony i suggest not only more wood but also more of other materials like stone and vines to keep the tree and wood together." Twilight told the rest of her herd.
Flashback
Twilight not long after finding and recruiting the 2 members of a group or trio called The Cutie Mark Crusaders was looking for another pony to recruit and add to the herd. She was looking for a pony that was rational and capable of long time survival.
Interestingly and luckily for Twilight, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo didn't slow her down they didn't complain about the constant traveling and walking or the lack of food. Twilight guessed that these 2 fillies either started off complaining about these survival conditions but later got used to it or they were already used to these conditions.
Twilight was looking for any signs of another pony, hoof prints, chopped down trees, or empty fruit trees.
"COMING THROUGH!" a mare voice yelled catching Twilight off guard, but luckily made her get out of the way. A light blue pegasus with a rainbow mane flew past the unicorn and crashed into a nearby tree.
"Sorry about that just trying to gain some speed" the pegasus informed Twilight. "Why are you just randomly flying around trying to gain some speed, supersonic flight is gone." Twilight explained.
"First of all i'm randomly flying around cause i'm not a part of a herd yet and second of all i'm trying to gain supersonic speed so i can perform a sonic rainboom" the pegasus informed the purple unicorn
"I've heard of a sonic rainboom before but that's just an old mares tale, pretty sure it's not possible even with supersonic flight." Twilight countered
"Oh come on my name's Rainbow Dash it's like i was born to make a sonic rainboom" Rainbow said in half annoyed half angered tone.
"Alright Rainbow Dash since you're not in a herd and your dream is to make a sonic rainboom guess you can join me and 2 fillies in my herd." Twilight offered
"Eh i guess i don't want to be flying across the lands trying to perform a sonic rainboom and plus maybe i could use my speed to collect resources." Rainbow said nonchalantly
"I was actually about to ask you if you were rational and capable of long time survival and i guess you are, so come along." Twilight concluded walking back toward Apple Bloom and Scootaloo, Rainbow following behind.
Now In The Present
"Still a huge threat just like last time" Skystar in her hippogriff form thought looking at Applejack and then the rest of the herd with a pair of binoculars
"Only if there was a way to distract them like a copy of myself" Skystar whispered putting her binoculars down, ducking behind the bush she was hiding behind and writing down clones in her notes.
"Hey thought of a new plan yet" Terramar whispered coming out of the bush Skystar was hiding behind "Cause all i managed to find is this brown rock with spikes on it which i'm 76% sure is edible." he said before shoving it into his mouth and try to chew it.
"Why a random number like 76?" Skystar asked
"It's the first number that came to my head." the male hippogriff responded slightly muffled before spitting the pinecone out of his mouth.
"I'm thinking of using clones or some kind of decoy!" Skystar informed her cousin
"I got an idea, how about cardboard cutouts we'll just make cardboard cut outs of the dragon eggs, me, you Silverstream and Queen Novo and use them to distract those land ponies." Terramar proposed
"There are 2 major flaws to your plan aka suggestion first of there's no chance that herd of land ponies is stupid enough to fall for a cheap trick like cardboard cut outs. Second of all we don't have a whole lot of access to cardboard i mean we live underwater so the only way we have access to cardboard is through the trash on the beach!" Skystar countered
"Fine maybe the cardboard cutouts of ourselves won't work but there's a small chance the cutouts of the dragon eggs could work" Terramar responded
"That didn't even address the- that's it we're done here" Skystar concluded grabbing her cousin's claw and dragging him to the beach shore.
Skystar in her seapony form was swimming around near the sea shore on a different part of the beach, the part of the beach where the shore was full of trees and bushes.
"Shelly, Sheldon what do you think i should to get those eggs?" Skystar asked the clams with googly eyes after a few moments of silence Skystar frowned.
"I'm getting too old for this" she said before dropping the 2 clams into the water. Shortly after her first encounter with the land ponies her whole personality for a while, mainly during the time she was helping rebuilt Seaquestria became about the dragons eggs and a plan to steal them and once she did think of a plan it'll be hard to get back into her old habits.
Skystar then decided to reach for the nearest fruit bush and grabbed a orange from it , but this was a special type of orange. This orange, if you bite it too softly all the juice will come out but if you bite it too hard it will explode.
"Alright Skystar you can do this just gotta get the right amount of bite power." She told herself before biting down on the orange, which ended up pouring out all its juice into the water creating a puddle then trail and finally swirls of orange juice.
"Dang it!" Skystar said throwing the remains of the orange onto the shore, landing in a bush. She turned into her hippogriff form and got out of the water to explore the land. All she really found beyond the special orange bush and 2 palms trees was a few other plants and trees.
"Wow this place looks a lot better from the outside" Skystar commented leaning against a random rock.
All of a sudden the rock was surrounded by a pillar of green light catching the hippogriff off guard and causing her to step back from the rock.
Once the pillar of green light disappeared a weird looking creature was revealed, it looked like a light blue land pony but it had blue non-reflective eyes it also had what looked like a transparent red tail and shell, overall this creature seem to resemble a bug.
"AHH GET AWAY FROM ME!" Skystar lashed out causing the creature to get scared and fly off into the mix of bushes and trees.
"For a big bug looking creature it sure wasn't all that threatening." Skystar thought as she continued to explore this new area, after a bit more of exploring she found an old discarded mirror. "Huh surprised i didn't find this on the beach shore." she said examining it.
Skystar then noticed her reflection, her along with the majority of Seaquestria had never come across a mirror while they heard of one which was described as the water but more clearer. While Seaponies did mainly use shiny objects like gold to check their reflections, they would occasionally use the water itself to check their reflections.
Finding this mirror she decided to mess around with it doing flying tricks, making faces and a bunch of other things. She eventually had to sneeze and noticed that her reflection didn't copy causing her to freak out and throw the mirror aside revealing that the glass part of the mirror was missing and what she was looking at was just the frame of the mirror.
"AH DOPPELGANGER!" Skystar yelled picking up a big rock and getting ready to throw it.
The second Skystar was suddenly surrounded by a pillar of green light revealing the same bug creature from earlier except this one was green, had purple non-reflective eyes, was taller, 2 orange antlers and purple transparent tail and shell.
"HOLD ON!" the green bug creature yelled covering his face with its hooves "Look i mean now harm i'm just trying to survive out here just like you and other creatures."
"Wait, bug-like creatures like you can change their appearance and gender?" Skystar asked
"Yeah i'm a creature called a changeling i can change my appearance, in fact i can change my species" it said before transforming into a male hippogriff.
"I can basically change into anything i want" the changeling said before transforming into a rock, then a tree, an apple tree and finally a seashell.
"By the way my name's Thorax and even though i can change my appearance, species and even gender i'm a male changeling i'm not non binary" Thorax explained
"My name's Skystar- wait a minute weren't you just way shorter and light blue earlier?" Skystar asked
"Oh so that's where she went, i'll be right back" Thorax responded before flying into the trees and bushes and coming back a few moments later with a deer.
"Skystar this is Ocellus" after a few moments of silence Thorax got annoyed and looked at the deer "Um Ocellus drop the disguise." he requested
After another few moments Thorax got even more annoyed "Fine if you won't drop the disguise i'll make you drop it" he said before pushing the deer into a puddle of water making the changeling drop the disguise.
When the changeling revealed itself Skystar recognized it as the bug creature she saw earlier.
"And if you're wondering no, the water didn't upset her and she dropped the disguise it forced her to drop the disguise, water is our weakness, another weakness is that whenever we disguise ourselves the eye color is green." Thorax explained
Skystar opened her notes again and looked through them eventually finding the clone/decoy plan "Hey i've got an idea how about you 2 help us with something" she offered
"What's in it for us?" Ocellus asked in a shy tone
Skystar actually didn't think of this part since she didn't think they would ask that question "I got it how about survival resources you know, food, construction material."
"Eh good enough" Thorax responoded
Skystar turned back into her seapony form, Thorax and Ocellus turned into fish versions of themselves and followed the seapony to Seaquestria.
"Welcome to Seaquestria kingdom of the seaponies" the seapony introduced to the 2 fishes before leading them into the throne room.
"Hey mom i finally thought of a new plan to steal the dragon eggs from those land dwellers, with those 2 creatures" Skystar said pointing at the 2 changelings disguised as fishes.
"Seriosuly Princess Skystar 2 small fishes?" Queen Novo complained in an angered tone before swatting another plate of cooked seafood off her throne, the plate smashing on the rocks below.
Skystar swam over to the disguised changelings "Hey drop the disguise if you don't my mom won't believe me."
The 2 changelings turned back into their normal forms but as soon as they did they both started drowning struggling to breathe.
"I didn't mean your normal forms, i meant seapony forms" Skystar informed the changelings in a half eager half panicked tone.
The changeling quickly turned into seapony form which was basically their normal form just with a fish tail in place of their back hooves.
"Alright here's the plan so we distract the land ponies with something, take the eggs and replace them with cardboard cut outs, that won't trick them for long so one of the changelings will turn into you and once the land ponies destroy the final structure the changeling will take the beating for you" Skystar explained
"First of all which one will take the beating for me and second of all are you sure they can copy others and not just change their species?" Novo asked
"Pretty sure they can that's how I met them one of them was disguised as me" Skystar responded
"Guess i'll take the beating" Thorax said answering Novo's second question before transforming into a exact copy of Queen Novo only difference being the eye color which was green "I mean how bad can these land ponies be?" the fake Novo states.
"This could work, especially considering that you look and sound like me " the real Novo said "Are there any disadvantages or weaknesses?"
Thorax turns back into his seapony from to answer the seapony queen's question "Yes there's 2, first the eye color every living form we take or copy the eye color is always green, so if we disguise ourselves as some creature else they might notice the green eyes" he explained before switching through a variety of seaponies and sea creatures before going back to his seapony form.
"And second is water if our disguised form touches water, it forces us to drop the disguise" Thorax explained
"Wait a second if water makes you drop the disguise how are you 2 down here underwater?" Novo countered "Huh can't believe i didn't notice that until now" Skystar commented
"Well that's because we can only take the form of sea creatures and now seaponies if we want to get into the water." Thorax explained before turning into a copy of Queen Novo from earlier.
Back on land Twilight was checking the progress her herd made on the crystal treehouse and noticed that even though some progress was made the place was nowhere near finished.
"Alright everypony wrap it, we made enough progress today." Twilight informed the rest of the herd, once they heard this they all climbed down from the crystal tree, careful not to knock or break anything which would destroy some progress they made.
Meanwhile not too far away from the nest Princess Skystar, Terramar Ocellus and Thorax were all hiding behind a bush going over the plan.
"Lets go over the plan again, Terramar you place all these cardboard cutouts of trees and bushes down" Skystar said pointing a talon at the stack of cardboard cutouts.
"Which will distract the land ponies and while they're distracted i'll take their dragon eggs and also replace them with cardboard cutouts, that won't distract them for long so once that fails Thorax will disguise himself as Queen Novo and chase after him got all that."
"What was that i was too busy trying to bite this brown rock with spikes on which i'm 84% is edible" Terrmar said before going back to biting a pinecone
Skystar face clawed herself dragging her claw down her face accidentally scratching herself but luckily the cut wasn't deep enough to draw blood, she then had to go over the plan again.
Terramar grabbed a cardboard tree and wrapped a vine around the stack of cardboard cutouts, he then moved hiding behind the cardboard tree just in case the herd saw him while dragging the stack of cardboard along.
Twilight was leaning against a tree reading a Equestria history book, Fluttershy added twigs and some leafs to the nest, Applejack was watching over the eggs and Rainbow was on lookout duty to spot anything strange.
"Uh ponies there's a bunch of fake cardboard trees and bushes over there" Sweetie Belle said spotting the field of Cardboard cutouts.
"We better go check it out could be a sign of something" Twilight told the rest of the herd, they all followed her leaving the eggs unprotected.
Princess Skystar then flew over and quickly grabbed the 3 dragon eggs followed by Terramar who replaced them with cardboard cutouts.
"Hey everypony i'm gonna try folding on these cardboard bushes" Applejack informed the rest of the herd before grabbing one of the fake bushes and folding it into a square "Ta Da!" she said which was followed by clapping.
Applejack then put the folded up cardboard bush under her hat. Rainbow had checked behind the last fake bush "Doesn't look like there's anything here." the pegasus informed the other members of the herd before they all headed back to the nest.
Once the herd got back to the nest they didn't notice the fake dragon eggs at first "Uh guys is it just me or do the eggs look a bit strange?" Scootaloo asked
"Yeah they look a bit flatter than usual" Apple Bloom added before touching one of the eggs. As soon as the filly touched it the egg flew over revealing it as a fake egg, a cardboard cut out.
The herd all gasped at the same time realizing what just happened "Where did-?" Twilight asked approaching the nest a little. She got angry, the herd following shortly. Rainbow then spotted Queen Novo not too far away from the nest, not noticing Princess Skystar and Terramar hiding behind Ocellus who was disguised as a rock .
"It's the hippogriffs!" Rainbow yelled alerting the others "I knew it, those darn half birds half ponies but also half hippogriffs half seaponies" Twilight said through gritted teeth.
"Guess their queen wasn't lying when saying they're not gonna stop until they eat the eggs" Applejack said trying to calm Twilight down.
"Come on everypony, Rainbow go prepare the slingshot, Fluttershy go grab some pressurized sea shells, time to pluck some hippogriffs." Twilight told the rest of the herd
Queen Novo had already finished building a structure and had also gotten 3 hippogriffs into position. Most of the structure was made out of wood, there were 3 planks placed vertically on either side, also on either side was another set of planks placed horizontally that were holding 3 stone triangle blocks, 2 of them were placed to make a square with the last one on top of the stone squares.
The middle part just had a another pair of vertical wooden planks on either side and the top part had a horizontal plank which was the platform for yet another pair vertical planks on either side which were holding up one last horizontal plank which was holding 2 stone triangle blocks. Inside the top part of the structure was a stack of 7 short wooden planks, and inside the bottom part of the structure was 3 male hippogriffs hiding under a pile of 6 short glass planks, the hippogriff in between 2 others was wearing golden armor.
"Wanna bet i'm the last one taken out?" the armored one asked the other unprotected hippogriffs
"This one should be easy enough" Twilight thought as she hopped into the slingshot and was aimed at the structure "AJ aim me at the bottom planks that should collapse the entire structure" the unicorn requested, Applejack fulfilling.
Once Twilight hit the wooden plank she let out a battle cry which collapsed and knocked over the structure and ironically enough the hippogriff wearing golden armor was the first one to be plucked by the collapsed structure shortly followed by the other 2.
The next structure the herd came across seem to resemble a kitchen there was a stone pillar with a triangle stone block on top, behind it was a stone box, on top and inside the stone box was tiny wooden blocks and behind it was a female hippogriff wearing blue armor, overall this part of the structure resembled a stove with a chimney.
The second part of the structure resembled a house it was made out of wood and glass planks and some stone blocks. Inside this makeshift house were 2 male hippogriffs sitting on wooden blocks and in between them was a hollow block that was holding up a plank resembling a table.
On the left side of the table where the first male hippogriff was sitting was a short stone plank with small wooden blocks which resembled a plate with food on it.
"For a simple structure Queen Novo sure has some creativity" the left hippogriff told the other hippogriff before looking down at the makeshift plate.
"That pillar sure looks unstable" the female armored hippogriff commented backing away a little from the stone chimney.
"Alright crusaders here's the plan let's go for the roof of that house." Apple Bloom told the other 2 crusaders pointing a hoof at the glass part of the makeshift roof.
They all hopped into a slingshot, Fluttershy pulled back the rubber and aimed them at the roof before releasing them. The 3 fillies all manage to make it and smash through the glass roof plucking the male hippogriff on the left. Unfortunately they weren't able to make the entire roof collapse and take out the other male hippogriff.
Twilight had already hopped into the slingshot and was being pulled back by Fluttershy "Fire me at the stone pillar and you take out the last hippogriff in the makeshift house." Twilight explained before being launched at the stone chimney.
The unicorn then let out a battle cry which knocked over the stone pillar crushing and plucking the armored female hippogriff.
Fluttershy grabbed a pressurized sea shell and used her wings to try to pull back the slingshot rubber band as far as possible. The herd never relied on pulling back the slingshot themselves since it would take a lot of force to pull back a giant rubber band, so they would usually rely on another member of the herd to pull back the slingshot.
Once she felt confident that it was ready she released herself she flew past the knocked over stone chimney and dropped the explosive seashell on the wooden table. The blast didn't hit the other hippogriff but luckily the explosion knocked Fluttershy up which destroyed the second part of the roof causing the stone triangle block to fall on and pluck the second male hippogriff.
After that structure was taken care of the next one the herd found was basically just a wooden bridge, all 4 hippogriffs on the bridge were hippogriff guards.
"This structure reminds me a lot of Mount Aris" a male hippogriff whispered over to a female hippogriff before going back into position.
Rainbow observed the bridge a little before coming to a conclusion. "If i know bridges, i know that if you take out one part the whole thing collapses" Rainbow concluded before flying into the slingshot
"If you want to make the whole thing collapse guess i'll fire you at the middle part, cause once you destroy that part it'll drag down the rest of the bridge and pluck all those hippogriffs." Applejack informed the peagsus before aiming at the middle part of the bridge.
After a few moments Applejack released Rainbow who sped up and smashed right through the middle part of the bridge leaving a rainbow trail behind, causing the entire bridge to collapse knocking all 4 hippogriffs into pits of hollow glass blocks plucking them.
The next structure they came across and found was strange, but that would be an overstatement it was more different than strange. The structure was on a hill, there was a small tunnel in the hill where 4 males and 4 female hippogriffs were, one of the female hippogriffs was a guard.
Blocking off the tunnel with the hippogriffs was glass, wood and stone hollow blocks that were held together by wooden planks.
Applejack jumped into the slingshot and stared at the structure for a while before coming to a conclusion "Eh i can handle this" the earth pony said which was Rainbow's cue to start pulling the slingshot back. Applejack was launched out and hit a hollow stone block breaking it.
Her braided ponytail fuse ignited and it eventually reached her mane which resulted in a explosion, it managed to destroy most of the hollow wood, glass and stone blocks a few of the blocks fell into the tunnel and plucked 3 hippogriffs leaving behind 5 hippogriffs one of them was the female hippogriff guard.
"Guess i'll pluck the remaining hippogriffs" Rainbow sighed before flying into the slingahot and pulling herself back. Rainbow is the only member of the herd to somewhat get the hang of pulling back the slingshot themselves.
Rainbow launched herself into the air and sped up and managed to pluck the rest of the hippogriffs including the female guard.
"Wow even with armor these hippogriffs are really easy to pluck." Rainbow commented before flying out of the tunnel and back to the herd.
"Alright everypony we hopefully made it to the final structure, cause it's the last one as far as i can see" Twilight said looking around the flat terrain for anymore of the hippogriff's structures.
The first part of the structure had a tower, the bottom and top part of the tower had stone blocks. The top of the tower with all the stone blocks, on top of that pile was a few wooden blocks and the middle part of the tower had 2 stone planks on either side and one stone plank in the middle. Finally inside the tower were 4 hollow wooden blocks.
Behind the Tower was Queen Novo and a female hippogriff guard and behind the guard was a normal male hippogriff hiding behind a tiny version of the tower, his tower barely reaching his beak.
Twilight didn't notice until now that this structure was on a stair looking platform on the right second step was a male hippogriff guard and behind him was 3 normal female hippogirffs each hiding behind wooden planks each increasing in size.
Rainbow went first, she dashed forward leaving a rainbow trail behind hitting the top of the tower the pile of stone blocks , although this didn't break the stone the pegasus hit it with enough force to pluck the female and male guard and crush Queen Novo.
With the stone tower now destroyed Fluttershy was flung next throwing a pressurized sea shell easily plucking the 3 female hippogriffs.
The herd then approached Queen Novo who survived the stone tower falling over, only suffering a few bruises.
"Alright Queen Novo where are the dragon eggs?" Twilight demanded "You're crazy if you think i'm gonna tell you that." Novo responded
This reponse just got her growled at by Twilight and her herd "This is your last chance Novo tell us where the eggs are or we'll beat you up." Twilight clearly stated through gritted teeth
"I'll like to see you try" the hippogriff sassed
"You ASKED FOR IT!" Twilight yelled before punching Novo in the face before grabbing her by the tail and throwing her into the stair platform the final structure was on.
Rainbow then sped forward giving the hippogriff a black eye, the crusaders then beat Novo up, Fluttershy smacked the hippogriff queen with a normal seashell, and Applejack finished her off by blowing up and blasting her away into a puddle of water.
Right before the herd's eyes a pillar of green light surrounded Novo for a second and once it disappeared it revealed Thorax who was badly bruised with bumps all over his body a black eye and one of his antlers broken.
"This isn't Queen Novo who is this?" Rainbow asked "Wait a second everypony i think i saw this once in my Equestria history book." Twilight said pulling a book out of her saddle bag and flipping through it which took a while, and also took away some of the herd's patience.
"Ah i found it changeling, they are bug looking creatures, that resemble ponies they can change their species and gender." Twilight explained to the rest of the herd.
"Wait just an apple bucking minute why are creatures like changelings in a history book shouldn't they be in a species book?" Applejack asked
"Well that's because throughout Equestrian history there have been multiple changeling sightings and reports" Twilight answered.
Twilight stomped on Thorax with all 4 hooves as Rainbow looked over flat terrain failing to notice Princess Skystar and Terramar with the dragon eggs hiding behind Ocellus disguised as a rock holding in their laughter.
"They actually fell for it!" Skystar thought still trying to hold in her laughter.
With Twilight's herd distracted and confused Skystar, Terramar and Ocellus had made their way to the sea shore and back to Seaquestria.
"The plan's was a success mom better get started on the eggs!" Skystar informed her mom "Oh yeah my feast almost forgot that was a step in the plan." the real Novo confessed. The white seapony then flipped through a cookbook and once she got to the egg section she looked through all the different ways to cook them. "Ah here it is boiled eggs, sounds a lot better than poached eggs." she requested before handing a seapony guard the cookbook.
Back on the surface the herd was still confused and kinda worried about where the dragon eggs could be. "Where else could the dragon eggs be?" Apple Bloom asked, double checking for anymore hippogriff structures.
"Alright this might sound crazy but what if those hippogriffs took the dragon eggs underwater to Seaquestria again?" Twilight brought up.
"That's crazy Twilight last time we went there, we basically left the place in ruins by destroying one of the structures which activated a underwater volcano followed by many others" Rainbow countered
"It's our only alternative if the eggs aren't down there who knows where they could be?" Applejack said grabbing the folded cardboard bush from under her hat and putting it in her saddlebag.
The herd but on their scuba diving equipment, the fish bowl helmet with a tube connected to an oxygen tank. Once they headed underwater and found Seaquestria they were all shocked to see that the kingdom was still in tact.
"Dang it i thought we destroyed this place" Twilight said through gritted teeth getting angry. "To be honest i guess these seaponies work fast." Applejack said being brutally honest
"Am i the only one who noticed that all the lanterns are now connected to what i assume is the castle?" Sweetie Belle asked pointing a hoof at the castle.
"Nope noticed it as soon as we got here" Scootaloo added
"It's still as beautiful as last time especially with the sparkles on and around the kingdom." Fluttershy complemented
"I've seen better looking kingdoms and buildings in Equestrian history books" Twilight stated giving the others an unfazed look. The herd couldn't tell if Twilight was exaggerating or not, for the most part they believe she was since there's no way a picture from a book looked more beautiful and majestic than a actual in pony kingdom.
At the same time the herd thought that maybe she wasn't exaggerating since she had a serious unfazed look on her face. Maybe the unicorn owned an enchanted or special edition book or something like that.
A male seapony guard swam into the throne room to inform Queen Novo "Your majesty it seems the land dwellers had made their way down here!" the guard exclaimed in a panicked tone.
"WHAT!" Novo yelled dropping the pepper shaker of black pepper and the dragon eggs, Skystar being able to grab the eggs in time.
She then looked at Skystar "Princess Skystar you didn't plan anything for this part like build another structure , you know when they CAME DOWN HERE!" Novo yelled
"In my defense mom you don't want Seaquestria to be destroyed like last time right?" Skystar countered "That was only because nopony knew about the hidden volcanoes." Novo countered back
"You know what fine, luckily i have a special line of defense in case something like this happens. GUARDS DEFENSE POSITIONS!" the Novo yelled. All of a sudden a bunch of male and female seapony guards with spears all grouped together blocking off the throne room and covered a bit of the castle.
"Alright this is the seaponies last line of defense, we break through this we get the dragon eggs back got it?" she asked the rest of the herd getting a nod from all of them.
Rainbow hopped into the slingshot as it was being pulled back "Lets go for the guards first then we can focus on the castle." the pegasus told the others before being released, she sped up and swam through a line of guards taking them out, scattering their armor and breaking their spears.
Twilight had already pulled back the slingshot and was waiting for the next member of the herd to hop in. Fluttershy hopped in next and as soon as she did Twilight released the rubber band launching Fluttershy upwards. The pegasus managed to take out the remaining seapony guards with a single pressurized seashell.
"The guards are taken care of now we can focus on the castle!" Twilight said while pulling back the band on the slingshot. The Cutie Mark Crusaders went next and they all were launched the glass looking material on the lantern, unfortunately the material wasn't fully glass so the 3 fillies only managed to crack it before sliding down to the rocks below.
"Alright Twilight shoot me where Apple Bloom and her friends were shot cause maybe i can break through the glass and blow up whoever's inside." Applejack requested
"Sounds like a long shot but it just might work" Twilight commented before releasing the earth pony towards the castle.
As Applejack headed towards the cracked glass material an electric eel got in her way and seeing the earth pony as a threat attacked and bit her electrocuting her before swimming away.
Meanwhile a moments ago inside the throne Queen Novo heard all the destruction outside "I never said this plan was gonna work" Skystar said out of the blue
"Yes you did the 5 times" Ocellus responded before turning into Skystar "I have a feeling this plan is gonna work just find" the changeling said before changing back into her changeling seapony form.
All of a sudden Applejack broke through the glass material breaking a huge chunk of the wall off before blowing up. But instead of an bomb explosion, Applejack released a massive electric shockwave which knocked debris everywhere hitting Skystar and Ocellus in face but leaving Queen Novo and the dragon eggs unharmed.
Once the electric sparks faded from Applejack's body Twilight and the rest of the herd entered the destroyed throne room.
Queen Novo reached behind her throne and pulled out a cardboard cutout of herself which Terramar as part of a plan pitch. "How about you give the cutout the beating while i give you the dragon eggs back." Novo said which was followed by a nervous laugh.
"Actually i'm thinking of something else for you that also involves cardboard." Applejack said before reaching into her saddlebag.
Twilight let out a sigh of relief having gotten the dragon eggs back, the Cutie Mark Crusaders jumped for joy, Fluttershy examined the eggs to check if they were safe and Rainbow was growling at something. It then revealed that Applejack had crushed Queen Novo with the cardboard bush she folded earlier.
Applejack saw Novo's tail moving so she stomped on the cardboard bush one last time for good measures.
"Welp everypony that's one hippogriff and seapony scheme foiled and a second successful save" Twilight said to the rest of the herd in a cheerful tone.
"Using a changeling to pose as Queen Novo and trick us" Twilight mumbled before picking up the 3 dragon eggs with her telekinesis.
"Hey AJ what was the deal with that electric shock wave?" Twilight asked the earth pony. "I'm not sure Twilight all i really know is that it came from that electric eel, but i doubt that'll happen again." Applejack said confidently as she followed the rest of the herd out of Seaquestria.
Skystar having suffered a throbbing black eye, bent antennas and a temporary scar swam over to her mother "At least Sequestria wasn't totally destroyed this time." the only response she got was her mom saying something muffled, barely audible.
As the herd swam out of Seaquestria with the dragons eggs the castle along with all the lantern houses attached to it collapsed once again leaving Seaquestria in ruins.
"Come on you 2 i know there's treasure down here i can feel it." Scootaloo said confidently to the other fillies while using a shovel to dig through the dirt. "I think i got something!" the pegasus filly said hearing her shovel hit something hard.
Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle trotted over to the hole Scootaloo was in, the pegasus then came out of the hole covered in dirt but more importantly with a treasure chest with a giant golden lock on it.
"Woah this must hold something very valuable if it has something like a lock on it." Apple Bloom pointed out, starting to mess around with the lock mainly by pulling on it.
"Come on you 3 the hippogriffs just STOLE THE DRAGON EGGS!" Fluttershy yelled catching the 3 fillies off guard. The Crusaders then spotted 3 female hippogriffs guards, each carrying one egg, after making it over a hill they ran into a small dortress that Twilight was easily able to destroy.
The herd then started launching themselves and destroying things around the hippogriffs in hopes of catching them off guard. The guards then ran into a small wooden shack, which was a little more sturdy than the hay one but was no match for Rainbow Dash who easily destroyed it.
Despite all the exploding objects around them all 3 female guards managed to make it into a metal dome the doors slamming shut. No member of the herd could even make a dent in it, even Applejack the strongest member of the herd only left a tiny tent in the metal dome.
"Never thought we would try this method again but grab every object you can and load them into the slingshot!" Twilight commanded. Despite the herd's effort this did nothing against the metal dome and didn't even leave a small dent like Applejack.
"Wait a second why are the hippogriffs in there if they want to bring the eggs to Queen Novo?" Applejack pointed out getting wide eyes from the others.
All of a sudden Queen Novo popped up from the top of the metal dome "HAH! take that you land dwellers knew a metal dome was a good idea! Time to cook these eggs!" she taunted before ascending back into the dome closing the hatch.
Twilight looked for anything else in the area that could be loaded into the slingshot before noticing the chest the CMCs had found she quietly grabbed the chest and loaded it into the slingshot before firing it. The chest when it hit the metal dome instead of snapping into pieces like everything else the herd fired the golden lock came off and when the chest opened an artifact rolled out.
The artifact simply resembled a severed griffon talon on a golden base. All of a sudden a portal appeared in the sky and a strange creature flew out of it and destroyed the metal dome launching Novo and all 3 female guards back towards the ocean. Miraculously the dragon eggs were unharmed and the herd got a good look at this strange creature.
The creature seemed to be a mix of every Equestrian creature Twilight knew about, it was dark blue, had a horn and wings looking like an alicorn according to the history books. Left hoof was a griffon talon, right hoof was a hippogriff talon, back hooves were yak hooves, the tail of a seapony, spikes of a dragon along his back, and the shell of a changeling.
"Um are you okay who are you?" Fluttershy asked walking up to the creature "My name is IE but you can just call me E, i'm the lord of chaos, from the chaos dimension." IE explained
"What do the letters IE stand for?" Rainbow asked with a puzzled look on her face
"It stands for Intermittent Explosive" he responded this strange name left Rainbow speechless "Yeah think i'll just called you by your nickname" she said casually trying not to slip a tone into her voice.
"I've been waiting for ages for someone to free me from the chaos dimension." IE said before stretching his talons and hooves.
"What happened and how did you get trapped in your dimension?" Twilight asked with a half-concerned half-worried tone.
"You see before i got trapped in my own dimension i used to leave it whenever i was bored and mess around with reality. That was until a group of 6 ponies called the Dark Pillars Of Equestria used dark magic to try and rule Equestria, enslaving every creature. I was able to stop them but that got both me and the pillars trapped in the chaos dimension." IE explained
"So where are the pillars?" Fluttershy asked
"I don't know but since they were just 6 normal ponies while i'm a chaos lord it's safe to say that the pillars are gone for good so nothing to worry about." he reassured Twilight's herd
"Moving on!" IE said flying over and grabbing the severed giffron talon on a golden base "If you ever want to summon me just throw this talon and i'll take care of the creatures you're fighting in some chaotic way , but only if it a absolute emergency cause if i'm interrupted too much i'll stop helping you creatures got it." he asked before getting a nod from the herd.