//------------------------------// // Trial by Wood // Story: Agents of Discord // by Scarlett Haze //------------------------------// Traveling through planes of existence is not a pleasant experience. Think about one of those spinning dryers for a moment. Put a rubber ball in it and imagine it being thrown around in the dryer's fastest speed and heat. This time, instead of winding up back home, I was right back where I started, in a open area of the Everfree Forest. "H-hang on a minute here. What the hell just happened?" I quietly told myself before hearing howls around me. I cringed, knowing that it was timberwolves. "Not this again," I moaned. Getting close to the ground, I kept shifting around to check for movement. "Come on, come on, I know you're out there watching me," I whispered. Hearing the rustle coming from behind, I had spun, bringing up my forearms up and roundhoused a rear leg into the side of a timberwolf's face, making it break apart. After the initial shock of watching the entirety of the creature fall to the ground as a pile of sticks, I grabbed the longest stick from the fallen beast and wielded it as close to a staff I could. "What I'd give for a flamethrower by this point," I said, backing back into the center. The glowing eyes of the timberwolves had started appearing in multitudes, making me nervous about my chances. "Come and get me, firewood!" I yelled out. "I got a stick and a temper that's red hot right now, let's go!" The eyes faded away, letting me ease up for a moment. When the ground started shaking, I got tensed all over again. That's when a huge timberwolf stepped out and roared into my face, an obnoxious smell blowing out of its mouth. "JEE-ZUS! Get a breath mint for that thing!" I yelled before a giant paw came over me. Zipping out of the way, the paw hit the ground as I took to the air. The thing took up a huge chunk of forest, It looked to have built itself from entire trees. "Alright, Quentin. If you expect to take down a god, you'd better be able to take THIS out in some way," I attempted to say to myself confidently. Moving into a dive, the wolf reared up and took another swipe as it stood.The push of air alone made flight difficult, I was surprised how well I took the shift and rolled around the head. The stick I had didn't have that much luck as it managed to break in two, making me drop it. It's head followed the roll by twisting as I flew back up in preparation for another dive attempt. "How do you work, anyway?" I asked myself, now curious how wood could form around into a shape of a wolf. "Are you alive? You must be, because you breathe..." Swooping down for another attack, I pushed against the air with my wings and threw my hooves forward, aiming for the side. Hoping to complete this ridiculous concept of maybe hurting it, I decided to yell out something random before cracking through its body. A loud cry of pain rumbled from the giant wooden monster as I had to resign myself back to the ground and out of its sight. Despite feeling proud about hurting it, my body refused to feel happy about it. Keeping my sight on its movement, it had started sniffing around. Knowing hiding wasn't going to be option for long, I tried thinking of another way of taking down a giant pile of lumber. I gave a quick look to my mental map of the forest and locked onto the river. If I could lead the wolf to the waters, the wood could begin floating away and stripping the wolf before it finally would keel over. Nodding to myself about the plan, I shot up back into the air and whistled out. "Yo! Kindling!" I called out, making it twitch it's ears before turning to where I was shouting. "Yeah, I'm talking to you, bundle of sticks! Come and get me if you can!" Flying off, I tried to remember where the river was. Seeing the ruined castle grounds that marked the base territory, I began speeding off towards it. The sound of loud crunches from behind me let me know that the wolf was hunting me down. I heard a bark before a sharp pain came careening from my back and my flight suddenly failed. Being so close to the tree line, I hoped not to get battered too hard or to at least get to the deeper waters of the river to carry out my plan. I hit a lot of branches, mostly with my face, but many more whipped against my body and legs to a point that the pain had already become numbing as I hit the forest floor. I was right by the river side as I hoped to be. Hoping that the sea dragon was still there I tried to call out. "Help," I coughed out, my throat unable to get loud. The pain that had wracked my body was focused into my chest. Looking down at it, I had nearly gagged. A long, straight stick was poking out. The entirety of its length had only gone through about three quarters of the way and was tinted red with blood. Taking both hooves and placing them on the pole, I gave a hard tug and felt the intense pain that came from the effort of pulling out the rest of it. Letting out the only scream of agony I had left, I felt the presence of the giant timberwolf bearing down on me. With little energy in me and blood continuing to fall out, I resorted to using the spike that had impaled me to try and stand again. The wolf's stench of its open mouth let me know he was close. Turning to greet his eyes, I held the pole up to defend myself. "You-u-u-u w-w-want m-m-me," I shuddered out, already losing my sight as I gripped the hole at my chest. "Th-th-then get i-i-i-t." With a final look of victory, the timberwolf's mouth opened, turning its head to chomp down on me. Seeing a light inside the wolf's mouth, I chucked the wooden spear that had crippled me towards it. The mouth closed, but I wasn't swallowed. The sound of falling trees, branches, and lumber simultaneously hit the ground as I was also brought down with it. Laying on the wood pile that used to be the wolf's head, I saw the light and stick come rolling down to me. The light came from a green gem, the stick I had thrown managed to pierce into it. I could barely think anymore, but I could only focus on one thing; digging myself from the pile with the help of my new best friend, the walking stick with a green gem on the end. Gripping the blood encrusted spear, I pulled myself out of the wood and back up on my rear hooves. Both forehooves wrapped around the stick as I had started dragging myself toward the direction of the broken castle ground. How I managed to get to the entrance was beyond my recollection, but eventually I got to where the hidden entrance had to be and banged into the switch, revealing the slide and hole. Falling on the opposite side of the wound, the slide took me right back into the base. "What the-? HAY! Somepony get over here, this pegasus is hurt bad!" My vision had finally gone down that I couldn't even see anymore from the pain and how tired I had become. Different flashes of ponies and light came through certain times and the sounds had been muffled throughout it. "-through withers and out through the chest-." "-clean dish to start removing splinters-." "-isn't the healing spell working-?!" "-naturally resistant? That's insa-!" "Rest easy, Quentin. You'll awake with healed skin." *** URGENT NOTICE Princess Celestia, I have some unfortunate news that I had recently came across. In the book about the Discordian Wars, I managed to learn more about human strengths and weaknesses. I had little time to truly focus on it with the teleportation machine that I had created. The machine is actually an amplifier on a transportation spell. On other ponies, I'm sure it is rather effective in sending them across dimensions, albeit with a massive drain of power as a result on the end of the machine. The reason I mention it works with other ponies is because I was horrified to learn on how humans were able to fight against the magic of Equestria's unicorns. Their bodies have a heavy resistance against magic itself, making many offensive magics completely fruitless against even a single warrior. What is even more shocking is that Discord is not unfamiliar with the concept of making humans into ponies either. He purposely changed their looks to infiltrate behind Equestrian lines and gather further information about battle tactics, weapons, and positioned forts. Even in their changed state, they managed to retain this resistance. I'm worried that despite having seen Quick Fix being enveloped by the spell and transported away, I'm unsure if he made it back to his Earth, let alone be able to break through the dimensional barrier itself. I'll continue my research for now, but as warning to you, I believe without doubt that Quick Fix is still in Equestria. He may be far away or close to Ponyville, but either way the threat of his presence has still not been taken care of. As such, I apologize for not being able to complete your task and will attempt to remedy it by the next night if he is found. Faithful Student, Twilight Sparkle *** Stirring up, I could hear a bunch of activity around me. The ceiling I was looking at was indeed the stone ceiling of the underground base, so I was curious as to what was going on. Tensing myself to get up made my body freeze in pain, enough to shut my eyes and clench my teeth for a moment before relaxing again. I could at least turn my head, and I was surprised to see the pole with the green gem laying next to me. The wood had a darker tint of red from the blood that had now seeped into it, making me feel slightly uneasy about what happened last night. The effort to bring up my hoof with the watch still sent echelons of pain from my body, but I forced through it, opening an eye to the time remaining. 1 day, 15 hours, 43 minutes, 19 seconds, 0 firsts "Nothing like added pressure to go along with your pain," I grumbled, slowly lowering the watch. "Mr. Fix?" I heard a voice call me. "I'm Doctor Stable, medical doctor that worked on your wound." He looked down at me, giving me a face to associate with the voice. Looked to be a golden colored unicorn with a long brown mane. He looked to be somewhat flustered, but I would guess it would've been having to work under the conditions of perhaps one of the worst places that could be operable on. "Good to know," I crackled out, my throat unable to create any spit. "Got a drink?" "I'll tell Zecora that you'll need a drink," Stable responded. "She's been giving me a lot of knowledge about you, despite the lack of medical records or any potential complications that you may have gone through in the past. Of course, the standard practice for open wounds is a regenerative spell, it regrows broken muscle fibers, any potential fractures, and of course is able to cover the wound with new skin." His face grew dark before continuing, "However, such a spell had little effect on your body. Blood loss was becoming a major problem and the hole, despite showing slow signs of recovery, wouldn't be able to be shut. Zecora made aware the fact that you are human to me was indeed shocking, but worse so the fact that humans are practically immune to magical effects and spells themselves." He went to the bandages to my chest and slowly removed them, showing a hole still apparent in me. "Hold still, I'll be giving your dose of the spell now." The doctor's horn lit up and focused onto the wound. Sure enough, it was just barely even reacting. Despite that, the pain had been stopped and held up from the magic that was being used on me. He slowly dropped the spell from me, bringing back the pain as he replaced the old bandages with new ones. "As you could tell," he began, "my own magic cannot heal a basic wound like this without an extensive period of time. This spell for other wounds similar to other ponies can be taken care of in roughly two cycles, one if I am not under duress with other patients." I grimaced, not from pain but from disappointment. If I wasn't going to get healed in time, I wouldn't even be able to have an attempt to reach Canterlot's gates. "Zecora will be with you for a moment, said she wanted to do something with you when you woke up," Stable finished before moving off. *** "This stone and staff, pushed through the body, let his blood and spirit embody," Zecora chanted, lifting the staff up and above me. "Let weapon and warrior be together, through every trial, war, fire, and weather," she continued, moving the staff across my body. "With purest intent of protection and defense, let both their fury's be intense!" She finished, swinging the staff towards the ground before halting it and setting it down gently. She knelt down afterwards and looked down to me. "Rise up, warrior, your training must begin. Take up your staff and fight me, until you win." She moved back and got her staff, readying herself for a fight. "I can't get up," I answered. "I'm not healed yet." With a cry, Zecora brought her staff up and down toward me, forcing me to roll and get my own staff. Barely standing, the pain in my chest and back was enough to make me cough. "If you expect to fight creatures beyond your might, you must push beyond your restrictions in order to smite," Zecora ordered before she began her charge.