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// Chapter 13: The Returning 
// Story: Red Clouds: The Strangers of Fate 
// by Akatsuki God 
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{Crystal Empire}

In the heart of the once great Crystal Empire was a destroyed city filled with changeling. The buildings were burnt, crushed, and any crystal statue of pony royalty was demolished and replaced with statues made of copper of Queen Chrysalis. The ground was covered with bodies, ash, and the bits and pieces of weapons and armor as the air within and around the destroyed city was polluted with ash and red cinders that gently made their way to the ground as they fell in the direction of the wind. Most of the bodies had some ashes over them and quite a few of them lay there with their mouths and eyes agape as they seemed to still be terrified by their attackers. The new occupants of the city did a poor job of cleaning up after exterminating the population as they only seemed to be concerned with either honoring their Queen or collecting what they called trophies from the dead unicorns and pegasus ponies, which were their horns and/or wings. 

Konan was walking into the destroyed capital as she saw the handy work and brutality of the changelings along with the former Akatsuki members. "So the ponies from before were speaking the truth." She said to herself. As she walked up to what seemed to be a large rectangular building that was missing more than half of its front end and with a cloud of smoke raising from where the roof once was. She walked further and noticed the head of a pony that still clenched his teeth with his eyes open. Konan stopped then bent down as she gently slipped her hand down his face, closing his eyes and mouth. She then rose, raising her hand directly at him. A moment later, small slips of blank paper formed from her arm and wrapped around the pony's body. Konan starred at the pony she had just covered. A tear began to form in her eye. "Such a terrible fate..."she said to herself. These poor ponies were taken by surprise and scattered to defend themselves......" The tear finally started down her cheek. "Even when all was already lost..." She then said as she remembered the former members of the Akatsuki that had attacked with the changelings. Konan closed her eyes as she gave a moment of silence for the dead pony, along with all of his comrades and innocent civilians and after that, her eyes shot open with a serious expression on her face as the outlines of squares started to cover her face and body. "Pain, I trust they have the same goals as us." Then the squares started turning into hundreds of small slips of paper as every slip folding itself into oragomi butterflies, all flying off in a random direction after folding. 
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{Manehattan}

The city of Manehattan was composed mainly of stone and wood buildings that were, for the most part, two to three stories tall, with the exception of a few builings near the city limits. The city was situated near a river that separated a seemingly never ending grassland that had a few trees scattered about the area and lush green grasses that covered the land with several wildflowers that also covered the area, from a large mountain range that lay nearly a hundred miles or so with Manehattan being on the side opposite of the mountains. The day was littered with light grey clouds with patches of blue sky here and there. The river was about 40 meters long with many sharp turns and twists with green water, almost making it look like a snake that seemed to go on for hundreds of miles. By the time Captain Shining Armor and his legion reached the city, things already started to look serious. Although the land around them was calm and without any sign of the chanelings, some of the ponies were evacuating deeper into Equestria while others joined the local militia, taking up immediate basic training after doing so. When Shining Armor and his two thousand legionaries entered the city, they were greeted by the militia, who were few in numbers even after having new recruits, and having two thousand trained legionaries as reinforcements straight from Canterlot gave them a boost in moral. The legion marched through the streets into an incampment on the outskirts of the city right next to the river. The ponies had already set up a wall around the city and another wall built between the incampment and the actual city itself. 

As Shining Armor walked into the encampment, he noticed that it was composed of several tents in rows and from where he and his legion marched into the encampment, they could see a tent that was quite a bit larger than the others and had two guards on either side of the entrence and right in front of it was a large camp fire with a few logs that lay close by which he assumed were used for seats. Shining Armor had dismissed his men to join the militia in guard and patrol duty and were assigned tents in groups of four to each tent, and with the tents anitially assigned by the militia one pony a tent added up to five ponies in each tent which was a bit cramped for them but seeing as the griffin and changeling invasion was already heading to Manehattan, this gave them very little time to prepare. With that they had to make due, even if overcrowding was an issue.

After dispersing his legionaries, he headed for the large tent, taking quick steps as he trotted past several other ponies that were either going about the encampment, on patrol, or just sitting around as they exchanged stories. A few moments of walking to the large tent he began to clench his teeth as he looked down, slowing his pace as he did so as he remembered his wife, who had aperently been killed during the fall of the Krystal Empire by the hands of the Akatsuki who fought along side the changelings. "Cadence......" He then shook his head as he continued to the tent to speak with the captain of the militia.
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{Old Akatsuki Hideout}

After Pain's meeting with Princess Celestia, he and the other Akatsuki had moved to another area to set up in order to stay hidden from any outsiders. Like the last one, this one was on the side of a cliff that overlooked Canterlot, but unlike the last one, this one didn't have any visible enterances, making it difficult for anyone to find it even if they knew about its general location. Inside the cave stood Pain. He appeared to be a holographic shadows of themselves with the clouds on their uniform in a rainbow like pattern as the only thing that was perfectly visible was his rinnegan eyes. "Kisame, why have you called me? You left the Akatsuki and attacked those ponies without my consent." He then stated.

Kisame was silent but grinned as he stared at him. "We'll for staters, during my time in the Krystal Empire, as they call it, I was with the former member of the Akatsuki." He said, still receiving a cold stare from Pain. "However, I didn't kill any of the ponies there, you see, I even brought you a gift to that may interest you." He then explained in a reassuring tone as he made a few hand signs before slamming his hand into the ground. "Summoning jutsu!"he yelled followed by a cloud of white smoke appeared from the ground that he hit. 

After a moment, Kisame lifted his hand as the smoke cleared, revealing a pink alicorn with a pink mane with yellow and purple strips which was easily Princess Cadence. She was on her side with her eyes closed. Pain stared down at her and after yet another moment, her eyes shot open as she lifted her head to look around. "You again, but when did you...and how?" Upon seeing Kisame. When his grin became slightly wider, she continued to look around only to see the holographic image of Pain. "Wha....Who are you?" She then asked. 

Pain then closed his eyes for a moment to think about how to respond. "I am Pain." He replied followed by him reopening his eyes. "I am god."