The sunrise revealed corpses, piles upon piles of Orc and Equestrian bodies strewn all over the town square, the ground slick with blood and gore. Terence drooped in exhaustion, staggering to a nearby bench to sit. Ralf stood staring at the pile of dead, wondering how many Orc bodies there were. Ponyville residents crowded around their dead, some grieving and others saluting the valiant stallions who had died defending Ponyville.
"Daddy?" A grey-maned young colt whispered to his dead father, who had been brutally struck down and smothered in his armour. Terence and Ralf looked away, nose starting to sour and eyes beginning to tear. Both English soldiers held their sorrow back. Other ponies openly wept for their dead. Applejack removed her leather hat in salute. Twilight and Rainbow Dash checked the corpses, dragging out survivors for volunteer residents to cart to the hospital or finishing them off if they were Orcs. Another group of volunteers carried and carted the dead off to Ponyville cemetery, which was already being expanded to accomodate the large number of dead fighters and civilians. Ralf decided to keep the poleaxe, unable to find his dagger in the mess. He would have to train with it somehow. He steeled his heart and unstrung his great yew stave.
"A report?"At Sweet Apple Acres, Terence had asked Twilight after the clean-up was finished. Spike tossed Twilight a piece of parchment that she neatly caught with her magic. She unrolled the parchment and recited.
"One thousand and two hundred Orcs dead and seven hundred ponies killed in the action. Not to mention over two thousand wounded." She looked up from her script.
"Thank you, Twilight, I daresay it is a victory we have won here today?" Terence enquired.
"We still lost, ponies died." Twilight flatly said.
"Jesus." muttered Terence. He sat on a lying log and started to untie the straps of his armour pieces. In ten minutes he was in just his tunic and breeches. Big MacIntosh picked up the armour in his teeth and carried them to three small fillies, which immediately did a comical leap in unison and shouted.
"CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS LAUNDERERS!"
"Shouldn't it be armourers? Or armour maintainers?" A yellow filly with a crimson bow tied to her mane raised an eyebrow.
"I dunno Applebloom, aren't armour clothes?" Her orange friend countered.
The three fillies who so insolently called themselves 'Crusaders' began to squabble amongst themselves. Ralf sat down at what Twilight called a 'polycarbonate and aluminium folding table' and grabbed a 'juice box'. Ignoring the ' straw', he tore off the top of the juice box and chugged down the contents. It tasted like apple juice, but the wording on the juice box was unrecognisable. It was printed in bright yellow and had a picture of Applejack somehow molded onto it. He crumpled the empty box and tossed it into a barrel repurposed as a container for waste.
"Say why would the Orcs come swarming out trying to kill us all of a sudden?" Rainbow Dash leant forward, looking around at her friends and the archer.
"Fluttershy here says they marched in, the attack was intentional!" Twilight inferred.
Ralf leant further forward, looking straight at Twilight.
"It is war you're suggesting, is it not?"
"We have no other choice, we can't just sit here and let them take all our lands!"
Terence unrolled an English banner and held it to a burly oak. With his dagger he stuck his proud banner into the oak.
"To war we go, then." Terence said, looking up at the three rampant lions emblazoned on the magnificent red banner.