Chapter 23: The Incredibly Rocking Battle for the Crystal Empire
After skimming Sombra’s Big Book of Demons, or Big Book of Demon Summoning, or Demonic Magic, or…well, it had something to do with demons. Anyway, after reading Sombra’s black magic spell book, I realized something: people that summon demons are morons!
Sure, there’s all those stories about how this or that guy met some demon on a crossroads and traded his soul for whatever, and several years later the devil went down to Georgia to collect. The whole problem with this idea is that a demon actually needs to bother making some kind of deal for a casual summoner’s soul.
I mean think about it. You’ve got this infinitely age old being of great cosmic power that gets called up by some dumbass that is pretty much an ant in comparison and taken out of his cozy hellish home to do some kind of favor? For the guy’s soul in some kind of deal that the demon has to work at?
Yeah, that’s not going to happen for so many reasons.
But, just for shits and giggles, let’s say you actually decided to call on some hell spawn to try for that whole, ‘I’ll give you my soul if you make that hot chick love me’ kind of thing, or money, or a neat truck. You’re already summoning a demon with little experience on the thing, so yeah, you’re stupid enough to sell your soul for a truck.
Now, for starters, the demon doesn’t need to actually work to get the your soul. You just summoned a demon, you’re already damned. In fact, the damned status of your soul makes it pretty unclean, and therefore, unwanted by the majority of all things below. They’ve already got tons of them. What the fuck would they want with yours?
Second off, demons are mean, egotistical bastards. Even if one of these things did what your soul, a demon isn’t going to sit around doing some stupid job that may take hours, days, or years, when he could just reach forward, smash your body into little pieces, eat your soul right then and there, and then go home. Possibly causing a little bit of genocide before he leaves because…well, he’s in the neighborhood and as long as he’s in Florida, might as well go see Disneyland.
In fact, the only guys that should be summoning demons are the guys that can beat them down, wrap a chain around their necks, and make them their bitch. The kind of guys that don’t really need them in the first place. Sombra was one of these guys. He could deal with the monsters as an equal because he was already a pretty powerful unicorn before going to the dark side. Even the bigger ones had to make deal with him, because trying to just kill Sombra and take the goods would have been too troublesome.
Twinkling Guardian however, was just your run of the mill dumbass. He had no awesome magical powers or weapons to make the demon wonder if messing with the guy would have been a bad idea He just knew how to put the money in the coin slot and make the phone call to area code 666.
And so, when the dark demon of storm and shadow said that whole dares thing, I kind of got this little sinking feeling in my gut that the innocent bystanders that were just standing by were fixing to kind of get caught up in a crossfire after Twinkie got smashed in the non-alcoholic way. I dropped the whole disguise to increase my armor class and got ready to fight after dropping my on all fours once Twilight had kind of killed the bonus attributes given by my battle cry.
“I have summoned you demon! Now bow to my will and destroy all those who stand against me so that I may be crowned Emperor of the Crystal Empire!” Twinkie shouted as he pointed a hoof at the thing with fists as big as his whole body.
For a moment, I contemplated sucker punching the monster like what happened with the last shadowy monster since the ponies around me were apparently too nice to even think of such a tactic, but…as long as the monster in question was going to do our job for us, I really didn’t see the reason to do anything until after Captain Twinkie had been squashed.
Thunder rumbled overhead as the demon spoke. “Blood has been spilled, and the contract fulfilled,” the monster stated with…rhythm. “You sent for me, to state your plea. Now prove your mastery!”
It was then that I realized just what kind of monster I was facing. Truly, it was from one of the deepest pits of Hell, more terrible than Lucifer himself. Oh God, it’s a rhyming demon, I thought to myself. Out of all the hellish creatures that could have been summoned, this was indeed the worst.
Aside from that, it was also one of those contractually obligated demons with some kind of code. Once again, they don’t actually do anything unless the summoner can make them, but there are some sort of rule involved to expedite the process and give more options than your basic brawl of a power struggle where the demon might end up getting killed if someone who knew what he was doing called on it.
“W-What?” Twinkie managed to say as he turned around to look up at the monster cloud. “I summoned you! You will obey me! Kill the alicorns and the bug!”
Arabus let out a roar. “You called on me to do some deed, but broke the agreement so on your soul I shall feed!”
I fought down the urge to laugh in Nelson-style as the demon dog cloud thingy opened its mouth and let out a roar before dozens of tendrils lashed out to wrap around Twinkie. They pulled. He screamed, and a few seconds later I was watching as his shadow got torn from his body and lifted into the monster’s mouth. A second later it swallowed, and the crystal pony dropped to the ground, unmoving.
“It would seem close quarters combat is ill advised,” Celestia said before her horn lit up and she stepped forward. “Shining Armor, enclose the field in a barrier spell! I do not what this creature escaping to wreak havoc on the Empire! Allow Cadence and Luna to enter when they arrive, but that is all. Twilight, Omnifarious, with me!”
Tia leaped forward and lowered her horn while me and Twi did the same. A second later, she came crashing down on the dark crystal beneath us, shattering the obsidian on the ground before she fired a blast of her bright golden magical energy right at the towering demon with two more of purple and green not far behind. The three beams of magic struck the demonic smog cloud and…passed right through him on the way to Shiny’s energy barrier.
“Oh that’s just not fair,” I grumbled before our magic struck Shining’s shield, and he let out a painful cry.
I glanced back for a second to see Shining go down while letting out a cry of pain, and his barrier flickered on and off for a few seconds before he recovered and looked back at the three of us. “Hey! Watch it!”
Twilight winced. “Sorry!”
At which point Arabus let out a bestial roar and turned his attention in our direction. “You dare to attack me, little pony?”
Then the demon let out another roar, and more of his multi-tongue tentacle things shot out of his mouth and the three of us scattered in different directions to avoid the Japanese porno attack. But instead of chasing after us, the tentacles turned in direction and went straight towards the member of our group that couldn’t get airborne.
“SHINY!” Twilight cried out as she charged her horn while me and Tia just kind of watched as the demon’s attack grabbed Shining Armor. A purple aura surrounded the unicorn for a moment and there was a loud pop of magic, but after the teleportation magic cleared and Armor dropped to the ground, I just watched on in shock as the pony’s shadow was pulled towards the demon’s mouth. Meanwhile, his body lay on the ground with a glassiness covering his empty eyes.
All at once the protection spell failed, and Tia’s body was surrounded by a flaming aura of power before she charged towards Arabus. The Goddess of the Sun lit up her horn with a light that made her body’s flames seem dim in comparison. I was left to grab Twilight when she just forgot to keep flapping her wings and dropped like a stone in shock.
While I snatched up the purple alicorn, the flaming one rammed into the demon’s gut at full speed and proceeded to punch the monster with her front hooves several times while her horn worked to somehow cut at the shadow tentacles coming out of the dark storm cloud demon. With each punch and slice the creature cried out in pain.
A few of the monster’s frog tongues of darkness touched Tia, and were quickly burned away as the alicorn fought for a few more seconds to free Shining Armor’s shadow before she grabbed it in her teeth and yanked. Switching to a retrete, Tia began beating her wings in powerful strokes to both push herself away from Arabus and create a gale force wind that also kept the demon from approaching her.
Tia tossed her head in the direction of me and Twilight and let go of Shiny’s shadow. It landed on the ground and slithered along before coming in contact with the pony’s body, which immediately gasped for breath.
Seconds later, Tia landed in front of us and spared a second to look back at the unicorn. “Twilight, is your brother alright?”
“H-He’s breathing,” the little alicorn answered in an unsteady voice.
I stepped in front of the siblings to address the flaming goddess. “Mind sharing just how you did that?”
Tia let out a rather satisfied humph, and smiled. “It’s a demon made from clouds and darkness, and I am part pegasus and the Alicorn of the Sun. This will be over in short-AGH!” the goddess shrieked as I heard a loud crackling sound, and she was knocked to the ground before her flames died out.
A purple shield of energy appeared around the four of us in time to block another bolt of lightning, and another, and another as the Arabus quite literally hurled giant masses of electricity at us with his hands as if he was pitching small spears. By the fourth one, Twilight winced. “Really wishing I had a magical lighting rod right about now.”
With Twilight covering the defense and my changeling magic not built for such a job, I looked over to the other alicorn. “Hey Tia, are you okay?”
“A little tingly, but otherwise…fine,” she managed. “Just let me get the feeling back in my hind legs.”
I looked back up at the straining purple alicorn as bolt after bolt of lightning struck her shield. “Yeah…I don’t think we have that long.”
“In that case, I will handle defense,” the goddess told me. “Twilight, see if you can rouse your brother. We only need to hold out a few moments before Cadence and Luna arrive with the Crystal Heart.”
I looked over to the monster and frowned. “To be honest, I’d rather be standing over his corpse and ask what took them so long,” I said before looking over to Twilight as a few more magical lightning bolts hit the shield Celestia had erected. “Any ideas? I can kind of mimic Tia’s flames but…nothing like what she can do.”
“Well…um, we saw the dark magic flow into that figure before it became that…thing,” Twilight replied as the sound of lightning crashing in the background went quiet. “It has to act as some sort of anchor for the enchantment. If we can destroy it, then-oh no!”
As Twilight’s face turned from a thinking frown to a horrified expression, I heard several screams behind me and looked back to see just what was going on.
With Shining’s barrier taken down, the crystal ponies had attempted to flee the stadium en masse. However, there was plenty of congestion around the exits, and the demon that had been hammering at us rather unsuccessfully had turned his attentions towards the much easier meal of the trapped masses. Dozens of tendrils shot out from the being, wrapping around ponies and tearing out souls bound to pony shadows and delivering them into Arabus’s waiting maw. With each one, he seemed to increase in size, and grow even darker.
“Okay buck the heart, we have to at least provide a distraction,” I grumbled before looking back to the goddess. “Tia, cut the shield.”
A second later, the golden barrier winked out of existence, and Celestia got to her feet. “I am recovered,” the goddess said before she once again became a raging inferno. “Remember, each blow must carry pegasus magic to be effective.”
Twilight moaned and winced. “I never really got to that part in my flight training,” she said while I looked over to her in worry. Hell, Twilight was still nervous just sitting on clouds.
For a moment, Celestia locked eyes with Twilight, then nodded. “In that case, you’ll be our support. Hang back and teleport us away from combat if we are about to be overwhelmed.”
“No I can-”
“I would rather make use of your talents than foolishly see you risk your life in an attempt to prove your worth to me Twilight Sparkle,” Celestia told Twilight before she faced me and looked to the giant monster that seemed to have grown to at least fifteen meters in size from his gorging. “So…any ideas? Judging by your entertainment, I doubt humans lack for ideas when it comes to battle.”
I sighed. “I’ll create an opening, you hit him. Then I’ll use the opening your attack creates. We keep switching off and keep him off balance,” my strategic mind said before my survivalist brain functions could kick in and advise running away. Then I charged my teleport and, “Sind Sie das Essen? Nien, wir sind der Jagar.”
The two princesses just gave me an odd look before the world disappeared in a flash of light, and I found myself staring at the back of the cloud titan’s head before I called up my green flames to surround my hooves and drove them into the nape of Arabus’s neck.
As the monster let out a roar and turned while trying to swat me, I saw Tia reappear near his stomach and ram her own hooves into his body down there. I quickly put as much distance between me and the monster’s grabbing hands as I could as she did. Unfortunately, the giant hands of cloud moved a lot faster than they were supposed to, and I found myself moments away from being grabbed before the world disappeared in a purple light, and I found myself floating next to Twilight.
“Nice save.”
“Thanks,” she replied.
I looked around and pointed. “Now send me under his left arm.”
Our delaying tactic continued on like that for a good three minutes, with me and Twilight using her magic to teleport me in and bring me out while I took potshots at the monster and we both did our best to keep to Arabus’s back. At the same time, Tia would blink in and out, usually doing a lot more in the way of flashy tricks and damage than I could thanks to my less than healthy breakfast of Big Macs. This included punching holes in his body at random points, and at one point completely burning away one of his hands when the demon nearly caught her.
If she was about twice my size and a hundred times older, I might have been jealous. But then, I was only operating on some earth pony clones while she had full power and the whole sky to play with. Otherwise, I totally would have shown her up.
The assault had some effect on the creature, besides making him cry out in pain that is. Every blow we dealt reduced its size a slight amount, and Tia destroying his hand had probably knocked him down a good five feet by itself. Still, his position above the arena and pile of unconscious ponies underneath him had forced all the other crystal ponies to stop using half the exits, and the vast majority of them were left to huddle in fear on the opposite end of the stands while the crowd that was escaping barely moved at a crawl.
As Sparkle pulled me back for the twelfth time, I looked around and frowned. “Okay, where the hay are Luna and Cadence? I’d think a giant smog monster would actually-”
A loud…whooshing explosion filled my sense of hearing and Arabus let out a cry before throwing up his newly reformed hand to shield his eyes. In retrospect, that probably would have been a good indication looking in the same direction he was a bad idea, but I turned my head to the left anyway and was nearly blinded by the light of the crystal castle as it shot a blast of magical energy into the clouds above.
There was another boom of magical energy, and a second later, the skies were cleared of his black magic clouds, and my attention was drawn to a bright blue burst of magic on the floor of the stadium.
Twilight ported us down to where the other teleport landed and we found Luna waiting for us while Cadence checked over Shining Armor…and five other female ponies stood by the wayside.
“Cadence what took you so long, and what the hay are they doing here?” I demanded as I pointed at a pair of pegasi, earth ponies, and one white unicorn. “Get them out of here before they get hurt!”
A second after the words left my mouth, my vision was filled with blue fur, pink eyes, and a multi-colored mane as Rainbow Dash zoomed up in my face. “Hey! We’re not letting you cut us out of the heroics this time!”
For once, I wasn’t amused by Rainbow’s overly brave actions. They were charming back in Ponyville, but the thought of anything happening to Dash fucking terrified me like nothing else. “This isn’t a game Rainbow! That thing ripped out Shining Armor’s bucking soul!”
The thump of something hitting the grass drew my attention, and I saw Cadence just collapse on top of Shining Armor with a face full of worry as she continuously tried to gasp for breath. Behind her, the Crystal Heart just lay on the ground and…
I found myself staring at it. That delicious...delectable hunk of crystal with the love of an entire country. Removed from the Crystal Empire’s network, I just just taste the sheer amount of love held within it and I was amazed Mom lasted as long as she did in holding back from grabbing the thing.
It was love incarnate, everything I could ever want and more. With it I could crush the demon in front of me like a bug, I could protect all my friends, all of Equestria.
And it made sense after all.
Cadence just saw her husband go down. She couldn’t do anything. I could just take the heart up and use it to save the day, and...well...do anything I wanted after that really.
I licked my lips and...
Blinked when Twilight blocked my view of the Heart as she rushed up next to Cadence before a full on panic attack could start. “It’s okay! Princess Celestia managed to get it back,” she said before looking up as Tia continued to fly circles around the demon and blow random holes in him while Arabus’s fought back with movements much more sluggish than before. Apparently, the sunlight that he had blocked wasn’t doing him all that well.
“In that case, it is time to end this foolishness,” Luna said as she stepped forward and took a deep breath while I put up a sound dampening bubble around me and the girls.
“SISTER, STAND BACK SO THAT WE MAY END THIS CONFLICT!”
The flaming goddess looked down, then winked out of existence for an instant to reappear beside us a moment later. Her flames died down, and she nodded to Cadence before the pink pony princess grabbed the Crystal Heart in her magic again to lift it towards the demon.
Then, as the heart glowed with the delicious love of all the Crystal Empire’s citizens…their juicy...delectable...
“WAIT!” the monster cried out as he held up a hand towards us.
Please don’t start going on about how you’ve learned your lesson and want to be friends, I mentally begged.
Arabus lowered his hand that was still big enough to crush a pony, and growled at our little group. “Strike at me with discretion, for I shall destroy all of the souls in my possession!”
The threat made everyone in our group tense, and I grit my teeth. Oh well…that’s much worse. And actually, it had been awhile since we had a whole villain turning into a friend. Except Sunset of course, and…I guess that wasn’t too long ago. And Trixie, and…okay I guess we were due for an eternally evil bad guy after all.
As all the other ponies were giving each other hesitating looks, Celestia stepped forward and started up at the demon’s face. “Then release them, and return from whence you came!”
“NEVER! THAT WHICH IS MINE SHALL ALWAYS REMAIN!” Arabus replied. “BUT FOR MERCY I SHALL LEAVE THESE LANDS, NEVER TO RETURN AGAIN!”
Celestia’s eyes narrowed at the beasts words. “UNACCEPTABLE!” she shouted. “I will not allow you to threaten other lands.” For a moment, the goddess closed her eyes and took in a deep breath as she steeled herself, and I could feel Tia’s guilt already on the rise. “Cadence…prepare to use the Heart and deal with this monster.”
I frowned at myself as Celestia’s words ran through my head, as well as what the demon had said. All of that, and what had happened in the crystal caves. “Wait a second…this thing gets summoned when a pony spills blood on its runes, right? And whoever is responsible for spilling the blood gets to boss around the demon if he can beat it around, right?”
“Yes, I guess that’s how it works,” Twilight replied. “I mean, that’s why Twinkling Guardian thought he could control the demon. But what does that have to do with anything?”
I put on my best all-knowing evil grin and went, “Because Twinkie wasn’t the only one who caused blood to be spilled on those runes. Sunset also lost a few drops.”
Twilight let out a sigh and shook her head. “That happened because Flash attacked her Fae.”
“But I cut her hand on my horn before we ever even got there, and there was no way a wound like that had closed in just a few minutes,” I said before turning to face the demon and walking out of the group. And before Tia, Twi, or the somewhat groggy Shiny could raise a protest while everyone else was asking what the hell was going on, I pointed my holy hoof up at the monster and smirked. “Arabus, by the rules set forth in the agreement to summon you to this world, I claim the right to challenge you for the right to be called master!”
“WHAT?” most of the ponies that were around my size shouted.
A second later, Tia was beside me, “You cannot be serious!”
Thunder rumbled from the demon’s gassy body and it bent down. “Terms?”
“If I win, you have to take your sorry excuse for an existence back to where you originally came from before you were summoned, and give back the souls of all the ponies you’ve taken before you go,” I told him.
“And if I should win, I get you! Body AND soul!”
The threat made me flinch but…I let out a long sigh. There really wasn’t much else I could offer. “Agreed.” Although, I did wonder what he wanted with all of me. I mean, the guy ate souls, so what did he want my physical body for?
“NO!” both Celestia and Twilight shouted at me…I think the other girls did to but…Tia was pretty loud when she wanted to be, and Twilight’s close proximity at least allowed me to hear her buzz of a voice while Celestia went on. “You cannot do this. We can-”
I looked up at the goddess. “And if Cadence does that, all the nobility will turn against her. Ponies are already saying she’s just your puppet and junk. If we take any losses among the crystal ponies, we’ll have ten idiots like the pony who summoned Arabus by the end of the week.”
Celestia glared back down at me. “And if something happens to you, then what happens to all the changelings?” she demanded through gritted teeth, although a whiff of her scent told me she was much more frightened than she was angry. “Will they run rampant over Equestria? With Ponyville being their first stop?”
“NAME YOUR CONTEST, TO DETERMINE WHICH ONE OF US IS BEST!”
With Arabus back in rhyming mode, I found myself a little put off thanks to Tia’s questions. To be honest, I hadn’t really thought about that. But then…the girls could…probably handle things if things went bad…I hoped.
Pressure welled up in my chest. The kind that only comes when you find yourself in deeper shit than you intended, and needed to get out of things as fast as possible.
I looked around for inspiration while all the ponies just watched on in silence for a moment.
The sight of Twilight made me consider going with a trivia challenge or contest of riddles. But…a demon could just as soon ask me crap that I didn’t know about, and I had no idea just how much he knew of how the universe worked. So, that was out.
Looking at Rainbow Dash had me thinking of just trying to race the thing. But, I didn’t know how fast Jabba the Cloud could fly, and I was more than a little tired thanks to all the fighting I had done before.
Rarity…only gave me a fashion show for an idea.
While all the contests of strength that seeing Applejack brought up made me look to the ponies with the purely pink manes less than a second later.
Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie didn’t give me any ideas either beyond a staring contest, or playing the quiet game.
Then I looked over to Cadence…and then to Luna, followed by Celestia, and then back to Cadence…and inspiration struck. It was insane, stupid, and probably the most suicidal idea I had ever come up with since entering Equestria…
But on the other hand, if I really WAS in Equestria…there was no way in hell I could lose the challenge I was about to propose.
“Okay Arabus, I challenge you,” I said before pointing at the demon and striking a pose, “TO A ROCKOFF! As long as I can have some of the ponies behind me on the instruments.”
“AGREED!” Arabus shouted before he began gathering his magic.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the ponies behind me just stare for a moment in various stages of confusion and shock, with Rainbow going so far as to actually drop out of the air. “…WHAT?”
“Are you kidding me?” Twilight demanded.
Rainbow cocked her head to the side. “You can’t be serious.”
“Darling that’s so…”
“Stupid?” Applejack finished for Rarity.
I turned around and held up my hooves. “No, no girls I know what I’m doing,” I assured them. “I just need um…a backup band…or something.”
“Fairy…none of us know how to play any instruments,” Twilight told me.
I slumped in disbelief. “Say what?” I asked while looking around at the girls. “W-What about you Rainbow? I mean…what about…” I stopped myself from saying Rainbow Rocks just in time. To be honest, aside from the title of the movie, nothing else had come out about it before I got whisked about away to Equestria.
“Just because I listen to rock and roll doesn’t mean I know how to play the guitar Fae,” Rainbow told me as she got into the air and crossed her forearms while frowning at me.
As I looked at the other ponies in disbelief and began to contemplate my sooner rather than later demise, Cadence cleared her throat. “Well actually, I think Shiny knows how to play. He um…did serenade me during our school’s homecoming game.”
In the alicorn’s arms, the unicorn stirred. “Wha?”
I was on the unicorn in an instant. “Shining Armor, you gotta wake up and conjure your guitar or something!” I shouted while dragging the unicorn to his hind legs and fluttering my wings to keep us both aloft.
And then, there was the sound of a thunderous noise, and we both looked towards the gigantic demon as he began to play a set of cloud drums that seemed to be part of his body.
I’M A DEVIL
AND I PLAY METAL
A second later, Arabus’s instrument had changed to a guitar and he leaned down until he practically filled my vision.
I’M A DEVIL I CAN DO WHAT I WANT
WHATEVER I GOT I’M GONNA FLAUNT
THERE’S NEVER BEEN A ROCKOFF THAT I’VE EVER LOST
I CAN’T WAIT TO TAKE YOU BACK TO MY HELL
I’M GONNA FILL YOU WITH MY HOT DEMON GEL
I’LL MAKE YOU SQUEAL LIKE SCARLET PIMPERNEL
THERE’S NO WAY YOU CAN STOP ME
YOU NO DICK, SPAS-TIC FLUTTER PONY
“HEY!” I shouted at the demon, stopping his little song. “NO BODY CALLS ME A FLUTTER PONY!”
Then I looked over to Shining Armor. “Hurry up and summon or conjure your-” I got out before Shining’s horn lit up and his instrument appeared in his hooves. It was a… keytar. Oh dear God, my brain managed to say while I felt weak at the knees.
Shining let out a sigh. “I know…I mean… There’s just no way that we can win, that was a masterpiece,” he said. “He rocks too hard to be beaten by mortals man.”
Wait a second…I can’t just lose like this, I thought to myself. Not with everyone just standing there watching me.
So, I summoned up everything I had and looked over to Shiny before I grabbed the front of his coat with my hooves. “Celestia burn it all Armor!”
He’s gonna make me his sex slave
I’m gonna gargle his mayonnaise
“Oh no!” Twilight cried.
Unless we bust a monster mammajam!
The stuff I’ve been through was totally sick
Deactivated lasers with my dick
Now it’s time to blow this bucker down!
For a moment Shining hesitated, then looked up at the demon, then back to me, and nodded. We separated, and then Shining began playing on the unholy child of a piano and a guitar while I spoke to him. “Come on Shining now it’s time to doors down!”
“I hear you Fairy now it’s time to blow doors down,” Shining replied as he worked his…instrument.
Light up the stage cause it’s time for a show down
We’ll bend him over and we’ll take him to brown town!
OOOoooooh We’ll pile drive him, it’s time for the smackdown!
I turned and pointed my hoof back up at the demon.
Hey anti-Chrysler, Beelzaboss
We know your weakness
Our rock it’s sauce
We rock the casbah, and blow your mind!
We will defeat you, for all pony-kind!
You hold the scepter
But we have the key
You are a demon
We are pony!
We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony!
As Armor continued to sing, I quickly slipped back and whispered into Luna’s ear, and then into Celestia’s.
“Are you certain?” she asked before she looked over to Tia, who sighed before nodding her approval of what I asked.
We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony!
I nodded, then noticed something odd. “Uh…what happened to your old-time speech?”
We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony!
Luna cleared her throat. “Yes well...my sister did inform me of the reality of your knowledge some time ago, and since my followers aren’t actually watching me at this moment or reading of my exploits in your graphical novels…I decided it was best to integrate with my subjects.”
We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony!
“Ah, okay then…sorry about the lying to you thing,” I apologized.
We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony! We are pony!
Luna smiled and nodded. “It is alright,” she said. “To be honest, everypony would have probably thought you were crazy otherwise. Now, should I wait until-”
“OKAY THAT’S IT!” the demon shouted. “You’re not even singing! You forfeit the contest and-”
“HEY!” I shouted back at Arabus. “I didn’t even start to sing my song! That was just something to get Shiny in the mood to be my backup band and distract you while I talked to the princesses.”
Luna’s horn began to glow, and the moon rose to take a place alongside the sun while I trotted up to stand next to Shining Armor.
“Um…what’s going on?” he asked.
I let out an evil chuckle. “Just play whatever comes to mind,” I told him as I grabbed a set of drums and symbols from where the band had dropped their instruments to run away with my magic as I stood next to Shining Armor in the magical pony land, that created musicals on demand.
Then we played the first thing that came to our heads, and it just so happened to be.
Not just the greatest song in the world, but all of reality.
All thanks to the Music of Harmony!
And it went like this…
Apologies, but putting the lyrics to the greatest song in all of existence on this website would so overload it with its sheer awesomeness so much that the internet would forever crash and send mankind back into an eternal dark age.
I laid on the ground next to Shining Armor, gasping for breath as I looked at the torn up ground, sparkling skies, and northern lights that had come about during what was without a doubt the greatest thing I had ever heard, or would ever hear in a million, billion lifetimes.
“I…” Shining managed with a weak voice, “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to rock that hard again.” With that, he collapsed and passed out. A second later, Cadence took him in her magic, and out of my sight.
A groan was all I could manage in response. The finale of the performance where I had raised into the air and somehow amplified the awesomeness of the music using my wings fluttering motions to blast Arabus into nothing and free the shadows trapped within him at the same time had drained me completely, so much so that I knew I would have been dead without that tiny spark of Tia’s magic within me.
Over in the stands, all the crystal ponies that had been climbing over each other to try and escape the demon now crowded the seats, and I think there were even more ponies than had been at the hoofball game.
Both Luna and Celestia stood there, completely stunned.
Rainbow Dash wept openly as her whole body trembled from where she sat on the ground.
Sometime during the performance, Applejack had removed her Stetson, and still held it over her heart.
Pinkie Pie tried humming the tune, but then grumbled something about a transmission…or maybe a transition. I wasn’t paying her that much attention to be honest.
Rarity just kept breathing heavily.
And Fluttershy was- “THAT WAS SO AMAZING!” -yelling a lot and jumping like when Dash had done her Sonic Rainboom.
As for Twilight…I found myself gently scooped up in her magic before her transformation spell once again restored my fake alicorn form with its blank flank. And then…we kissed.
But of course she had to go and ruin the whole thing by giving me a frown afterwards. “Don’t ever scare me like that again.”
“Y-Yes Ma’am.”
“Ever!”
I gulped, and then quickly shut myself down to get some rest.