What is the difference between an Empire and a Tribe? To begin with the lesser of the two, there is the Tribe, which is a social division in a traditional society consisting of families or communities linked by social, economic, religious, or blood ties. These tribes also have a common culture and dialect, typically having a recognized leader that is often chosen through a display of being the strongest or wisest of the bunch, depending on the traditions in place. These groups typically are small communities that are often on the move and constantly competing to find the best resources available while they travel, often with a close connection between the leader and their subjects as the population is typically small enough that managing relations with each individual is possible.
Meanwhile an Empire is much more larger version of a tribe with much far more options but less sociability. An Empire is an higher organized and unified traditional society consisting of several group of states or countries under a single supreme authority, which is often referred to as an Emperor or Empress. Whereas the leader of a tribe is often referred to as a 'Chieftain'. This unity would often allow an Empire to grow prosperous and even larger as time went on but disallowed the 'Emperor' from communicating with the majority of his subjects directly due to the sheer distance and security concerns involved.
So, imagine my surprise when I learnt that near a thousand years ago, a great calamity originating in the Equestrian kingdom struck out at their leader, Empress Ashen Horn, and destroyed their capital city, in the aftermath. With the later invasion years later by the granddaughter of Commander hurricane, Wind Shear, who broke up the remainder of the once proud empire, and left it a culturally devolved group of primitives, adding its lands to the Equestrian border and granting, and I quote, 'Refugee rights' to these poor folk. The now former Empire consisting of some of the wisest minds of its era, gone. Under the leadership of the Moonslayer.
To say that the forest shook with rage with that discovery was an understatement.
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The Caretaker had stormed off, and the trees looked much more lively than usual. Instead of strangely swaying in an unnatural breeze that was a product of the strange magic that dwelled in the Everfree, it was more like an invisible hurricane was causing several of the trees to shake their branches, some even losing leaves to the over aggressive movements. Before that point, Chrysalis and the Caretaker had spent an hour talking at late over the misfortune that the Buffalo had been put through. To their surprise, the great calamity that had struck the nation was a strange purple semi-sentient goo that had once been referred to as the Smooze. Its terrors had struck after several dozen unicorns had redirected portions of it out of Equestrian borders and into the plains that they called home while they sought to find a more... Suitable solution.
The Caretaker had rushed out after that point Leaving Carl alone with Chrysalis, who merely cackled for reasons he did not yet understand. To him, ponies were weird. Bug ponies even weirder. Leaving the changeling queen to whatever it was she did, Carl instead resumed his watch over his ward, Twilight Sparkle. Preferring to follow the simpler route and leave the forest's caretaker to his devices as was standard to his habits, Carl only cared that the caretaker was moving again with vigor and haste, he hadn't seen the old tree-pony move with such speed since well... ever. But he was just a young sapling of fifty years to know the ins and outs of the forest, but he fancied himself one of the smartest trees around, as odd as that was. Of course anywood would comment that the non-moving trees acted as a collective, which far outstripped his own, he would reply back that the trees barely did any thinking as he did, and that those trees and their 'great intellect' often reacted like a bees nest when things happened to it, and would often go into long winded rants to itself about what was better, rain or sunlight. He gave a mental shudder, reminding himself of the great winding rant that went on for ten years at one point of time on the subject.
Meanwhile he looked to his ward, and frowned in disapproval. Her hornlock was mildly misaligned, do to her tampering with it, so he went over and fixed it much to the purple one's dismay. When he turned around again, he noticed immediately that she tried to tamper with it again, and so without even looking back, reached out with an extension of himself, and grabbed her with a branch off his very tree-like form.
"Woah! Let me go!" The purple one in his charge yelled out, but Carl didn't listen to it. Instead, he took a bit of excess wood from a tree, hard wood, free of bark, but never the less durable for his purposes, and did the one solution to stop her from tampering with the magic-lock. He coated it with wood, mending and shaping it around the pony's head and leaving it locked in place, covering everything but her face and ears.
"Are you done trying to tamper with it now, or should I add more restraints?" Carl asked.
"Why are you doing this!?" The purple one plead, "Don't you know Chrysalis is evil?!"
"I only know what I want to know and from my reckonings, I don' think you know quite what you think I know." Carl said, earning himself a smirk as he saw Twilight get momentarily confused expression as she processed it, and he added in, "What I do know is that your little sunny shine princess ain't quite what you know, and that both sides are in the wrong for one reason or another. That's just war and politics, no high ground in which to root for, ya know?"
"But she mind controlled my brother and kidnapped my soon to be sister in law!" Twilight protested.
"And your little miss sunshine, or 'Moon-Slayer' as my pa likes to call her, did a lot of bad things to get to where she was." Carl replied in turn, was he supposed to be chattin' with his ward? He didn't quite know, but it was a bit more entertaining than talking to them dumb tree collectives about what kind of nutrient intake was best for the season.
"Like what?! Celestia is the kindest pony I know!" Twilight snorted angrily, and Carl supposed if she wasn't wearing a comical remake of the classic safety helmet, she might of looked somewhat threatening, but seeing as she was a magic-less unicorn with shackles and the safety helmet, it was kinda funny to see her indignant.
Carl humored her line of questioning, "Well, Them buffalo be one thing, and another be how the Caretaker be referring to her, 'Moon-slayer'. Seems kinda nonsensical to me, he never did really tell me why... Just that the big pony hidin' inside tha' grand old castle in the mountain was the slayer of the moon's 'Caretaker'."
Carl trailed off in thought, "Hey... if the moon was slayed, why is it in the sky anyway...?" he pondered that for a moment, "Maybe it has another caretaker? Eh... I don't know..."
"Caretakers?" Twilight asked, slightly confused, "What do you mean 'Caretakers'-" She was interrupted as Carl continued.
"Yeah, like my pa takes care of the forest, another took care of the moon, but shes gone now." Carl explained.
"You mean princess Luna then." Twilight had a look of considerable thought, "Wait a second... a thousand years ago Luna turned to Nightmare Moon, and was banished to the moon by Celestia for a thousand years... Is that banishment what this 'caretaker pony fellow meant by 'Moonslayer'?"