//------------------------------// // World Nine - The Red World // Story: The Conversion Bureau: Worlds Where It Wouldn’t Work // by Sora2455 //------------------------------// This story started off the same way all the best ones do: with a tremendous explosion. "We're under attack!" One of the guardsponies yelled. "Sound the alarm!" "What is it?" One of the ponies further back cried. "Are the Changelings back? Are the Seaponies invading? An Usra Major?" "Humans!" The first guard yelled back. "What? Don't be daft!" The second guard yelled back, all traces of worry gone from his voice. "Humans are, like, the only things that can't be attacking!" "Bomb di wind!" The ball of magically compressed air hit the castle wall, blasting the second guard down and blowing a hole in the fortifications. The first guard snorted. "Told you so." A second spell blew him the way of his comrade. "Geez Louise!" Lina Inverse, the 'beautiful genius sorceress' cried as she dusted off her hands, magically levitating in mid-air. "I've seen bandits with better training than that." "Uh.. Miss Sylphiel... are you sure this is the right way?" Princess Amelia of Seyruun wondered, flying alongside the red-head. "Those looked kinda like royal guards... and this kinda looks like a royal castle..." "Um..." Sylphiel the cleric flustered as she once more balanced her sceptre on her palm. When it fell, it pointed directly at Canterlot Castle. "My magic still says it's this way." "Don't worry Amelia, royal castles always have the best stuff to loot!" Lina assured Amelia. The white-clothed princess sighed. "Sometimes I wonder why we travel together, Miss Lina..." At this point Zelgadis caught up to the three. The sorcerer with a body made of stone gave Lina a flat stare, one cobalt eyebrow raised. "I know you always like to poke things with sticks Lina, but we broke that Barrier on the way in. We can go get your money now. No need to go looking for some Demon Lord equivalent." Lina spared a glance backwards. "Aw, come on Zel. I tore through that Barrier like paper. Whoever put it up must be a total wimp!" She grinned fiercely, showing her incisors. "Wimp?" Zelgadis gaped at her. "It took most of the remaining power of the Dark Lord Shabranigdo to make the Mazoku Barrier; that level of magic doesn't happen by chance." A lucky guard managed to hit Zelgadis with a crossbow bolt, but it bounced off his rock skin. "It took the death of Hellmaster Phibrizzo to make said Mazoku Barrier fail. Whoever put this one up must be at least as strong as he was." "Ha!" Lina barked, absently flicking a Freeze Arrow at a Pegasi guard. "No way. You're over thinking this, Zel." "I refuse to take that from the girl lobbing fireballs at a castle." Zelgadis muttered. "Heeeyyyy! Wait up, you guys!" The lone non-mage of the group, Gourry Gabriev cried as he ran full tilt through the streets of Canterlot. "Gourry...!" Lina growled. "Hurry up, you're making the rest of us wait!" Several Earth Pony guards tried to intercept Gourry. Their valiant efforts went completely unnoticed as he shoulder-barged them, sending the poor ponies flying. "Hey, you guys are the ones who left me to climb a mountain while you flew up. Not cool." He retorted, reaching rough equilibrium with the spellcasters outside the castle walls. "Oh, are we all here then?" Came the unwelcome voice of Xellos as he phased back into the material plane. The blue haired staff-wielding priest nodded as he saw the five adventurers. "Good, good." "Mr Xellos? What are you doing here?" Amelia wondered. Xellos gave his usual smirk. "That - " Lina grabbed the monster by the front of his shirt. "If you say 'that's a secret', I'm going to burn that staff of yours to ashes." She threatened. With a shrug, Xellos vanished from the sorceress's grip. "Fine, be that way." His bodiless voice echoed. "I'll see you later on. Do watch out for the ballista, won't you?" "Ballista?" The four airborne targets echoed. They barely had time to share a worried glance before the giant crossbow-like weapon nailed Zelgadis right in the chest, sending him sprawling through the sky. "Get down!" Lina cried unnecessarily. Amelia let out a squawk as pegasus-made lightning missed her by centimetres, aborting her downward glide into a sidewards dodge. "Oh, for crying out loud..." Lina muttered, having made it safely down herself. "Flare Arrow!" Seven bolts of yellow fire magic raced upwards, scaring the pegasi spit-less but more importantly dispersing the clouds they were using. "Hi-ya!" Gourry cried, making himself useful by smashing the castle ballista to bits with his family sword. He resumed his battle stance, but the ballista crew decided to leg it rather than face the angry human with a pointy stick. Zelgadis, having regained control over his flight path and being more than a little upset with his unplanned soar, touched down on the ground. "Mega Explosion Array!" He cast, blowing another huge hole in the castle wall with the explosion spell. "Couldn't the trouble maker just be on the other side of the city?" Amelia sweated. "I don't think anything this adorable could possibly be responsible for -" "Quit your yapping and get in the castle!" Lina ordered, blowing more ponies away with a Dug Haut, the earth spell smashing the equines with slabs of earth. She tried to follow it up with a Burst Rondo, but a golden shield spell blocked the flames she conjured. "Now, I don't care if you're a Changeling, a Mimicker, or simply very good at illusions." Xlestia emerged from the smoke that flowed out of the hole in her castle. "I also don't care why you chose the image of a human. Nobody hurts my ponies." "But we are humans... right? We are humans aren't we!?" Gourry asked the smarter members of the group in confusion and slight panic. Xlestia didn't respond, instead looking over her targets. Three seemingly human mares, one sword wielder stallion and one... rock monster? Picking the toughest-looking target, she blasted Zelgadis with a burst of her own fire magic, knocking him away from the other four fighters. "Windy Shield!" Lina cast, blocking Xlestia's second fire spell with a wall of defensive wind. Gourry reached into his belt and retrieved a hex key, which he used to detach the blade from his sword. "Light come forth!" He cried, and the magical sword handle conjured white magical energy to replace the metal blade. With his new pseudo-lightsabre, the swordsman made a jumping attack against the Sun Princess. Scowling, Xlestia aborted her third attack spell in favour of a forcefield. Her default protection spell is Defence? Lina noted, slightly worried. The non-elemental shield spell did provide greater projection than her Windy Shield, but at the cost of much greater magical expenditure. For the royal pony to use it out of habit, she would need a Pool Capacity (the amount of magic she could cast without tiring) larger than her own! Lina blinked, having noticed that Amelia was doing nothing but fidget while Gourry and Xlestia went hammer and tongs, Sylphiel supporting Gourry where she could. "Hey, look alive there!" "I'm sorry Miss Lina, but I can't get involved in a fight with another kingdom. You understand, right?" The princess of Seyruun wilted under Lina's fierce glare, shuffling off to the side of the fight. Jeez, that girl picks the worst times to be diplomatic. Lina thought, holding her hands behind her back. With a fierce cry, Xlestia picked Gourry up telekinetically by his boot and tossed him through a nearby store front. With a cry of "Gourry dear!" Sylphiel raced after him, a healing spell already forming on her lips. Lina's eye widened a bit when she realised she was now alone in the street with the royal pony, the civilians having scampered. "You have no idea how much trouble you are in right now." The Solar Alicorn mentioned casually, building up charge in her horn. Lina's kept her eyes on the royal pony, but out of the corner of her eye she noticed that Sylphiel had dropped her sceptre in her dash to heal her crush. Spinning around on one end, the magical tool fell - pointing dead at Xlestia, the divination spell still active. Lina's eyes widened, and then she smirked. Well well well... "If you want a fight I'll gladly give you one!" Xlestia yelled, levitating large amounts of rubble and throwing them as a wave of stone. "Grey Bomb!" Lina counter-cast, causing the ground under the rubble to explode and scatter the alicorn's attack every which way. Xlestia raised an eyebrow, and levitated the now much larger amount of rubble. "Yeah, not one of my brightest ideas." The sorceress muttered. She needed room to manoeuvre. With a cry of "Ray Wing!", she took to the sky. This version of Levitation came with a built-in shield, so she should be fine. Looking behind her revealed the veritable ocean of rubble proceeding the alicorn who had likewise taken to the sky. Then again, maybe not. Lina thought, preparing for some magical dog-fighting. Meanwhile down on the ground, Zelgadis had finally extracted himself from the remains of somepony's office. Being made of stone had let him tank Xlestia's fire spell, but it hadn't made digging himself out of the rubble any easier. Shaking the dust off himself and ditching his ruined cloak, the sorcerer made to re-enter the fight but found himself blocked by six mares. "Don't move, buster!" A certain lavender unicorn told him firmly. "We have powerful artefacts and we aren't afraid to use 'em, you... er, you..." "Chimera." The sorcerer identified his species with a grimace. The Mane Six shared confused glances. "You've only got one head." Applejack pointed out. "Chimera as in my body is made from pieces of different creatures." He clarified further. He took a step forward. "Hey! One wrong move buster and we'll scrub your soul so clean you'll be able to see your reflection in it!" Pinkie pointed her forehoof threateningly at him. "Wait, what?! Don't use purification magic on me, I'm part demon! It could kill me!" Zelgadis yelled, alarmed. "Don't worry." Twilight said soothingly. "The last evil spirit we used these on just turned to stone." "I'm also one third rock golem. I'm already made of stone." He pointed out. "Uhh..." This one seemed to stump Twilight. "Then I guess they'd banish you to the moon...?" Zelgadis exhaled. "And my remaining third is what's left of my humanity. I still need to breathe." "There's air on the moon!" Twilight told him as though that was obvious. "On your moon or on our moon?" The chimera asked. The unicorn fumed for a moment. "Wait right there. I need writing space to work this out!" So saying, she trotted off. Her friends watched her leave in disbelief. "Twilight, dear?" Rarity tried not to panic. "Where are you going?!" "To get a chalkboard!" The retreating pony called back. The five remaining members of the Mane Six swivelled around to look at the sorcerer, who had started twirling magical flames around his fingers. Abruptly, all five bar Rainbow scampered, leaving the weathermare to fend for herself. Said mare rolled her eyes. "Scaredy ponies." 'Cracking ones knuckles' had no real meaning on a pony, but Rainbow flexed her fetlocks together regardless. "Bring it on!" She cried, surging forward. Since her return Luna had, rather to her chagrin, acquired a reputation of being useless, which she felt was unfair. Everypony knew she slept through the day, and normally the invasion of a city involved loud, pony-waking explosions! Stupid Changelings. Hence when several -BOOM-s echoed around the castle hallways, Luna was rushing to put her armour on before she'd even remembered to take her nightcap off. "Hold tight, sister." Luna muttered as she shook the last dregs of sleep off. "I will lend my assistance post-haste." "I'm afraid I really can't allow you to do that." Came an unexpected and unwelcome voice from behind the Luna Alicorn. The half-second of warning and a flash of instinct lead Luna to turn to mist just as Xellos's staff passed though where her chest just was. Re-forming on the other side of the room in the set of golden armour she'd gotten to replace her Nightmare Armour, Luna scowled at the Trickster Priest. "That is not how a gentlecolt introduces himself!" Xellos gave a wide, fierce smile, his eyes still closed. Luna's own eyes narrowed, tense. "You may dispense with your human guise, monster. It was flimsy to begin with in a human-free zone." "Oh, you may find your human-proof fence has a new hole in it. That is," Xellos opened his eyes wide, completing his fierce appearance even as his own body began to turn into swirling darkness. " if you can survive!" Luna noted that the creature's true form was that of a twister of shadows even as she blasted it apart with her dark blue magic. Annoyingly, it had no effect, the creature simply reforming much as her own mist form did. She was forced to duck to avoid being pierced by the pointy end of the monster as it charged her. "Do the monsters of this world need a reason to attack royalty, or are you all simply bloodthirsty?" Luna boomed as she tried to contain Xellos in a forcefield only for him to teleport out. The sound of Xellos's chuckle echoed despite him having no mouth to make the sound with. "The monsters of this world need no reason to sow destruction and chaos. But in this case, your sister has made herself quite a target." Angry red bolt of magic hurled themselves from Xellos to Luna, who avoided them by turning to mist once more. "My sister wishes only the happiness of all!" Luna cried, trying a volley of weaker beams rather than one strong one. Xellos teleported behind Luna, both dodging her attack and striking from her blind spot. To his annoyance, she anticipated him and dodged to the side in time to avoid being skewered. "And that is why we monsters must stop her. If she erases unhappiness from this world, from where shall we derive our food?" Several things clicked in Luna's head at that moment. Her opponent fed off negativity -> she was fighting the local version of a Wendigo. She couldn't hurt him -> because like a Wendigo, her opponent's true form was that of a spirit, tangible only on the astral plane. "I should warn you, monster. Here in Equestria I am the guardian of dreams. I know how to enter the astral plane." Luna boomed, vanishing from mortal sight. Xellos vanished shortly thereafter, his voice still present in the now-empty room. "And I should warn you that astral combat is my speciality." Hastily, Lina patted out a fire that had started on her shoulder pad. So that she could actually return fire, she'd switched out her Ray Wing spell for the simpler Levitation. Unfortunately, this meant that Xlestia's near misses were now setting her clothes on fire. "Die already!" Xlestia yelled, covering herself in solar fire and rushing Lina. "Aqua Create." Lina cast, conjuring a wave of water in the alicorn's flight path and interrupting her attack. "Same to you, lady. Freeze Arrow!" "Oh jeez, oh jeez." Spike panicked as he ran through the halls of Canterlot. You'd have to be completely deaf to miss the fights going on, and the young dragon was alternating between running toward and away from the battlefield as his courage rose and fell. Turning a corner at high speed, Spike ran into somebody with an "oof!" Shaking his head, Spike looked up to see that he had run into a blond human woman dressed in white and blue robes, inspecting him in return. "This is it?" She said critically. "Uh... what?" Spike blinked. "Actually, isn't there like, a giant anti-human field up...?" The strange lady picked Spike up, ignoring his squawk. "I come all the way out here on a rumour of talking dragons, and this runt is all I find?" "Hey, judge your own species!" Spike told the lady, naturally offended. With a poof, the lady turned into a fully grown yellow-scaled dragon, still holding Spike in one claw. "Oh." Spike said in a small voice. Rolling her eyes, Filia the dragon priestess tossed the comparatively tiny dragon over her shoulder. Maybe there were some other dragons somewhere else? Being the last adult talking dragon in the Red World sucked. Luna reappeared in the material plane, flying as though the legions of Tartarus were on her heels. Her fur was smouldering, and deep cuts could be seen across her body. She made immediately for the open window, but it was blocked off by a purple magical barrier. "Tut tut, princess." Xellos materialised in the hallway behind Luna, blocking off her other route of escape. Xellos had shrouded his true form again, but instead of a human form the Mazoku now appeared to be a unicorn with a blue mane and a grey coat. "What would your subjects say if they saw you running away?" Luna turned her head around to glare at Xellos hatefully. Xellos dramatically raised his staff to point at Luna. "Now it is time to say -" "Hello!" "Ack!" Xellos yelped as he jumped to one side, having just found Pinkie Pie standing on his other side. "When - when did - ?" "Hi, I'm Pinkie Pie! I've never seen you before which is weird because I've been here for like hours which is normally enough for me to befriend everypony and by the way do you like parties?" Xellos pawed uselessly at his throat as he lost his balanced and collapsed. To understand what was happening one needed to consider three things. The first was that because Xellos was blocking the doorway, Pinkie couldn't see her injured princess. The second was that as Xellos had taken a pony shape, Pinkie couldn't tell he was an invader. But the third and most important point was that Mazoku, just like their Equestrian counterparts the Wendigos, feed off negative emotions but couldn't handle positive ones. Amelia had once driven Xellos to his knees just by singing about how live was wonderful. Amelia was only slightly detached from reality. Pinkie Pie's infectious cheerfulness was causing Xellos to do the astral equivalent of vomiting. Must... get away....! The monster thought, trying to crawl away. "Oh, are you ill?" Pinkie bounced after him. "Don't worry! If anypony can cheer you up, it's me!" Luna, still breathing heavily from her astral bout, still had enough energy to smirk. Saved by the pink. Rarity's panic rose a little each time she turned a corner and found that her friends weren't behind it. For goodness sake everypony, where are you?! They'd gotten separated after the... incident with that ruffian. She and Twilight were going to have words, that was for certain! "Oooh ho ho ho!" For a moment, Rarity had the curious sensation that her ears were trying to fold into themselves, so jarring was the laughter she had just heard. "Whatever in the name of sanity was..." Rarity muttered, before finding the source of the most unpleasant sound. It was a human (another one?!) and was very clearly female. It was very hard to mistake her gender when the entire point of her outfit seemed to be identifying it's wearer as quite firmly female. Naga the White Serpent, dressed in her usual black leather bikini, spotted Rarity and strode confidently towards her. "You there, pale horse-creature! Have you seen a short flat-chested red-head of a girl running around?" Rarity's mouth flopped open and closed like a fish out of water, a high pitched whistling noise the only sound to escape her throat. "Oh dear, my magnificence appears to have stunned the dear..." Naga waved her hand in front of Rarity's face, having to bend over to do so and placing her... mammary glands far too close to Rarity's face for her state of mind. "I suppose I could always follow the explosions... little Lina always did have such trouble being subtle about things." As Naga turned to walk off, Rarity finally found her voice. "Where..." Naga looked back. "Hmmm?" "Where did you find that absolutely hideous outfit!" The fashionista screamed. Her trained mind automatically translated the outfit for a pony body - black straps that really only covered the teats and the nethers - and regretted not for the first time never learning the 'brain bleach' spell. Naga looked down at her rather scant clothing as she straightened up. "Oh, this? Found it in my mother's wardrobe." "I see." Rarity stated flatly. She tried to think about how to ask her next question politely. "And what... profession was your mother exactly?" Naga blinked. "Mother dear? Princess." "P-p-princess?!" Rarity screeched. The mere thought of royalty that would wear such an outfit... The white unicorn's eyes rolled into the back of her head and she fainted dead away. Naga shook her head as she looked down at the fainted pony. "Ha. Some creatures just cannot hold in their jealousy. Oh ho ho ho!" Lina clutched a hand to her side, casting what little White Magic she knew to heal her busted ribs. Xlestia meanwhile was breathing heavily, trying to regain as much stamina as she could before the fight resumed once more. "It is impressive." The Solar Alicorn conceded. "Considering the pain I put you through, you should have dropped your illusion of humanity well before now. "Oh, give it a rest!" Lina rolled her eyes. "I'm human, get over it." "No, you're not." Xlestia stated quite firmly. "Humans cannot enter this kingdom." The red-haired sorceress smirked. "Okay then. How about I show you the spell I used to get in here? Lords of darkness of the four worlds, I call upon you: grant me all the power that you possess." In sequence, each of Lina's four Demon Blood Talismans lit up. Xlestia, not stupid enough to just fly in place while her opponent cast, coated herself in fire once more. Lina's eyes widened as she hurried up her chant. She'd been skipping them for all her spells so far, but this spell needed the extra control. "Lord of the dreams that terrify. Sword of the cold dark void, free yourself from the heaven's bonds. Become one with my power - " Xlestia charged the human once more, knowing that Lina couldn't counter-cast while casting her main spell. Lina stopped concentrating on her Levitation spell, dropping like a stone and avoiding the attack; resuming her magical flight in time to avoid a collision with the ground. " - one with my body, and let us walk the path of destruction together. Power that can smash even the souls of the gods: Ragna Blade!" Into Lina's waiting hands, her spell squeezed the tiniest portion of the Sea of Chaos - the place from which all things come and to which all things must one day return. The jagged spikes of darkness formed something vaguely approximating a massive broadsword - the blade with which Lina had cut a hole in Xlestia's trump card. "Just try and block this, I dare you!" Lina swung her second-most powerful spell at the alicorn, the magical energy blade extending outwards to cover the distance between. Lina knew she had won - by definition, the Ragna Blade couldn't be blocked, even by a dimensional wall. Xlestia rolled her eyes and teleported behind Lina, avoiding the attack altogether. Its caster in pure shock, the Ragna Blade spluttered out of existence in Lina's hands. "Never hint that a spell is unblockable if you don't want your enemy simply dodging it." The ancient ruler advised the teenage adventurer. Lina cursed inside her head. Casting the Ragna Blade twice in a day alone with all the other spells I've been using has left me drained. I've only got one good spell left in me, and my opponent can teleport! Now what?! It's not like I can simply Dragon Slave all the - Lina facepalmed. "This time, die!" Xlestia cried, charging a sphere of plasma at the tip of her horn. "Lords of darkness of the four worlds, I call upon you: grant me all the power you possess." Lina re-cast her power boost spell. Xlestia frowned, but fired her own spell nonetheless. "Darkness beyond twilight, crimson beyond blood that flows; buried in the stream of time is where your power flows." Xlestia's Plasma Orb smashed, not into Lina, but into the thick streams of magic that were already building up around her and flowing into her hands, leaving her unharmed. "I pledge myself to conquer, all the foes who stand; before the mighty gift bestowed in my unworthy hands!" Xlestia tried Telekinesis, Teleportation, and Transmutation on Lina. All three were disrupted by the sheer power she was channelling into her spell. "Let the fools who stand before me be destroyed by the power you and I possess!" Lina swung back her hands containing the ball of pure red magic, as if to throw it. "Dragon Slave!" "Ha!" Rainbow cried, holding Zelgadis in a headlock. "Didn't expect me to be a black belt in karate, did ya?!" Zelgadis merely grunted, and swung his head back into Rainbow's chest. His hair, as thick and stiff as wire, stabbed into soft pony-flesh. "Yeouch!" The weathermare cried, involuntarily releasing the Chimera. Zelgadis rolled forwards, intending to channel magical lightning into his opponent. His actions stopped when he noticed the red glow out of the corner of his eye. Rainbow clenched her teeth to try to deal with the pain. "Not cool, dude." She blinked in surprise as the sorcerer ran past her at full speed. What's his problem? She looked where he had been looking, gaped for a precious half-second, then flew in the same direction as him; hitting Rainboom speeds almost immediately. Gourry and Sylphiel paused from their fight, neck deep in guardponies. Sharing one quick panicked look, they both bolted. The door to the Canterlot library opened to allow Twilight out with her sheath of notes. "Okay, I worked it out! Using the elements on that chimera will..." She took in the massive glow of magic in the sky, then slowly backed into the library, locking the door. "Oh Lina." Naga muttered, placing her hand onto the cobblestone street and forming a giant golem to stand in between her and the Dragon Slave. "You always do make such a mess." "I don't remember getting red party lights." Pinkie tilted her head as she saw the red glow from the window. Xellos took his chance and scrounged up enough concentration to shift back into the astral. Amelia looked back at Canterlot mountain as the extreme wide-area explosive spell blew it to smithereens. She closed her eyes and hung her head dejectedly. "I suppose it was stretching to hope this could end without one of those." World Nine - Friendship beyond Twilight, Magic beyond Rainbow flows