--Chapter 4--
Encounter In The Forest
Princess Celestia, kind and wise ruler, protector of Equestria, guardian of harmony, bringer of day and night, those and many other names were given to her by ponies of Equestria through all the years she had ruled the pony kind. Yet she couldn’t call herself by any of them.
She knew that without her sister she was nothing more than an empty shell that could only go on, waiting for better days to come. And so she waited for years upon years, awaiting her sister's return. The return that she had planned. The return that would let her be truly happy once again. The return that came too soon…
In the day she had banished Luna, using the Elements of Harmony against her, she wasn't able to fully use their power. To heal her sister from a corruption of such depth would require combined force of all elements. The power she couldn't hold on her own; she'd need Luna to do that.
With all force she could muster by herself, she had sealed her sister on the moon, so the dark magic that corrupted her mind could slowly drift away, letting Luna regain control over herself once again. But the banishment wasn't supposed to last one thousand. It supposed to be ten thousand. All of which she would have to spend watching her sister's face embalmed on moon's surface.
And yet, Nightmare Moon had found a way to escape, just like the prophecy said.
The prophecy she ignored… Just like she ignored Twilight’s attempts to warn her… As well as her other students…
And now she waited… closed in dungeons of her old castle… weak and hopeless…
"So, darling, why are your clothes so wet?" Asked Rarity, preventing Twilight from asking a question herself.
"Ahead of us, is a river. When I heard you screaming I had to swim through it. What happened there anyway?" Said, human, while pushing the branch away from his face. "It sounded like you got cornered by the pack of wolves."
“Uh, hehe… ya see that's pretty funny story actually…"
"You bet it was funny Applejack! The looks on your faces were just priceless! Especially when you realized out that it was just a bunch of trees! Shame I didn't bring a camera!" Screamed Pinkie, because talking quietly in the forest filled with deadly creatures that wanted to kill them all is too boring.
Trees? Seriously? They screamed like they were about to be ripped apart by some monsters!
Twilight already wanted to begin asking her questions but didn’t manage to do so, because they reached the river. A very rough river. They all began to looking around for the way to cross it.
“Da fuck happened here!? The River was calm when I’ve swum through it!”
"Is there any other way?" Asked Twilight, unfortunately, it was not what she wanted to ask in the first place.
“None that I know about, we’ll hav-“ Revan was interrupted by a loud crying coming from the river.
Before any of them could say anything, a large, purple serpent with orange hair and mustache, emerged from the underwater. “What a world, what a world! What will I do now!?” The serpent cried out.
Revan, Mischief and all girls just stared at the large creature rolling in the water, crying like a baby and creating the massive currents. “What the fuck…” Muttered Revan.
Their stares were broken by Twilight who asked the serpent. "Excuse me, sir, why are you crying?"
She was the only one in the group who actually knew what she was looking at. She had read about Dragon Serpents while studying rare creatures living in Equestria. Mostly to find out more about Minotaurs; she got interested in the subject when she attended to some ‘Assertiveness Seminar' organized by a Minotaur. His name was Irony Wallet or something like that.
“Well, I don't know. I was just sitting here, minding my own business, when this tacky little cloud of purple smoke just whisked past me and tore half of my beloved mustache clean off! And now I look simply horrid!” Serpent replied.
Seriously? That's why he's crying? By the way, why doesn't it bother me anymore that I'm watching the giant serpent with Johny-Bravo-like hairstyle and mustache acting like six-year-old girl who just broke her doll? Revan wanted to say something but was stopped by the serpent throwing himself into the water, creating a big splash. Water fell directly at him and rest of the group.
Now the whole group was wet and irritated “Oh, give me a break…” Rainbow commented.
“You’re fucking kidding me, right?” Revan said while sending serpent annoyed look.
“That's what all the fuss is about?” Added Applejack.
Suddenly Rarity stepped between Rainbow and Applejack. "Why, of course, it is. How can you be so insensitive? Oh, just look at him. Such lovely luminescent scales." She went closer to the serpent and started caressing his beard (Which for some reason was purple instead of orange).
*SNIFF* “I know.“ He agreed.
“And your expertly coiffed mane.“
“Oh, I know, I know.“
“Your fabulous manicure.“
*GASP* “It's so true!“
Am I really hearing this? Revan commented in thought.
“All ruined without your beautiful mustache.“
“It's true, I'm hideous!”
“I simply cannot let such a crime against fabulosity go uncorrected.” She caught one of Serpent’s scales in her mouth and yanked it out, causing scale’s owner to yelp.
“What did you do that for?” He didn’t receive an answer, Rarity only lifted his scale above herself.
“Rarity, what are you-„Twilight didn’t finish asking, she was interrupted by Rarity using the scale she took earlier to cut off her tail. Seeing that serpent’s mind apparently got overloaded and he simply collapsed on the ground in a dramatic way.
Revan, along with other ponies, watched in awe as Rarity used her magic to attach her cut off the tail to serpent's mustache. Revan was also looking curiously at the magic display. It was the second time he saw magic in use, and the first time he saw it used to lift an object. That must be helpful. He thought.
“Oh-hohohoho! My mustache. How wonderful!” Screamed the overjoyed serpent.
“You look smashing.” Commented Rarity.
"Oh, Rarity, your beautiful tail..." Spoke up Twilight with a concerned look on her face.
“Oh. It's fine, my dear. Short tails are in this season. Besides, it'll grow back.”
Now Twilight's expression turned to happy, again got the same feeling she felt when Pinkie sang her song. She got a little startled when suddenly Rainbow approached from her left site and said. "So would the mustache.”
"Ok, maybe now since Mr. Weeper stopped making currents we could go?"Revan said, pointing at the river which was now just as calm as it was before.
"Oh, right! Let's go."Twilight said and stepped into the water, rest of the girls followed her. Revan wanted to step in too but stopped when he noticed something.
"Wait a sec. Why is the water level so low? When I was here before I couldn't feel the ground beneath. And I'm much taller than you." At his comment, all ponies stared at the water surface. Applejack and Pinkie Pie, being Earth Ponies had much more sensitive hooves then rest of the group, so they could feel that it wasn't the ground they were standing on.
Before any of them could speak up, the serpent they all knew and loved emerged from the water, startling all of them. “KURWA!!!” (SHIT!!!) Screamed Revan, reaching for his gun. Only to find out that it was whole wet. Just fucking great. Now I must wait for this shit to dry.
"Allow me." The serpent said and gave a slight bow after which he hid his head back underwater. Now everyone around could see that he created a bridge for them to pass through.
Revan was rather skeptical about walking on that serpent’s back but he did it anyway. Although he kept his hand close to the knife, which for the time being was his only weapon.
They all passed to the other side. Mischief had some problems with jumping on the serpent but after that, he quickly passed through. Pinkie Pie got Revan's attention by bouncing like that one Looney Tunes character that spoke with a French accent; he didn't remember the name.
When everyone was standing on the ground, the serpent poked his hand out of the water and waved his hand before disappearing underwater again.
"All right, now since we've gotten through that river, let's go." Said Applejack. In response, Revan nodded and began walking in the direction of the castle.
“Now, could you please tell me-“
“Actually, can I ask something first ?” And yet again Twilight couldn’t ask her question. She was getting a bit annoyed by this.
“Eh, sure, ask away.”
“Before that whole ‘serpent in the river’ thing, you said that you’re dealing with some kind of crisis and that you need something from that castle of two sins-“
“Sisters” She corrected.
“Care to explain what I’m helping you with?” He realized that he should have asked about it before he even agreed. But then again, he was rather focused on leaving that forest, and agreeing to help them seemed to be his best option (it still is).
"Oh, right. I probably should have explained something before." She cleared her throat and began her lecture. "One thousand years ago, there were two sisters who ruled over the land of Equestria, the first one was bringing day and the second one, night. Over the years, sister of the night began to notice that her nights were left unnoticed by ponies and in her grief –quite possibly with some help of dark magic- she transformed into ‘Nightmare Moon' and attempted to bring an eternal night. However, her sister was able to defeat her and trap on the moon for eternity. There was a prophecy that Nightmare Moon will return after a thousand years of banishment, and that prophecy turned out to be right. We're heading to the castle because that's where the artifacts that were used to defeat Nightmare Moon for the first time –The Elements of Harmony- are probably hidden."
Twilight finished her explanation and looked up at Revan. He had a thoughtful expression on his face.
Then suddenly he facepalmed. "So it's that kind of universe? The one with ancient evils, magical artifacts, heroes who always have to save the day and are ten times better than an army with no training of any kind? Jaja se ze mnie robicie?”
"What?" All ponies asked in unison.
“Are you kidding me?” He responded, realizing he had switched languages. That was something that kept happening to him from time to time, but he didn’t fight with it. Knowing a language that almost no one knows and sometimes using it in conversations seemed funny to him.
That and he likes Polish curse words. There’s much more of them then in English and they sound more powerful in his opinion.
“No, that’s what I read in my books.”
"Wait a second. If that whole Nightmare Moon wants her nights to be appreciated, then why is she trying to kill every living being on this planet?" While saying 'her' he made quoting gesture with his hands. He thought it was just some old believes. Also, by ‘eternal night' he understood ‘destroying the sun with magic' because that sounds like something that could be put into the RPG game (at least to him).
“Whatever do you mean, darling?” Asked confused Rarity.
"Yeah, she didn't seem tempted to kill anypony." Added Rainbow Dash.
"Seriously? Just answer me this. What will happen if plants won't have an access to the sunlight?"
Twilight was first to answer. “Well, they wouldn’t be able to perform photosynthesis which would lead to…” Her eyes winded with realization. Oh, sweet Celestia how could I not notice that?
“… to death of all plant life, followed by herbivores who would be left without a food source and eventually predators would die for the same reason. And that’s not even counting other things, like global temperature drop.” He finished Twilight’s sentence.
Now eyes of all ponies winded. Even Pinkie’s smile dropped. They all knew that this mission was important, but they never realized just how much. They were dealing with a worldwide threat that could wipe out pony kind from existence.
“Darn, Ah didn’t realize just how important that escapade was…” Said silently Applejack.
“Ok, enough with sad subjects, Twilight was trying to ask some questions for quite a while now and though I still have some myself I’ll leave that for later. Now ask away.” He said and smiled.
That brought a wide smile on Twilight's muzzle, one that could be compared to Pinkie Pie's while she's eating a lemon. "Great! First, I'd like you to tell me-" she suddenly stopped. "Um, you wouldn't happen to have a notebook and something else to write?"
Revan began checking pockets in his uniform but he found nothing. "Sorry, I've probably left it in the car" When he was checking pockets in his pants he noticed that Fluttershy was staring at his knife with a fearful expression.
“Damn, guess I’ll have to remember it all and-“
“Here you go!” Suddenly a pink hoof appeared out of nowhere; holding the notebook and the pencil.
Twilight looked to her left and saw Pinkie Pie and her (almost) ever present smile. "Where did get that from? None of us brought saddlebags or anything like that."
"During that party at the library I found this shelf with was half opened so I decided to check it and then your little assistant bumped into me and when I was falling my head landed on that shelf and I guess that notebook and pencil just got stuck in my mane" She explained almost as fast like before; ending with her trademark smile.
“I’m not even going to bother asking about this.” Said Revan. “Anyway, your question Twilight.”
“Hey, why is she asking first? I have some question’s too you know.” Argued Rainbow while hovering in front of Revan.
“Me too! Me too!” Screamed the pink mare we all know and love.
“Eh, so how about this Twilight asks her question, then Rainbow, Pinkie, Applejack, Fluttershy, Rarity and then I will ask something.” Said Revan. “How does that sound to you?”
All girls agreed with him.
Except for Rainbow… "And why Twilight asks first?"
"Because I said so." Answered Revan. She wasn't really happy about not being first but didn't have any arguments, so she remained silent.
Hearing no objections, Revan continued. “So what did you wanted to as-“
*GROWL*
All eyes turned to Mischief, who was growling at the line of trees on their left. “Eh, what do you wa-" Before he finished, in the corner of his eye he saw another one of those wooden wolves he encountered earlier running out of the nearby bushes.
Revan noticed that the wolf was running straight at Twilight, who was still turned to Mischief and didn't notice the incoming danger. Without further thinking, he jumped forward, pushing Twilight away from the wolf.
He himself had less luck, as the wolf’s fangs bit into his leg. Revan screamed in pain as wolf’s wooden fangs cut deep into his flesh.
The first ones to react were Mischief and Rainbow Dash. The dog learning from his first struggle with those wooden creatures, instead of trying to bite it, charged at it to push it off of Revan. The wolf who didn't expect that attack and lost his balance, falling on the ground.
When he did that, Rainbow Dash dropped hard on its head from the air. The Head didn’t get smashed though; the wolf just got stunned for a moment.
A moment that was enough for Revan to reach for his knife and hit the base of its neck.
When Twilight got back on her hooves, she instantly ran towards Revan, as did Fluttershy. Neither of them managed to get to him, as more wolves engaged from behind the trees and from bushes. All of which began circling around them.
Despite the pain in his leg, Revan stood up. Then he noticed a few differences in those wolves appearance. While they were clearly made out of wood like those he met before. The wood seemed to be darker and shining slightly.
The other thing he noticed were their eyes. Instead of light green, those shown with a dark-blue light.
Both Rarity and Twilight began shooting magic bolts from their horns. Rarity's much weaker bolts were deflected and shot off into other parts of the forest. Twilight's attack, though much more powerful, still weren't enough to cause damage bigger than slight burns; despite being made out of wood, the wolves that got hit shrugged off the damage like it was nothing.
Few wolves that didn't get hit by the unicorns and manage to get closer, got pushed back by Applejack and Rainbow Dash. While cyan pegasus was using her flight avenge to strike from above, Applejack had a help from Mischief, who was holding approaching wolves in place, so the farm pony could place a precise strike with her powerful hind hooves.
Normally Applejack's kick would turn a Timber Wolf into splinters. She fought with those wolves before to protect animals that lived on her farm and her along with her brother, Big Macintosh, destroyed them with almost no issue. But those wolves were different. No matter how hard she'd kick, none of the wolves appeared to suffer any major damage.
While the other ponies were fighting, Fluttershy was hiding in the middle of the group, curled up in the terrified ball of fur. Pinkie Pie was trying to calm her down a bit (occasionally throwing a rock at the wolves). With a little success.
Revan was struggling stay on his feet. His leg was still burning in pain, but he tried to ignore it. When he finally managed to find the balance, he was instantly greeted with the wolf jumping on him.
Before it could have reached the target though, Rainbow Dash dived into it. The wolf hit on the ground but instantly began to stand up.
Again, Revan used his knife to finish the wolf before it could start another attack. While ponies were struggling to keep the wolves away, he reached to his holster and pull out his gun. Luckily for him, it already dried enough to use it without risking damaging it.
Without waiting, he aimed at the closest wolf and pulled the trigger.
*BANG*
He hit the wolf in the chest.
All eyes turned to Revan; both ponies and wolves looked at him. Only, Mischief wasn't looking at Revan, since he was used to hearing gunshots.
Ignoring the stares, Revan chose another target and fired another bullet. This time he hit the wolf's head; breaking off the half of it.
Wolves decided to resume their attack and few of them charged straight at Revan. Seeing that, ponies created the defensive circle around the human; letting him safely shot down another wolf. This time Pinkie Pie gave up with cheering up Fluttershy (She was still standing right next to her, it seemed to calm her down a bit) and was throwing cupcakes at the attackers. How she got them is a mystery.
It didn't take Revan long to reduce the number of wolves from 12 to only 3. He was a good shooter and managed to hit the target each time. Only one wolf didn't die from the bullet. This one was hit in its leg when it tried to attack Pinkie (who was preparing another box of cupcakes) and was finished off by the human's knife.
The reminding wolves decided to escape. While the first two managed to disappear behind the trees, the last one wasn't so lucky as Revan fired the last bullet from the magazine; hitting the wolf in the back of its neck.
When it was all over, all ponies (except Fluttershy) were panting. Revan kneeled and unveiled a wound on his leg. It was rather deep and was still bleeding. Soon the adrenaline left his body and the pain began to spread through his body. Oh, fuck! That hurts!. He growled in pain and fell on his back.
Fluttershy and Twilight quickly turned around and examined his injury. “Oh, it doesn’t look good, and we don’t have anything to treat it. Pinkie, please tell me you have bandage somewhere in your hair.” Said concerned Fluttershy.
“Sorry, I used it on Derpy yesterday.” Pink pony responded.
That automatically turned on Fluttershy's panic mode. "Oh n-no, what are we going to do!? He's going to die and we can't do anything about it! Oh, I'm so, so sorry Rev-" She was stopped by a hand closing her mouth.
“Calm down, panicking won’t help us now!” Revan said. “ I’m sure there’s something else nearby that can be used as a bandage.”
“Ok, Rainbow, Fluttershy, you two will look for something in the area around us, the rest of us will stay here and see if we can find something useful here, now go!”Twilight ordered and the two pegasi took off after nodding. She turned back to Revan and said. “You just lie here and don’t move. We’ll figure out something.” He nodded in response.
Once the girls began walking around, looking for a way to stop the bleeding from his leg, Mischief came closer to Revan and laid beside him; resting his head on the human’s chest. Revan moved his hand to pet his companion.
They both watched the ponies running around, checking every bush, rock, and tree they could, to find something that would help him. When he was beginning to feel a bit dizzy, he heard Twilight screaming. "Applejack, come here! I think I‘ve got an idea!"
Applejack turned away from the small bush she was checking and quickly walked toward Twilight. “What is it? Did ya find anything?”
“Yes, I’ve just remembered reading that Timberwolves have a specific resin in their bodies. In ancient times it was used to ease the pain, as well as to disinfect the wound.” The unicorn explained.
“So what’s stopping ya? Just get the thing out and we’re one step closer to patching him up.”
“What’s stopping me is the fact that I just can’t get it open, it seems like that wolves were enchanted in some way. My magic is near to useless.” She demonstrated by trying to tear the nearby wolf open with telekinetic grip. “See?”
“So what do ya need me to do?”
“Well, I can’t open it up with my magic, but if you’d be able to damage it enough, I will be able to get the resin out through the cranks.”
“So basically, Ah have ta smash that thing as hard as Ah can?" Twilight nodded. "Well, Ah reckon Ah could do that." Farm pony said with a smirk. She was more than happy to crash some timberwolf under her hooves. Those things were incredibly annoying; both to her and many other farmers.
Her smirk quickly turned into a look of surprise. She had smashed into the wolf's chest using both of her front hooves with all power she could muster three times over, but the dead creature still laid there with only a hole Revan made with that strange thing of his, on its head.
Wha- impossible! That could have broken a tree trunk, and there's not even a small crack here! She smashed into the wolf in the same manner a few more times, but again with no effects.
Seeing that, Revan decided to help them a bit. “Hey Applejack!” He took a knife in his hand and throw it. “Catch!”
The blade hit the ground near her. She looked at him and said “Thanks.”
Taking the handle in her mouth, the farm pony picked up the knife. To her surprise it was much heavier then it looked to be. How does he walk around with that thing? He's stronger than he looks.
She used the blade to cut the wolf's chest open and was quickly met with the dense liquid pouring out from the hole. Unlike the normal resin, that of timberwolves had a light green color.
Not wasting the time, Twilight used her magic to collect the liquid and began putting it on Revan’s wound. Almost immediately the human felt his pain slowly fading away.
“How did you know about that? It doesn’t really seem like a common knowledge to me.” Revan said.
"I tend to read a lot." She answered. "Some say that I read too much as if that was even possible."
So, we have a book-nerd here. Didn’t see that coming. Soon after Twilight had finished putting the resin on Revan’s wound, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash came back.
“Did you two find anything?” Asked Twilight.
Fluttershy was the one to answer. "Yes, we have met that nice family of spiders, and they agreed to make a bandage out of their web." She pointed at Rainbow who was holding two sticks with about 25cm of the web between them. One site of the ‘bandage' was also covered with leaves.
That adds few more questions to my list. Thought Revan.
Twilight took the sticks with her magic and like with the resin, she had put it on the wound. The improvised bandage was large enough to cover the whole wound.
When she was done, Revan started to get up, but before he could do so, Twilight pulled him into a hug. "Thank you, if It wasn't for you, we would have died here."
“Eee… you’re welcome.” He said while starting to blushing.
Soon rest of the girls joined the hug. Even Rainbow whom Revan thought would be ‘too cool for that’.
They stayed like that for some time. Revan’s blush getting worse with each second. “Ummm… could we move on? And Twilight, can you please step out of my crotch?”
Nightmare Moon growled in anger as she watched that creature annihilating the wolves she had enchanted. The spell she used to shield the wolves from any kind of danger was fueled by the magic she absorbed from Celestia when she attacked her and was extremely powerful. Not only did it deflected magic but also absorbed kinetic energy from the physical strikes.
It was near impossible to get through that. Only the most powerful mages could pierce through.
But here she was, watching as one of the most powerful shields ever developed was brought down to the level of paper armor. Whatever the creature was doing, this magic was causing the wolves chests and heads to explode.
And again she didn’t detect any kind of magic. She never heard about somepony even TRYING to hide magic trail after casting the spell.
She looked at the remaining wolves running away from the creature and ponies surrounding it, and for the first time in over a thousand years, she was truly afraid.