A Battleground of Kindness

by StormDancer

Cinematic

So, the Master scammed the magical superpowers, took over a nation, befriended an elder god, abandoned the lair, fought a nigh invincible centaur to a standstill, was betrayed by said elder god (no surprise there), empowered said nigh invincible centaur, abandoned her sanity, empowered an ancient artifact of unknowable power by sacrificing her minions, committed suicide, and then killed that self-same nigh invincible centaur in a fit of spite.... then blew up the sky for good measure to cement her tyrannical rule of the planet.

Did I forget anything?

Oh yheah. She also apparently knows necromancy since she resurrected herself and then raised all of her minions after using them in a blood sacrifice.

That ~was~ kind of awesome, to be honest. I mean... why don't more warlocks practice necromancy? It would make sacrifices so much more convenient.

But, anyway. Yheah.

I mean... I get that my contract kind of says I'm supposed to serve her and all, but what the hell am I supposed to do, exactly?

She already owns the fekking planet. She has more magic than the Kirin Tor's bastard offspring with the eredar. She's more ruthless than a monastery full of nuns who manufacture rulers. And she's already a mutated, seemingly immortal, horsebeast with a head mounted stabbing implement and the wings to let her catch up to anyone who would dare to flee her imminent slaughter of all they hold dear in life.

I mean, I can dust the shelves or whatever, but she doesn't even have a Lair anymore.

So, it was during this particular stream of panic that there was a flash of light and the Master reappeared with her swarm of minions, still branded with the arcane signs of their recent necromantic reanimation.

Really can't say I ever expected I'd be thinking a sentence like that but.... eh.... par for the course.

And that massive crystal tree thing? The one she's been feeding the souls of all that would die within the confines of her terror-forest? Apparently, the Master wasn't done because a moment later, it lit up and that little relic she'd used as a sacrificial alter? It lit up, shot ANOTHER DEATH-RAINBOW through the ceiling of the cavern, and launched itself.

Oh...

OOOOOOH!

She's VINDICTIVE too!

Must have been upset that her secret mutant owl legion didn't arrive in time and now she's making sure they never will.

Did NOT see that one coming. Most warlocks stick with shear malice... but she's going all the way to spiteful retribution and teaching loyalty through terror.

I'd never have thought she'd just overload a necromantic alter and use it as ranged artillery.

I.... should be taking notes or something. I'm certain this will be on a test later.

But, anyway, one moment it was there and the next the alter had been fired through the stone of the cavern and off to destroy whatever pitiable wretch had dared to waste the Master's time.

An then there was a lurch and we were all standing in the bright sun again, the Master's minions looking around before she snatched back the power she had lent them.

I honestly expected them to all fall to dust, the last remnants of failure having their animating magics stripped from them, but nooooooo, the Master wanted them to suffer with their inadequacy.

And then I looked up.

There was a castle. An enormous, blue and purple castle made of slabs of what looked like mana crystals. It's front door was a massive golden slab with ruby inserts shaped to look like hearts which parted down the middle, obviously to remind all who entered that the Master would just as easily separate them from their own.

It rose from the ground, a towering reminder of her superiority, perfect and unassailable to any but the most vicious and determined. A pillar of reflective, magic, doom, just waiting for a victim. before spreading branch-like growths to support the purple keep it held aloft.

Balconies of gold extended from various places, threatening lethal drops for any uninvited guests while blue crystals grew from it's imposing base like some sick mockery of life, spreading tendrils across its face like the veins of a parasitic infection.

And atop the keep, taller than even Tea-wreck at his largest, shown the largest single spellstone I have ever seen. It's face, a glimmering blue, shown with a vibrant sheen of magic. Ten crystal arms extended from it, tapering to lethal points while its center glowed a brilliant blue-white.

I truly doubted anything could possibly be so foolish as to challenge the Master with THAT creation looming above.

And the Master, truly in her element, feigned surprise at the whole thing and asked "But.... whose is it?"

And then I nearly screamed in surprise as a voice spoke up from behind us all, "I believe it is yours, Princess Twilight."

That massive white one from the mountain castle had somehow snuck up on us, flanked by the dark one and the candy colored one that had given the Master their magic, and behind them all, the elder god loomed with a devious smirk upon his ever shifting maw of chaos.

I was about to attack when I noticed that Spike was keeping them all herded together so the Master could dispose of them.

Smart dragon.

But the Master, ever the one to impress upon others her absolute power, simply smiled and acted innocent, before leading us all into her new Lair.

...

Well, at least I know what I'll be doing.

With that much crystal, I'll either need the world's largest squeegee or a spiked whip to encourage the peons that will be cleaning the windows.

-~oOo~-

So, there I was, hopping around the Master's new lair.... pardon.... fortress, when, all of a sudden, I hear this commotion from outside.

And not the commotion I've gotten used to here.

There were no "AiiEEEEE!"s or "Bunny STAMPEDE!"s or "The Horror! The Horror!"s about gardens wilting... oh no. This was a full blown scream-because-you've-just-witnessed-previously-unimagined-horrors-involving-the-loss-of-life-and-limb kind of scream.

You know... the real deal. Not the prissy little 'just one calorie' diet screams that the peons seem to like here.

Sorry... The Master informed me that I should try to use shorter sentences because, apparently, only Pinkie has lungs that can functionally contain enough oxygen to reliably generate multiple paragraphs of communication without risking harm to oneself and others as a side effect of continued deprivation of said oxygen.

Then she told me I should try to break up my thoughts a bit since that's apparently where those sentences come from.

Which, I guess, means she can read minds too. Shocker, there... that's supposed to be a priest thing.

Multiclass indeed.

Anyway, so the screaming's just started and before I can even get to the kitchen to make some popcorn to watch the show, the Master and Spike go charging by with a clatter of hooves and claws.

And that's another thing. This place is entirely made of crystal... hooves on crystal are NOT quiet.

On the upside, most of her would-be assassins are hooved so I suppose that kind of makes it an alarm system of sorts.

But anyway, before I can even get to the kitchen, my tether ended up yanking me along for the ride, bouncing my head against a few turns in the hallways and down the stairs for good measure.

I don't even think the Master realized it.... but that's the Master for you, so powerful she doesn't even have to think about causing harm to succeed at it.

I mean, once I got to sit down after my nice, relaxing, 59 and a half hour shift of polishing the windows, it just kind of came to me . . .

She probably didn't even feel threatened by Tea-Wreck the whole time.

I mean, yheah, there was some yelling, and sure, the widespread destruction and won ton violence was a bit more upbeat than her usual antics, but at the end, I got to thinking about it.

I mean, really thinking about it...

And it was a kind of horrifying realization that the whole time, even in the midst of destruction the likes of which this place has probably never seen, I don't think I saw the Master even bleed.

Not one drop.

It's like even her blood knows that disappointing her would result in terrible retribution and simply decided that "no" it simply wasn't going to leak out of any gaping flesh wounds.

Not that there were any of those either.... her skin's probably just as terrified.

But still.... that means that she was so absolutely certain of her victory that the only thing that gave her pause was the moment she realized that her minions, ahem.... her 'friends'.... were being held captive, and just decided to give Tea-Wreck the fleeting glimpse of victory to make his inevitable defeat all the sweeter.

So.... yheah. But, getting back to the screaming...

So, there we were, clamoring down the stairs, and this place has a LOT of them, when all of a sudden, the screams go silent all at once.

The Master nearly tripped over her own hooves when that happened, novice mistake really. I mean, I didn't miss a beat tumbling head over hooves as my face repeatedly found each step as I caught up.

And then, the front doors burst open and a pile of pony bodies just kind of slumped in.

And behind them, wreathed in orange and green magic, a thin figure rose to easily twice the Master's height...

... and began to cackle.

...

Wait a second! I know that laugh! I KNOW that laugh! This is amazing!

...

No. No! Wait, this is NOT amazing. This is Terrible! Well, still kind of amazing, but definitely still very very bad.

...

And I'm out of fel-enscorcelled tables to use as munitions.

Note to self: work with the scaly-harbinger-of-the-end-times to make another table for the Master... in case of munition emergencies.

...

Oh right... the laughter.

Stitchface had apparently decided to visit.

Yay?

Comments

[hyrushoten]

Now that's a cliffhanger! It should be interesting to see how this goes and it might even get Twilight to finally have a long talk with Gakham and actually listen to him.

[Venerable Ro]

There was a castle. An enormous, blue and purple castle made of slabs of what looked like mana crystals. It's front door was a massive golden slab with ruby inserts shaped to look like hearts which parted down the middle, obviously to remind all who entered that the Master would just as easily separate them from their own.

It rose from the ground, a towering reminder of her superiority, perfect and unassailable to any but the most vicious and determined. A pillar of reflective, magic, doom, just waiting for a victim. before spreading branch-like growths to support the purple keep it held aloft.

Balconies of gold extended from various places, threatening lethal drops for any uninvited guests while blue crystals grew from it's imposing base like some sick mockery of life, spreading tendrils across its face like the veins of a parasitic infection.

And atop the keep, taller than even Tea-wreck at his largest, shown the largest single spellstone I have ever seen. It's face, a glimmering blue, shown with a vibrant sheen of magic. Ten crystal arms extended from it, tapering to lethal points while its center glowed a brilliant blue-white.

And a deranged, murderous imp is the first to manage to make that thing sound impressive. Ironic, that.

[StormDancer]

9402684
Well..... he ~does~ have a skewed view of the world. <chuckles>

[nightmaster0]

Well this took a very unexpected twist. I can't wait to see how this meeting/confrontation between Twilight and her Imps previous Master will go.