Consequences of Past Mistakes

by SoaringCoal

Weapons of Harmony

Twilight gasped as she found herself back in the throne room. She was laying on the floor, trembling from her time in the void. It almost felt odd for her to be able to move her body, to feel herself breathing and feeling the cold marble floor against her side. Remembering back on the void it felt familiar. Like she had experienced it before.

She glanced around and saw that her friends were in similar situations. All of them trembling with the exception of Fluttershy who had started crying. Cadance, Rainbow Dash and Applejack were pale and were looking aimlessly at the floor. Rarity was clutching her mane and testing out her limbs, trying to make sure she still wasn’t in the void. And Pinkie Pie’s mane had completely deflated and she was even frowning. A rare sight for the ponies around. Twilight shifted her attention towards the throne and saw that Celestia was sitting, waiting patiently, for them to recover.

“I’m sorry you had to go through that.” She said regretfully.

Twilight found the strength and got on her legs. “W-what happened?”

“That was a most horrible experience.” Rarity said, standing up as well.

“Ah’ll say.” Applejack said, shivering at the memory of the void.

“It was like all happiness and laughter was sucked out of me.” Pinkie Pie her eyes widening and she started to shiver. “All emotion meant nothing. There was only nothing.”

Fluttershy was shaking and kept her hooves over her head, but only enough to minimize her sight and still keep the light. After that experience, the warm light was more than welcoming. “I-it was scary.” She peeped in.

Rainbow dash shook her head, stood up, spread her wings and started to flap them to test them out. “It felt familiar, like I’ve been in that void before.” Her friends nodded in her direction.

“Yeah, me too.” Twilight said.

“Same here.” Applejack nodded.

Cadance stood up and shivered. “I really hope you girls are joking. That was the worst feeling I have ever felt in my life.”

“What you just went through is unfortunately a side effect of the spell.” Celestia told her guests.

“How long were we in there?” Twilight asked.

“Only a couple of minutes.”

“What?!” Twilight exclaimed. “But it felt like hours!”

“Time loses its meaning with the lack of senses that ties it to us.” Said a familiar voice.

The guests turned and saw that princess Luna had entered the room once more. She wore a sad expression.

“Glad you could rejoin us, Luna.” Celestia smiled at her sister and Luna greeted her with a quick smile of her own.

“We wish we could say it’s a pleasure.” Luna replied. “But you are right, sister, we have to face our demons and tis’ long overdue.”

“Yes, it is.” Celestia replied. Luna flew up beside Celestia and sat on the throne beside her. Luna lifted a hoof, urging for Celestia to continue and she did so. “As many of you may have guessed, what you witnessed was the day I met Discord. And at the time I was afraid of draconequui. Our mother had told me and Luna about some of the horrible things they did on the battlefield so that we would never sympathise with them or care for their existence. But that day changed my view on them forever. The draconequus I had met had not wanted to hurt me, he was simply curious. When I came home I told Luna about the meeting--”

“--And I was furious.” Luna continued. “But as time went on and Celestia kept telling me about that day, I became curious myself.”

“Many years went by before I snuck out of the Beacon again, But he was there again and we came to know each other. Eventually we became friends.” Celestia lit her horn and a picture appeared over her and Luna. It displayed Celestia and Discord playing. The picture brought a small smile to Celestia’s face. “I visited him as much as I could, which wasn’t very often. If I was lucky, I could visit him twice every fourth month, as he was my only friend.” Luna coughed. “Aside from Luna of course.”

“Weren’t there any other alicorn foals in the beacon?” Cadance asked.

Luna shook her head. “There were but those few were from another district. To keep things orderly and to create harmonic and lasting relations, a child in the beacon was only allowed to befriend other children from the same district.”

“What a stupid rule.” Rainbow Dash bluntly said.

Both Celestia and Luna nodded. “Indeed.”

“Over the years I started to bring Luna to mine and Discord’s meetings.” Celestia changed the picture and now it showed a teen and a slightly smaller alicorn running away, laughing, from the familiar draconequus. Celestia put out her horn and the happy memory disappeared

Luna sighed and continued from her sister’s stop. “Over the years we visited Discord, the war waged on. Many lives on both sides were lost and our kind even tried recruiting dragons, diamond dogs and even griffins, but they all refused to participate in the war, fearing what the draconequui might do to them if they sided with the alicorns. Then came a turning point. A grand battle came between draconequui and alicorns that lasted for days. When it was finally finished, the draconequui had lost. They had lost almost twice as many in the battle as the alicorns and were forced to retreat back further into their forest.”

“Wow, the draconequui must have messed up bad for that to happen.” Cadance stated.

Luna nodded. “Indeed, the draconequui weren’t trained in the art of war as our kind was. But what they lacked in the field of strategizing they made up for in cunning.” Luna’s gaze hardened. “And this was not the turning point.” Cadance gulped under her aunt's hard gaze.

Celestia put a hoof on Luna’s shoulder and her gaze softened.

“So, what was da turnin point?” Applejack asked.

“Let us continue the story and you will know.” Luna answered. “Shortly after the draconequui retreated into their forest, my kind followed. Discussions were made if they were simply to burn down the forest and then hunt the rest of the draconequui, but in the end they decided not to. Scouting groups and attack forces were made and sent into the forest. The strategy was to drive them out of the forest and then capture the draconequui with the rest of the army surrounding the forest, but that is not how it went. A day went by after the forces were sent inside, but they never returned and soon the draconequui made a counter attack.” Luna shook her head. “The alicorns that survived that day described that the draconequui came out of nowhere. The alicorns weren’t prepared for an attack and was quickly overrun, which shouldn’t have been possible with the many that they had lost days before.”

Luna lit her horn and an image formed above her. It displayed a dark shape in golden glowing chains surrounded by five alicorns, inside a white marble room. Two of the alicorns being Luna and Celestia’s mother and uncle. There were visible cracks across all of the chains, like they were slowly falling apart.

Celestia looked sadly at the image for a moment and then looked back at her guests. “There was a lone draconequus our uncle were able to capture before the long battle. Interrogation for information gave little to no results, but after the slaughter of many of his kind our mother discovered something. The draconequus had only become stronger in his time imprisoned and he was starting to break the bonds that held him. Our mother discovered that the draconequui’s magic was bound to each other.” Celestia nodded to Luna and she extinguished her horn and the image above them faded away.

“Uh, princess” Twilight began. “What do you mean by that their magic was bound to each other?”

“Well…” Luna began.” From what I was told, the draconequui’s magic were bound to one another and at the same time it wasn’t.”

Twilight and her friends gave Luna a weird look.

“Their magic was shared.” Celestia elaborated. “They each had a part of the tree’s magic within them, and for each one that died, that one’s magic would be divided equally among the rest. At the same time, if a draconequus was to be born, it would gain its own share of magic by taking from the ones that already existed. In a way they were each an element of the tree of turmoil similar to the tree of harmony except that they could, and preferred, to use their magic alone.”

“That sounds mighty complicated.” Applejack said with a raised eyebrow.

“It is.” Luna stated flatly.

“Anyways” Celestia continued. “Our mother and uncle realised that over time, the war would only twist more and more in favor of the draconequui. For every draconequus that would fall, the rest would become stronger, while the alicorns would only weaken for everypony they lost. They kept this information hidden from the public out of fear of their reactions towards their discovery.”

“Our mother and uncle began searching for a way to end the war anyway possible.” Luna picked up from Celestia. “First they tried to talk with the draconequui’s leaders, but it proved no result. The draconequui were resolute in getting revenge for their fallen. They said that the alicorns had started this war and the draconequui would finish it. Secondly they tried to contain the chaos magic from spreading when a draconequui dies, but the results proved disastrous, almost killing our mother and uncle in their first attempt. For many months they tried to contain the magic, but no matter what they tried, the chaos magic broke through their magic.”

“Wait, you two were very young when all of this happened, so how do you know all of this?” Twilight asked with a raised eyebrow.

Celestia and Luna shared a look. Then Luna spoke. “We spied on our mother when we had nothing else to do…” She admitted. “There weren't much to do in those years other than studying and our occasional meetings with Discord.”

“Oh…”

A short silence followed Luna’s words. Then Celestia began to speak again.

“As we were saying. Our mother was starting to get desperate, so she tried to do as the draconequui when they were in need. Our mother and uncle went to the tree of harmony for help. Unbeknownst to them, Luna and I followed.” Celestia lit her horn and another image appeared. it showed Celestia and Luna’s mother and uncle standing in front of the tree of Harmony while Luna and Celestia were outside the cave, looking in. “Our mother asked the tree for the power to combat the draconequui and end the war, but the tree turned them down. Our mother asked why it wouldn’t help them like the tree of Turmoil helped the draconequui and the tree answered that the alicorns were not ready or in need of such power. Our uncle disagreed and started to yell at the tree about what it stood for, and that they were only trying to accomplish peace and nothing more. Eventually the tree caved in and said that it would help them.” The image above Celestia and Luna changed and the two alicorns were now standing with six gems. “It granted them the Elements of Harmony.”

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The Everfree forest. It is a forest that is feared by the pony populace for it is different in almost everyway to the rest of Equestria. The clouds move by themselves, season change by themselves and everything inside of it is just unnatural and different. The creatures that live inside aren’t helping on this matter. Quite the contrary, they are the biggest reason as to why ponies fear the forest. For Everfree is home to many chaotic and strange creatures. Hydras, Manticores, Cocatrices and many others. Each of them frightening and very dangerous. But they all pale in comparison to the creature that has just entered it, for that creature is cunning, calculating, manipulative and can do things that can be hard to fathom.

Discord yawned and scratched his behind as he lazily walked inside of the feared forest. The sudden anger that had emerged inside of Fluttershy’s cottage had seemingly disappeared. And now he was just tired and annoyed. Not to mention he still had a massive headache.

He began to notice just how quiet the forest was. There was no birds singing or animals growling or howling in the distance which was odd. Normally one could hear some of the Everfree’s distant animals noises even from inside Fluttershy’s cottage.

In his absent mind Discord didn’t notice where he was going and tripped over the root of a tree, landing face first in the dirt. He grumbled to himself as he turned onto his back and sat up, putting his lion paw to his head. “This just isn’t my day is it?” He asked no one in particular. As he looked out the way he came from, he noticed a hole in the forest that let him see directly to Ponyville. But what caught his attention was a field with tall grass besides the buildings. His eyes widened as he kept staring at it in the distance. It seemed familiar and yet not.

“I love you, you know.”

A female voice sounded in his head and sweat began to form on Discord’s forehead. The voice was young and it was familiar like he knew the owner of the voice but just couldn’t remember.

“You know that’s impossible, right?”

Another voice sounded through Discord’s head, but this one was male and it sounded like his own, but younger.

“Oh yes”

The female voice said. Discord felt as if something was pressing against his neck and chest. Something warm. He could smell roses his heart was beating faster.

“But I love you none the less.”

And with that the female voiced stopped and the warm feeling Discord felt seized. He gulped. What just happened? He thought. Something strange was happening and he didn’t know what. That feeling… He had never felt that feeling before. It was so warm and cozy and he felt absolute happiness in its short appearance and he already missed it. The only thing familiar he had felt was with Fluttershy, but not of the same magnitude as what he just felt.

A violent pounding began in Discord’s head and he rolled onto his stomach and clutched his head. “ARGH!” He groaned as the pain kept getting stronger.

“She lied to me!”

All sound and all of the pain Discord felt seemed to out volumed by the angry voice. The earth around Discord began to tremble and he felt his magic going out of control which had never happened before. The earth beneath him turned into a wide variety of candy. Licorice, chocolate and giant gummybears. And as the voice the voice stopped, Discord’s headache inside increased tenfold. “ARRGH!” He screamed and his magic spinning further out of control. Discord heard lightning strikes and what sounded like roaring fire, but he didn’t notice much as the pain kept him crippled clutching his head on the ground.

And suddenly the enormous pain stopped just as fast as it had come. Discord took ragged breaths and he felt sweat dripping from his face. What is happening to me?! He shook his head and slowly stood up. His eyes widened at the sights around him and he gulped.

The ground that had been made into candy had been incinerated and had left black smudge in its place. The trees 30 feet around him were charred husks of their former selves. As much as Discord liked chaos, he had never liked the overwhelming destruction it could cause. Without thinking he snapped his talon and the trees and ground was restored to before his loss of control happened. This is bad, I have to tell the girls. He thought and was about to snap his talon and teleport to Canterlot when something caught his eye. He could see something looking at him and laughing. It had two mismatched wings, four mismatched limbs. It looked like himself. A draconequus, could it be? The creature gave a warmhearted laughter, turned and began running .

“Wait! Come back!” Discord yelled and began running after the creature following it deeper into the Everfree forest.

Author's Note:

I did not plan for this and the last chapter to share the same word count. Its just one of those weird coincidences. And sorry it took so long. I've been busy.

Comments

[Spiritofchaos227]

That thing with the Daconiqquii ( I have no idea If I am spelling that correctly ) and their magic splitting like that... Is really clever. It's a good way to explain why Discord is so powerful. But I fear that their bond runs deeper that just a bit of magic...

[RainbowPonyBrony]

Please update! This is very interesting and I want to read more!