Ch10 - Dragonshy - Part 3
Ponyville’s Tiny Librarian
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Chapter 10
Dragonshy
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part 3
“We seek audience with the Dragon Lord. Meeting with him is of great importance,” Luna stated, taking a regal pose despite the size disadvantage.
“Out of the way, puny pony princess. Dragon Lord does not wish to waste his time with you,” a dragon sneered as another approached the cake. Both were about half the size of an Ursa Minor, and the ends of their tails looked like maces the size of wrecking balls.
“We will take the cake though. It will satisfy our lord’s hunger way better than raw gems or ponies like you would, so scram before we change our minds,” the second dragon said contemptuously and moved to grab the giant cake in his clawed hands. A mere breath away from ruining the cake, both of the dragons were arrested in a telekinetic aura, and they slowly turned their heads towards the alicorn.
“Puny pony Princess? We see that the centuries have done little for the manners of dragons!” Luna boomed in her Royal Canterlot Voice, a smirk on her face. "Let us start with respect! This puny pony princess demands an apology from you lizards, lest she take it upon herself to ship you two home in a coffin made from your own scales!"
The dragons tentatively tugged against the magical grip, before gulping and smiling a sheepish smile at the alicorn.
Cadence sat in front of the mountain, her legs trembling beneath her and her gaze fearful and unfocused. Come on, Cadence, get ahold of yourself. Auntie Celestia needs you, Twilight needs you. This dragon is dangerous for ponies in Ponyville and they are all counting on you.
Her eye twitched. I’m much bigger now. What happened last time won’t happen again…
“Leave her alone you monster!” Cadence screamed as she threw a crystal fragment at the dragon as hard as she could. It bounced harmlessly off his scales. “Stop hurting my family!”
The humongous beast ignored her and, with one strong swing of his tail, crushed Cadence’s home, reducing the igloo made from crystals and ice blocks into little more than dust. In his clawed hands, he was holding another crystal pony in a crushing grip.
“Leave my mom alone!” Cadence shouted again as galloped forward.
“R-run… s-save yourself...” the crystal mare wheezed out as the dragon opened his maw.
“Mom, I cannot leave you, I ca—”
“Cadence!”
The disguised alicorn jumped into the air with a shriek and a flutter of her wings. She swiveled around at the group of ponies heading her way, quickly noticing the tall, red stallion and the small, purple shape waving at her from a comfortable spot on his head.
“T-Twilight,” Cadence murmured, and she made a noticeable effort to stop hyperventilating before galloping towards the group. The tiny unicorn jumped from Big Mac’s head to meet her halfway, landing right into her warm embrace.
“Twilight, you and your friends should have stayed in Ponyville. I can handle it myself,” the alicorn advised as she hugged her small friend close to her chest. She loosened up when she felt the tiny hooves pushing against her. Twilight freed herself from the hug and climbed up onto the raised foreleg.
“No way. We won’t sit comfortably in our homes while you face a dragon on your own to protect us. Friends stick together,” Twilight stated with a final stomp.
Cadence looked at her tiny friend curiously. “If that’s the case, would you like me to remove the shrinking spell from you?” she offered cheerfully as Twilight jumped down onto the grass. “I can recast it anytime you want, if you’re worried about that.”
Twilight brought a hoof to her chin, her face scrunching up into a pout. “Ahh, but it would make this adventure way too easy. I would prefer not to.”
Cadence sighed, her ears dropping. “If you really want to…”
Twilight turned around and crouched down into a special position the alicorn easily recognized, and she perked up quickly when and mirrored her friend’s pose. A moment later, the two mares started their dance.
“Sunshine, sunshine, ladybugs awake, clap your hooves and do a little shake!” they said in unison as Cadence’s giant hooves carefully and gently clapped against Twilight’s tiny ones. The tiny unicorn performed a backflip in the air after their final clap and landed on the grass with a shake of her tail.
Both mares fell onto grass, laughing amidst a few stifled giggles and confused looks from the others.
Gilda’s brow furrowed, and though her mouth was open as if to say something, it took a second to find her voice. “Wha… what was that?” she asked.
“That was a welcoming dance, silly, and it was sooooo adorable!” Pinkie said as she bounced forward. She turned around and copied her friends’ poses. “Wanna try it too? It looks fun!”
Gilda rolled her eyes with an exasperated huff. “In your dreams.”
“I’ll pass,” Rainbow Dash replied, drawing out a sad pout from the pink pony. “How about me and Gilda show you what we learned back in flight school?”
The griffon raised an eyebrow at Rainbow Dash. “Just like that? In front of everypony?”
“Come on, Gilda, pleasssse?”
Gilda grumbled unintelligibly for a second before she let out a breath of resignation. “Just for you, Dashie,” and she and Rainbow Dash flew up and did their own song and dance to the cheers of Pinkie and Fluttershy.
Overwatch stroked her chin with a hoof. “Ahh, so this is what they taught the foals back in the day.”
Twilight wiped off any stray blades of grass from herself as she got up and trotted towards the team. Cadence followed slowly behind her, careful not to step on her friend by accident.
“I don’t think there’s a point for you to hide under your disguise, Cadence. Besides Gilda and Big Macintosh, only my friends volunteered, and they’re all trustworthy,” Twilight commented as she turned to her taller friend with an encouraging smile.
“Disguise?” Gilda remarked as she gave Cadence a closer look, observing her curiously. “Looks like a regular pegasus to me.”
Twilight and Cadence looked at each other and giggled. With a small bow, a bright flash erupted from the pink pegasus, leaving behind a slightly taller pink alicorn. Cadence slowly opened her eyes and swept her gaze between her friends’ facial expressions, chuckling at the big red stallion looking at her with his mouth agape and the griffon blinking several times in disbelief.
“I thought you only had one pony with both wings and a horn,” Gilda said, looking to Rainbow Dash.
“Yeah, I thought so too. Turns out we had another one in disguise in Equestria for hundreds of years,” Rainbow said with a shrug. “Pretty neat if you ask me.”
Gilda walked casually up to Cadence and poked her in the wing, much to her displeasure. The alicorn withdrew from the griffon’s talons and asked, “Is something wrong?”
“Nah, I just didn’t expect to ever see a winged unicorn.” Gilda smiled eagerly. “So, you were alive for centuries. Did you learn anything useful about dealing with dragons? They’re not exactly pushovers.”
Cadence’s eye twitched at the mere mention of dragons. “Well…” she started hesitantly.
“Oh, she has plenty of experience. I’m sure she’s learned something useful over all those years,” Twilight replied confidently before looking up at her alicorn friend. “Am I right?”
Cadence opened her mouth to answer, but Gilda spoke first. “Experience may be useful, but does she know how to fight? Dragons are pretty violent, and if you’re not going to grow and kick its flank, we’ll need to rely on her power instead.”
Twilight jumped onto Gilda’s beak and pointed towards Cadence. “Oh, she can fight. She participated in the war between Equestria and Griff—”
Twilight stopped abruptly, slowly bringing a hoof to her mouth. She turned with an apologetic look at Gilda and bowed. “Umm… sorry.”
The tiny unicorn jumped down to the ground and turned around for another bow. “I really am sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“Hey, no problem. That’s a pretty cool fact. Know how many griffon soldiers she’s killed?” Gilda asked casually with a smirk.
Cadence took a step back, caught completely off guard. “Ex-cuse me?”
“How many kills did you score?” Gilda asked again. “I mean, you fought and you’re still alive, so you had to have done something.”
An awkward silence hung in the air for a good five seconds before Cadence cleared her throat and said, “Well… I did fight, but I did not take a single life. I knocked out whoever I could and took them prisoner.”
“Prisoners?” Gilda scoffed. “Lame.”
"Lame?" Cadence asked with a wince. "I fought in a war against your people. Kinda thought you’d be a little more angry at me since, y’know, I was once an enemy of your kind?"
Gilda shrugged. “What’s past is past. I couldn’t care less about a few feather-brains who died in that stupid war. They invaded, they got what they deserved. If there’s anything I’ve learned, it’s that ponies aren’t to be messed with,” she said to the obvious amusement of Rainbow Dash. “What’s more important is that I’m on your team, we fight on the same side, and I do prefer when those I fight alongside with know how to kick flank.”
Cadence blinked dumbly as her memories of her participation in the war butt in and took a seat next to her memories of her encounter with the dragons. Banish those thoughts, Cadence. Gilda may be a griffon, but she’s Twilight’s friend, if she trusts her, so should I, she thought, trying to convince herself that not every griffin is a bloodthirsty monster.
“Well…” Twilight said hesitantly, “how about I introduce you to Applejack’s brother?”
Cadence snapped out of her thoughts with a shake of her head. “O-of course. I don’t believe we’ve met.”
Twilight ran towards the humongous stallion, pointing a tiny hoof at him. “His name is Big Macintosh, but everypony calls him Big Mac.”
The alicorn looked at the big earth pony and next down at her tiny friend. Big Mac? How very fitting.
The stallion finally recovered after his long shock and half-bowed. “Honored t’ meet ya.”
“Pleasure is all mine,” Cadence said cheerfully as she raised her hoof towards the stallion. “Please, don’t bow. I’m just a fellow pony, alicorn or not.”
Big Mac straightened up and shook Cadence’s hoof, exchanging a friendly smile with her. They turned to Twilight when she began climbing up onto Cadence’s foreleg, and the alicorn raised the tiny unicorn up to her head.
Twilight settled in behind Cadence’s horn. “Now with introductions out of the way,” she said, pointing a hoof forward. “let’s save Ponyville!”
“What’s the meaning of this?” the humongous, over millennium-old dragon bellowed. His voice echoed through the expansive cavern, causing the other dragons and his servants to tremble in fear.
He rose to his full height as two of his servants escorted in an alicorn and her guards, all of whom were barely noticeable from his perspective. Despite his age, his keen eyes caught the presence of a plethora of gems in the giant cake levitated in as well as several other gifts.
“I stated clearly that your kind is not welcome here. Begone!” The gale-force winds caused by the strength of his voice nearly bowled over both of dragons and lifted the miniscule being off the ground.
Luna spread her wings and grit her teeth, barely stopping herself and her offerings from impacting the stone wall and avoiding the small, loose stones that crashed into it a moment later.
She narrowed her eyes and flew up to the Dragon Lord’s head, giving her a good look at his features. She had already noticed the two massive horns growing down from his head, curling up at the ends. Several teeth were visible, each three times the size of a common pony.
With a deep breath, she shouted in the Royal Canterlot Voice, “We assume that thou art the strongest and mightiest of all dragons, respected and feared by your kind, the ruler over all dragons on the continent: the Dragon Lord!” Her eyes scanned over his face, finding no recognizable features. ”We do not recognize you. Hast the previous Lord passed away? Black Claw, was it?”
“You heard about Black Claw?” he asked, raising an eyebrow. He did not move from his stone seat, surrounded by mountains of treasures.
“We didn’t just hear about him, we met him and bested him in battle before our banishment!” Luna stated proudly with a fiendish grin.
Dragon Lord burst into laughter, forcing the alicorn to readjust to the sudden gust of wind and bad breath, and stood up slowly. “Of course you did! Black Claw was a weakling, but even so, you? Besting a Dragon Lord in a fight?” He slammed his hand against the ground with a thundering boom, leaving a crater on impact. “And they say dragons blow hot air all the time. Go ahead, amuse me more as long as you still have a mouth on your tiny, empty head.”
”Thou darest to insult us? We are Luna, Guardian of the Night and Princess of Equestria. We shall not stand such lack of respect!”
“And what are you going to do!?” he asked as their audience only grew. “The only Princess I’ve ever heard about was Celestia, and while she defeated my predecessor, all she’s done over the past centuries was nag and nag about having us send ambassadors to her lands. Nothing but words.”
Luna raised her eyebrow. “And what of thy predecessor? We know that a new Dragon Lord is chosen every five hundred years. If he respected the peace with Equestria, why not thee?”
“Ha!” The humongous dragon grinned as he walked towards her, every step making the cavern rumble. “That old codger was a pushover. His time as Dragon Lord was worthless and pathetic.” He glanced down at the gathered dragons and asked, “Am I right?”
The dragons looked at each other.
“Agree with me!”
The cavern filled with nodding dragons and unintelligible, but generally affirmative mumbling. Luna crossed her forelegs and rolled her eyes.
The Lord looked back at the miniscule princess and added, “I respected our laws and waited for the time I could win his crown, and once I did, I brought forth the mightiest reign of all Dragon Lords before me. He groaned before releasing steam from his nose. ”I followed the agreement my weaker predecessor made as he was defeated by the pony princess in a fair battle, but no more.”
Luna coughed and waved her forehoof in front of her nose, wondering if she wouldn’t ruin her negotiations if she suggested the Lord to clean his mouth from time to time. A quick glance at her guards told her they weren’t faring any better. “Why?” she asked. “What changed your mind?”
“My rule is reaching its end, and I will not stand upon any agreement with ponies when their ruler hides from us behind the walls of her castle and the words of ambassadors,” he said, narrowing his eyes at the tiny princess. “I will be remembered as the one who defeated Celestia, crushed Equestria, and claimed untold riches and lands for my kind, something the next Dragon Lord might be too cowardly or weak to accomplish.”
He waved a hand dismissively. “It’s too late for gifts to change my mind.” He smirked. “Though if you kneel before me and beg for mercy as I eat your tribute, I will consider letting you go.”
Lune scoffed. “We said that we bested the previous Dragon Lord in a fight. If thou dost not believe our words, we shall prove the truth in them!” She grinned as she put the giant cake into the custody of three royal guards and one bat-winged pony. She flew closer to the Lord’s face with a confident sneer. “We challenge thee to a fight, that I may prove to thee the might of Equestria!”
“Our Lord won’t waste his time on pony like you!” a dragon spoke up, striding ahead of the group. Though he was the size of an elephant, he burst from the ground at surprising speeds at her before taking a deep breath and sending waves of flames at the flying alicorn.
The proud young dragon’s grin faded quickly when all he saw after the flames had dissipated was the angry glare of an alicorn with nary a burn mark on her body.
Luna growled. “Thou expected to defeat us with such a weak attack? Our fireplace burns hotter than thee. We did not even need to shield ourselves,” she stated as she swept the soot from her fur. In the next instant, she was within melee range of her attacker, planting a solid hoof into his gut. The two-ton dragon was sent flying, and her blue horseshoe bent into unusability from the impact. “We shalt not waste our magic on thee either.”
The dragon quickly fled into the crowd, who had started to look at her with a hint of admiration. Luna chuckled. “Do not let our appearance deceive you. We are stronger than we look.” She flew back to the Dragon Lord, who looked at her unimpressed. “If we win, thou wilt renew all agreements between dragons and Equestria.”
Dragon Lord laughed as Luna darted upward, evading both wind and bad breath. “You remind me of my daughter, so tiny, yet filled with big words.” He closed his mouth and snorted steam from his nostrils. Flames flickered from between his teeth. “I accept your challenge, little pony.”
He flapped his giant wings, pushing Luna and a few of the smaller dragons among the crowd away. He glanced at the cake, noticing that some of his servants were eyeing it with growing interest. “Any dragon dare to take a bite out of my cake, and I’ll be the one taking a bite out of them too!”
The distance between the cake and the gathered dragons drastically increased.
Smiling in satisfaction, the Dragon Lord turned his attention on the tiny alicorn hovering near the top of the cavern, her horn lit with magic. With a grin, he leapt off the ground, and the battle was begun.
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Woot! Some anger relief incoming from Nightmare Moon/Luna!
Favorite line
Love this
But Gilda! She's not a winged unicorn. She's a horny pegasus!
8601698
We can only hope :P
Suddenly, just as Luna and the Dragon Lord are about to battle, a disembodied male voice echoes throughout the area...
"ROUND ONE... FIGHT!!"
... and those words are followed instantly by a pair of words iconic to a planet Equestria knows not...
"MORTAL KOMBAT!!!!"
8601734
oh you.
At least the cake will be safe.....i fear for whomever destroys a cake in from of Tia though.
...some weeks later
Twilight: Waaaa... Princess Luna had an awesome combat with a giant dragon and I didn't get a chance to watch it!
Rainbow: Totally agree! We should go with them instead of dealing with the softie dragon here. Even Flutter could take care of it easy enough.
Gilda: While I agree with watching an epic fight, didn't you got your flank kicked by that softie lizard?
8601698
8601762
That's a possibility.
8602309
In this AU, Tia is not interested in cakes anymore as it remind her of her unfortunate accident involving devouring her student.
8602553
To be fair, it is hard to tell if this Dragon will be as soft as in the show, after all Dragon Lord ordered for dragons to raid Equestria, so this one may not be as peaceful.
I can't wait to see Luna face the Dragon Lord and Fluttershy to face the dragon close to Ponyville.
Your cool Gilda.
The level of probable violence in the next chapter is off the charts.
8603069
I take it she's cooler than the show Gilda?
8603332
Eeyup
8603332
Waning the following chapter is not twiliy frendly
8600614
Yes. That has been confirmed, she's a changeling and she knows it.
Let the Dragon Lord beat down courtesy of Luna begin! And she should take Ember back to Equestria with her. I'm impressed Fluttershy volunteered to come, but now we see the problem with Celestia's plan, Applejack and Rarity aren't going! I can just see Celestia thinking, "At least Twilight and all her friends are growing closer!" as she flies home... only to learn those two sat out the adventure and get a headache.
Also Twiny: SAY THAT YOU'LL GO BIG IF NEEDED JUST TO KEEP PONIES FROM WORRYING!!!!!
8603068
I don’t remember Fluttershy joining the group. Unless I forgot someone, we have Twilight, Overwatch, Cadance, Big Mac, Pinkie, Rainbow and Gilda.
8605447
Here is the evidence
8605453
I had forgotten that part. Fluttershy has been quite discreet from then, except for the moment in that last chapter where she cheers.
8605518
Anyway we'll see what happens when the next chapter rolls around.
8603589
Thanks. Not many readers are fan the way I try to develop Cadence in my story, nice that someone likes it.
8604030
Just because AJ and Rarity didn't join Twilight on her adventure doesn't mean that it is a complite lose. After all, Pinkie and Dash are there, and Fluttershy even volountiered herself, so 3 out of 5 isn't all that bad.
Well, she did say that going big will be only as her last resort when adressing the crowd, and she's putting a lot of trust in Cadence's power
need more,so good!
8605530
I am one of the readers who like the way you write and develop Cadance's character.
I can't wait for Luna to trounce the Dragon Lord.
I kinda like the dragon lord. He's at least honest about it. And although the line about eating whoever eats that cake is a bit mean, it was funny.