A Beginner's Guide to Heroism

by LoyalLiar

IL - Shuffling Off

IL
Shuffling Off

The next morning, I rolled off of Silhouette’s couch, rubbed my brow, and regarded the sun creeping over the balcony. I vaguely recalled relieving my stomach over that balcony from the effects of Silhouette’s disgusting liquor not long after Tempest flew away. I didn’t feel any sort of hangover, thankfully, but the sun was offending me all the same.

“Good morning, Morty,” Celestia said, perhaps three feet behind me.

I jumped roughly the same distance in the air. “How… how…”

“How can I be so quiet at my size?” The alicorn smiled. “A mare never tells.”

Over the course of the night, her mane had begun to go back to its magical self. To my amusement, the transformation started at the ends of the strands of her mane and tail, rather than their roots.

“How are you?” I managed to ask.

Celestia smiled. “Fine, I suppose. You seem a bit better than last night.”

I didn’t feel it. In place of any desire for breakfast, a knot sat firmly in my stomach, stubbornly refusing to budge until I gave up my idiotic plan of confronting Wintershimmer alone. I hoped Celestia couldn’t see it on my face, but somehow her magenta eyes seemed to imply that she did.

“I’m alright,” I told her. “I’ll survive.”

“Well, I should hope so. I didn’t go to the trouble of regrowing the middle of you for nothing.” Despite how prescient the statement seemed, she laughed as though it was just a passing joke. “Look there, on the horizon.”

“You mean ‘look straight into the sun’?” I asked.

“Ah, right. I’m sorry, I sometimes forget other ponies can’t do that. The Triumvirate are arriving. I can see their wagons now. I imagine you’re excited to have Typhoon admit she was wrong?”

“Something like that…” I swallowed. “Actually, I’m not feeling so good at the moment. Um… sorry…” I grabbed my side, and then pushed past her on my way out the door.

“Feel better soon, Morty,” Celestia called to me as I darted down the hall and then into the somewhat winding path down and out of the Crystal Spire.

With my every step, the knot in my gut shouted to stop. I really did begin to feel ill, despite my outright lie to Celestia. My plan, if you could really even pretend to call it that, was almost certainly going to get me killed. And yet my hooves just kept going. I knew what had to be done, and I knew I was the pony to do it, even if my mind still wanted to make excuses.

Crystalline stairways led to crystalline streets, and soon I found my way to a waiting skywagon with five pegasi hitched into a six-pony harness. Blizzard, standing in the back row nearest the wagon, saw me first as I approached. “Oh, everypony, Morty’s here. Morty! What’s happening? Tempest was… well, he was very strange about this.”

“Yeah…” I sighed. “I know. Look, everypony, this will all make sense back in Everfree City. I promise. Whichever one of you is in charge… old guy.”

The stallion in question, who I retrospectively remember was named ‘Dusk’, turned around. “You call everypony ‘old guy’, kid?”

I shrugged. “Not the mares, no. But I did call Hurricane ‘geezer’ to his face, and I’m not dead yet.”

Dusk whistled shrilly. “Well, you’ve got quite a deathwish, haven’t you?”

“You have no idea,” I answered, stepping up to the door of the wagon. “Fly west for about three minutes, then turn south and fly straight to Everfree City. Time is of the essence.”

“Three minutes in the wrong direction?” Blizzard asked. “Morty, what are you getting at?”

“I’ll explain later. Right now I need… quiet. Please.”

In Blizzard’s eyes, I saw a blatant worry. All she said, though, was “Alright.”

---

My meditation inside the lonely wagon cabin, which really amounted to more of a continuous attempt to convince myself of the sanity of my own plan, was interrupted by a slow descent. Very carefully, I leaned my head out the window, where my five chauffeurs were focused on Everfree City ahead, below us. I narrowly avoided bestowing a sort of orange-green esophageal rainstorm on the ponies in the farmland below.

“Hey! Can you hear me?”

A few heads turned, and ears perked despite the wind.

“Take me to Diadem’s tower. Just let me off where the staircase ends near the top.”

Not five minutes later, we were there. I stepped out of the wagon onto the railing of the stairs, near the top of the tower. Solid ground was a welcome sensation, though it took me a moment to regain my balance.

“Morty, what are you—”

I hurried through the door before Blizzard could finish the question, slamming it behind me. Fortunately, thoughts of my plan, its urgency, and the increasing likelihood of my impending death kept me from lingering in guilt at the time. I hardly noticed the sound of the wooden door, nor the click of my hooves in the long hallway leading to Diadem’s library.

When that door creaked open, though, my miserable reverie broke very quickly, with the weight of warm fur slamming against my chest.

“Morty back!”

I stumbled under Graargh’s weight, nearly falling completely. “Graargh. It’s good to see you too.”

“Morty seem sad. Or worry?”

“Absolutely.” I nodded firmly. “But try not to worry about it. I’ll explain in just a minute. If you’re here, I assume my letter must have—”

A stallion coughed, obviously to attract attention and not to clear his throat. I looked up. It was the first time I laid eyes on Star Swirl the Bearded in the flesh. If anything, I note how far out of his way he seemed to have gone to bely the appearance of being a pony of any importance.

I suppose I should mention Diadem was standing next to him, ever living up to her role as the footnote of historical mages.

Star Swirl did, however, live up to what I had seen of him in the past from the memories I ripped out of Clover’s soul—remembering that event only made my stomach twist more. He wore his gaudy stars-and-moons robe, the corresponding pointed hat resting on a hook near the door. When he idly shifted his weight, the garment on his shoulders jangled, the result of the ridiculous number of bells he had attached to their edges. Now over one hundred years old, the stallion’s entire coat had passed to white, dotted with salt-and-pepper flecks of gray and black that mirrored his floor-length beard. But despite his advanced age and the atrophy of his limbs, Star Swirl was still a pony with a formidable frame whose broad shoulders seemed untouched by the ravages of time.

“Mortal Coil,” the stallion greeted me with a nod. “Student of Wintershimmer the Complacent. The reigning Pale Master, if what I’ve heard is true.” Star Swirl’s magic produced a heavy, stubby pipe from within his jacket and lifted it to his lips. Smoke of various shifting colors rose from the the stallion’s lips, creating a smoky veil between our eyes, held there by his wide-brimmed hat. The voice was strong, aged with an almost oaky timbre. I’d heard it once before, though never with my own ears. Yet the sound was so firmly burned into Clover’s memories that I couldn’t help but recognize it.

I bowed. “Archmage Star Swirl. It’s an honor to meet you.”

Star Swirl scoffed, releasing a puff of distinctly purple smoke from his nostrils. “I’m certain you would like me to forget our meeting in court, but I am afraid my memory is not that shot yet. Please, at least refrain from chewing your hooves for a moment.”

I stared at him for a solid few seconds, and then in sad realization, glanced at Graargh. The bear cub was scratching behind his own ear with a rear claw. I didn’t know if it was worse to imagine that Star Swirl had seen through that particular deception, or that Graargh had ruined my reputation forever.

“We’ve arranged what you asked in the lecture hall upstairs, ‘Morty’. But before we go up there, I wanted to ask you a few questions. Please, sit down.”

His horn lit, and in one of the most casual displays of impossible magic I have seen in my entire life, the wooden floorboards in front of him took on an almost liquid state, roiling as they rose until, all at once, they stopped. The result was a chair crafted out of what looked to be near the natural grain of the wood.

As I approached the seat, I glanced around the room. “I wouldn’t mind just taking one of the chairs that’s already here.”

“That’s fine, but those chairs are not matched to the shape of the pony sitting in them.”

When I sat, the comfort I felt in my lower back, just above my tail where chairs normally fail to support equine anatomy, proved the archmage correct.

Star Swirl calmly removed the pipe from his lips with magic, and rotated it so that he could point directly at me with the mouthpiece end. “Foremost, I wish to hear the unbridled truth from your lips. You killed Wintershimmer?”

“Yes, though not on purpose.” Star Swirl held an even look, or at least seemed to, though with his enormous beard covering his entire face and nearly touching the floor, it was hard to tell. “I guess you’re welcome?”

Again, I got no readable response from Star Swirl’s face. “You know how to cast The Razor, don’t you?”

“The Razor?” I bit my cheek in thought before I nodded. “You mean the spell to sever somepony’s soul? I didn’t know it had a name.”

“Wintershimmer once told me that he left it nameless intentionally. Forcing them to call it ‘Wintershimmer’s spell’ or ‘ripping out a soul’ made it dominate a sentence, and thus a thought. Namelessness gave it weight, and by extension increased his reputation. Though perhaps it was a ploy to get me to title it for him. I suppose it’s a rotten rose by another name either way. My concern is what I’ve heard of you, Coil. That you can cast it.”

I hesitated before offering a small nod. “I can. I’ve never used it on anypony, though.”

“Clover tells a different story,” Star Swirl countered with a genuinely visible frown.

“Well, if you want to talk about that… yes, I did grab onto her soul with the spell, but I didn’t use it to kill her. The point was looking into her memories. What I meant was that I’ve never used it to take away somepony’s soul.”

“No. You’ve only used it to violate the privacy of my apprentice’s soul against her will.” Star Swirl shook his head. “Regarding your letter, I will only say that I don’t like it.”

“Did you not do it?” I asked, stepping forward.

“I never said that.” The frankly ancient stallion grabbed his bell-laden hat, and his horn glowed just beneath its rim. Floating into view from within the pointed cap, I saw my jacket. Its hemlines were stiched, its burns and scrapes soothed, and it glistened, freshly washed. “Just that I don’t like it. You’re young, Morty. You’ve got a future ahead of you.”

“So does Silhouette. And everypony else Wintershimmer has gone after because of me.”

Diadem stomped a hoof, making her presence known. “You can’t blame yourself, Morty!”

“Can’t I? If I’d seen him for what he really was and never helped him with his ritual—”

“Then he would have found somepony else!” Diadem yelled back, briefly toppling her glasses from her muzzle. “Morty, listen to me—”

I shook my head, cutting her off as she had me. “I have to be resolute here, Diadem. Alright? It’s… It’s easier this way. What gemstone spells did you manage to get me?”

“All three Purges, since I know personally how effective Wintershimmer can be with illusions,” Star Swirl replied, businesslike. “But we only had time to make one of your shields, and the only gravity we got to was the one that would affect you personally. If you can wait another three hours—”

“No.” I shook my head firmly. “Celestia and Gale will come back by then, and they’re both too stubborn to accept that this is the right choice.”

“I’m not convinced,” Diadem grumbled aloud. “Morty… You don’t have anything to prove.”

“I know,” I lied. “Please. Help me.”

Star Swirl placed a hoof on Diadem’s shoulder when she opened her mouth. “Let him do this, Diadem.”

“Star Swirl? Why? Wouldn’t you of all ponies want to stop him?”

“Absolutely. But… I’ve met enough young wizards to know when somepony’s got something so locked in their mind that you can’t change it. And I know what Wintershimmer is capable of, if he got hold of one of our horns.”

“So you’re going to let him go in alone? You know Morty will die.”

“Morty not die!” Graargh protested.

I swallowed, and forced a grin onto my face. “Graargh’s right, of course. Just like I said in my letter.” I turned to Diadem and winked heavily. “Or was I too subtle?”

“Don’t joke about this…” The younger of the archmagi shook her head, though looking at Graargh, she at least bit her cheek to any further protest. “Let’s just go up to the hall.”

And that, to my mild surprise, was it. Diadem handed me the bandolier I had requested, and I slid it under the collar of my jacket, wrapping it around my chest and buckling it below my neck. With a surprising amount of finality for so simple an action, we all started to walk.

I don’t remember what exactly when through my mind at the time, but I recall it leaving me distinctly melancholy. The bruises on my sides didn’t help the walk up to the lecture hall, and I hoped the quiet groans I issued as I walked would help mask any tears, if they decided to well up.

The lecture hall was exactly as we had left it, filled with desks and benches centered around a raised podium. Star Swirl started toward it immediately as soon as the door opened. Diadem hesitated.

“Morty, let us help you.”

“I want to, Diadem. I feel like I should run away,” I answered. “But this is cold hard logic. If Wintershimmer does beat me, he gains nothing except perhaps one extra soul of mana and a unicorn body that doesn’t cast spells right. I have the only broken horn we can rely on.” I glanced down to Graargh an considered his vocabulary before continuing. “I’m expendable.”

“Don’t say that about yourself.”

“If I don’t, and somepony else dies, it’s my fault.” I stepped past Diadem, walking about halfway down one of the aisles between the benches before stopping, a half-dozen strides from the podium. “Please. Time is of the essence.”

Diadem sighed, and as she walked past, she placed a hoof on my shoulder. Then she took her place on the edge of the podium and looked to Star Swirl. “Alright. Based on what Morty and I worked through when I interviewed him, before he took that feeblemind spell—” I glanced briefly at Graargh, who was grinning when he met my gaze. “—I’ve got a six-school version of Wintershimmer’s ritual here. Master Star Swirl and I should be powerful enough to hold it open, and as Morty requested, we set up gold dust in lines for Proxy’s Transmission so we can be downstairs while we maintain the spell. Morty, I’m afraid the necromancy portion is a bit more involved than either of us understand, so we will need your help opening it.”

I took a leaf from Gale’s vocabulary when I replied with just one syllable. “Fuck.”

“What?” Diadem asked. “Morty, I’m sorry, but we just aren’t specialized the way you are.”

“I need all of my spells for my plan. I can’t spend one just opening the portal.” I rubbed a hoof in circles on my temple.

“Graargh help?” Graargh asked.

I was forced to shake my head. “Graargh, you can’t cast magic. Even if you could, it took me almost my entire life to be good enough to cast this spell, and we only have a few minutes.”

“Perhaps we might be of assistance?” Those words billowed from the far side of the room, where the lecture hall doors slammed open in an inexplicable gust of wind that should not have existed inside a closed building. I couldn’t help but frown, however, when Luna strode into the room, embracing the perfect lead-in of her obviously staged timing.

---

I barely feel the need to rebuke Coil in this; just because he is petty enough to use magic solely for the sake of enhancing the drama of entering a room does not mean that others stoop to his level.

---

“Lady Luna!” Diadem smiled. “Please, talk Morty out of this!”

“Archmage.” Luna shook her head. “I think you’ve mistaken my sister and I. Celestia would be the one to talk somepony down from such a dangerous challenge. I happen to think more ponies like Coil ought to accept such risks.”

It was the nicest I think Luna had ever been to me, and I offered her a bow in reply. “Why thank you.”

“Then there will be fewer ponies like Coil in the world.”

I will note that, even as Diadem protested “Lady Luna!” and Graargh grumbled “Moon pony…”, Star Swirl choked back a tired chuckle.

“In all seriousness, Luna, why are you here?” I asked.

She shrugged. “Sister was worried about you, once she realized you had fled the Crystal Union alone. It turns out, she was exactly right in her fears. She spent a great deal of magic contacting me from such a distance.”

“So you are here to stop me?”

Luna sighed. “Star Swirl, Diadem, please leave us. Take your positions and be ready to maintain the ritual once I give it my magic.”

Star Swirl’s horn flared up gold, and in an instant, he was gone. Only the jingling of bells remained in the air for a moment.

Diadem was not so fast to vanish. “I do not think this is a good idea,” she rebutted. “If we’re abandoning Morty’s plan to fight alone, and we’re risking Wintershimmer getting ahold of your alicorn body, then Master Star Swirl and I should be here too. We should devote all our energy to—”

“I appreciate your concern, archmage,” Luna corrected sternly. “But I have not survived millenia to be worried over by a mare not even a century old. Begone, and know that I am at no risk here.”

Diadem hung her head for a moment before she too teleported away.

“Foals… Does she assume I am some frail princess in yon tower to be rescued?”

“What is ‘yon’?” Graargh asked. “Can eat?”

“Silence, changeling,” Luna reprimanded, shaking her head to clear her focus and turning to me. “Coil, before all else, I will observe that you have proven yourself innocent of my accusations. I still think you are an insipid, self-absorbed ass putting others down to bolster his faltering self-confidence, but I also grudgingly admit what you are doing here is a great sacrifice for a noble cause. And given what Celestia told me of your conflict in the Crystal Union, I agree that I cannot be here with you to confront Wintershimmer.”

“Alright…” I muttered back. “So… what are you doing here?”

“I’m not,” she answered, grinning like a foal who got away with stealing a slice of cake and blaming it on an older sibling. “Has Celestia told you what a changeling is?”

“No,” I told her. “But between seeing Graargh ‘pretend’ and the name itself, I think it’s pretty obvious.”

“Not changing! Graargh stay bear! Ponies make fun of Graargh when Morty. Chair look very tasty, but only take one bite.”

“I…” There really wasn’t anything I could think to say.

“Mourn your dignity later,” Luna told me. “I used my magic to make him appear to others as you, as best I could. His peculiar grammar took most of my energy. But given that you’ve brought him here, knowing how much danger that will mean for him, I have to suspect you have a plan to keep him safe.”

I nodded. “Graargh?”

“Yes, Morty?”

“We’re going to fight Wintershimmer here shortly. I have a plan, but I need your help. And it will be dangerous. Are you willing to—”

“Graargh smash bad pony!” Graargh answered enthusiastically. “Many time,” he added. “Graargh happy Morty let Graargh help!”

“Well, that’s the thing…” I frowned. “Graargh, I don’t need you to turn into a big bear. I need you to be me again.”

“Oh.” Graargh shrugged, and then burst into emerald flames.

Stars, I will never get over the raw chemistry of seeing that perfect jawline.

“I thought so,” Luna noted. “Hoping to leave him in front of Wintershimmer, and then take him from surprise from behind?”

“I’d never put Graargh in that much danger alone,” I replied.

That earned me a frown. “Then what is your goal?”

“Well, Luna, do you know what a shell game is?”

She raised a single brow and nodded. “You speak of the game con ponies play on the streets? Cleverly moving a ball to deceive gamblers?”

“If Wintershimmer can sit and count my spells, he can beat me in a war of attrition.”

“Ah. Well, then my ploy will help as well.” Luna glanced up at the tip of her horn, where I noticed a small flame. Before my eyes, the blue alicorn’s horn melted like wax, dribbling down her face. “I retrieved the wax left over when you and Silhouette fought Wintershimmer in Platinum’s Landing.”

I blinked twice in shock. “Wait… you’re in a candlecorn?”

“You do not believe it? How many times must I say this before you believe it, Coil? I am your better in the pale arts.” Wax continued to flow down Luna’s body, and before long, it started to take on a new color and a new shape.

Not long after, I smiled at myself with perfect white teeth that one could hardly mistake for wax. A brief spell from the goddess’ wax effigy of me concealed the candle on her brow as my horn, and the illusion was complete.

Three Mortal Coils looked between one another, preparing for the highest stakes street con in Equestrian history.

“Well, Morty,” the well-grammared copy of myself observed, rubbing his hoof on his chest. “You’re certainly looking arresting today. You could sweep me off my hooves any day.”

I briefly shuddered at the sound of the smooth, suave, confident tone. “Believe me, good sir, the pleasure is all mine.”

“You too good, moon pony!” Graargh protested in my voice. “How you copy so good?”

“It’s important—” I started, but I was cut off by myself.

“Wintershimmer will know if I don’t act like he expects. And he basically raised me,” I continued.

“So we basically have to do this perfectly,” I concluded.

Then I stared at myself with a frown. “He isn’t going to work if he opens his mouth. And he can’t cast magic.”

“Can’t he?” I asked in reply, chuckling. “Hey, Morty. Light up your horn.”

The me who was Graargh nodded and closed his eyes. To my shock, his horn flared to life.

“Wait… can he actually cast spells?”

“Physically, of course. What good would a changeling be taking the form of a unicorn if they couldn’t cast a spell? Same with flying as a pegasus. But he’s still untrained, so we’ll have to make do synchronizing the light show with other magic,” I—meaning Luna—answered.

I’m sorry for the confusion, by the way. I’ll do my best to illuminate who is speaking more clearly, but I’m afraid it only got more confusing for me from there.

“There is one more little trick I can help with,” Luna-Morty announced, casting another small spell.

“What?” I asked, glancing around for some effect of the magic. “Did your spell even do anything? What did you cast on?” This sentence was peculiar, in this case, because the ‘I’ was Graargh speaking with that functional grammar, and therefore answering his own question.

“Oh.” I, myself, announced. “That’s… How did you achieve that?”

“It’s an illusion,” Luna-Morty answered. “He’s still speaking with the grammar of something you scrape off the bottom of your hoof, but your ears are hearing it different. Remember, in addition to being the gods’ gift to mares, I’m also an incredibly talented wizard.”

“Stars,” I, myself, corrected. “Wintershimmer doesn’t consider you… rather, doesn’t consider Luna a goddess. So I picked up the astrologer’s verbal tic.”

“Ah.” Luna-Morty nodded. “So what’s the plan?”

I turned to the Morty on my left, who was Graargh. “If I incapacitate Silhouette, I want you to get her out of here as fast as you possibly can. Turn into a big bear if it helps you carry her, but rush out and keep her safe. Once that’s done, Lu—Myself and I will finish off Wintershimmer.”

Graargh-Morty scowled. “You honestly think you can send the protagonist out of the room while you polish this slimeball off? How do you think I’m going to feel if you get hurt while I’m gone?”

“Having you and Silhouette in the room would be a lot more dangerous for us than getting her out of the way. Wintershimmer did the same thing to Gale; he put her in danger, and because I didn’t want her to get hurt, I got almost killed instead. Can I trust you?”

Graargh-Morty sighed and shook his head. “I suppose I could lower myself that much. But only for your, Morty.”

“It seems like we’re ready, then,” Luna-Morty announced.

A six-pointed star on the podium began to glow along with Luna-Morty’s horn, and then the shape itself rose up a hoof’s width off the floor of the podium itself. Hovering there just above the ground, it began to spin in place, slowly at first but then more rapidly until it took on an appearance less of a star and more of a shimmering white vortex.

The portal rose up further from the floor, and rotated so that instead of the ceiling, it was facing toward me. There it hovered, with its lower edge just shy of kissing the floor.

I slightly spread my hooves and braced myself as I felt the warm breeze of an eternal summer day.

“Ready, Morties?” I asked, in a flagrant abuse of plurality that never regretted, even to the day I died.

Graargh-Morty gave a single nod.

Then the portal flashed a brilliant orange-gold.

Wintershimmer’s assault gave no time for my eyes to recover from the flash. I felt a chill on my neck before I could even see, and only an urgent flare of my horn managed to save my soul—and hopefully, to protect myself for a few further minutes from that most dangerous of my former mentor’s tools. Even before the fatigue swept down my horn and through my body, I felt another spell grasp my mind.

Agony shot through my limbs. Pure, undiluted pain that skipped any pretense of an explanation in favor of grabbing straight onto my nerves and twisting. Squeezing. Burning. Grinding.

“Is this your trick?” I heard him ask through ringing ears. “Three copies of yourself? Some petty illusion, no doubt.” His laugh was hollow.

My hoof, flailing as it was, finally managed to pull a small gem from the uppermost slot on my bandolier. With no hesitation but considerable difficulty, I pressed it against my chest.

The sensation of magic was sickening, but the pain stopped. Finally, I could see, though it took some time to gather my balance.

Wintershimmer stood in the threshold of the Summer Lands. He wore his old familiar coat, which rippled in the warm summer wind. His face was ever as sunken as it had been before I left the Union, and his skull like eyes swiveled between all three of me.

To his left, Silhouette watched us as well, tentatively waiting for some guidance from the old wizard. Her black leather clung tightly to her glittering form, stretched by her shoulders and neck tensing to attack at a moment’s notice. In her eyes, though, there was some desperate pleading to be seen.

On Wintershimmer’s right, still frosted in places and bristling with icicles, stood the earthly remains of Solemn Vow. He too wore one of our jackets, torn and ripped in places that matched the wounds on his body. Having been pried from the ice, he looked good for a pony dead twenty years—at least, he was no rotting corpse you might imagine. Were it not for the gaping holes in his sides and throat, one might even make the mistake that his actively swiveling orange eyes were still alive.

“You raised Vow?” Luna-Morty demanded. “I thought you wanted his horn!”

“Only as a stopgap,” Wintershimmer answered, taking slow strides out into the real world where his hooves clicked on the polished wood of the lecture hall stage. His horn lit, leaking pale gold magic into the air, but nothing changed in the room. Whatever the spell, it seemed trivial enough—though relying on that gut assumption worried me all the more. “You should know this is your fault, Coil. Had you let me be, I would have been more than content taking Clover’s body, or binding some peasant’s horn to Smart Cookie’s skull. But now that I must deal with the Equestrians, I cannot afford to pass for less than one of the alicorn sisters.”

“You’re pretty old to pass for one of their suitors,” Luna-Morty snapped back.

Wintershimmer cocked a brow. “You know better than to waste your breath taunting me. I won’t be distracted. Or did you just want to die a hero?”

“I seem to remember…” I groaned, pushing myself up to my hooves. “Somepony once told me not to let myself banter in a duel.”

“Coil, I bested you with Celestia by your side from the body of a mere candlecorn. This is barely an amusement, let alone a duel. And in the time you’ve wasted talking, I’ve just finished searching the room for any trap you might have orchestrated, sneaking Star Swirl or one of the sisters in to catch me off guard. Thank you for the time.”

As I finally got a good look at the old wizard who walked even further toward us, stopping at the edge of the hall’s podium, I found myself surprised. Somehow, Wintershimmer had managed to visibly age even further. His retreating hairline had slipped back even further on his scalp, and his mane was knotted and gnarled. As he finished his thought and closed his mouth, I saw just how hollow his cheeks had become, and by extension, just how fully he’d exposed the shape of his skull. Sunken yellow eyes watched me with disdain. “Do I scare you now, colt?”

“No.” I rolled my neck, and took in the rest of the room.

“You’ve never seen me make a true undead, have you, Coil?” Wintershimmer cocked his head toward Vow.

“I don’t care about your undead.” Graargh-Morty rubbed a fetlock across my muzzle. His eyes were locked on Silhouette.

“No? You’d rather die sooner?” Wintershimmer shook his head. “Or are you stalling for time, hoping that somepony else will come to save you?” I couldn’t resist my face twitching in shock, and that seemed to be all the confirmation Wintershimmer needed. “I’m honestly surprised you’re here at all, Coil. You should have died from the hole Celestia put in your waist.”

Rather than stand there bantering, I took the reasonably direct action of reaching out with my magic for his soul. Wintershimmer’s sunken eyes widened in shock as my horn flared, but his finesse with necromancy was more than enough to stop my brute-force gripping from ending the duel then and there. Where my magic met his, my horn insisted it had touched icy steel, and the chill left me shivering for a moment as the fatigue of a second spell in a day swept through me. My braced knees kept me from hitting the floor outright, but I did obviously dip.

Wintershimmer shook his head. “Disappointing.” Then he slowly took a stride back toward the portal and clicked his tongue twice. “Vow, Silhouette, pick one and focus your efforts. I will stifle the others’ magic, if they are real enough to have any.”

“You bastard!” I shouted, tapping into the emeralds in my jacket. Magic rushed through my blood, refreshing the two spells I had already spent.

Silhouette and Solemn Vow glanced at one another, then leapt down off the stage toward Luna-Morty. Vow’s pace was slow and deliberate, his horn glowing a pallid orange. Silhouette was anything but. Much like she had beneath Vow’s manor, she thrust her golem hoof into the stage and used that as an anchor to hurl herself across the room.

Luna made my body look impeccable when she rolled to the right, narrowly avoiding the bladed limb and catching Silhouette’s jaw with a right hook from a forehoof. When Silhouette stumbled from the blow, Luna gave two more punches before lighting my horn and firing a salvo of three bolts at point blank.

Solemn Vow’s magic wrapped around the crystal soldier, and she found herself teleported back to the walking corpse’s side. He let out some sort of wheezing noise from a hole that presumably led to his lungs.

“Master, that isn’t the real Coil,” Silhouette noted. “He could never fight me hoof-to-hoof that effectively.”

“That much was obvious,” Wintershimmer answered. “He fired three bolts at you, and all lacked his usual brute force. It’s a sophisticated golem, I would guess. And the others have cast nothing… one may be the real Coil, saving his magic. Or he might not even be in the room. Pick another. I’ll—”

Luna-Morty’s horn ignited again, and I felt a sudden sense of vertigo as all three of us vanished in a burst of teleportation.

When we landed, I glanced around in confusion, only to realize that I’d traveled barely three feet. I was standing in Graargh’s place, and most likely, Luna and Graargh had likewise shuffled.

Unfortunately, and somewhat amusingly, I had no way of my own to tell, at least until Luna cast a spell or one of them said something to give the game away.

“I see…” Wintershimmer muttered. “Very well. We will want to kill all three regardless. Go.”

What followed was absolute chaos. Without wanting to use up more magic until I saw an opening, I yielded my advantage of the fastest horn in the room. Solemn Vow took up that advantage, hurling a piercing beam of what looked passingly like fire toward another of me. That Morty lunged toward one of the pews in the lecture hall, rolling into cover and scrambling aside as Vow’s orange magic sliced through the wood unimpeded.

I gathered the Morty under attack was Graargh, as the other Morty who wasn’t me lit his horn and shot a similar blue beam at Vow. The oncoming attack more than stole his attention, and he hurled up an orange shield to defend himself. I took quiet note that rather than the traditional orb, Vow’s magic took the shape of a kite shield. It was a rare touch of aesthetic class for most mages, and certainly more appreciation for style than I would expect from a zombie.

I didn’t have long to think; with the other Morties and Vow occupied, Silhouette lunged at me.

I flung myself to the side, and felt just how powerfully Star Swirl had enchanted my garment when it cushioned the painful landing of my shoulder on hard wooden stairs. Silhouette’s bladed limb slashed through a pew without any meaningful resistance.

“Silhouette… listen to me. I can fix this,” I pleaded from the floor. “Fight him.”

“Can you?” her mouth asked, smiling at me with a hunger that, for the first time in my life, I found myself wishing was sexual. Her quicksilver limb shifted into an avian claw, and I watched her legs tense again.

When she jumped, I lit my horn. The blue glow of my telekinesis caught her in midair, where she flailed at me.

“Let me down!”

The drain of the third spell was staggering, and the edges of my vision flashed, but my grip held. My head was getting heavy, and I leaned on one of the nearby benches for support as I once more lifted my eyes toward Silhouette.

“You won’t need to wait long,” Wintershimmer spoke, comforting her as his own horn lit gold. In the corner of my vision, I saw him hurl a spell at Luna-Morty, who teleported away from the blast with wide eyes and desperation written across my face. “His horn can’t hold that spell for long. Ten seconds, perhaps.” He turned his attention to Graargh-Morty next, charging up a blast that I knew the young creature couldn’t hope to avoid.

I gritted my teeth, and then cocked my head back and forward again in a single whiplash-inducing motion. Silhouette flew like a hurled stone straight for Wintershimmer. The old mage’s horn burst to life, and just before collision, I heard the pop of teleportation. Silhouette flew past where he’d been and straight into the Summer Lands, scraping her clawed metallic hoof across the floor of the podium as she slid in hopes of slowing her momentum.

When my eyes finally found Wintershimmer again, he was standing against the far wall of the lecture hall, just to the left of the Summer Lands portal where he could only barely maintain line-of-sight to me. His horn was glowing again, and I heard a whoosh of wind behind me. The air that swept over my back was warm with the heat of summer, and smelled strongly of flowers.

Silhouette’s claw scraping over my back somewhat ruined that pleasant sensation.

I spun to find a small portal in the air closing, and my mind put the jigsaw pieces together almost immediately. Wintershimmer had given Silhouette a faster way back than charging at me from the distance I’d thrown her.

Soon, magic wrapped around my body, and I was yanked backwards two strides by telekinesis, just before Silhouette’s claw would have caught my throat.

“I can’t fight all of them at once!” Luna-Morty shouted at me. “We’re supposed to be some huge hero, right? Act like it!”

I took two jumps back under my own force, feeling my body protest from bruises and fatigue, as Silhouette lashed out at me with her lethal limb again and again and again. My flanks burned and my lungs gasped for air, but to my surprise my back felt uninjured.

My back leg caught on a bench and I stumbled as Silhouette lunged. Unable to flee, I defended myself on instinct, bringing my hooves up over my head and neck.

Silhouette’s claw stopped against the sleeve of my jacket. We both stopped, staring at the failed attack in momentary confusion. Star Swirl’s work was better than I’d given it credit for.

I realized what had happened faster than she did, and used that opening to punch Silhouette square on the end of her muzzle. The blow almost certainly hurt me more than it hurt her, since she was still a living gemstone, but it dazed her enough for me to scramble a few strides away.

Something whistled in the air behind me, and I turned just in time to duck as one of Wintershimmer’s long scything blades of golden magic slashed its way across the room toward me. Passing a hair’s length over my head, the blade bisected the bench I’d run into defending myself from Silhouette. I popped my head up to check if Wintershimmer was casting another spell. Thankfully, he’d been distracted by Graargh, who had actually closed to a short enough distance that he put one of my hooves straight into the old stallion’s gut. My satisfaction was short lived when the hoof slid through thin air; only an illusion of my enemy and mentor.

I thought I had only taken a second’s glance, but a second was all it took for Silhouette to recover. This time, she was smart enough not to aim for my jacketed back. Her claw gouged into the flesh at the base of my skull, pulling away mane and muscle in a single savage blow that dropped me to the floor in pain. My own blood felt cold as it pooled on the lecture hall floor. The chill reminded me of the feeling of Wintershimmer’s ‘Razor’, and some small part of the back of my mind reminded me that in a few moments, the effect would largely be the same.

I lit my horn as fast as I could without flaring, and hurled a gem from my bandolier onto the floor. It shattered and spun up a shield just in time to stop Silhouette’s killing blow. Her claw met the pure force, but Diadem’s green magic held.

“Be ready for him to teleport out, Silhouette. He loves that approach.” Wintershimmer walked toward me slowly from behind a nearby pew, his horn igniting. Idly, he hurled an arcing golden blade toward Luna-Morty, who was distracted trading spells with the corpse of Solemn Vow. The blade of magic severed my head, rather ominously. Wax leaked from the stump.

“Well…” Wintershimmer chuckled. “You restored a candlecorn? I should have given you more credit as a student. Vow, kill the one on the stage. I suspect it cannot use magic. Silhouette, attack the shield until it breaks.” His horn ignited again. “I need to retake what’s mine.”

Something changed on Wintershimmer’s dull expression, from harsh amusement to broken shock, when his magic touched the candlecorn slowly regrowing its head. “What animus… no, this is a real soul? Who are you?”

By the time he charged up another spell, my head and face had regrown. This time, Luna felt no need to conceal the candle on my brow as a horn, and instead brought up a shield to defend herself. “Just one I found lying around.”

Wintershimmer scoffed. “Coil has never had the gall for murder. No doubt you’re aiding him willingly—gah!” That stifled gasp came when the candle on my wax head flared. Though I had no other evidence, I could tell it was a spell similar to what Wintershimmer had used on Celestia, and then on me. His body was wracked with pain.

The shield around me cracked at Silhouette’s ongoing attack, though before it shattered fully, Graargh came charging from the stage, tackling her away from the attack. Before she could retaliate with her claw, Luna flared the candlecorn’s flame again and teleported Graargh away. In the course of that opening, Solemn Vow slammed one of his brutal fiery beams into her side. Luna only raised one of my brows in amusement as the better part of the middle of my torso melted away.

“You know, you would be a much more interesting enemy if Wintershimmer had bothered to fix your lungs,” the goddess taunted in my voice, hurling a blast of her own at Vow.

On the ground, Wintershimmer’s horn flared. “Lu—Morty!” I shouted, but even as she turned, his spell finished. Her candlecorn body siezed up, and then collapsed twitching and fighting itself on the floor. Luna’s spell likewise struck Vow, and his corpse was flung hard against the far wall of the auditorium.

“What did you do?” I demanded.

“The soul in the candlecorn left herself open by focusing on Vow. He was ready for me to launch another physical attack on the golem body. Or perhaps an illusion. I used something far more efficient. I simply bound Vow’s soul to the golem as well. Almost exactly as you did to Guardian Angel in Platinum’s Landing. They are contesting for control of that body now. If your donor’s soul is particularly strong, he might be able to overpower my grip on his soul. Unfortunately,” Wintershimmer’s horn flared, and the candlecorn effigy of my own body began screaming in agony as it writhed. “...fighting another soul leaves very little willpower to ignore other concerns, like the illusion of pain.” His horn flashed again. “Fear can be almost as distracting as pain,” he continued. “Facing one’s greatest fears is a powerful way to grow stronger… if one survives. Now, Coil, you have a choice to make.” His horn ignited a third time, preparing for some damning spell. “You may spend one of the few remaining spells your body can support freeing the souls from that golem body. If you do not, I will destroy the golem and disperse both their souls.”

“No!” I shouted. Magic began to grow on my horn, though it faded before it could really flare. Instead, I watched in awe.

Luna, wearing my form as a candlecorn, created a pale blue shield between herself and Wintershimmer, defending against the golden arc he sent slicing through the room toward her. Slowly, on shuddering hooves, she rose from the floor. Her candle flared again, and some of the shaking of her legs stopped. The screaming of agony vanished in an instant as well, replaced by grim focus written on my face.

“Impossible,” Wintershimmer noted to himself aloud. A sigh followed that single word. “Silhouette, kill the one in the shell. If he starts to cast a spell, shout. Ignore the one out in the room unless he tries to stop you.”

“Of course, Master.”

Wintershimmer nodded, watching the candlecorn in front of him. “Star Swirl? I’m surprised you’d hide yourself like this.”

“You think I’m Star Swirl?” Luna asked.

“Your apprentices are both pathetic compared to us, and I doubt they have the willpower. From facing Celestia, it’s clear the so-called goddesses lack that much strength as well.”

“Oh ye of little faith.”

My mentor’s eyes widened, then narrowed. “You far outclass your sister, Luna. But if you know what happened in the Union, you know you still cannot best me.”

“No?” Luna chuckled with my voice. “We shall see.”

Wintershimmer slid a hoof over the ground in front of him in a wide arc as his horn sprang to life. A dozen golden orbs formed an arch over his back.

Luna narrowed my eyes, lighting up her candle again.

In the time they’d been speaking, Silhouette had returned to her position outside my shield, and began to attack it. Graargh started approaching her, and I nodded to him through the transparent green force.

Sihouette whirled as Graargh approached in my form, lashing out with a bladed foreleg. It was a ferocious strike, which Graargh narrowly dove back from. It also left her unable to quickly turn back to me when I blew on the dust of Diadem’s gemstone, putting an end to her shield.

I rushed forward, wrapping my forelegs under Silhouette’s and tackling her to the floor. She was stronger than me, but my position gave me enough of an advantage to hold the position as she thrashed. My neck screamed in agony, but I held the grapple for everything I could manage.

“How do I help?” Graargh asked, rushing forward. He had to hop back again when Silhouette’s quicksilver hoof bent at an odd angle, swiping at his hooves.

“Knock her out!” I shouted. “Hit her right on the skull!”

Graargh tried to run forward twice, and both times Silhouette’s strange flexible limb fenced him off. At last, rather than stab at him, the bladed limb turned on me, slashing ferociously into my fetlock right where the hem of my sleeve ended. Rather than tear away gore like she had to my still stinging neck, the blade stayed rooted in my bleeding leg, and after a moment, I felt a surging sting running up my arm.

When Graargh rushed forward this time, he stomped once on the crown of her brow, but the blow was glancing. I couldn’t hold my grip through the pain, and Silhouette rolled out from beneath me, hopping to her hooves even as I rolled in agony. I could smell the quicksilver in my open wound, and with every passing second, the world seemed to swirl.

“Morty! What do I do?” Graargh demanded.

“Give up… the trick…” I answered through the urge to vomit.

In a flash of green, a full grown grizzly stood over me.

“You will not hurt him,” Graargh declared. I didn’t realize the humor at the time, but Luna’s illusion meant that he still spoke in my voice despite taking the form of a massive grizzly.

“Ah. You. Master, this one doesn’t have magic. It’s just his bear.”

“Then kill it.” I turned to see Wintershimmer teleporting rapidly around the room to avoid Luna’s attacks. At times, one of his golden orbs would launch itself at the candlecorn body standing planted firmly on the floor, launching brilliant blue beams at Wintershimmer and ripping up the walls and ceiling in the process. “The candlecorn must be running low on magic, and when it is spent, it will be trivial to finish Coil.” He flicked a hoof toward the candlecorn, and all dozen orbs launched themselves like a swarm of bees at my wax replica.

Luna leaned backwards, locking my back legs so that she fell toward the floor. To my amazement, she fell completely into the floor, seemingly merging with her own shadow just in time to avoid the lights.

“Very well.” Wintershimmer flicked his head and sent another arc of magical energy surging toward Graargh and I. Graargh turned to push me away, but I knew he wasn’t fast enough. Bracing myself through the sheer physical agony and the spinning of the room, I swallowed hard, gritted my teeth, and lit my horn. Silhouette shouted as I picked her up and spun her around to float in the air directly in the path of Wintershimmer’s attack.

“It seems I finally taught you something,” Wintershimmer observed, as he let his spell dissipate before it cut Silhouette in half. “How practical.”

I was getting tired of Wintershimmer’s voice, so I hurled Silhouette at him once again. Once more, Wintershimmer teleported out of the way. It seemed to take a very long time for him to reappear. I closed my eyes and listened closely for the second pop, and as I did, tapped into the last of the emeralds in my jacket. I had three spells left, though a part of me wondered if I could even walk once I started tapping into them. My vision was already fuzzy in addition to the swimming of the room, and I couldn’t tell if the effect stemmed from my overuse of magic, quicksilver poisoning, or from the blood draining down my neck and my fetlock.

“I’ve got the same advantage with her that you did with Celestia,” I growled, struggling to locate Wintershimmer. “You need her…”

I heard him reappear a few dozen strides behind me, pushed myself up to my hooves, and lit my horn. A sizeable crack tore down the side of the enamel, and I howled in yet another fresh pain, but I knew I would die if I couldn’t keep casting. My magic ripped at one of the long benches and, with no small effort, I ripped the entire thing up off the floor. A gaping hole looked down on Diadem’s library below, though I barely had time to reflect on the architecture; I brought the bench down toward Wintershimmer. Wood and stone cracked from the blow as Wintershimmer was forced to once more teleport himself to freedom.

“A fifth spell, and you’re still standing? I’m not sure how much longer that will last, though.”

Behind me, I heard a sickening shout, not unlike somepony using a chalkboard to file their hooves. When I turned, Silhouette had thrust her claw-like hoof into Graargh’s shoulder. He answered the blow, somewhat shallow for his enormous frame, by slamming a claw into her face with enough force to bowl her over and shatter the pew she landed against. She rolled to a rest against the next pew back, surrounded by a cloud of splinters.

I turned the attention of the bench I was holding on Silhouette, ready to beat her into submission, but Wintershimmer gave me no such time. His horn sent two more of his bladed golden arcs toward me, and followed the latter up with another of his pain illusions.

There was some amusement to be had when the disorientation of the blood loss and the poisoning I was facing numbed the illusion to the point that I could ignore it completely. I ceratinly didn’t laugh at the time, though. I rolled forward and looked back at Wintershimmer.

Luna rose up out of the shadows behind him, just as smoothly as she had fallen into the floor, still wearing a candlecorn of my own face. The candle on her head flared up.

Just before she struck, Wintershimmer smiled.

When blue magic pierced Wintershimmer’s skull, molten wax dribbled from the hole it left. Luna had only a moment to look shocked with my face before Wintershimmer’s molten, headless body hurled itself backwards into her. Wax molded with wax, and then both bodies crumpled into a puddle on the floor.

Stepping out of the Summer Lands portal, the real Wintershimmer sighed.

“How?” Graargh asked. “He’s supposed to be real!”

“He is,” I answered. “He had one candlecorn left, but…” The pause came from my nausea as I fought to stand. “He can’t control it and his real body at the same time. The Summer Lands are another dimension, so they’re adjacent to everywhere in the world at the same time. That’s how you were able to control a candlecorn even in the vault, right?”

“So you do understand,” Wintershimmer noted. “Too little, too late. Silhouette, get up.”

“Master…” she groaned. “The bear is too strong.”

“Yes, but Coil is protective of it. Stay clear, and I will slay that beast.”

Wintershimmer’s horn began to glow again, and I knew I only had one chance. “Graargh, get close to Silhouette!”

As Graargh rushed forward, I too hurled myself in her direction. Silhouette was fast, but she wasn’t prepared for the pew I was still holding to slam into her face when she tried to turn and run. The blow staggered her enough that Graargh could pin her beneath both his forepaws.

A slashing crescent of Wintershimmer’s magic drove through the room toward Graargh. It was aimed high enough not to risk striking Silhouette, but I doubted Graargh could avoid it in such a massive form.

“Be small!” I shouted. “Quick, Graargh!” As I spoke, I dropped the pew I’d been holding in my magic and reached into my jacket with simple telekinesis.

Graargh shrunk in a burst of green fire, just in time for Wintershimmer’s attack to fly over his head. Unfortunately, now so much smaller, he was no match for Silhouette when she rolled to pin him with his throat beneath her quicksilver hoof. I had only a second to act. I pulled my magic free of my coat.

“What… where am I? Egads! Master Coil! What happened to you? Why am I—?!”

The voice was Angel’s, and his rock was what emerged from the pocket of my jacket, just as I had ordered from Star Swirl. With raw telekinesis, I hurled him at Silhouette—not even enough magic to make my horn flare

Silhouette turned at the sound of the familiar voices and pounced off of Graargh’s chest, slashing her hoof through Angel’s rock.

I heard the swish as the chiseled leg came down on my oldest companion, and the crack as rock split. But those sounds paled compared to the flare of painful light from my horn and the the beam of brilliant blue energy that slammed into Silhouette’s chest. The crystal mare’s eyes rolled back in her head, and she collapsed.

A moment later, fatigue from my sixth spell overtook me and I fell to my chest beside her.

“Hmph.” Wintershimmer shook his head. “Frail’s Fundamental Freeze. Nonlethal stunning. You lost your golem, you’ve spent so many spells that you can barely stand, and you didn’t even deny me the body I needed.”

I turned my head toward him, though with the pain from the gouge in my neck, it might be more accurate to say that my head fell that way largely on its own. “Did I? Angel, Graargh, run!”

“Yes, Master Coil!” said Silhouette, eyes still rolled back in her head. Wintershimmer turned toward her with an expression of shock as the crystal mare leapt awkwardly to her hooves and bolted for the door. Graargh followed, but hesitated at the door. “Morty, I—”

In raw anger—an unusual display from the stallion—Wintershimmer lashed out with another arc of golden magic. The blast forced Graargh to run the rest of the way clear of the auditorium, and the plaster he tore from the walls collapsed the entryway entirely.

“How…” My mentor growled, looming over me.

“I removed the binding between Angel’s animus and the rock in Platinum’s Landing. I was…” I coughed. “Explaining to my friends the difference between binding and possession.”

Wintershimmer nodded once. “Presumably to explain why you needed to rescue the souls from my candlecorn before you destroyed it?”

I nodded, and through a sudden surge of light-headedness, I offered a smile. It seemed to make Wintershimmer angry, if the downward twist of his cheeks was any indication, and that only gave me another burst of satisfaction. “So Angel wasn’t bound to the core. When Silhouette destroyed it, his soul just popped out. And as you were kind enough to provide, she has a golem attached to her body, in the form of that leg.”

“So the golem possessed her. And since you rendered her unconscious, her bound soul could not control the body, but he could manipulate it by possession.” Wintershimmer’s horn lit as he stood over me. “You’ve delayed me a bit, Coil, but the Ouijan golem is an imbecile.”

“His name is Angel…”

“It is a failed experiment. In that regard, not unlike yourself.” The glow on Wintershimmer’s horn grew, and he wrapped his magic around my throat. I felt myself gasping for air as he outright lifted me up off the floor. The open wound on my neck screamed in agony, though only a whimper slipped past my tongue. “Know this before I disperse you, Coil: your ‘heroic’ death amounts to nothing more than an inconvenience for me.”

“I…” The darkness around my eyes seemed to be approaching the center at an alarming rate. I fumbled with my bandolier, and finally fetched a single gemstone that I desperately needed.

“I don’t think so.” While still choking me in his magic, Wintershimmer pulled the gemstone away from my grip. “Hmm… Gully’s Gravitational Grasp. That was your best idea?”

I lit my horn as quickly as I could without spending my last precious seventh spell and reached for my bandolier. Wintershimmer moved faster, willing to spend more mana for the sake of speed, and ripped the garment away from my chest.

I smiled into the cloudy gray that had become my vision, turned that same trivial telekinesis toward the gem Wintershimmer still held in his magic, and pushed.

Wintershimmer’s grip on me released as the gravity I felt shifted abruptly. Wintershimmer lost his grip on my neck to the abrupt shift, and I fell toward the center of the room, where the Summer Lands now lay open below me.

“Pathetic,” Wintershimmer declared as his horn charged, standing on what I perceived as a wall, above and behind me. I felt my ward against his infamous spell, the Razor, ripple away into nothing. “Goodbye, Coil.”

He let his horn surge for power, and knowing it would knock me out, I cast a spell as well. The sensation of ice flooded down the back of my neck.

And then came… nothing.

Comments

[Zennyth]

Hot damn! That chapter was a rush. Likely some of the best action I've read from you.

Wintershimmer is just brutal. I keep visualizing him like Magneto or something like that in battle. Just cold, cunning, and calculating power. A heck of a foe, that's for sure.

Can't wait to see what's up everypony's proverbial sleeves in the next chapter!

[Fireeaters]

So he took out his own soul? I'm not sure how that'd help but ok

[mustangdrew4]

So much action. If there was anymore michael bay would be in the background setting off random explosives for added effect. I honestly don't have many words I feel fitting for this right now. Despite how much I read, my used vocabulary is unfortunately small. Thus, I can only say: That. Was. Totally. WICKED!!!

[Celwoolf]

How, how is this story not getting more love?! kudos my good sir you have me enthralled.

[AliCentaur Br0ny]

I think that I know what spell Morty cast.

[djthomp]

I didn’t feel any sort of hangover, thankfully, but the sun was offending me all the same.

That's harsh.

“Good morning, Morty,” Celestia said, perhaps three feet behind me.

But possibly intentional.

Oh my God, it's Gandalf Star Swirl the Bearded.

Star Swirl's position as an archmage may be be proven through his ability to make a perfectly comfortable chair regardless of anything else.

“Perhaps we might be of assistance?” Those words billowed from the far side of the room, where the lecture hall doors slammed open in an inexplicable gust of wind that should not have existed inside a closed building. I couldn’t help but frown, however, when Luna strode into the room, embracing the perfect lead-in of her obviously staged timing.

So much for the "No alicorns involved" plan. I was curious about Luna versus Wintershimmer, though.

“Then there will be fewer ponies like Coil in the world.”

Hahaha, ouch.

Ooooo, Luna (and Celestia) know exactly what Graargh is.

Stars, I will never get over the raw chemistry of seeing that perfect jawline.

Ooooo, Luna running a candlecorn for the fight sounds potentially very helpful.

Luna-Morty annoying Morty with her version of his arrogance is perfection.

Correct grammar Graargh is also pretty great. Especially since he's apparently the story's real protagonist.

“You’re pretty old to pass for one of their suitors,” Luna-Morty snapped back.

You know, Luna, there's some important logical issues with that retort.

I feel like this would never have worked without Luna here to help, assuming it does work even with her that is.

Wintershimmer scoffed. “Coil has never had the gall for murder. No doubt you’re aiding him willingly—gah!” That stifled gasp came when the candle on my wax head flared. Though I had no other evidence, I could tell it was a spell similar to what Wintershimmer had used on Celestia, and then on me. His body was wracked with pain.

This may go better now that Luna is no longer pretending to be Morty.

On the ground, Wintershimmer’s horn flared. “Lu—Morty!” I shouted, but even as she turned, his spell finished. Her candlecorn body siezed up, and then collapsed twitching and fighting itself on the floor. Luna’s spell likewise struck Vow, and his corpse was flung hard against the far wall of the auditorium.

On the other hand...

Oooo, I should not have doubted Luna.

When blue magic pierced Wintershimmer’s skull, molten wax dribbled from the hole it left. Luna had only a moment to look shocked with my face before Wintershimmer’s molten, headless body hurled itself backwards into her. Wax molded with wax, and then both bodies crumpled into a puddle on the floor.

Doh, maybe a little doubt.

Hey, so they rescued Silhouette, and now it's time for Morty to die, as planned.