Chapter 9
Rifleman Maxilos strode along the ruined streets, chewed up pieces of debris crunching beneath his boots. Many of the buildings still standing were all so small and so . . . colorful. The style of architecture was focused more on pleasing the eye than any form of practicality. While the nobles built homes in this way, and the churches and palace were built to be as grand as possible, the majority of humanity’s cities were built not to look pretty, but to last. The city was at once familiar and alien. It generated a slight unease in him as his eyes scanned the buildings around him, searching for any of the . . . ponies lurking in the shadows as he tightened his grip on his rifle. Ahead and behind him strode rank after rank of the Blessed with the Emperor and the Grandmaster taking the lead.
Aurelian swept his eyes from side to side, letting not even a single shadow or piece of debris escape his gaze. Yet despite their progress into Canterlot, no ponies had been seen. Screams and a booming voice had been heard, but they had yet to see any ponies intercept their route or even fly over them.
“So where will you spring your trap?” he mused aloud. He was soon to be answered. As the vanguard forces made their way through the bombed out city they finally reached what appeared to be the city center. While much of the buildings were reduced to little more than rubble, this site delineated the border between the worst of the shelling and the sections of the city relatively untouched by the bombardment. Dominating this space was a large fountain. The water had long since stopped flowing under the force of the bombardment and the centerpiece had a massive crack running down its center. Arrayed around this fountain stood what appeared to be a thousand or so ponies, all armored in gold plate. The majority of these forces were unicorns or pegasi, but earth ponies were present throughout the ranks. While all of these ponies were armed it was their leader that interested and disgusted the Emperor. Standing tall, with a slight shiver running through her body, and wearing a determined scowl was. . .
“Daemon-queen.” Spat out the Emperor. The word alone was insulting enough, but the vitriol and hate with which the Emperor said it caused many guards among the front ranks of the ponies flinch. In fear or shock, nopony was quite sure. As the Emperor spoke, the entirety of the human forces readied their weapons. The Blessed all drew their blades as one, the harsh, metallic rasping of 500 swords filling the air. As the Emperor placed his hand on the hilt of his sword, something struck him suddenly. The daemon-queen standing opposite him was an offensive shade of pink. Besides that, she looked . . . younger, unsure if such terms could be applied to such an infernal being.
“What is the meaning of this madness?” The Emperor asked, incredulous. “A third daemon-queen? Empiricus what is the meaning of this?”
Empiricus shook his head. “I know not my Emperor. The stories and legends spoke only of the daemon-queens Celestia and Luna. Never have I heard tell of a third.” The Emperor frowned as he examined the daemon before him.
“Either this one was too young to participate in their war of aggression or they somehow created another like themselves. Whichever theory is true, we can’t afford to be delayed here or ignore this new threat. But at the same time, a fight with a daemon-queen could reduce this city to rubble and our plans won’t work without it. Magnus forgive me for what I’m about to do, but I will offer her a chance to surrender.” The Emperor said this last word with a pained expression crossing his face at the thought of offering a daemon-queen, albeit a new and relatively innocent one, mercy of any kind. Empiricus shared his pain.
“I will . . . support this plan lord. However we must be ready to fight should she refuse.” The Emperor nodded at the Grandmaster.
“Of course.” Stepping forward, the Emperor took a deep breath and took hold of the hilt of the Blade of Magnus. He looked down at the young daemon-queen and spoke. His voice thundering across the distance
“Creature!” He roared. “I am Emperor Titus Aurelian and this city has been claimed in the name of the Blessed Magnus and of all humanity. We will offer you this one chance to surrender and flee the city with the rest of your . . . subjects. This will be your one and only chance.”
----
Cadence could not believe what she had just heard. The massive, gold-armored biped before her had spoken in Equestrian, albeit heavily accented Equestrian, and told them that he and his kind had claimed Canterlot as theirs. The royal guards arrayed around her had been brought out of their shocked state at his words and anger was plain on their faces as many of them tightened their grip on their weapons. The guard to her left looked up at her.
“Princess, we can’t let this monster insult you or Equestria like this! We should defend Canterlot till they or we are dead.”
“If what they did to the city is any indication, than we would be the ones dying here today and what good would our deaths be to anypony?” The guard looked ready to continue arguing the point, but decided against it and began grumbling to himself inaudibly. Cadence could see the obvious distrust and hatred in the human’s eyes as they stood tall, ready to respond immediately to whatever answer she gave their ruler. She sighed as she tried to decide what would be the best course of action for the ponies she was tasked with safeguarding. Surely their lives were more valuable than a city? Even their capital? After casting a final glance over the assembled guards, Cadence turned towards the Emperor.
“We . . . will leave the city. However we must ask that you give us time to gather the rest of our ponies together.”
“No.” Cadence’s eyes widened in shock as she stared into the cold, impassive face of the Emperor.
“But. . .,”
“Any of your subjects outside the city are free to go, but any and all who remain in the city at this time will not be allowed to leave. You may go now.” That was the final straw. Even as Cadence continued to stare in shock at the harsh judgment of the Emperor her guards sprang into action. Two pegasi grabbed her and pulled her backwards even as a veritable wall of unicorns formed between Cadence and the Emperor, their horns glowing brightly as they prepared their spells.
The Emperor scowled at her and the unicorns, but stood his ground defiantly.
“Very well. If this is your decision daemon, than I will show no mercy!” With that, the Emperor drew the Blade of Magnus from its sheathe. With a flourish, he held it above his head for a moment and threw back his head, eyes closed in prayer.
Empiricus had ordered his forces forward, but as he himself moved forward to protect the Emperor he saw an amazing sight. As the Emperor held the holy blade aloft, a golden light seemed to shine around him, as if a beam of pure, untainted sunlight was shining down on him and him alone. His eyes glowed golden as well and an expression of awe and joy was apparent on his face. The image lasted only a second before returning to the familiar image of the Emperor he knew, but even as Empiricus ordered his Blessed forward and drew his own sword a single word kept coming back to him in response to what he had seen: Magnus.
Captain Firebrand stood at the head of the unicorns staring down the human forces. The crimson unicorn could feel a rage unlike anything else he had ever felt when he looked at them. They had insulted his princess, invaded Equestria, and now they had the gall to demand so much from a princess. But there was something more there as well. It was the way the humans looked at them. He could see in their eyes a cold hatred unlike anything he had ever seen before. It was as if the humans begrudged the ponies every single breath they took. That was all that he could stand. With one last glance back to see if the princess had been safely moved away from the square, he stared straight at the humans and began filling his horn with as much magic as he could.
“All unicorns, fire on my signal!” The unicorns nodded and Firebrand was pleased to see that many of them had already been charging up their own spells to hurl at the invaders.
“Three . . .” The humans had begun drawing their weapons, their so called “Emperor” drawing an especially exquisite weapon.
“Two . . .” They were moving forward now, the look in their eyes screaming of their violent intentions for the unicorns standing before them.
“One . . .” Some of the unicorns had begun to tremble from the strain of holding in the power they had been gathering.
“FIRE!” A kaleidoscope of colors and spells exploded from over one hundred horns simultaneously. Fierce winds whipped the square, explosions of multicolored beams and spheres of light created blinding afterimages, and the air chilled and superheated from the passage of ice, fire, and lightning. The howling maelstrom of magical discharge flew towards the human forces as they advanced unafraid on the ponies. Firebrand eagerly watched the ever advancing wave of magical power, but something about it seemed different. Even though it seemed fine something was off. Cocking his head to one side, Firebrand considered it. Is it dimming? But even as he though this, the wave finally made contact with the humans in a crescendo of light and sound that blinded Firebrand and the rest of the guards temporarily.
The guards picked themselves up from the ground as they rubbed their hooves against their eyes in an attempt to clear the spots of light they could not stop seeing. As Firebrand shakily came to his hooves, he could just make a noise cutting through the ringing in his ears. As the smoke and mist from the spells cleared and his senses started to restore them to working order, he looked at where the human forces had been standing . . . and his jaw fell open in shock and horror.
Standing there, unharmed by the mass of spells stood the human forces. The face of Empiricus and the Emperor were stoic as they faced down the stunned and frightened unicorns. The advance began. As the Blessed advanced on the drained guards, they began to chant:
We are the Blessed.
We are the True Sons and Daughters of Magnus.
In us lies His Divine Spark.
No blade shall cut us.
No arrow shall pierce us.
No foe shall best us.
No magic shall fell us.
We are the Blessed.
Firebrand could not believe his eyes and could feel his mind being consumed with fear. These . . . these . . . creatures had walked through a wall of magic generated by over one hundred unicorns. What were they? Were they monsters from the depths of Tarturus? The byproduct of one of Discord’s mad “games?” Or a race of monsters from the Everfree? What were they? What were they? Whatweretheywhatwertheywhatweretheywhatwereth. . .?! As these thoughts ran rampant through his mind, Firebrand was unable to prevent the blow which made him the first confirmed guard casualty of the Siege. There were to be many more before the siege had ended.
----
Cadence had finally gotten the two pegasi guards to release her just as the rest of the Guard forces had unleashed their magical volley. While the resulting explosion was intense, her distance from it gave her a much better position from which to see just what kind of effect it had on the human forces. What she saw was stunning. As the magical attacks roared towards the human forces, they began to shrink and their light dimmed faster and faster the closer they got to the black armored soldiers. When they finally struck the humans, the magical force violently dispersed in every direction but towards the humans. It was as if the magic was actively recoiling from them in fear. Cadence had never seen anything like it. Every pony in Equestria and others beyond its borders all felt, used, or interacted with magic in some way, shape, or form every day of their lives.
But these humans. . . They seemed to actively repel magic rather than interact with act. It was something she would have to investigate later because even as she watched this she saw her ponies being thrown backward by the forces of their own spells rebounded upon them. And as they fell the humans advanced, swords raised and murder in their eyes. She made to go to her fallen guards, but the two pegasi on either side of her quickly made to stop her.
“What are you doing?” she demanded. “They need our help. We have to help them!” The two pegasi just shook their heads and the leftmost one stepped forward.
“Princess. Our first duty is to safeguard your life and every one of those guards would gladly die to protect you. Those “humans” are obviously more powerful than we gave them credit for and if all of them can do that with magic than you need to tell Captain Shining Armor. And if Princess Celestia and Princess Luna . . . failed.” Cadence could tell that just voicing that idea was hurting him. “Then you are the last princess of Equestria and we can’t let you die here.”
Cadence didn’t want to give in. She was a princess of Equestria! Perhaps more importantly she was the Princess of Love and compassion. It just wasn’t in her to leave those guards to die for her. But at the same time she could see the truth in this guard’s words. If her aunts had failed, than she had to live for Equestria and Shining Armor: Even if that meant leaving these guards and the city behind. With a final resigned sigh, Cadence accepted the bitter truth.
“Very . . . very well. Gather any guards left in the city and make for the tunnels. I will meet you there.” Snapping off a quick salute, both guards took off to find the last of the royal guards in the city coordinating the evacuation efforts. For her part, Cadence could only take one last look at the embattled royal guards still in the square before flying off to join with the crowds of fleeing civilians and guards.
----
The Emperor continued forward, his blade swinging fluidly through the air, never failing to strike a target. The ponies had tried to use their magic against the Blessed and it had obviously failed. This brought a smile to his face. The Blessed were, quite literally, blessed by Magnus Himself. In them was a fragment of His Divine Soul and allowed them to repel and nullify the unholy magicks of their enemies. Adding to their innate power, the Blessed were identified young and taken to monasteries to be trained as the elite soldiers of man. No mere pony could dare to stand against such fearsome warriors.
“Empiricus!” Empiricus turned towards the Emperor, seeing the splashes of crimson covering his golden plate.
“We must move quickly! Tell your troops to finish off these fools so we can move on. The daemon queen has pulled back and we must move to secure a better defensive point on our approach to the castle.” Nodding, Empiricus redoubled his efforts to finish off the shell-shocked ponies. It would have been much easier to obey the Emperor’s orders if all of the ponies had been as affected by the magic as the unicorns had. However the earth ponies in the group had been farther back from the front and were even now charging forward to assist their comrades.
----
Stone Wall could not believe that just hours earlier he was asleep in his bed and all seemed right with the world. Now? Now he was fighting a race that seemed to have been spawned from the depths of Tartarus itself. The city he knew so well was falling into ruin and the blood of his fellow ponies was everywhere as the enemy carved into the fallen unicorns with no remorse or mercy. The princess had been moved before the unicorns had launched their disastrous attack so at the very least she was safe. Now all he could hope to do was buy her time. So he did his duty and ordered his troops to charge headlong at the enemy. Those with crossbows fired them, but the bolts seemed to bounce off the humans’ armor and there was too much confusion in the melee to get off a clear shot at their unarmored areas.
As he approached the humans, he could feel the stone ground beneath his hooves grow slick and the air was filled with a bitter, metallic tang. He felt bile rise in his throat as he began to gallop through the still-wet blood of his fallen comrades and saw the lifeless corpses that had, only moments ago, been living ponies. Steeling himself he continued to lead the counter charge against the humans, but almost stopped short as he felt the most unusual . . . chill. A wave of cold seemed to wash over him as he got closer to the human lines, but unlike most cold this burned. The feeling of burning cold swept through him in seconds and he could feel his strength fading the closer he got to the humans. He could feel a strain on his body of a kind he had not felt since before he had joined the guard. Looking behind him, he could see that the rest of the earth ponies could feel the same chill sapping their strength and endurance from them. Some had broken down and completely stopped advancing; instead sitting on the ground panting as if they had just run a marathon.
Stone Wall continued his charge and finally he and his troops crashed into the humans with as much strength as they could muster. Swords, spears, and other weapons were brought to bear. Many of the swords scraped against the thick, black armor of the Blessed and the spears fared no better in the initial clash of the two sides. Stone Wall found himself facing off against one of the Blessed who held a massive, two-handed greatsword. Stone Wall lunged forward in an attempt to catch him off-balance and thrust his blade up towards the man’s unprotected face. The Blessed brought his ponderous blade to bear with surprising speed and managed to just parry Stone Wall’s blow before it could do any serious damage. Snarling in anger and indignation, the Blessed turned his full attention to the earth pony guard and lashed out at him with the greatsword. Stone Wall, true to his name, brought up the blade attached to his armor and moved to block the blow. As the blow fell, Stone Wall could hear the apparatus holding his sword to his front leg whine in protest and felt immense pain shoot up said leg at the same time.
Before his shock could fully register, the Blessed lashed out again and this time Stone Wall ducked out of the way, the sword crashing upon the cobblestone street raising a small cloud of sparks in the process. Stone Wall thought quickly about the throbbing pain his leg. Yes the humans looked strong but he was an earth pony! He was naturally strong and he had been stronger than most. Yet suddenly, he could barely manage to block a single blow. What was going on? Did it have something to do with that strange cold he was feeling? But what was it and how could he . . . The greatsword punched through his armor and out his back, cutting his thoughts short as pain exploded throughout his body. Looking up at the cold smile on the human’s face, Stone Wall could only curse his own weakness and distraction and in an attempt to get one last shot in punched the human as hard as he could in the face.
He felt the satisfying feeling of contact as he hoof struck the human’s unarmored face hard. A smile came to his face, but that vanished only a second later as his hoof burned. There were no flames and no apparent damage, but the hoof that had touched the human surely felt like it. This last, sudden trauma was too much and Stone Wall felt his last breath leaving him even as the human’s face, contorted in rage, once again appeared in his vision.
----
The battle was over. The forces in the square proved to be the only guards remaining in the city and with their defeat the city fell completely. Humanity was soon reinforced with hundreds upon hundreds of soldiers arriving via the train station to occupy what was once the shining capital of Equestria. The Emperor and Empiricus lead the vanguard throughout the city and up to and through the castle gates. Through the magically carved corridors of stone and marble, through massive rooms of opulence and luxury, and through the darkest sections of the dungeons they marched, not willing to let any section of the castle be unaccounted for.
Eventually their march culminated at the golden doors of the castle’s throne room. When the doors opened they were greeted with a massive room. The walls were lined with stained glass windows detailing what appeared to be scenes from their history. Large, gracefully-carved columns dotted the room, flanking a large red carpet that stretched from the doors to a large, golden throne on the opposite side. The Emperor walked through the room towards the throne, ignoring all else. When he finally reached it, he took a moment to examine it before turning back to the rest of his forces.
“Take this blasphemous throne and burn it till naught but ash remains. Destroy these windows glorifying the daemons and begin purging all traces of them from this castle. I want nothing of them to remain intact when you are done. Am I understood?”
The sound of over 500 armored fists striking metal answered him.
“By your word!” With that they dispersed, eager to begin the mission given them by their emperor. Empiricus stepped forward to speak with the Emperor.
“Aurelian, I must admit that this went far better than I had hoped. Their capital seized, one of their daemon-queens brought low by retreat, and more of their forces broken beyond any hope of repair. Truly we are blessed in this endeavor.” Aurelian smiled at his old friend’s enthusiasm.
“Was there ever any doubt old friend? This is the will of Magnus Himself. Much has been done already, but do not revel in it just yet. For there is so much left to do before we are done with this crusade. At any rate, we must get back to business for now. When the troops have an accurate tally please give me a report on how many of these ponies remain in the city.” Empiricus bowed to him.
“Of course lord. It will be done. But in the meantime, what will you be doing?” The Emperor had already begun walking away.
“Praying, Empiricus: Praying for the continued blessings of Magnus in this, our greatest test of faith.”
----
The sun was just beginning to set when the final numbers came in. Apparently, many of the ponies of this city had been unable or unwilling to evacuate. Many appeared to be some form of nobility trying to preserve their wealth and estates. Others were merely civilians who were cut off by the human forces before they could reach the evacuation sites in time. Finally, there were those who simply could not bear to abandon the city where they had been born, raised, and in which they had raised families of their own. Thousands upon thousands remained in the city. If the reports were anything to go by, than of the original population barely 20 percent had been able to escape with their princess. The rest were trapped in Canterlot, occupied by a hostile force, and had no hope outside of Celestia and Luna themselves coming to save them. In addition, a good 30 percent of the city had been leveled or nearly been leveled in the bombardment. Additional damage had been avoided due to the bombardment being mainly focused on areas closest to the train station and had not gone much farther apart from the stray shell or two.
The Emperor stood on a stone balcony on the castle overlooking the assembled crusader forces as they stood in gleaming ranks, heads held high and smiles evident on their faces. They had pleased their Emperor. They had fought the usurping daemons. They had earned honor and glory in Magnus’ name and their names would go down in history. Wearing a smile himself, the Emperor walked to the edge of the balcony to address his men.
“Brothers and sisters! Soldiers of humanity and loyal servants of Magnus! Today we have won a great victory! The stronghold of the daemon-queens has been captured and their subjects subjugated! Their armies have been routed, their leaders forced to run before our might, and this land has been freed! Revel in your victory my friends! For tonight we celebrate and give thanks to Magnus. Tomorrow we march!”
Stats
Page generated in 0.031 seconds
Total duration
943 users online
1,514,688 hits today, 2,814,898 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
The victims in this story are the humans of the past, and the ponies of the present.
The villains of this story are the ponies of the past, the princesses, and the humans of the present. The ponies of the past are dead, so I'm just waiting for the princesses and the present human army to join them. Of course I realize that it is unlikely to happen, but hey, a guy can dream.
It's painful to read about the way the present humans are mowing down innocents, but it's a war story so innocents are bound to die at SOME point.
What's REALLY painful is seeing people in the comments section cheering the murderers on. And by painful I mean INFURIATING. I mean seriously.
Anyway, chapter-relevant commentary: not much plot CONTENT happening, but definitely plot ADVANCEMENT. A functional bridge to the next event of significance. I'm looking forward to seeing where this goes.
1582571 What the hell do you mean by that. Its finally nice to see a story where the humans so far is winning the war against the ponies. There is to many out there where the humans are loosing a war against the ponies. Hope that this story is not one of them. And by the way, this is a story, Not real life. If this would happened in real life then I would be of course against it but this is a story so lighten up a little.
1582619
What I mean by that is I get annoyed at people when they cheer on a murderer as he kills innocent people (and talk about how the ponies had it coming even though the ones that DID have it coming are all dead already), and this position applies regardless of the specific number of murderers and innocents involved. The races of the specific parties are irrelevant. I thought I was pretty clear about that. What did you THINK I meant?
On a side note: Man, I just really hate the princesses in this story. The characters I mean, not the writing. They're basically responsible for every dead pony since THEY decided killing the humans and driving them out was a good idea and then spent hundreds and hundreds of years NOT DOING ANYTHING TO RECTIFY THE SITUATION. No follow-up scouting, no attempts at diplomacy, no anything. And they let the ponies forget what they (the princesses and the past ponies) had done, so the present ponies are getting completely blindsided by the whole thing. Just...NNNNG.
1582625
Admittedly the princess have their reasons . . . Not good ones mind you, but reasons all the same. I may or may not have said this to someone else, but in future chapters I hope to expand on the reasons for their change of heart on the issue, as ineffectual as it may be, and how it affected certain events. However I would like to thank you for your comments, as I honestly love reading sincere comments, and am very happy that you are enjoying the story so far. I hope that you will continue to enjoy the story as it continues ever forward to. . . some conclusion I haven't quite reached yet.
Thought for the day: "Pain is an illusion of the senses, despair is an illusion of the mind."
This is great so far but one thing I would add is the resistance. Humans that have been against the reign of Aurelian/Magnus since the civil war (mentioned in previous chapters) that see this as an opportunity to dethrone him and join forces with the ponies to do so.
2092640
Well then, you're missing this fic's entire message. It's trying to say that war has no true "Good Guys" or "Bad Guys", that there is no such thing as evil.
1583111 the resistance was wiped out and the humans would not side with the ponies any way because there hatred is to deep rooted
to be ignored it even says in the story just looking at them makes the humans rage. :P
1583111 and it would make the story shitty
. . . . . I'm guessing that you have something against the "Youtuber" Joshscorcher aka Commander Firebrand, don't you.