Realm of the Lost

by Orsuros

Chapter 29: The Price of Redemption

A large metal door layered in magical circles and gems sat at the far end of the room. The magical energy coming off of it made Sandbar’s hair stand on end. Scriptus sat to the side and looked them over.

“This won’t be possible without your help,” he said. “But we need to do things right. We can’t let the corrupted dragons escape, and I’ll need to protect my library from outside attack at the same time. The three dragons were only slightly older than Smolder. One was large and strong. One was cunning. And the last had a way with words and charm. The void spirits will use those attributes against you.”

Smolder clenched her fist. “I’m tough, so it sounds like I should fight the big one. Ocellus, you should take on the smart one. And Sandbar, you can take on the last one.”

Sandbar didn’t really want to fight a dragon, but he’d do it to get everyone safely back home. And he’d be doing it to help save Equestria. It was just hard to feel brave about it, even if his reasons were good.

“Sure,” he said. “But how are we going to know when to use the magic of Harmony on them?”

“You must weaken them first,” Scriptus said. “I wish I had a better way than fighting them, but that is the easiest way. It would take far too long to exhaust them in any other way.”

“And we don’t have to worry about getting corrupted by them?” Ocellus asked.

Scriptus shook his head. “No. The magic of Harmony and the seals in this place will stop that. As long as either of those two remain, you won’t have to worry. Here is the key that will unlock the seal. Use it in five minutes. I will have my defenses ready by then. Sandbar, Ocellus, drink these potions. They’ll protect you from dragonfire.”

He handed a golden key over to Smolder. It had similar intricate magical circles to the door. He pulled out two potions then turned to leave.

Sandbar uncorked the potion and drank it slowly. It tasted like mint, but the cold feeling spread throughout his entire body.

“Let’s hear a growl from you two before we start,” Smolder said. “That always gets me fired up.”

Smolder’s fierce growl echoed in the room. Ocellus tried to growl, but she sounded more like a cute puppy. Sandbar thought his own attempt sounded more frustrated than angry.

“Sorry,” Ocellus said. “I can do better.” She transformed into a bugbear and let out a fierce bear-like growl. “There! I’m ready now.”

He wished he could transform into something with wings and claws, like his two friends. He looked down at his hooves. It would be up to his old reliable bucks and kicks to do the job.

Smolder pressed the key against the single slot in the door. “That should be enough time. Let’s get the fun started!” She turned the key.

A loud click came from deep within the door. The hum of spells activating and deactivating came from the huge door as the spell circles lit up and faded. More of them went dark until a final huge circle across the entire door flashed. It started to dim. The central seam of the door appeared before the two halves swung open.

The room beyond the door lit with the harsh white of magical lights. Three dragons shook their heads and looked at the open door. In the bright light, it was easy to see that each dragon had black where the whites of their eyes should have been. Their eerie gaze made Sandbar want to shiver.

“I’ll take Ignis.” Smolder pointed at the center dragon.

He stood a head taller than her and flexed his large muscles. He was a deep red color. He smiled at Smolder’s challenge.

Ocellus pointed with a claw. “Sandbar, you get the one on the right. That’s Risk. I’ll take on Tremor, like we planned.”

She turned to face Tremor. He was a thin black dragon with calculating eyes.

Sandbar looked at his opponent. Risk was a beautiful silver dragon, but her icy glare spoiled her elegant, smooth complexion.

“Remember,” he said. “We’re here to help them.”

Risk took a step toward him. Her every movement was mesmerizing as her scales shimmered in the light. “We aren’t the ones who need help. A strong pony like you should put that strength to use for those who need help, like your friends.”

The words echoed in Sandbar’s head. He chased after Risk, but she slipped away like water. He reared up and aimed a kick at her, but he blinked and found his kick aimed at Ocellus. He stumbled backward to avoid hitting her.

“Ah! A fight!” Ignis road and pounded his chest. “It’s the perfect way to wake up. I will take on any challengers! Give me all your rage!” He roared at Smolder.

The two dragons met with a loud thud. Smolder grabbed his arm, but he got a grip on her tail and slammed her into the ground. She grunted as the air was knocked out of her. She kicked his arm to break the hold. She stood back up and backed up as she tried to catch her breath.

Tremor grinned as he circled Ocellus. “The great game of battle is set. Choose your moves well. I hope to at least have some fun. It’s so boring when my opponents can’t match my strategies.”

“If you think you can trick a changeling, you’ll be very disappointed.”

The two danced back and forth. Dragon and bugbear claws were inches from hitting their targets. After a flurry of swipes, Ocellus scored a light hit.

“Is my little pony playmate getting distracting, or scared?” Risk’s voice sounded like it was right behind him.

He tried to kick out with his back legs, but a push from the side toppled him. He fell hard on his shoulder and had to untangle his legs.

“Hey! Stop that. Fight fair!”

Smolder’s roar sounded from across the room. Ocellus gasped in pain. But Sandbar had to focus on his fight. He’d help them once that was over.

Risk laughed. "Fair? We all have our own ways of fighting. Are my words too strong for you to resist?"

"If you're going to use your power, then I'll use mine!"

Sandbar dug deep until he could feel his own strength and the magic of Harmony. He used both and charged after Risk. She danced away from his stampeding kicks, but he clipped her with the edge of his hoof on one kick.

She rubbed her snout and growled. “How dare you bruise my beautiful face! You surprised me, but you won’t hit me again.”

The surge of power within him was fading, but it had shown him something. As long as he could see or hear Risk, her powers would make her very difficult to hit. He hummed one of his favorite songs about the Wonderbolts and used his hooves to feel the dragon’s nearby steps. She darted in for an attack, but he twisted and bucked her right in the chest.

“If you stop fighting, I won’t have to hurt you.”

She was breathing hard through her clenched teeth. “We won’t stop until we’re free. After ages of imprisonment, we won’t be caged again.”

Sandbar couldn’t look away from her. Any tactical thoughts slipped away, and he stared. She walked closer and grabbed his muzzle.

“You can obey! Let’s put those kicks of yours to better use. Your dragon friend, for example.”

The shadow behind her eyes filled his mind. He watched himself charge at Smolder’s back.

“Yes! More!” Ignis shouted as he continued the fight with Smolder.

The two dragons had deep scratch marks across their scales. Smolder was bleeding in a few places and was barely keeping up. Ignis was fueled by the pain and the battle. He hit Smolder across the chest with a swing of his tail. She was about to get up when Sandbar knocked her back down. She didn’t get up this time.

“Smolder! No!”

He broke free of whatever was holding him. He picked her up and prayed for Harmony’s strength as he tried to connect to her fading energy. It blazed up, like a fire, and Smolder opened her eyes.

“Thanks, Sandbar. I can keep fighting that brute. You finish her off and then you can help me. And it looks like Ocellus is doing fine. We shouldn’t distract her.”

Sandbar wanted to say something, but Smolder charged back into the duel with Ignis. He tried to hold on to his connection with Harmony as Risk approached him. She was avoiding putting much weight on one foot. She looked weak, and if he could find another opening, he might be able to use Harmony’s magic to end the fight.

He tried his trick of humming a song and closing his eyes, but she sang her own tune that twisted with his own. His mind went blank. He watched as he kicked Smolder in the side after she scored a heavy blow on Ignis’s wing.

“What in the sulphur pits are you doing, Sandbar?” Smolder glared back at him for just a moment.

“Sorry. She’s twisting something inside me. It’s hard to fight that.”

“Get your head in the game and out of the clouds. Ignis seems to be getting stronger the more I hurt him. I hate to say this, but I don’t think I can take him by myself.”

Sandbar took several steps back as he stared at the blazing eyes of the red dragon. He retreated behind Smolder and looked for his opponent. She was just out of reach.

“Scriptus said you’re like Nightmare Moon. Deep down inside, there’s still that young, curious dragon waiting to find great things in the world and make great friends while you do it.”

“That’s wrong. The only thing we ever wanted was power. I wanted the power to turn all hearts to me with my words and my beauty. And that is exactly what I got.”

“No. It’s not. These spirits turned you against your friends. But it’s not too late to go back and start again.”

Sandbar focused again as the strange pressure of her words started to twist his heart and mind again. He thought of his friends and the lessons in friendship that they had learned together. The magic inside him grew stronger and stronger. A faint glow appeared around him. He rushed forward and trapped Risk in a big earth pony hug.

She cried out in what sounded like two voices. She struggled and tried to escape. She cursed and tried to breathe flame, but the potion did its job. Sandbar only felt a pleasant warmth from the flames. Harmony’s magic flowed through him. The shadow in Risk’s eyes faded, and an inky shadow evaporated from around her. Sandbar set her gently on the floor as she collapsed.

Even if he was victorious, he could feel the magic inside him weakening with each use. He rushed in and had to use part of that magic to bolster his strength as he grabbed one of Ignis’s arms. Smolder held the other, but the two of them were shaking from the effort, even with the magic helping them. On the far side of the room, Ocellus used the same magic to defend herself from the darkness that was swirling around her head.

“Yes! Finally a fight worthy of my strength!” Ignis roared. “My claws shall tear the strongest to shreds!”

Smolder tried to twist his arm, but he nearly pushed her off her feet. Sandbar coughed as the dragon’s hand caught hold of his chest and almost crushed it. They were burning all of the special magic they had just to hold on.

Ignis pushed Sandbar back. He caught Smolder as she tried to jump away from a blow. His fist smacked her into the wall on the other side of the room. She wasn’t moving.

A flash from the other side of the room distracted Sandbar for a moment. Ocellus collapsed, but the void spirit’s link had been severed from Tremor. The dragon fell unconscious at Ocellus’s side. Ocellus looked over at Sandbar.

“I can’t hold on! Take the power I have left.”

Sandbar felt the fading magic of Harmony grow a little brighter as Ocellus shared it with him. It wouldn’t be enough to overwhelm Ignis without finding a weak point, but it was enough to keep going. Ocellus slumped and didn’t try to get up again.

He rubbed the crystal circlet. His friends were down, but he had one last trick. And he had to figure out what to do with it before the battle-crazed dragon could attack.

“Link established. How may I be of assistance?” Hedron’s calm voice was a relief.

“I’m not sure. What can your magic do against a corrupted dragon?”

“Void magic detected. It is hard to contain, but I will do what I can to slow him down.”

“I could use any help you have. Thanks!”

The circlet lit up the air in front of Sandbar with a kaleidoscope of magic circles. They settled to the ground around him.

Ignis charged into the magical circles with no hesitation. He lunged for Sandbar.

His eyes went wide as the dragon’s claws reached for him. He saw no way out. The second before the dragon tackled him, everything stopped.

“Move out of the way,” Hedron commanded. “Every second I buy you burns up the power in the circlet.”

Sandbar jumped to the side. He thought he was clear, but a thick red tail swung at him as Ignis spun around. It swept his legs out from under him. He gasped as he hit the hard stone floor. He’d have a bruise there later, but everyone was counting on him. He wouldn’t let a little pain stop him. The dragon was at the center of the circle. He hadn’t planned it, but it was right where he needed him to be.

“Use all the power left, now!” Sandbar shouted and charged.

He felt claws rake his side as he slammed down on top of Ignis. Hedron’s magic stopped the dragon in place, but Sandbar could barely focus. His side felt both like it was on fire and like it was wet with something warm and slick. He called on the rest of Harmony’s magic and forced it into the dragon from his front hoof. The dragon knocked him away. The last thing he saw was the room flying by. He bounced once before all went black.

---

A warm feeling was the first thing Sandbar felt. He opened his eyes slowly. Scriptus stood over him and held a burning scroll in his hands.

“Good. You survived. My healing magic is a bit rusty, so I wasn’t sure you would.”

He looked around. Smolder was lying in a bed next to his. She was bruised, bandaged, and had one wing in a sling. Ocellus was sitting next to Smolder. She had a few bandages on and had a blindfold over her eyes.

“Did we win?” Sandbar asked.

Scriptus nodded. “You did enough. The magic you used trapped Ignis and started to purge the void spirit within him. When I arrived, I only had to complete the spells to free him. The three dragons are all resting and being tended to.”

He looked over at his friends. “And how are you two?”

Ocellus groaned. “This headache is the worst I’ve ever had.”

Smolder laughed as she tried to lift an arm. “I’m so sore, I can barely move. And you should have seen the slash in your side! There was so much blood! Without healing magic, you would have had a nice scar.”

Sandbar lifted the blankets and glanced at the bandages that covered almost half his body. At least Smolder thought it was cool. It felt numb at the moment, probably from the magic that Scriptus had used.

“I shall see that you are all healed and cared for,” Scriptus said. “And you shall have the use of my Orb of Finding when the time comes. You have done something priceless for me.”

“Do you think you could contact Starlight Glimmer for us?” Sandbar asked. “I was supposed to use my circlet to tell her how things went, but I used up its magic in the fight. It needs time to recharge.”

“I have plenty of sending scrolls, so I can get a message to her. Write it down and get some rest while I wait for her reply.”

Author's Note:

Click here for stat sheets and other information.

Our group was an inch away from failure, but Sandbar managed to pull through. They used everything they had to win against the three corrupted dragons. When I was rolling the dice, Ocellus and Tremor were quite even. Risk had low stamina but was very hard to hit. Sandbar tended to switch between doing very well and doing very terribly. Ignis had great combat stats and started off rolling well. His rolls got higher as the battle went on. Most of the group's friendship tokens/Harmony magic got used up just to prevent them getting taken out by Ignis's strongest attacks.

Anyway, the characters will all get a level up at this point. They'll need it for the upcoming final battle.

Comments

[Yoshifan30]

Whoa that was pretty epic battle so smolder ocellus and sandbar are fighting the three corrupted dragons so the battle went on and sandbar was amazing his fighting skill was improving so the others won over the 3 dragons so now they got the item so I wonder How would this go I guess will find out next time