Book 1 - The Behemoth came to Canterlot

by Equimorto

Chrome

Luna grunted as the flare of magic around her horn collided with that around Nightmare Moon's. The two pushed against each other for a few seconds, then Nightmare Moon dashed backwards with a push of her wings and came back to attack from another angle.

Luna blocked her again. She'd been on the defensive end of the conflict since the beginning, partly out of choice. She was supposed to keep her enemy there as long as possible, and that was easier if she was trying not to get hurt more than she was trying to hurt the other. Not that she didn't look for openings left by Nightmare Moon's charges to strike, but she didn't take any risks trying to land blows. She wasn't the one supposed to defeat her, and that aside she knew, though it bothered her, that she likely couldn't. There was more to the alicorn she was fighting against than there should have been to a normal pony, she could only hope the Elements would still be enough.

Nightmare Moon flew away again. Luna took her chance to fire a spell at her, hitting her chest but not doing much damage. After disappearing momentarily into the cloud of swirling darkness around them, Nightmare Moon struck again, faster. She didn't attempt to hit Luna directly, instead she dashed by her, and as Luna blocked her horn she moved past her and disappeared again. Then she struck another time in the same way, and another, and yet another, always emerging from different angles to try and catch Luna by surprise.

Aware that sooner or later she would make a mistake, Luna surrounded herself entirely in a magical shield instead, and there began to plot her next course of action while Nightmare Moon still hit her on all sides. She had avoided doing so before as it drained more magic than simply blocking each assault by itself to constantly keep a shield up, and because it could be seen as a somewhat dishonourable action in a duel to shield oneself fully for too long a time. She didn't care about appearing honourable in Nightmare Moon's eyes, but she cared about making sure that the other played fair too, something she'd surprisingly been consistent with that far.

Just as Nightmare Moon was dashing in again, Luna released her shield outwards, knocking the other off balance and giving her an opportunity to attack. She fired a spell behind the alicorn and dove towards her, and while Nightmare Moon did react to her charge by blocking it the impact was still enough to push her into the spell, and the reaction from that was enough for Luna to fire another straight at her. A moment later however Nightmare Moon was firing back, and Luna was forced to dodge to the side before she failed to push the magic blast back.

Luna was back to defending herself, as Nightmare Moon began to fire a series of spells at her. Perhaps the worst part of having to face her was how annoyingly, unnaturally resistant she was. No matter what, nothing seemed to really hurt her. Luna hoped, as long as she managed to hold on long enough, Twilight and her friends would be able to do more than her.

Comments

[Speckle]

Hang in there, Luna!