• Published 25th Dec 2020
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Harmony of Heroes: Ultimate Multiverse Explorers - Lucar



Several months after her adventures on Popstar, Sweetie Belle decides it's time to start new adventures in new universes

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Chapter 82: Corneria

Phantom was on a street, looking up as the sky was more and more obscured by countless flying aparoids of all kinds that were already fighting the Cornerian defenses while dropping their ground brethren. She had just finished warning her friends and she was now ready to start to defend Corneria City. She won't be able to do much more. As powerful as she was with the power of the Phantom Ruby, it couldn't cover the whole planet. A few miles at most. Enough to cover the city.

So, after cracking her knuckles, she flew up in the middle of the swarm of aparoids and unleashed a powerful wave of Phantom energy that went all over the city and slightly beyond. As the wave passed, it caused countless doubles of various people she knew to appear everywhere in the city. Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, Sonic, Shadow, Metal Sonic, Mario, Luigi, and so on. Also appeared were turrets and even Eggman's airships from when he took over Mobius with Infinite's help as well as Equestrian airships from her world.

Just like that she already turned the scale of the battle for to the advantage of the Cornerians, and she had thankfully warned Pepper so the Cornerians would know that they were friendlies, but she wasn't done yet. She immediately sent part of the army she materialized to go beyond the city to defend the rest of the planet when they had the possibility (like the hedgehogs and Rainbow Dashes who could cover great distances in a blink of an eye). Then, she raised a fist and made countless blades materialize, creating a huge cloud of them that she then sent at the flying aparoids with a wave of her arm. The blades gored the bugs, often skewering them in lines. Following this, she materialized two laser cannons that she grabbed before she made them fire two continuous beams toward the sky. Using them like swords, she swept the sky with the beams, killing even more aparoids.

Between herself and her army that had started clearing the streets from the ground aparoids, she must have already killed many thousands of the bugs in not even one minute. And yet, they were still as numerous as before.

This promised to be a long battle.

Then she received a call from Pepper (who was also participating in the defense aboard his personal starfighter which she was keeping an eye on) warning her that their radars were being jammed, and he asked her help to kill the aparoids responsible of this. They quickly identified which ones were responsible, the aparoids looking like big hovering balls which were actually an eye surrounded by six pointed fin-like arms. They immediately became a priority to eliminate.

An infected mecha that Phantom remembered Andrew's forces used was sent by the aparoids to deal with her. Probably they got it after decimating what remained of the Androssians. It was fast, agile, and quickly charged a devastating beam that Phantom had to dodge. The antro pegasus countered by sending a cloud of cubes at the mecha, materializing four manacles that caught it by the arms and the legs, keeping it in place. She then used the manacles to control the mecha and make it ram other aparoids before she eventually made them tear it apart. What remained of the mecha dropped to the ground where it was crushed under the leg of one of these U.F.O.-like aparoids like the one she fought on Katina.

Looking down, she saw that a few of these things had dropped in the city and around, firing their rockets and crushing everything in their paths. Wasp-like aparoids were also in the sky in number. The bugs really sent everything they had to stop them from extracting the data from the Core Memory.

Materializing in her hands a spear that she pointed down at the giant aparoid that had just crushed the mecha, she imbued it with electricity before she dropped on the bug like a lightning bolt, right on the spire that contained its core. She pierced right through it in a thunderous crash, and the aparoid let out a terrible wail before it dropped dead.

Rising from the corpse of the titanic beast, she turned back to face the aparoids in the sky, ready to unleash the full power of the Phantom Ruby on them. She will show them how she had been able to almost exterminate an army by herself when she had been Infinite.


Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom didn't wait for the Unique Horn to approach to charge into the battle above the planet while the Cornerian ships that had been defending Aquas traversed the portal that the alicorn's battleship opened with the Great Fox among them.

Thanks to her speed, Sweetie Belle was the first to enter the battle, reaching a first swarm of aparoids battling a small, disorganised, and heavily outnumbered Cornerian fleet. The swarm had all kinds of flying aparoids, from beetle-like and moth-like ones to ones resembling more like ships, and had a huge number of the big wasp ones.

Frowning as she charged at the swarm big of several thousands individuals, she surrounded herself with her ten cannons in double sword beam mode and also created energy blades on her wings and her legs. She even divided herself so there were four of her flying in a squarre formation toward the aparoids, all with energy blades on the wings and legs.

Then they slashed, slashed, slashed, slashed, slashed, slashed, up, down, left, right, right again, and so on and so on until they traversed the whole swarm, leaving behind the aparoids cut into pieces. All of them. In just a few seconds.

Sweetie Belle then sent her doubles to continue the battle and help the Cornerians fleets around the planet before she called Phantom.

"We're here, and we brought with us Star Fox and the Cornerians who had been defending Aquas. What is the situation on the surface?"

Further away, she saw Apple Bloom enter the battle by unleashing in the middle of a swarm of aparoids where there were no friendlies some kind of cloud of death that killed everything touching it, breaking down their bodies until they were dust. After that, she began the process of zombifying the bugs.

"Not good. I'm using everything I have but I can't defend the whole planet. The capital is still standing despite having taken some damage and it seems to have taken the brunt of the assault, but I don't want to think of which state the rest must be. Hopefully, the Cornerian army and the clones that I sent were able to limit the damage out there. And for the ones who ask, General Pepper is okay. He's fighting the aparoids in his own ship and I'm keeping an eye on it to ensure that it doesn't get infected. But for an old dog that has probably not piloted a fighter in several years, he's still quite the war hound. He's giving the aparoids a lot of work."

"I'm not surprised," Peppy joined in. "It's not time that will worn him down, especially when the lives of what he holds dear is on the line. We're still descending to help him defend the city. What about you Sweetie Belle?"

As he talked, the members of Star Fox began to fight their way through the aparoids while they flew toward the surface of Corneria. They quickly began to battle a wasp using the same method than the first time they fought one.

"The capital seems to be in good hands, so I will rather help defending the rest of the surface," the alicorn answered, judging that the pilots didn't need her help as she watched. "What about you Apple Bloom?"

"Ah'll remain in defense of the fleets above the planet," the Spirit of Death answered.

"Alright. I will leave some doubles behind too," Sweetie Belle said.

"Doubles?" Peppy asked.

"Haven't you seen that there are four of me flying around?"

There were a few seconds of silence as the rabbit seemed to search for the doubles and quickly found them slaughtering the aparoids by thousands here and there. "So you can duplicate yourself?"

"Yup! But don't expect me to be able to create thousands of them. Everything is shared between my doubles. My consciousness, my energy, the damage I take... To put it simply, all the doubles are part of my body so the more I create doubles, the more dangerous it becomes for me. But against these bugs?" She grinned. "I can allow to create a dozen or two."

And she duplicated herself again, creating more and more doubles until they were fifteen. Counting the three that were already fighting the aparoids, this made a total of eighteen Sweetie Belles.

"Time to go!" the fifteen exclaimed before they all flew toward the surface of Corneria, eventually separating to go all over the planet.

The number of aparoids on the planet rapidly began to drop afterward.


It didn't take long for Fox and the others to kill the wasp and fly to Corneria City, fighting through countless aparoids on the path.

Then, they reached the city, and it was pure chaos. Thousands of aparoids of all kinds were flying around unknown airships all over the city in a dogfight against the Cornerian fighters while more bugs were on the ground fighting both Cornerian soldiers and all kinds of creatures. Laser, plasma, and other kinds of energy projectiles were going in all direction among the smoke coming out of the buildings and the giant U.F.O.-like aparoids that were like walking fortresses spreading death and destruction. In the chaos, they easily spotted General Pepper's ship and Phantom, the filly killing one of the giant aparoids by making it eat some powerful bomb.

"Let's spread to cover more ground. Kill as many as you can. Priority to the giant ones," Fox instructed. "Remember, their weakness is the core in the spire on their back. When it opens, fire at will!"

"Yes!" the three others replied before they flew in different directions and began to fire at the aparoids.

"We must also kill the bloated ones. They seem to be some kind of bomber," Krystal rapidly informed.

"Slippy, you already have three bogeys on your tail," Peppy warned.

"Oh come on!" the frog shouted in frustration. They barely started!

But thankfully for him, the three aparoids were quickly destroyed by Pepper's ship, which looked like a much bigger and more powerful version of the usual Cornerian fighter. "I'm glad to see you here Star Fox, but be more careful. With their number, any mistake could be your last."

"Thank you General," Slippy said.

"At least we can count on you and the pony to keep an eye on Little Froggy," Falco added. "But who and what are all these guys fighting for us?"

"Creations of Scootaloo. Her power apparently allow her to create whatever she wants, and this seems to include other people," Pepper answered.

"Woah! All of this is from her? Even the ships?!?" Slippy exclaimed.

"Ahah! Take that!" Falco shouted as he managed to kill one of the giant aparoids. "I'm not even surprised. Now, I'm more wondering what these ponies can't do. By the way, a few of these guys seem to be adults of their species."

"So all these beings are probably doubles of people they know," Krystal concluded. "Oh oh... Can someone help me? Rocket-like aparoids are chasing me and I have a bad feeling."

"Those are kamikazes!" Pepper informed.

"I'm coming!" Fox shouted and quickly joined Krystal to destroy the few rocket aparoids chasing her before they could reach her.

Meanwhile, Falco, Slippy, and Pepper fired at a group of these bloated bomber aparoids that had been about to attack the research center. At the same time, Phantom killed another giant aparoid that had been getting too close.

"Dad, how long until the data are fully extracted?" Slippy asked his dad.

"Almost done! Hold on a few more minutes."

"Alert! The aparoids are targeting the gate!" a soldier suddenly alerted. "A big missile aparoid has come out of a portal not far from it!"

"Damn it! They're changing target!" Falco shouted.

"Don't worry guys, I just destroyed the missile," Sweetie Belle then said. "Darn, more are coming!"

"The aparoids must think that if they destroy the gate then we won't be able to send our forces to their world," Pepper guessed.

"Ah! Too bad for them, even if the gate is destroyed my ship can open one. Uh? What is it Admiral Stinger?"

"Missiles are coming toward the Unique Horn."

"... I should have shut up my big mouth," Sweetie Belle deadpanned before she giggled. "Not that I worry. The Unique Horn can handle them."

"There're more and more aparoids up there. We'll need reinforcements if this continues," Apple Bloom warned.

"Alright. I'm sending some of my doubles from the surface."

The battle thus continued, and before long, between Phantom and Star Fox, all the giant aparoids were killed. Just in time for Beltino to announce that he finished extracting the data from the Core Memory and that he now knew the coordinates of the Aparoid Homeworld.

"That's great, dad! Give them to us and we will go right away!" Slippy exclaimed happily.

"Hold your horse, son. We aren't done yet. There's still something else that I must do before you can go and end their invasion."

"What is it, Beltino?" Pepper asked.

"Yeah, what is more to do? We go there, blow up their queen or whatever, and we're done, right?" Falco asked.

"Well, blowing up the queen would be good, but nothing would stop the surviving aparoids from creating a new one, making the whole operation useless. Without forgetting that even if you manage to kill the queen, you would still have to deal with its billions, maybe even trillions of servants, and you would be dead before you could escape."

"Wouldn't blowing up their homeworld work?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"WHAT?! How would you blow up a whole planet?!"

"... I have a way..."

"Hum... W-well... I suppose that blowing up the planet would kill the majority of them, but nothing garanties that all the aparoids will be on it. If even a single one escapes the planet's destruction, then this nightmare would eventually restart. No, we need to find a way that will ensure that every single aparoids in the universe will be eliminated in one go."

Sweetie Belle pouted. "Darn."

"You are disappointed that you can't blow up a planet?" Phantom asked. "You're starting to scare me, Sweetie."

"Ahem! Thankfully, we found something that could allow us to eliminate all the aparoids in one go. You see, from the data of the Memory Core, we discovered that the aparoids are vulnerable to apoptosis."

"Apoptosis, huh? You mean they contain cells that are created for the purpose of self-destruction?" Slippy asked, understanding what his father meant.

"Right! And I'm making a program to set off a chain reaction in those cells. If you fire the program into the queen, all aparoids will self-destruct!"

"That's incredible!" Fox complimented.

"Now, you just have to wait for me to finish the program. Until then, continue to defend the planet and the gate. And especially my research center."

"Well, we already did a good job and I don't see any reason why this would change now," Phantom said.

Apple Bloom groaned. "Please, don't jinx it,"

Apple Bloom's worry quickly turned true as the aparoids seemed to grow desperate, sending more and more missiles more and more heavily guarded at the gate and the Unique Horn. In the end, the focus of the battle of Corneria shifted from the capital to the gate as the Unique Horn flew to approach it so it would be easier for everyone to defend the two targets. Corneria City was still assaulted, but the aparoids were much less present than before, and the rest of the surface had almost been entirely cleaned by then. The aparoids zombified by Apple Bloom served as a first line of defense against the missiles and their escorts, and any that passed were promptly destroyed by the Cornerian army, Star Fox, and the fillies. The sneaky bugs attempted to send a missile directly at Corneria City to destroy the research center while everybody was busy defending the gate and the Unique Horn, but Phantom who had remained on guard easily destroyed it.

After several long minutes spent destroying dozens of missiles and the swarms escorting them, a last wave came with an humongous missile several times bigger than the others, easily the size of a ship like the Great Fox. And of course, it was heavily guarded.

Sweetie Belle yawned as she charged energy into her horn before she released a powerful beam that, upon hitting the missile, not only destroyed it but also caused an explosion that destroyed most of the aparoids escorting it.

No more missiles came after that. Seemingly understanding that they lost the battle, the remaining aparoids retreated, probably to prepare the defense of their homeworld knowing that an assault was now unavoidable.

And just in time for Beltino to call. "Well done everyone! We've just finished the self-destruct program, too!"

"Way to go, dad!" Slippy exclaimed.

"Now all we have to do is gift wrap it for the aparoid queen!" the scientist continued.

"That's one gift it won't forget," Apple Bloom said.

"You should add a little note that says "long live the queen" while you're at it," Phantom added.

"Guess it's time to head for their homeworld, huh?" Fox said.

"Yes. I will prepare our fleet for our assault. It's finally time for us to go on the offensive. And I must thank you, everyone, for defending Corneria. We are in your debt, Star Fox and... Excuse me, but what do you call yourselves, little ones?" Pepper asked.

"Us? Huh... Well... Good question." Sweetie Belle began to think of a name for their group. "The Cutie Mark Crusaders?"

"Mmh... What we're doing has nothing to do with Cutie Mark crusading. And we already have our Cutie Marks," Apple Bloom said.

"And while we may be CMCs, we are from different CMC groups. The three of us form a totally different group," Phantom said.

"Oh! Oh! I think I got it! We are the Ultimate Multiverse Explorers!" Sweetie Belle exclaimed, winking at nothing.

"Seriously?" Phantom deadpanned.

"Hey, it's simple and effective. Ah like it." You could almost hear her shrug.

Phantom sighed. "Alright. Let's go with the Ultimate Multiverse Explorers. Damn, it's so corny..."

Author's Note:

Two missions in one here. In the game, because of the time lost chasing Pigma, the aparoids attacked Sauria. While Star Fox was busy defending the planet, the main force of the aparoids assaulted Corneria and defeated the defenses, overrunning the city. By the time Star Fox found out and arrived, the city was badly damaged with aparoids everywhere and infected Cornerian soldiers and vehicles in every corners. Worst, Pepper's personal fighter was infected too with the General still in it. Star Fox, with an unexpected help from Star Wolf, was able to force the aparoids to retreat and destroyed Pepper's ship, but Peppy was able to save the old dog.
Beltino then revealed about the emplacement of the Aparoid Homeworld and the self-destruct program and the aparoids began a new assault, this time on the gate in hope to destroy it and thus stop the Cornerian from launching an assault. So the mission was mainly to destroy aparoid missiles before they could reach the gate and destroy it.
Here, since Star Fox was able to directly give the Core Memory to Beltino, the aparoids were forced to launch an assault on Corneria earlier, and thanks to the fillies, Star Fox was able to participate in the actual defense of the planet instead of dealing with the aftermath. Of course, I guess that the assault in the game was less important than the one in the story. The fillies' actions obviously led the aparoids to be more desperate.

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