The Kaiser of Griffonkind
Yesterday, Grover von Greifenstein stood before his war table, claws clasped under his beak as he leaned against it. The Reichstone’s gold glittered above his head, balanced perfectly on his tan feathers. The tips of light-brown primary feathers complemented the long, tailored coat that covered his dress shirt and pressed slacks. The coat was left open so the medal-laden orange sash drooped to the table underneath his chest.
Grover’s deep blue eyes, calm and collected, swept over the figures across the map and judged their positions. The wooden alicorn was not present on the table. It would be a distraction. The photographers dutifully took their pictures from a variety of angles, making sure to capture his folded wings and bobbing tail. The Kaiser of Griffonkind looked every part the image of his great ancestor.
A painting of Grover the Great had even been brought in from Griffenheim and hung across the hole in the tower wall. The photographers made sure to angle a few photographs so both Kaisers were in the frame. Grover the First and the Great was in the same position in the image; claws clasped under his large brown beak as he scanned across a proposed battlefield drawn on paper.
It was an imagining of the climactic battle against the Wingbardians. Grover the Great, clad in gray enchanted plate armor, scowled beneath fiery golden eyes, cheeks pulled into a frown next to his beak. He wore an iron crown. The Reichstone had not been made yet; he commissioned it afterwards with the announcement of the new capital of Griffenheim, deep in the Herzland of Griffonia. It became a symbol of his Reich, just as much as the Idol of Boreas.
Today, the painting was gone. It had been bundled back into its padded packaging and carried away by loyal dogs once the photographers departed. It would go back to Griffenheim to be rehung in the palace. Grover’s ancestor served his purpose; the newspapers in Griffonia would print his image beside his descendant across the front page tomorrow.
Kaiser Grover VI Leads His Armies to Victory!
And today, Grover VI knocked his crown over with a sharp elbow. The courier squawked in terror and caught it reflexively, diving forwards across the stone floor. Grover stared down at him with wild blue eyes.
“Forget about the crown!” he roared down into the courtier’s beak. The Kaiser flung the hastily written order at the beleaguered griffon. “Get this downstairs! Break off the 17th and 21st from Army Group South and cross at the river! Are the engineers there?”
“Y-yes!” the courier answered with a frazzled squawked. He gently set the crown to the floor and grabbed the folded note. “T-they l-landed-”
“Go!” Grover roared again. The courier turned tail and fled down the stairs.
The Kaiser took a deep breath and leaned his sweaty claws against the map again. His long coat and sash laid across a fallen chair; a lashing tail occasionally smacked against the medals hanging from the sash. A few had been knocked off. Grover did not notice.
Benito stepped forward from his position and carefully picked up the crown between his paws and rubbed a scuff mark off the gold with a paw pad. Grover glared down at the map and pushed two metal griffons across a river to the south. Ignatius is pushing forward south of the Duskwood. We can encircle the reserves.
Grover’s head snapped up and fixated on the wall of attendants beside the balcony. One of the female griffons in a simple dress flinched at the direct eye contact. “Get a report from Air Marshal Ebonbeak!” Grover snarled.
The griffon nodded rapidly and fled the room.
“You just got a report five minutes ago,” Benito remarked quietly as he set the Reichstone down on the edge of the table.
“I need another,” Grover muttered. “The Luftwaffe is exhausting itself. They have concentrated on the Duskwood.” He snapped his head back up and jabbed a claw at another attendant. “Where are the damn fuel trucks for Army Group North!?”
The griffon blinked.
“Go find out!” Grover spat at him.
The attendant’s wingpits were visibly staining his simple shirt, even with the chill in the tower. He raised a claw to his chest and paused before he left. “My Kai-”
Grover grabbed one of the discarded metal griffons along the map edge and flung it at him. “Go, Maar damn you!”
The griffon’s wings trembled at the profanity, or at the thought of being damned by the Kaiser of Griffonkind and the griffon chosen by the Gods. The attendant fled towards the balcony and leapt past two knights, taking the direct route down to the radio center. The two Aquileian unicorns in the room, one at the door and another beside the balcony, scuffed their hooves.
Benito bit his lip with a fang and looked around the room warily again. I should have never told him this was the Nightmare’s tower, Grover rolled his eyes and spared a side-eye at the knights along the large map on the wall. They think the very brick and mortar is cursed.
“I had the tower blessed; it is fine,” Grover said aloud to the dog. He grabbed a damp cloth and wiped his glasses, only smearing more sweat across the lenses. Grover sighed and grabbed an old report.
He used that instead, unhooking the frames from his feathers and taking them between two talons. Grover’s dress shirt was unbuttoned; the plain white undershirt beneath was soaked in sweat from his armpits to his wingpits. The Kaiser had kicked his dress shoes off hours ago; they landed somewhere in the line of knights. His bare paws flexed against the stone with a click of extending and retracting claws.
Grover squinted down at the map, adjusting the standing figurines with a careful claw. He was nearsighted; he could see it well enough this close, and the blurry knights standing at attention in the background were a distraction anyway.
The Kaiser slammed a griffon down just above Las Pegasus. The Hegemony had bolstered their forces to hit Canterlot with everything they had. Mudbeak and Army Group South had advanced with limited resistance and sliced across the south. In a few days, they would cut southern Equestria off from the north; the Appleoosan Protectorate and the hundreds of thousands of changelings inside would be forced to evacuate from Las Pegasus to the Olenian Peninsula or up to Vanhoover in eastern Equestria.
I’m winning.
His cheeks pulled into a smile as the griffon flapped sweat off his wings. After the initial push, the Luftwaffe was flagging. The Reich shot them down too quickly to replace. Griffons had always been better pilots, and now they proved it.
There were some difficulties. It pained him to admit it, but Flurry was right about Thundertail. The idiot advanced into the northern valleys and fell into an ambush as the Changelings brought out some new kind of tank. He at least had the decency to die with his overrun forward post.
Grover brushed two more little metal trucks forward to the north. He twisted his head to the blurry shapes along the wall. “I need a report! Where are the reserves for Army Group North?” He waited until one of the griffons ran down the stairs on all fours before turning back to the map.
“Duke Gerlach assumed command,” Benito reminded him quietly. The dog still stood beside the Reichstone to his left.
“I am aware,” Grover said absently. He hooked the glasses back onto his beak.
“Some of the Changeling bombers nearly reached the Everfree,” Benito continued.
“They were shot down by the Princess’ forces,” Grover dismissed, “and we have anti-air installed. It hasn't even fired yet.”
“Canterlot is burning,” Benito tapped a sharp claw on a sheet of paper. “They are clearly struggling to contain the breakout. If they breakout, they will be behind our lines.”
“It is burning,” Grover agreed. “She said she was willing to burn it to the ground.” He turned to the attendants and picked one with a claw. “Get an update from Mudbeak.” He’s not the fastest griffon. We have to cut the south off while we have momentum.
“The Princess is not with her army,” Benito added. He finally put a paw down on the wooden alicorn standing in a line of tanks before the Duskwood Forest. The tanks were far ahead of their supports, though the knight figures were right behind them.
Grover sighed. Ahead of schedule. “Our air support isn’t in place. Is Bronzetail holding?” he asked aloud.
No griffon answered him. He pointed a claw at another courier. “Go find out.”
The first courier returned through the door as the other tried to leave. The Aquileian’s horn flashed and magic brushed through his feathers. “Clear!” the mare announced in clipped Herzlander.
The courier rushed forward and bowed with a claw clasped to his chest. “Divisions are breaking off to cross the river. Bridges are in place.”
Grover waved him away with a claw, not even looking up from the map. He swallowed thickly, beak clacking. I can hear my heartbeat. The Kaiser almost laughed.
He was having fun.
Ancestors above, did you feel the same way? Grover II liked to fight at least, but his temper and disdain for the war table was legendary. His loss. For the first time since he folded his wings and landed on Equus, Grover was actually enjoying his war.
Another courier landed on the balcony. The knights held her at gunpoint until the unicorn announced she was clear. She bowed. “Knight-Captain Wavewing reports that she’s captured one of the new panzers, my Kaiser.”
“Good,” Grover scoffed. “Have her break off a squad and send it to the reserves. I want the engineers to study it.” Tear the damn thing apart. He clacked his beak at the map.
He expected the Changelings to try something; the Hegemony was predictably unpredictable and uniformly cruel. He himself had similarly used the Everfree to disguise the movements of his own tanks, but disposable armor designed to look like one of the weaker models was ingenious.
Not Synovial, Grover decided. Perhaps Vaspier’s plan. The panzers had slammed through Thundertail, but Grover had artillery in place to shell the valleys to halt any continued fallback. The Princess’ ragged force withheld a minor push along the northern face of Mount Canterhorn well-enough. At any rate, the call-ins from the field commanders indicated that there weren’t many of the new panzers; the old Changeling armor appeared after the initial spearheads were repulsed. The front was stabilizing to the north and holding. Air support to the north, then the Duskwood.
The casualty reports were littered across the cracked stone. Many griffons had died today, and many more would die over the coming days, but the Hegemony couldn’t compete with enchanted armor and the mechanized normal Reichsarmee. Grover glanced at the bound Friendship Journal holding one of the edges of the map down; the most recent casualty list from the field hospitals was atop it.
Starlight Glimmer may not have lived to see it, but the Equestrian Liberation Front broke the Hegemony’s back. It is up to us to shatter their fangs and finish the job.
A griffon burst through the stairwell door, halfway flapping his wings. One of the knights slammed the butt of his assault rile into the courier’s back and he tumbled to the floor. Benito drew his saber.
“Wait to be checked,” Grover commented without looking up from the map.
“My Kaiser,” the mustard-colored griffon coughed in apology from the floor. “Field Marshal Bronzetail is advancing to the north.”
Grover blinked and looked at the map. He’s still too far ahead of his supply lines. Wait, to the north? The metal changelings had pressed up against the Canterhorn north of the Celestial Plain. With Duke Gerlach in command and holding, that front had stalled.
The Kaiser traced a talon up to the large, vaguely elliptical line at the top of the map. We could pin them against the shield wall with a breakthrough. He shook his head, snapping back to the pile of metal changelings lumped across the large forest. The reserves in the Duskwood will hit our exposed flanks.
“Army Group Center holds at the Duskwood,” Grover announced. “Mop up the survivors from the plain.”
“He’s already moving, my Kaiser,” the griffon panted.
Grover tilted his head, then jabbed two talons towards the armored knights beneath the map of the world hanging next to the balcony. “Go down there with him and find out what in Boreas’ name is happening! Hold at the Duskwood!”
The knights clasped gauntlets to their chests and hauled the courier up. They dragged him down the stairs together. Grover returned to the map beneath his claws.
The little wooden alicorn stood above the line of tanks. Grover exhaled at it, and the figure wobbled. Volley fire like Grover the Great? This better not be her idea. They had broken through well-enough, but it was straining their reinforcements to keep up with the advance.
The two knights returned after a few minutes; they held their helmets in their claws and looked nervous. “Field Marshal Bronzetail is requesting the supply trucks be sent along the plain,” the one on the right said. “He’s moving north.”
“He’s exposing his entire flank to the Duskwood!” Grover snarled. He glared down at the map. The little wooden alicorn didn’t have any real features carved into it, just bumps that suggested wings and a lump atop the head that could be a horn. “Where’s the Princess?” Grover asked lowly.
The one on the left swallowed. “The Marshal said the Princess will deal with the forest.”
Grover stared blankly at them. His claws clenched the table and he inhaled to screech. At the last moment, he snapped his beak shut. “Thank you,” he ground out, “for your information.”
More couriers arrived after the knights walked back to their positions. Grover refocused and dealt with their information. He continued to adjust the battle plan atop the map. Benito and two attendants helped organize the reams of paper.
The command center below the tower was doubtlessly frantic with squawking radios and frenzied, inaccurate, or outdated information. The Reichsarmee was known for its bloated bureaucracy during his father’s reign. Thank you again, Eros, Grover thought as he pushed the little wooden alicorn out of the way and over the forest. By the time anything reached him, it was verified and accurate.
“My Kaiser!” a knight screeched from outside the balcony. He flapped up before the guards with flailing claws. “There’s a dragon above the Duskwood! It’s torching the west!”
Grover slammed a claw down on the southern edge of the map, atop the Dragon Isles. Dragon Lord Ember still remained neutral, refusing any offers of negotiation. The dragons did not trouble the convoys to Baltimare, but they also did not engage any of the Changeling fleet.
"Our scouts would have noticed a dragon," he said dryly. "Verify it."
The knight looked west on hovering wings. Two of the guards on the balcony followed his gaze, seeing the beginnings of a swath of smoke clouds. Grover gave the balcony a side-eye, then returned to the map. He ignored the wooden alicorn.
The Kaiser had almost pushed it out of his mind before another courier returned. "The Changelings are breaking off the attack from the Duskwood," she panted. "Army Group Center is advancing north with little resistance."
Looks like Bronzetail's gambit paid off. "Just so," Grover commented idly.
"There's, uh," the courier hesitated. "Uh, shouting. Coming from the forest."
"Shouting?" Benito scrunched his muzzle.
"That all the Changelings are going to die," the courier clarified with twitching wings. "It's in Herzlander."
Grover's eyes went to the small alicorn, then he wrenched them back to the north. "I want the 17th Artillery Brigade to shore up the Flutter Valley," the Kaiser said.
Several minutes later, an even more nervous messenger arrived, an Aquileian pony. "There's two more reports about a dragon." He hesitated. "The Changelings are shelling the Duskwood with mortars."
Grover did not respond.
"We have not located the Princess," the stallion added with visible reluctance.
Grover took a deep breath. He ripped his talons free from the aged wooden table and took off his glasses. The Kaiser calmly set them down atop a stack of reports, then pulled his goggles free from a shirt pocket. “Sir Ewing and Sir Erreck, with me.” Grover affixed the goggles over his eyes. The world came back into focus. The two nervous Opinicus knights saluted and replaced their helmets.
“My Kaiser,” Benito said quietly, “please allow us to get a proper escort.”
“Handle any reports until I return,” Grover said instead, facing Benito with flared wings. “I will be back shortly.” He shrugged his long-sleeved shirt off, now only in slacks and an undershirt. The fur was matted under his wings, and the primary feathers flexed.
“My Kaiser-”
Grover ignored him and walked to the balcony. The guards bowed their heads and stepped aside. The Kaiser leaned his claws on the broken railing, then turned back to look at the Reichstone still on the table. He twisted his head back to the west and leapt.
Grover snapped his wings into position and flapped, catching an updraft and soaring above the dilapidated castle. The knights followed with a squawk. Grover was faster, only clad in clothes, not armor. The chill wind blowing across the midday helped dry the cloth. The griffon kicked his bare paws as he flew; he folded his wings and corkscrewed before snapping them back out
When was the last time I flew somewhere? Grover considered. Probably back in Griffenheim, somewhere inside the palace. The walls and roofs were high enough for griffons to fly in the spherical golden tops.
Grover continued to ascend, sparing a quick glance at the cloud air base to the southeast. The Princess’ fighters had scrambled early that morning and spread over the rear, but most were in the north. Duke Gerlach reported that some rammed the tank line in the northern valley as the crews bailed and returned to Mount Canterhorn.
Canterlot and the mountain still poured smoke. The anti-air fire and artillery echoed in the distance, audible from the clouds. Grover slowed, flapping his wings unevenly. He was about at Canterlot’s height now, and could see the inky smoke pouring from the west. He flapped up towards a cloud.
A two-griffon Reichsarmee spotting team was atop it, both male brown griffons. Grover landed behind them as they faced west. One spoke into a radio pack strapped to his chest.
“Zone four clear,” the griffon said in a light voice. He might have only been a year or two older than Grover himself. The scout noticed the griffon flying up behind them and tensed while holding the headset to his beak.
“Give me your binoculars,” Grover said as he landed. He stepped forward on the rough cloud. The Everfree was wild magic and the clouds tended to move on their own. It didn’t feel as springy as it should have. The older griffon turned around with the binoculars in his claws.
The griffon dropped his binoculars and they hung by the strap around his neck, but his claw moved down to his wing holster with wide eyes. “S-step back!” He tugged on the pistol grip, but hadn’t unclipped the holster.
Both griffons were in cloth gray uniforms of the standard Reichsarmee, not armor. Grover inhaled to say something to them, but instead he leapt forward at the older scout. His beak opened in a snarl instead of an explanation.
Grover lunged forward with his left claw and caught the griffon’s arm. His right claw punched him in the throat. The scout choked on his spit. The Kaiser used his momentum to spin the griffon around and block his partner’s aim.
The radio pack griffon was slow on the draw. He fumbled with the wing holster. Grover let go of the choking griffon’s right arm and buffeted him with two wing strikes around the head. The disoriented, choking griffon coughed as Grover unclipped the holster and pulled the pistol free.
He flicked the safety off with a talon and pointed it at the other scout with his left claw, wrapping his right arm around the coughing griffon’s head. The radio pack griffon had just gotten his own pistol free. He gaped up at the tall teenager that was using his partner as a shield.
“Drop it!” Sir Ewing screeched. He ascended with a readied assault rifle, flapping to stay airborne in one position. Sir Erreck appeared on the other side of the cloud.
The radio griffon dropped the pistol. It fell off the cloud and to the forest floor far below. “He just came out of nowhere!” the young griffon pleaded to the knights. “W-what’s happening!?”
“My Kaiser!” Sir Ewing shouted. “Are you alright?”
Grover dropped the coughing griffon and flicked the safety back on. The radio scout gaped at him with outstretched claws. The gray uniform developed a stain around his back legs. The other griffon wriggled backwards on the cloud with wide, terrified eyes. Through the griffon’s choking sputter, he attempted to gasp out, “My Kaiser!” and failed. His right claw flumped into a salute against his chest, only adding to the coughing.
“My Kaiser!” Sir Erreck continued. “Are they changelings? Shall we shoot them?”
The radio scout shook his head and his raised claws shook. “N-no! No! We…we just-”
You just what? Grover opened his beak to sneer. His claw reflexively drifted up to adjust the Reichstone. It met empty air.
The griffon blinked blue eyes behind thick goggles, then looked down at his stained white undershirt and rumpled slacks. His bare paws sank into the cloud. The two scouts stared at him like they had no idea who they were looking at.
The radio griffon didn’t finish his sentence. He just shook in place with a growing stain on the crotch of his pants. Grover looked to both of them and guessed what he was going to say.
“We just didn’t recognize him.”
Grover tossed the pistol to the coughing scout, leaned forward, and used a sharp talon to cut the strap of the binoculars free from his neck. The older griffon caught the pistol and nodded rapidly, trying to say, “Thank you, my Kaiser!” He wheezed instead.
“Help him up,” Grover ordered with a clack of his beak. He stared to the west and raised the binoculars to his goggles. His beak twisted underneath the lenses.
At this altitude, the Duskwood Forest stretched across the horizon. It burned in a mix of golden and blue fire. Even with the binoculars, it was difficult to see anything further beyond the tree line.
She might stop a counterassault, but taking the forest will be hell, Grover scoffed to himself. Hopefully, the magical fire will burn itself out by the time our air support and ground assault are ready. There was no flash on the horizon from spellfire. He was high up enough to see beyond the flaming tree line, and occasional bursts of smoke emerged from somewhere deeper in the center of the forest. Parts of the forest were burning further in, but nothing like the destruction against the plain.
Grover sighed as he remembered Bronzetail was pushing north. Ignatius can cut the Duskwood off to the south. Send the reserves through the Celestial Plain to follow Bronzetail, then swing north and cut the forest off. We can pin the northern advance against the shield wall and encircle the forest afterwards.
Grover spared a quick look north. It was a bright, sunny afternoon through all the smoke and drifting explosions. The sky was tinged pink from the distant shield. Grover thought about the history report he requested from Vedina, the northernmost peninsula on Griffonia and the first settlers of what became Nova Griffonia.
“The earliest runestones speak of a pink Aurora Borealis across the ocean, but also of other colors. It was a known presence, but not particularly important after several generations. Griffons were busy with griffon affairs. Only one runestone speaks of the glow fading, roughly dated to the Time of Contempt (Discord).
“The earliest settlements of the Nova peninsula reported the foundations of crystal structures in the frontier. Many of the structures were dismantled and the shards shipped back to the Reich for enchantment, greatly boosting the value of the colony. Archaeology has been discouraged since the reappearance of the Crystal Empire.”
“Well, you got your land back,” Grover said to himself.
“My Kaiser?” Sir Erreck asked, having landed on the cloud behind him and shouldering the assault rifle.
“The Princess is trying to stall a counterassault from the Duskwood,” Grover explained. “It is not a dragon,” he added wryly. “Go ahead and radio that,” he said to the younger griffon. “I do not want any panic at facing a dragon, nor any eager dragonslaying knights hunting for a challenge.”
The scout reported it dutifully, ignoring the stain across his pants. The other griffons also ignored it.
He watched for several more minutes before tossing the binoculars back. The older scout had recovered enough to catch them and scramble to look west again. He thumped his claw in a hasty salute, but Grover ignored it.
“Bronzetail will get his fuel,” the Kaiser planned aloud, “and reinforcements.” Grover flared his wings and walked to the edge of the small cloud. His talons pulled on a bit of the cumulus. The Kaiser and his two knights looked down to the east, towards the castle below.
The Princess can play at war with her spells and ragtag army. I have-
The sun rose in the west.
Just for a moment, no more than the time it took to blink. Grover still saw the flash, even though he was facing the opposite direction. The two scouts behind him inhaled to scream.
The wave of magical discharge hit before they could, riding the sound of the world’s largest soap bubble popping. It sounded nothing like it should have. To Grover, it sounded as if a balloon was popped next to both his ears.
The magic blasted through his extended feathers, unbalancing him for a second, then the wave continued past him across the eastern Equestria. Grover looked up to see crackles of blue magic extend to the eastern horizon, traveling as gusting wind. He flexed his claws on the cloud. Lingering arcs of blue electricity tingled along his talon tips.
Grover looked to his knights first. Sir Ewing and Sir Erreck’s enchanted armor sparked with blue electricity as the residual magic reacted against the spells woven into the steel. He registered the screaming from behind him and turned around, looking to the scouts.
The older griffon with the binoculars was clutching his eyes, binoculars long-forgotten and fallen off the cloud. He whimpered through his ruined throat and blinked wide, watery, dilated golden pupils between his talons as he screamed hoarsely. Blue sparks clung to his uniform.
The younger scout stared west, eyes wide and unfocused. His beak was open in a wail that continued into a dry squeak. The griffon seemed to forget how to breathe. The radio on his chest sparked with blue arcs. Grover followed the scout’s eyes west.
A massive cloud of ash stretched across the sky. It was vaguely in the shape of a dome, but that shape was breaking apart even as he watched. It was higher up than he was, reaching across the entire Equestrian Heartland. The ash would blot out the sun.
The sounds of the battle on the plain, the planes fighting above it, the anti-air and artillery fire from Canterlot, the distant rumbling of the trucks moving supplies forward through the Everfree, everything stopped. The gray cloud began to break apart and drift down, twisting in the winds. The world was quiet.
The Duskwood Forest was gone. Grover did not need the binoculars to see it. There was a massive crater shining like glass where it used to be. A few scattered and burning trees still stood against the Celestial Plain, but the crater now sat in the horizon, roughly in the center of the former forest. Nothing moved.
“Though Scheißwald wood be come to Griffing…” Grover quoted distantly. The ash began to settle across the world as it was frozen in silence.
“I can do this, and I will, even if it means my death.”
The Duskwood was the size of Griffenheim, Grover remembered suddenly. All of it, the palace, the industrial centers, the Reichsarmee barracks, the city, the temples…
“Any guess that does not say Princess Flurry Heart could lay waste to most of a continent is inaccurate.”
Sir Ewing stepped forward on the cloud, helmet in his claws. “Oh sweet Gods.”
Sir Erreck followed him, moving past Grover like he wasn’t even there. “She…she can’t…” he trailed off. “She must be dead.” His voice sounded pleading.
Grover stepped up to the western edge of the cloud beside the radio scout. His scream was a wheezing rattle now and his eyes bulged above his beak. The Kaiser remembered the alicorn with hidden leg braces stumbling awkwardly through the snow, and he remembered what she said to him several minutes before.
“I was preparing to fly to Griffenheim and burn it to the ground the night your bombers turned away.”
The planes fighting above the Duskwood drifted through the ash; they broke off together, trying to escape the cloud before their engines clogged. Some dropped low, Changeling and Reich flying side-by-side in a momentary truce. Some pilots abandoned their planes and leapt from the cockpits as the engines failed. Grover watched the dots fall from the sky underneath the ash.
“I look ridiculous, don’t I? Quite the joke.”
The world was silent. The crater glittered beneath twisting clouds of cinders.
“She must be dead,” Sir Erreck repeated with a relieved nod.
Grover did not know what to say in response to that.
A golden beam lanced into the sky from the center of the crater. It trailed wisps of blue electricity until it nearly reached the falling ash clouds, then exploded outward like a firework. Blue and gold sparkles fell down towards the earth.
The artillery fire resumed from the base of Mount Canterhorn. Flashes of spells and gunfire echoed from the eastern side, where the road winded up the mountainside. As Grover stood atop the cloud, it seemed to only intensify.
The echoing sound of trucks and planes resumed from around him. Grover clacked his beak and turned around. “Follow me,” he ordered over his wing to the knights. They stumbled backwards and twisted around to see their Kaiser, but Grover leapt off the eastern side of the cloud and drifted back towards the castle.
Grover landed on the Nightmare’s balcony several minutes later. No griffon challenged him or stopped him. The guards snapped to attention with extended wings and a salute, but the Kaiser walked past them without a glance. He stripped his goggles off with a claw as he walked on all fours.
Benito leaned over the low table. Papers and figures were scattered across it, knocked out of place. The Friendship Journal was half-way off the edge of the table; Grover bumped it back with a wing as he resumed his position. Benito opened his muzzle, but words failed him and he shuffled his paws to the side.
Grover reared up and braced his claws atop the old wood. He scanned the room. The dozen knights, six attendants, four dogs, and two unicorns were all staring out of the shattered balcony.
“You forgot to check if I was a changeling,” he said in Aquileian. The unicorn near the balcony flinched and her horn flickered. Grover felt the spell wash over his feathers, not even half of the wave that blasted across Equestria as an aftershock.
“We need to redirect the air force,” Grover said in Herzlander. He jabbed a talon at an attendant. “Get Ebonwing. Avoid the Celestial Plain. Shift everything to the south until the ash settles.”
The courier blinked and wandered out of the room. The knights and dogs slowly recovered and resumed their guard watch. Sir Erreck and Sir Ewing arrived back on the balcony, and the unicorn remembered to scan them.
“The radios still work?” Grover asked Benito.
The dog nodded shallowly.
“Good.” He jabbed a claw at another courier, then pointed at the two recently-arrived knights. “Get Bronzetail what he asked for. We redirect to the Celestial Plain and assist the push north. We can drive the army against the shield wall and shatter them.”
They moved a bit more quickly than the last courier.
Grover looked down at the fallen figures. “Have Countess Raison’s mages assist to the north. Run down the infiltrators. Have Ignatius push straight with Army Group South rather than try an encirclement.”
“My…” Benito blinked. “My Kaiser?”
“The Duskwood is gone,” Grover answered. “It’s unnecessary.”
Benito licked his jowls and his black nose scrunched around the whiskers. “I-I’m sorry, my Kaiser?”
“The Duskwood is gone,” Grover repeated calmly. He gathered the metal changelings that had fallen over in the forest. Out of all the figures atop the table, only the wooden alicorn remained upright, standing over the changelings around it. The muzzle wasn’t carved very well, but it seemed to have a smirk.
Grover tossed the figures under the table; they scattered across the stone floor. Deal with it later, he shrugged a wing to himself. “We need to go around the crater,” the Kaiser said. “It is too deep. When the rains come, it will surely become the Duskwood Lake.”
Not a single voice laughed at the joke. A small blue spark blew in from the balcony. Grover stopped to watch it settle atop the Reichstone. He brushed it off with a talon and put the crown atop his head, ignoring the strain in his neck.
“Right,” Benito nodded. “Just so!” he said, louder for the entire room. “We have a war to win! Move!” He pointed a paw at two couriers. “Relay it to Countess Raison! We need to move! The Heer will be scattered after that!”
After that. Grover’s blue eyes flicked down to the table. The smirking wooden alicorn stared up at him, even though no eyes had been carved into the muzzle. He looked up at the map of Equus and Griffonia on the wall above his knights.
The newspapers would print his headline. But there were dozens of photographers and film crews along the frontline, all to travel back east to the Reich with evidence of the cruelty of the Changelings and the Kaiser’s victory. Grover took a breath through his nostrils and his tail curled around a leg. The tuft whipped around the paw and tapped on the floor.
The largest coordinated naval invasion in history. The largest mechanized assault, the largest armored engagement, the first time the Kaiser has led his armies himself for two centuries…
He clenched his beak and looked down at the map.
She followed my plan. She went to Manehattan on my orders, to Baltimare, to the Everfree. She fought with my army.
Grover thought about the painting. Grover the Great’s gray, enchanted plate armor and his iron crown. He had reports about the Princess’ armor, but he hadn’t seen it for himself. The knights that had were unusually subdued, and described it only as ‘crystal’ and ‘heavy.’
Or my army fought with her.
The little wooden alicorn stared up at him.
Grover stared down at it, then flicked it over with a talon.
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Holy water cannot help you now...
A thousand armies couldn't keep me out...
I don't want your money.
I don't want your crown.
See, I have to burn your kingdom down...
Well well well you spoil us mister Error. Two chapters in one day.
Oh and also, flurry will walk out that crater like a badass or so help me.
I don't know why, but for some reason Grover feels like:
An actual HOI4 player.
A dork.
And type of person who people look at slightly strangely.
11545942
Grover better start using the "research all" command soon..
Epic fail.
11545951
Grover just needs to finish his army focus tree.
Flurry likes to Play Rough
Sometimes, she breaks her toys
Destruction: ∞
I think Grover at the end just felt his heart break. Because he doesn't know if she lives or is dead. And is afraid to find out which.
An explosion like that though makes me wonder if Discord noticed.
Is Flurry Heart dead? The suspense is going to kill me.
11546279
There's no way Jacques wouldn't have noticed, if we get hints correctly.
11546279
11546295
Flurry sent a flare up after the blast. She lived. Grover knows she's alive. He saw it.
Congrats Grover you got played. Thought you were playing chess while Flurry was playing with a rock. But now she’s smashed the board with said rock and in front of the entire world.
Be thankful she still needs your army and kinda likes you. Don’t forget your Anniversary Day buddy.
11546324
I assumed that was her flying out of the crater and teleporting, which felt odd given the magic exhaustion she was showing.
Grover should really send someone...
Have...have I read this somewhere before? It seems like I've read this part somewhere before? 🤔 Damn my cotton-filled brain.
...well look at the bright side Grover, no one with enough brain cells to think and breathe at the same time will mess with you once the marriage is officiated. And if they try, a before and after shot of the woods should be sufficient for most. The ones that don't accept it are simply letting natural selection take its course.
11546359
Eh, she's fine.
After all, she's an alicorn...
11546279
he probably felt it deep in his gut
Well,.....no.
Grover playing a game of HOI4,
Everyone being horrified by Flurry's sheer power,
Grover realizing he might end up being bottom in this relationship.
This good sir, was another great chapter.
She's far to stubborn to die
Grover has his answer already. The scouts' interaction showed him. Unless he wants his Empire to fall to political violence he'll have to step up his game. At least, so is my speculation.