As he was about to face off against Gnasty Gnorc, Spyro encountered a very young mysterious creature with wings. After Gnasty Gnorc’s defeat, the purple dragon is charged with being the young filly’s role model. This is their story.
Notice: The Death & Suicide/Self Harm warnings are for implications for the second to last chapter only; the rest of this story is very much E for everyone.
Tag Information: While there is/will be some romance included in certain parts of this fanfic, it is not a main focus. As such, only chapters marked with “(Romance)” in the title will include heavy romance moments.
Story Progress: Ripto’s Rage (Completed) Year of the Dragon (Completed) Fan-Made Spyro Adventure - Mystic Quest (Complete) Season of Ice (Complete) Season of Flame (Complete) Enter the Dragonfly (Complete) Attack of the Rhynocs (Complete) A Hero's Tale (Complete) Story Finale (Complete)
It had been quite the shock in more ways then one. Once the magic returned, the main six had returned to the school of friendship and were soon joined by Celestia, Luna, and Chancellor Neighsay. Yet, both groups had expected to come across Cozy Glow and get some answers. Instead, all that awaited them was the young six.
“Would some creature tell me where in Equestria Cozy Glow is? Did she escape?” Twilight asked.
“That’s just the thing Headmare Twilight: Once we stopped whatever ritual Cozy Glow used to drain the magic, she vanished into the rift that was being created.” Sandbar said.
“So…she’s in a separate dimension now? Just great.” Twilight said. “Discord, we need your assistance, stat!” She called out.
“Someone call for me?” Discord asked as he suddenly appeared.
“Cozy Glow got sucked into a different dimension. Think you could fetch her?” Twilight asked.
“Most certainly, just give me…wait hold up.” Discord said before suddenly some sort of portal appeared out of the ground. “I didn’t make that.” The Draconiquis said.
“Funny thing is, I believe him.” Rainbow Dash said. Suddenly out from the portal came not just a much different looking Cozy Glow but also some sort of purple quadrupedal dragon; the later simply gliding through it.
“I swear I’ll never get used to that.” Cozy Glow said. “Oh…hey every creature.” She added.
“…Uh…Yona not sure what but…something different about Pony…” Yona said.
“So…are we really here?” The purple dragon said. He noticed the stares. “What? Judging from what I’m seeing, you should recognize a Dragon when you see one.” He added.
“Hey bro, I think their staring because of the fact your a quadruped dragon and not a bipedal one.” Cozy Glow said.
“Guess that would be something, huh?” The dragon asked. There was also some kind of yellow dragonfly floating around the dragon.
“Okay, now I really need answers.” Twilight said.
“Can we pick this up in the morning then? I’m all sorts of beat.” Cozy Glow said. “You try dealing with near back-to-back bad guys in the span of a few years and see how you like it.” She added.
“We kind of already know what that’s like, dealing with something dangerous every week in Ponyville.” Rainbow Dash mentioned.
“I’m talking facing stuff that is on the same level as Nightmare Moon, Discord, Lord Tirek, King Sombra, and Queen Chrysalis with only a week or two between each baddie. And that’s just the average.” Cozy Glow said.
Twilight’s eyes went wide. “That…sounds painful.” The purple Alicorn mentioned.
“Boy…you want answers, I got answers. I just got one…small question.” Cozy Glow said. “…Why is everyone looking like I did something bad?” She asked. “Kind of…don’t remember much of what I did here before I landed on Spyro here.” The Pegasus filly said, before parking herself of the purple dragon.
“Cozy Glow, you know your getting too big for that…” Spyro said.
“Can’t help it; your the best brother I think I’ve ever had.” Cozy Glow said.
“…This is going to be interesting…” Celestia stated simply.
The next day, at breakfast time, while Cozy Glow was given some regular food, Spyro was given a plate of gems and he just picked them up.
“Uh…where’s my breakfast?” Spyro asked.
“I thought all dragons could eat gems.” Spike said. Cozy Glow and Spyro suddenly burst out in laughter. “Did I say something funny?” Spike asked.
“Sorry, it’s just that…Spyro’s dragon-kin…they don’t eat gems; they hoard them as their treasure. Every dragon has their own Treasure Hoard though for some reason, whenever the bad guys came specifically to our doorstep, which happened I think happened three times over, they stole some of the treasures from many dragon hoards.” Cozy Glow said.
“Make that four, Cozy Glow. Your forgetting one time that happened again.” Spyro said.
“Oh right. Can you blame me for forgetting about Ripto’s second venture in our specific Dragon Lands? It wasn’t even a few weeks since his first attempt.” Cozy Glow said.
“Whose this Ripto your talking about?” Twilight asked.
“A bad guy we had to deal with five times over.” Cozy Glow said. “Though the first time was when I started helping bro out.”
“So…what happened to you, really?” Smolder asked.
“Well, from my earliest memory not about this world…” Cozy Glow said.
Spyro had finally managed to unlock the door to Gnasty Gnorc’s lair before suddenly a mysteriously pink being landed right in front of him on the stone ground from the sky; surprisingly without a scratch on her.
“Whoa…that’s not something Gnasty Gnorc did.” Spyro said. “You okay?” He asked.
“Wh-whewe am I?” The mysterious creature said; she looked just over two years old, just barely out of infancy.
“Your in the Junkyard, though right now your in a safe place away from the reaches of Gnasty Gnorc.” Spyro said.
“Gnasty Gnowc? Who that?” Cozy Glow asked. “He don’t sound vewy nice at all.” She added.
“He’s not. You stay out here where you’ll be safe. I’ll come back after I deal with him.” Spyro said and went to fight Gnasty Gnorc.
“…Dragon brave.” Cozy Glow said.
“Afterwards he beat Gnasty Gnorc, Spyro took me to the elders, where I was made into his adoptive sister. While I seemed to know a few names that I knew were other bad people, I…couldn’t remember anything else besides my own name. I don’t remember anything besides the bag guys of this world and my name.” Cozy Glow said.
“…You think she lost her memory sister?” Luna asked.
“I believe she has. She remembers nothing of this world besides the names associated with being evil.” Celestia said.
“I’m not a bad guy though. I’m a good pegasus. After all, I took down Ripto four times over and that’s just one of the bad guys I faced. I even got to meet Gnasty Gnorc later on but that’s later. I was about to begin when me and Spyro got sent to Avalar.” Cozy Glow said.
“Avalar? What’s that got to do with anything?” Spike asked.
“It’s where Cozy Glow and I had our first encounter with Ripto himself.” Spyro noted.
“Okay now you have my attention.” Rainbow Dash said.
After Spyro had a more proper meal, all those present were waiting on more story.
“So after a few weeks of learning about the dragon realms, as me, Spyro, and Sparx were out playing in the Artisan’s Homeworld, it started to rain.” Cozy Glow said.
“Whose Sparx?” Rainbow Dash asked. The nearby Dragonfly buzzed and the cyan Pegasus. “…Fluttershy, a little help here?” Rainbow Dask asked.
“I-I’m afraid I couldn’t understand a thing. How bizarre.” Fluttershy said
“Sparx said ‘That would be me’.” Cozy Glow said. “I…had to learn a lot about Dragonflies to understand him.” She added.
“Guess they must be different in Spyro’s world.” Fluttershy said.
“I believe my homeworld’s dragonflies don’t talk like the ones from Spyro’s world.” Cozy Glow said. “But that’s something to touch upon later.” She added. "But for now, I think it's best to start with the beginnings of my Avalar adventure. As stated before, it had suddenly started to rain as me and my brother played." She added.
"Are you alright, Cozy Glow?" Spyro asked his adoptive sister as he, Sparx, and the baby pegasus filly. "The rain came out of nowhere." He added.
"Twanks to you bwothew, I'm more then dwy." Cozy Glow said with a smile.
"We should try one of the portals to go somewhere nice and sunny for a while." Spyro said. Sparx buzzed and pointed out a portal to Dragon Shores. "Dragon Shores, good eye Sparx! Let's head there." The purple dragon said before heading into the portal with Cozy Glow still on his back and Sparx following close behind.
"Back up a minute." Rainbow Dash interuped. "How did you end up in Avalar if you were going to Dragon Shores?" She asked.
"Well about that..." Cozy Glow started back up the story.
Though the trio had used the portal to go to Dragon Shores, the portal somehow spat them out somewhere that was most certainly NOT Dragon Shores, next to a mole, a cheetah, and a mysterious other creature.
"Hey, which way is the beach?" Spyro asked, but noticed the strange looks. "What? Have you guys never seen a Dragon before?" He asked.
"Bwo is dwagon; why we not on beach?" Cozy Glow asked.
"Oh my god what is that on your back?" The cheetah asked before suddenly the entire group got blasted.
"Well well well, why didn't you invite me to the party?" A male voice rang out. Cozy glow spotted a mysterious trio of creatures: One bipidal creature holding a club, one quadroped creature that had some kind of device attached to it, and one small creature holding a sceptor. "Are you trying to hide something from me?" The small creature asked after smelling around and then noticed Spyro.
"Hey meanie, did you twy to blow us up?" Cozy Glow asked before getting onto Spyro's back.
"A DRAGON?! YOU BROUGHT A DRAGON TO AVALAR?!" The small creature exclaimed.
"What's wwong with Spywo being a Dwagon?" Cozy Glow asked.
That...is just too cute... The mysterious friendly creature that got hit by the blast thought before suddenly a fairy took the sceptor.
"Crush, get my sceptor!" The smaller creature said to the club wielding creature who tried to hit the fairy. When Crush failed, the four legged creature chomped on the sceptor before swallowing it on instinct. "GULP YOU IMPICILE, YOU SWOLLOWED MY SCEPTOR!" The smaller creature yelled. "I'll deal with you later." He added before riding away on Gulp with Crush following close behind.
"Who was that mean guy?" Spyro asked.
"That was Ripto, and he's been causing all kinds of problems here in Avalar. But there will be time for all that later." The mysterious friendly creature said before handing over some kind of book. "Here, take this guidebook, it'll help you navigate our world." The creature said before she, the mole, and the cheetah ran off.
"Mean shorty guy almost huwt me..." Cozy Glow said.
"Don't worry Cozy Glow, I'm not about to let that jerk Ripto get away with that." Spyro said before heading off through Glimmer.
"While we were in Glimmer, we managed to meet this bear named Moneybags who became quite the thorn in our side as he forced Spyro to pay gems for lots of things over the course of our adventures." Cozy Glow said. "But that's not really something that we should focus on right now. Moneybags has already gotten comeuppance several times over as it is." She added.
"Sounds like something we'll hear about later." Rainbow Dash said.
"Yeah something like that. So we manged our way through Glimmer, got the first of the tailsmans of Avalar, and managed to get to Summer Forest where Elora properly introduced herself to us. She identified herself as a Faun which none of the dragons knew about before. Officially making Spyro the first dragon to come across one." Cozy Glow said.
"I gotta know though: How tall was Ripto?" Smolder asked.
"I'd say he is more or less around Spike's height." Cozy Glow said.
"Wait he's not that much bigger than I am? How in the wide wide world of everything did he somehow manage to come back FIVE TIMES in that case?" Spike asked.
"Hey, I'm wondering that myself." Rainbow Dash said.
"Oh we thought was dead for good after the two times it seemed like he died during this adventure; and I'll get to those later; but both times he somehow managed to escape death both times. And I highly doubt we've seen the last of him even after the fifth time." Cozy Glow stated.
"Yikes...the little guy seems very persistent I'll give him that much." Rainbow Dash said.
"Again, that's information for later." Cozy Glow said.
"Can we break? I need to check the school for the cutie mark crusaders." Rainbow Dash said and then went off to the school.
"...I bet she's going to tell them about Cozy Glow's little...amnesia thing while she's at it." Rairty said.
"Should we consider her amnesia a good thing or a bad thing, Princess Celestia?" Twilight asked.
"Well...that depends. On one hoof, she obviously did some terrible things such as trying to drain all of the magic out of Equestria, but on the other hoof..." Celestia said as she looked over to Cozy Glow.
"Cutie Mark Crusaders...they sound nice." Cozy Glow said. Twilight just noticed that Cozy Glow's Cutie Mark had changed and was now apparently a Dragon Egg. At least it looked like a Dragon Egg.
"...An argument could be made that the pony with who we are talking about is a much different pony then the one who left this world." Celestia noted.
"Her cutie Mark." Twilight noted.
"What about it?" Celestia said.
"Twilight's right, Cozy Glow's Cutie Mark is different: It's now some form of Dragon Egg; maybe like the ones from Spyro's World." Starlight said. "But I've never heard of a Pony's cutie mark changing like this before..." She added.
"Her cutie mark was tied to her special talent, so I'm guessing that because she lost all memory of who she was before, her original cutie mark vanished, and a new cutie mark took it's place later." Chancellor Neighsay said.
"That would make a lot of sense actually. This is our first time dealing with a Pony whose lost all semblence of memory of their former self, been age regressed, and then had to have worked their way back to where they were before." Twilight said.
"That's just freaky...I know I detested cutiemarks, but one cannot just make them disappear." Starlight said.
"Like Chancellor Nieghsay theorizes, the vanishing of her old mark must be due to her amnesia; I have no doubts that if and when she gets her memory back her old cutie mark will show up somehow." Twilight said.
"...Question: Is it right for me to suddenly worry when Cozy Glow's memory returns?" Starlight asked.
"So, what was Ripto doing around Avalar anyways?" Applejack asked.
"Put simply? Turning the locals on one another using some context clues he managed to pick up. We didn't even realize what had happened either until it was a little too late. For being such a small guy, he knew what made people tick." Cozy Glow said.
"...And you're sure you don't remember anything from before you ended up in Spyro's world?" Starlight asked.
"Not a thing." Cozy Glow agreed. "Didn't even remember Nightmare Moon, Discord, King Sombra, and now Ex-Queen Chrysalis until after well...I'll mention how I remembered them later." She added.
"So you mean you don't remember what you did over here?" Twilight asked.
"Nope." Cozy Glow said simply as she drank some Apple Juice provided by Applejack.
"Ah really can't tell if this is deliberate, or if she's telling the truth." Applejack mentioned. Rainbow Dash returned with the CMC who she had informed of things.
"I'm not sure if I believe this, amnesia thing." Scootaloo said.
"Wow, another pegasus." Cozy Glow said and went over to Scootaloo said. "Come on, let's go outside." She added before dragging Scootaloo outside.
"Well, she's going to be busy for a bit, so I guess I'll continue for her." Spyro said.
"Wow bwother, this place is sweet looking." Cozy Glow said in awe.
"Yes it is. But we need to focus." Spyro said. "Looks like Moneybags is here as well. Let's ignore him for now. Let's see...Idol Springs and Colossus. Let's head to Colossus first." He added before entering said portal.
As Spyro began detailing how in Colossus they needed to stop a big yeti, Cozy Glow was outside with Scootaloo.
"Wait you really cannot fly?" Cozy Glow asked.
"Nope. I've tried and tried and tried." Scootaloo said.
"Bet you haven't tried a method I was taught about." Cozy Glow said. "So work with me, this is how I learnt to fly. First, close your eyes, make sure their nice and tight." She added.
"O-okay..." Scootaloo said before closing her eyes.
"Now, imagine yourself flapping your wings in a steady rhythm at first. Up , pause, down. Up, pause, down. Gently and slowly. Up, pause, down. Up, pause, down." Cozy Glow guided. Scootaloo's mind started to imagine that, not realizing her wings were following this same rhythm. "Now, a bit faster, but not too fast now. Your wings gently getting you up into the air." Cozy Glow said, with Scootaloo's wings easily carrying the orange pegasus into the air. "Keep that rhythm, don't stop it now. Now, as you continue that rhythm in your mind, slowly open your eyes." Cozy Glow said.
Scootaloo opened her eyes very slowly and noticed, she was flying. "Wh-what the..." She said, but remained calm.
"It's a method someone taught me. Relaxing your mind in order to fly, that's how I was taught." Cozy Glow said.
"Who...who taught you this method?" Scootaloo asked.
"A potential future sister in-law I encountered." Cozy Glow said. "Now, follow along closely and I'll help you control this." Cozy Glow said.
Back inside, Spyro was finishing up how in Idol Springs, he and Cozy Glow had to deal with tikis that had come to life.
"So wait...am I still wondering what a Tiki is?" Twilight asked.
"Only you Twi; only you." Rainbow Dash said. Suddenly Cozy Glow and Scootaloo flew into the castle. "...Scootaloo, your flying!" Rainbow Dash said.
"I figured as much. You taught Scootaloo the same way you were taught, didn't you sis?" Spyro asked.
"Yep. You bet I did." Cozy Glow said with a smile; a genuine smile. Even Applejack could see the genuineness behind this smile.
"So I'm guessing Spyro knows about Cozy Glow's potential sister in-law then?" Scootaloo asked. Then Spyro flinched.
"COZY GLOW, AGAIN? SERIOUSLY?" Spyro asked.
"It's fun to tease you so much brother. Besides, I know you like her~" Cozy Glow teased.
"That's...not really for this discussion right now." Spyro said. "Not that I can blame you...I'm still just young after all." He added.
"Considering how alike you and she are, I'm surprised you two haven't found a realm besides Dragon Shores you can both go to for time away from everything." Cozy Glow said.
"That is an extremely good point. You think I should ask Malafor for help with that?" Spyro asked.
"Well he is the father of that Dragon girl you've gotten real close to, so..." Cozy Glow said.
"Who are you talking about?" Spike asked.
"Someone that comes into play later in our tale." Spyro said. "And that's all I'm saying for now." He added quickly.
"Gee, Cozy Glow's adoptive brother must really like to avoid talking about his girlfriend." Apple Bloom said.
"Reminds me of a certain Princess of Friendship. How long are you going to friendzone Flash Sentry anyways?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Yeah about that..." Twilight said, smirking before taking out a wing band ring and putting it on one of hers.
"Wait...isn't that a--" Rainbow Dash said eyes going wide.
"I figured you'd recognize it Rainbow Dash. Considering your the resident expert on Pegasus romance habits." Twilight said.
"...What's she talking about, RD?" Applejack asked.
"AJ, that's an engagement wing ring; Pegasi gift them to the ones they want to marry. Mainly it's the stallion and not the mare who gifts them." Rainbow Dash said.
"No wonder my Pinkie Sense has been going off like crazy whenever I'm around Twilight!" Pinkie Pie said.
"It's just...I wanted things with the friendship school to be under control before I announced our engagement." Twilight said.
"It's alright Twilight. We understand." Fluttershy said.
"Should...we wake up the white one?" Spyro asked.
"Her name is Rarity." Sweetie Belle said.
"I'm going to have to memorize a lot of names aren't I?" Spyro asked.
"Eeyep." Apple Bloom said. "Better start now while Rarity recovers from fainting at the thought of Twilight Sparkle getting married." She added.
"Well at least now I'll be able to attend a wedding now that I'm back. Equestria here seems really easily accessible through portals." Cozy Glow said. "Huh...I wonder if she will show up at some point?" She added.
Eventually Rarity recovered after Spyro learnt everypony's name.
"So, where were you brother?" Cozy Glow asked.
"Just finished up with Idol Springs." Spyro said.
"Ah yes. So then as you heard then, Spyro and me learnt how to swim thanks to Moneybags. Though I still don't agree with having to pay him so many gems." Cozy Glow said.
"But you said he was going to get his comeuppance several times, right?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Oh yes. Just not right away. Regardless, thanks to Spyro's Dragon magic, we didn't need to worry about needing to hold our breath underwater." Cozy Glow said.
"Dragon magic? Dragons here don't come with magic." Spike said.
"You probably don't realize that you do, because I can sense some in you and the orange dragoness here." Cozy Glow said.
"How can you even tell?" Smolder asked.
"Something I picked up from being around my brother." Cozy Glow said.
"But of course." Rainbow Dash said. Sparx buzzed some things.
"Sparx says that you're distracting Spyro." Cozy Glow said.
"So next up was Hurricos and the Gear Grinders being delt with. This officially was the first level where Ripto had secretly given the Gear Grinders an ace up their sleeves in the form of them removing diodes which powered electric gates." Spyro said.
"After that though, Spyro and I went to a different sort of level that I would later grow to hate: A speedway level. Because I hadn't learnt how to fly yet, I was forced to sit in an audience portion of the level. Looking back on it now, I wish I had never expressed interest in helping my brother with those Speedway levels because watching them and doing them are two totally different things. And I would later grow to HATE speedway levels." Cozy Glow said.
"I always had fun with them, but Cozy Glow...well as you can plainly hear, she didn't have fun with them. At all." Spyro said.
"Spyro loves Speedway levels as does Sparx. But I don't understand how they can enjoy something I most certainly HATE with a burning passion. I swear, if I EVER see another Speedway level, I am going to basically nope out of helping my brother with them." Cozy Glow said.
"Considering the last time we dealt with Speedway levels you injured your wing in one of them, I don't blame you. It's why I won't let you help me with them anymore. The last one you helped with you injured your wing. I refuse to let you do that to yourself again." Spyro noted. "Though I doubt we'll ever encounter another one of those levels." He added.
"I hope we don't. Just like you won't let me help you in another speedway level, I never want to see you do another speedway level for as long as we both live." Cozy Glow said.
"Well golly gee willikers, that sounds rough." Applejack said. Suddenly Cozy Glow got a headache which Spyro soon conforted her on.
"It's okay sis, the 'golly' voices can't get to you anymore." Spyro said.
"...What's that about?" Applejack asked.
"After the Avalar adventure, Cozy Glow had nightmares about a bunch of demonic voices repeating the word 'golly' at her." Spyro said. "Since then, she gets a headache everytime someone says 'golly' around her." He said.
"But that's what she said all the time back here." Apple Bloom said.
"I...I don't want to ever say that word again then. It's...it's too much..." Cozy Glow said.
Poor Cozy Glow...now more than ever I have to find her birth parents. Twilight thought to herself.
"Cozy Glow, let's take your mind off things by talking about your two favorite locations from Avalar: Sunny beach and Aquaria Towers." Spyro said.
"Th-that'll help. Thanks brother, you're the best ever. I'm so glad the dragon elder who adopted you adopted me as your sister." Cozy Glow said. "And that's after I remembered well...you know. But that's not for here." She added.
"Indeed. So, me and Cozy Glow soon came across Sunny Beach, one of Cozy Glow's personal favorite areas of Avalar." Spyro said.
"It's mainly because of the baby turtles. So cute." Cozy Glow said before taking out a picture of baby her, Spyro, and some strange baby turtle-like creatures. "We even got to have a picture with them. See, aren't they just adorable~" Cozy Glow said.
"So cute~" Fluttershy coo'ed at the photo of baby Cozy Glow and the baby turtles with Spyro.
"...For...once...I can't help it...I agree with Fluttershy: SO GOSH DARN CUTE! LIKE AWESOMELY SO!" Rainbow Dash said.
"Dang...if even Rainbow Dash says it..." Scootaloo said.
"But probably even better was Aquaria Towers. Once we cleared the place out of Waterworkers; who had taken over both places; we managed to flood Aquaria Towers to the top. And thus the entire level for the most part was underwater. Like I said, thanks to Spyro's Dragon magic, neither me or Spyro had to worry about drowning." Cozy Glow said. "It was an early taste of what it was like to fly." She added.
"I guess in a sense it would feel that way. Especially if you didn't have to worry about drowning." Rainbow Dash noted.
"It was so amazing too! Too bad it took me until my third adventure with my brother and our second run-in with Ripto and his goons to learn how to fly." Cozy Glow said.
"Too true. But hey, at least next we were to face off against Crush, one of Ripto's goons." Spyro said.
"Finally some fighting. I can't wait to hear what amazing stunts you did to beat some of the big bads you two fought." Rainbow Dash said.
"Actually Crush was a disappointment. All my brother had to do was dodge Crush's attacks and flame him several times to win. It was rather disappointing." Cozy Glow said.
"Wait seriously? Darn I got all excited for nothing." Rainbow Dash said.
"Let's be fair Rainbow, aren't most first bosses in video games the easiest thing ever?" Scootaloo asked.
"When we got to Autumn plains, Ripto had already taken over that area's castle. As we explored the surrounding area, we encountered Moneybags again who made us pay for Spyro to learn how to climb. I am still unable to climb with him, but early on, I managed to get by by hitching a ride. Now though well..." Cozy Glow said before taking to the air to showcase what she meant. "Yeah, no need to piggyback on my brother when I can fly." The pink pegasus added.
"Which was a relief because at that point, you were starting to admittedly get a little too heavy for me." Spyro said.
"I get it's because I'm a pony who matures differently than your dragonkind does. Still, the piggyback rides on my brother were fun while they lasted." Cozy Glow said.
"After I had learnt how to climb, we backtracked to Summer Forest and cleaned up that hub world as well as Glimmer and Sunny Beach." Spyro noted.
"The later of which was nice because that meant getting to see the baby turtles again~" Cozy Glow said.
"It's getting close to lunch time right about now." Twilight noted. "This seems like the best time to be taking a break." She added.
During the break, Smolder approuched Spike.
"So, you really sure about telling Twilight about...you know. What you've decided on." Smolder asked Spike.
"Yeah. I can't help it though. You've managed to show a lot of care ever since I got my wings." Spike said, flapping his dragon wings.
"Heh...you may be a bit soft, but as you grow older, there's going to be some things your not used to. And I want to make sure you can deal with it." Smolder said. "Plus, I'll help you become a bit more of a dragon where we're going." She added.
"That's also true. Your such a great friend Smolder." Spike said. "It's going to probably break Rarity's heart though." He added.
"If you ask me, you wouldn't be doing anything in regard to her. Sure, you gave her that fire ruby, but obviously she hasn't returned your feelings. And that can cause some long-term effects on your body if you can't move on from it. Which I've helped you sort things out in regards to that." Smolder said.
"Hey Smolder?" Spike asked.
"Yeah?" Smolder asked.
"Thanks for being hearing me out on that. I never really thanked you for helping with that." Spike said.
"No need to thank me. I'm just glad you finally realize your crush on Rarity was nothing more than just that: An early childhood crush. You're a growing dragon, Spike; you need someone to love who can love you back. And now you realize that isn't going to be Rarity." Smolder said.
"Way too true. I know we're just friends right now Smolder, but...maybe..." Spike said. "Just saying, we might become closer. Who knows?" He asked.
"Well took you long enough to suggest that we see about going further. And here I thought you weren't gonna take that chance." Smolder said.
"Well I just...wait you were thinking the same thing?" Spike asked.
"In dragon culture, it's the males who are supposed to take charge. We need to work on that for you, but this is a good start." Smolder said.
Oh geez, what am I getting myself into now? Spike thought to himself.
After lunch, Spyro and Cozy Glow began to continue.
"So, after the backtracking, Spyro decided to tackle the Speedways first of which there were two in a row this time around, though for one of them, Spyro had to pay Moneybags to enter it in addition to activating two proper levels." Cozy Glow mentioned.
"Wait seriously? I think I'm beginning to hate Moneybags." Rainbow Dash said.
"I agree with Rainbow Dash with this one: This bear is obviously a very greedy soul." Rarity said.
"Like I've mentioned already: Moneybags is going to get his comeuppance for stonewalling our progress so much later, just not right now. Regardless, after the Speedway levels, we went to Skelos Badlands where we dealt with a few more enemies as we went through the badlands because of some bet one local made with another." Cozy Glow said.
"Sounds like Avalar already had problems before Ripto showed up." Twilight noted.
"Oh there were already several problems before Ripto showed up; Ripto only made things worse in a few instances such as esculating the war between the Breezebuilders and the Landlubbers by suppling the former with a giant airship while also tipping the Landlubbers off on how to disable it. We did at least find a Landlubber and a Breezebuilder who were kind of this classic star-crossed lover thing." Cozy Glow said.
"Like Romeo and Juliet?" Sweetie Belle asked.
"Funny, I didn't think anyone from my world knew their names..." Cozy Glow said.
"Wait seirously? The landlubber was named Romeo and the Breezebuilder was named Juliet?" Twilight asked.
"Yep." Cozy Glow said.
"...Twilight.mlp will stop working now..." Twilight said before fainting.
"...Well that just happened..." Cozy Glow said. "For your information, the whole thing with the Breezebuilders and Landlubbers happened in the locations of Breeze Harbor and Zepher." She added.
Twilight got up after a bit. "Sorry about that, the whole thing with Romeo and Juliet actually got to me." She added.
"Did you mention that on purpose?" Applejack asked.
"What do you mean? I didn't expect Princess Twilight over there to faint on me after mentioning Romeo and Juliet." Cozy Glow said.
"So then...you don't know about the tragedy story that is Romeo and Juliet, one of Shakehoof's famous plays?" Apple Bloom said.
"There's a play about Romeo and Juliet in this universe? Though the tragedy thing makes me believe that unlike with our two friends from Zepher and Breeze Harbor, they didn't live happily ever after." Cozy Glow said.
"Yeah sadly no." Twilight noted.
"Well we actually went to Breeze Harbor and Zepher after an all ice location known as Crystal Glacier. It was there we had to help the locals free their leader from a bunch of Ice Wizards because according to the locals, their leader had tickets to a hocky game in Colossus." Cozy Glow said.
"Wasn't that all the way back in Summer Forest?" Fluttershy asked.
"The portal to it was yes, but I couldn't tell you on a map where each location was period even the ones from Spyro's world." Cozy Glow mentioned. "Regardless, after rescuing the leader he admitted that he sold the tickets for one of the tailsmans though in the middle of the level we had to bribe moneybags to build a bridge." She added.
"Seriously again with the bribes?" Rainbow Dash said.
"Yep. In Breeze Harbor, we actually had to fix the ship Ripto had given the Breezebuilders while in Zepher we had to blow up the Breezebuilder's ammunition shed. But after those two levels, we arrived in Scorch where we encountered the twins Handel and Greta where we helped them out with taking over an area of soldiers." Cozy Glow said. "...But for some reason, whenever I was near them, I got the strangest feeling..." She added.
"Gee, I wonder why?" Rainbow Dash said sarcastically.
"Cozy Glow's not the only one who was put off by them. Those two little kids were capable of defending themselves." Spyro mentioned.
"...And now I take back my sarcastic remark." Rainbow Dash said.
"Yeah they were wierd. After that we headed for Fracture Hills where we encountered enemies Spyro couldn't beat on his own, and Hunter was in that level; he advised us to come back later when Spyro learned how to headbutt things. So we quickly save the Stayrs from being in stone prisons and got the talisman. As we exited, we also heard from one of the Satyrs that Shady Oasis also needed headbutt for something. So we went and got the tailsman from there which required us to basically play escort for a hippo who could eat fruit to become giant sized for a time." Cozy Glow said.
"You've seen a lot around your adventures with Spyro, huh?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Yes, we did see a bunch of stuff." Spyro said. "After the Shady Oasis, we went to Magma Cone for the last Tailsman. Now there, the locals believed that the Earthshapers had oncorked the volcano but really it turns out that Cozy Glow figured out that Ripto had Gulp open up the volcano lid instead. We managed to close the volcano lid however." He added.
"Gulp huh? With how much of a disappointment Crush was, I'm not expecting much." Rainbow Dash said.
"Actually, Spyro's flame couldn't harm Gulp so Hunter had to drop in things for Spyro to use against Gulp. That included things like metal barrels, rockets, and other similar items. Spyro had to use that stuff in order to beat Gulp as we couldn't hurt Gulp the same way we could hurt Crush. It was because of Gulps special armor that provided him immunity to Spyro's normal firebreath. While I'm willing to bet we could've used a super flame power to defeat gulp there wasn't a nearby power-up gate for that. And gulps size made it impossible to charge into the big green dude." Cozy Glow said.
"Why couldn't Spyro charge into Gulp? Spyro said that he had to charge into enemies wearing flame-proof metal armor." Rainbow Dash said.
"Gulp was way too big to charge for Spyro. Maybe when Spyro gets older and much bigger he could defeat Gulp easily. But it's just way too early for that." Cozy Glow said.
"Yeah admittedly Dragons live for a long time." Spike admitted.
"Oh my, it's close to supper time." Twilight said.
"Well once we defeated Gulp, a resulting in him loosing all of his armor and fleeing the scene, his stomping caused Ripto's throne in the castle to knock over, sending Ripto to what appeared to be his death. But we found out shortly that Ripto somehow managed to survive, tricked Moneybags into selling the tyrant some bombs, and then proceeded to steal a crystal that we needed to get back home. Also in the new area we met up with Money Bags again, and this time he wanted us to pay so Spyro could learn how to headbutt things. It wasn't cheap in the slightest." Cozy Glow explained.
"I really hope Karma catches up with Moneybags for all this at some point in his life; whatever comeuppance he's going to get won't be enough." Rarity said.
"You say that now...but anyway with the ability to headbutt, we backtracked and cleaned up both Shady Oasis and Fracture hills. And now it was onto the final area to clean up those last few locations before taking care of Ripto once and for all. Though first I did take care of a Speedway challenge again." Spyro said.
"Really grew to start hating those later." Cozy Glow mentioned. "But this is a good time to stop for eats." She added.
During the break, Rarity was looking at the Fire Ruby Spike gave her all that time ago and then at a photo of the dragon after his wings came in. "Where has the time gone? But...I've long since squandered my chances." She said to herself. "But now...I think it's time to let him know....that I should've returned his feelings long ago." The white unicorn said.
Soon the break was over and it was time for the final levels in Avalar. "I gotta know, why'd you bother with those last few levels in the Winter Tundra?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"We wanted to cut down on the legwork it was going to take to fix Avalar and of the areas we encountered. Every bit helped. Plus, we were finding orbs in the process, and considering what happened with Ripto, it was nice to have the extra fire power help from the professor." Cozy Glow said. "But I'll talk about that more later. First and foremost after Spyro cleared out the Speedway, we then went to Mystic Marsh where their fountain had ended up stopping causing the animals there to go crazy. However, turns out the one in charge of the fountain had simply fallen asleep." Cozy Glow stated.
"Your kiddin' me, right?" Applejack asked.
"Ah don't think she's kiddin'." Apple Bloom said.
"After Mystic Marsh, we arrived into Cloud Temples where we had to take care of some evil Warlocks who had stollen the wands off of several wizards. Once we took care of that area, next up was Robotic Farms, a mysterious farm run by robots that dealt with robotic insects." Cozy Glow said.
"Normal insects seem annoying enough as it is; I doubt the robotic versions weren't that plesent to deal with either." Scootaloo said.
"They weren't. Once we managed to turn on the Robotic Bug zapper and save Robotic Farms, we then headed towards the final area of Avalar Metropolis which was being invaded by space farm animals." Cozy Glow stated.
"Space farm animals? Were they any different then cows, pigs, or other similar animals?" Fluttershy said.
"Let me just stop what your thinking: Whenever we encountered enemy animals of any type, they were always working for whoever the bad guy happened to be at the time after this whole adventure. Just letting you know that upfront. And it was no different here either." Cozy Glow stated.
"Oh...that's not very good to know." Fluttershy said.
"I swear if I see a cow with a space helmet on again, I will feel like going crazy as all get out." Cozy Glow said.
"I don't blame you sis. So, once we were done in Matropolis, it was finally time to take on Ripto." Spyro said.
"Considering how small you said he was, even if he was flame proof somehow, Spyro could just charge into him." Rainbow Dash said.
"Actually, because Ripto is also an expert in spell casting, whenever we faced off against him except for the one time, he made himself both flameproof and unable to be damaged by charging into him." Cozy Glow said.
"...I take it back, for being such a short dude, he had a brain on him." Rainbow Dash said.
"Luckily for us, the Professor had modified the orbs we helped gather to give me not just a more powerful firebreath attack that Ripto's magic couldn't protect him from, but also the ability to spit out green rocks infinatly for a short time, as well as the ability to do a supercharge attack for a limited time. None of these powers Ripto could use magic to bounce off of him because the orbs were using magic itself." Spyro said.
"I had to sit out though and watched the battle unfold with Elora. After a certain amount of hits, Ripto used his magic to create a robotic version of Gulp and continue the fight that way. Spyro had to fight the robot Gulp and Ripto combo the same way as with Ripto by himself with the powered up orbs. When the robotic gulp fell, Ripto used one of the orbs to create a robotic paradytal and took to the skies. My brother used another orb to gain the powers of Superfly and Superflame at the same time in order to continue the fight as the platform they were previously fighting on sank into the lava. Eventually, Spyro took out the robotic paradytal, which sent Ripto flying into the lava. Of course though, that was not the last we saw of Ripto, he came back later on." Cozy Glow said.
"Once we were finished with Ripto, we did take some time off at Dragon Shores for a bit. Once we took a few days off at the carnival there, it was time to go back home. Though, it seemed that something happened with Cozy Glow when I defeated Ripto. Seemingly, part of the magic of the Super Crystal the professor created and that Ripto stole rubbed off on Cozy Glow, which made her remember a few things about her original world." Spyro said.
"That's when I remembered the stuff like Discord, Nightmare Moon, Queen Chrysalis, and King Sombra. But it wasn't just the evil people I remembered. I also remembered where I was living in this world before the School of Friendship." Cozy Glow said.
"Then don't keep us waiting, I really do want to find your Parents Cozy Glow." Twilight said.
"That's...nice of you to offer, Princess Twilight but...I'm afraid...you won't find anyone alive..." Cozy Glow said.
"Huh?" Twilight asked.
"Cozy Glow was only two months old, when a monster killed both her birth parents." Spyro said, putting a claw on Cozy Glow.
"It's why the one who adopted Spyro adopted me once we got back. Because I simply didn't have any family here back in my original home." Cozy Glow said. Twilight's hooves were over her mouth.
"That was nice of Spyro's adoptive father to take you in." Fluttershy said.
So...the entire time...we were dealing with an orphan. Twilight thought to herself. As princess, I must protect her. Regardless of what she's done, she's obviously not that sort of pony anymore, and I'd rather get banished from Equestria then let Princess Celestia imprison an orphan. She added to her thoughts.
Twilight was still up as everyone else headed for bed. She had requested a talk with Celestia to take place in the library.
"Quite the symbolic place for you, isn't it, Twilight?" Celestia asked.
"Princess Celestia, you know I hold you in high regard, but...after what Cozy Glow said there...I want to know what's going to happen to her." Twilight said.
"I suppose that depends on the courts and what they think. But, I wouldn't hold my breath on her getting a happy ending." Celestia said.
"You can't send an orphan to court especially someone as young as her." Twilight said.
"You forget that she almost drained all the magic out of equestria. Because of such a crime, she has to be tried as an adult." Celestia said.
"You'd really just turn this over to the court system when she has come back to us an entirely different sort of pony? She's not the same as when she left, I can feel it." Twilight said.
"Twilight Sparkle, you have to understand, I am looking after the citizens of Equestria as one of it's Princesses." Celestia said.
"One of it's Princesses huh? You want me to call you just Celestia, and treat you like a friend. You have ever since I became an alicorn. However, your actions speak louder then your words. You don't care for your citizens. Not the ones that really matter, like the children who have no hope." Twilight Sparkle said.
"If you'd just let me explain..." Celestia began.
"There is nothing to explain. I won't let you take this to the courts if I can help it." Twilight said before using her magic to grab a particular scroll. "...This here is something I did on a whim, just in case such a situation like Cozy Glow's ever came up that would ever come between you and me like it clearly has. I refuse to doom an orphan to Tartarus who simply didn't get the chance to have a loving family." The purple alicorn noted.
"Exactly what is that scroll, Twilight Sparkle?" Celestia asked.
"A royal decree that will separate Ponyville from your protection. I've made tons of copies and each one is fully filled out. All one needs is my signature and the dead is done. You know you can't stop me, being one of Equestria's princesses. Let me be clear though: I really don't want to sign this, Princess Celestia, I really don't. So, here's the deal: When Cozy Glow is done with her story, if you still feel like taking Cozy Glow's situation to court, then I will have no choice but to sign this. I will not allow you to doom a filly who has only just gotten a loving father and brother figure in her life. I can't allow that to happen. Not all ponies are as lucky as I am, and neither are you. You know it, but right now you are refusing to acknowledge it." Twilight explained.
"Twilight, you do realize that I can just as easily declare war on Ponyville if you sign that." Celestia said.
"My friends warned me you'd say that, and they feel the same way I do about the youth of Equestria. Of course, I can just as easily tell everyone in Equestria what you were planning to do to Cozy Glow and why it was a bad idea considering she's an orphan. If you're really willing to sentence an orphan to Tartarus simply because they didn't know better, then we can see how the public will react to that information." Twilight said. "As a Princess of Equestria, I have the right to protect my subjects just as much as you do. But as your student, I really don't want to have to act on that right. And yet, it seems that you have not learnt anything. Once again, you are driving a wedge between your citizans and your student. Isn't that exactly why Sunset Shimmer left Equestria to begin with?" She asked. A glare suddenly crossed Celestia's face. "...Okay yeah, low blow. But do you really want me to have to act on a similar premise? I really don't want to ruin any good faith, but I won't hesitate if I have to." Twilight said.
"...Fine...I'll willingly hear Cozy Glow's story out, but if she fails to change my mind by the time the story ends..." Celestia trailed off.
"Somehow, I doubt she'll change it. So instead of thinking about just Cozy Glow you could hurt with such a rash decision, then also think about how you'll be hurting me as your student and how you'll never gain me as a friend if you can't change your mind." Twilight stated and headed out of the room.
Alone, Celestia lowered her head. Admittedly, the white alicorn didn't want to admit it, but Twilgiht had a point: Cozy Glow was just an orphan, and now had a family who would fight like hell for the young pegasus filly. And who knows who else Cozy Glow has on her side. Especially, when Cozy Glow mentioned a name all too familiar to Celestia.
Malefor, the lost Dragon Prince. According to former Dragon Lord Torch, there was once a Dragon Prince from a lost dragon kingdom who mysteriously went missing. According to legend, the king of this Dragon Kingdom was more of a Benevolent Tyrant, one who enforced rules harshly, but fairly. The treatment of his subjects always went to sleep peacefully at night, knowing the King would always protect them. What's more, the Dragon King had the power to connect lands together through mysterious magical doorways, and the king's son; Malefor; showcased early signs of having the same powers. But one day, when a mysterious group of Shadow Walkers attacked the kingdom, the Prince and one female dragon citizen from the kingdom went missing and were presumed dead. The kingdom fell into disarray and chaos reigned, until before long, the kingdom fell to ruin.
This was the story Dragon Lord Torch's own father once told him as a child, and the legend has passed down through the family since then with the only other one to know the tale being the current dragon lord. No doubt by now Torch has told the tale to Ember, the current Dragon Lord as Torch will not be around for much longer.
Malefor...if Cozy Glow has indeed encountered and made friends with the Lost Dragon Prince himself, then that means Cozy Glow has access to the most powerful dragon ever. At that point, trying to put Cozy Glow on trial, would no doubt reach the prince's ears. Even if the world no longer acknowledges his linage or kingdom, he is still to be feared as it was stated that whoever crossed the Prince's Father would soon regret such a decision.
After some breakfast, everyone supposed it was time for the next part of Cozy's tale.
"So, next up is when the Sorceress did her scheme if I'm not mistaken." Cozy Glow said.
"I don't think I can forget The Sorceress. Even if we faced off against Ripto most of the time, we still had some other more different villains to deal with from time to time. I still remember Gnasty Gnorc." Spyro said.
"That's more so because we faced him more recently." Cozy Glow said. "Again, something to talk about more later." She added.
"How were you unable to forget this sorceresss chick?" Rainbow Dash asked.
Twilight opened her mouth; ready to redical Rainbow Dash when Spyro spoke up. "That's something else I'll mention later. The important thing is is that The Sorceress was in command of our most re-acurring set of bad guys who would later be employed by Ripto the Rynoc Army." The purple dragon said.
"Yeah they got annoying rather quickly considering how often we ended up facing off against them. The Rynocs ended up being our most re-occuring enemy force. Sure there was only one other time after this where we didn't face them; which was our second time facing off against Ripto. The Rynoc Army hadn't been employed by him quite yet at that point, but we'll get to that later." Cozy Glow said.
"So the Rynoc Army were a constant threat then it seems. What were they doing this first go around then?" Rarity asked.
"Well The Sorceress had persuaded this rabbit girl named Bianca who wanted to become a Sorceress herself to command the Rynoc Army to capture the Dragon Eggs from an event known as The Year of the Dragon." Cozy Glow said.
"Year of the Dragon? Spyro's kind has a whole year dedicated to them?" Smolder asked.
"It's an event that occurs every few years, mostly only occuring once or twice in a Dragon's lifespawn. While dragons normally do lay a lot of eggs, after a rare Golden Moon that occurs once every few years, it's not impossible for that number of eggs; which usually rounds out at twelve or thirteen a batch; to skyrocket to insane numbers. When the Sorceress launched her plan to take the Dragon Eggs, there had been one hundred and fifty Dragon Eggs." Cozy Glow said. Suddenly Smolder and Spike both fainted.
"...That's...a lot..." Rainbow Dash said, eyes widened to the size of dinnerplates.
"Normally, I'd make an Egg joke but...I can't...not this time..." Pinkie Pie said.
"Yeah. Whenever the Golden Moon appears, every dragon across the Dragon Realms drops everything and prepares for a festival in celebration of the abnormal egg count. A festival known as The Year of the Dragon that tends to last for two years." Spyro said. "And Hunter had wanted to see more Dragons like me, so he ended up following me to the Dragon Realms. Kind of funny thing is, is that on the same night that this occurred, the rare Golden Moon appeared." Spyro mentioned.
"Which meant Hunter was going to get a double surprise: Meeting with other Dragons and getting to know the ones from the Dragon Realms, as well as being the first outsider to be there for the Year of the Dragon Festival. At least, that was the original plan." Cozy Glow said.
"But The Sorceress had other ideas. Bianca led the Rynocs to the Dragon Realms and took every last egg to the other side of the world through holes. According to Argus; the Dragon Elder who adopted me; where the eggs ended up are what the Dragons called The Forgotten Realms." Spyro said.
"The reason why will become clear later. Anyways, we ended up encountering Bianca shortly after me, Spyro, and Hunter all headed through the holes to the Forgotten Realms. She gave us more of a verbal warning before leaving. After her, we encountered Money Bags again and surprise surpise, he wanted us to pay for stuff again. Though for this first encounter, he wanted us to bribe him to release a captured Kangaroo girl." Cozy Glow said.
"How'd she get captured? Those Rynocs?" Twilight asked.
"Ones specifically lead by The Sorceress herself as we'd find out. But for now, we paid the fine and after being let out, Shelie actually used those Kangaroo Legs of hers to launch Moneybags away." Spyro said.
"Finally! Took Karma long enough to catch up to Money Bags." Rainbow Dash said.
"Oh yeah, should've mentioned Hunter helped get the gems we paid money bags in Avalar back. Though this was the first time Money Bags was actually getting actual Karma for all the bribing he's forced us to do. Though after being freed, Shelia the Kangaroo mentioned that Dragons used to live in the Forgotten Realms, and when they were still there, the whole place had magic out the wazoo." Cozy Glow said.
"Yeah, she mentioned there used to be flying saucers, shooting stars, and wishing stones as just a few examples and concluded that there was more we could name that included magic that went away after the dragons left. It did explain why finding the dragon eggs which hatched as soon as we found them was restoring magic to the disabled portals." Spyro said.
"The dragon magic was also rubbing off on me, making me remember specific details of the villains I mentioned before." Cozy Glow said.
"Though that was more so coming into play later. Sadly, Cozy Glow and me couldn't follow Shelia into her home world, but Sparx relayed what happened. So after Sparx followed Shelia, we went to Sunny Villa." Spyro said.
"Within Sunny Villa, we were tasked with rescuing the mayor from the Rynoc Squad in the area. Along the way, we encountered Shelia again. Sparx had to solo accopany her again, but she did get us an Egg and some more gems so it wasn't all bad." Cozy Glow said.
"So, Shelia could go grab eggs and gems you two couldn't get." Rainbow Dash said.
"More or less. We'd find others the Sorceress imprisoned later, but they don't come into play yet. After rescuing the mayor we took a break with hunter to explore some of the sights. Though as we were doing so, Bianca showed up again and this time she made her warning a lot less vurnable. She cast a spell at us that almost took out Hunter so I flamed her for it." Spyro said.
"I guess to be fair, she did attack that time." Fluttershy said.
"After dealing with her, we then went to Cloudy Spires where we had to find a way to reactivate the cloud generate that the rynocs had shut down. As we proceeded through the area, Moneybags made us bribe him to activate the Bellows. Turns out though, by doing that, we ended up helping fixing the Cloud Generator." Cozy Glow said.
"...So...one of Moneybag's bribes actually helped you fix the problem you were trying to fix? Pinch me, I must be dreaming." Rainbow Dash said.
"Actually, The Sorceress paid him to guard the bellows." Spyro said.
"Never mind." Rainbow Dash said. "Now I'm starting to hate Moneybags too." She added.
"Once we were done with Cloud Spires, we had enough eggs for Spyro to do the first Speedway in the Forgotten Realms. The speedways in the Forgotten Realms offered two challenges, the first being the standard timed challenges I would later grow to hate, and a race against five opponents. For the race this go around, it was against the local butterflies. Hunter was also around the speedway, and there was something he had to do for a third egg. Once the Speedway was cleared, we headed for the Molten Creator." Cozy Glow said.
"There the task was to clear a path to the Tiki Lodge, and thus that's what we did. Moneybags had been paid by some egg thiefs to guard their hideout and made us bribe him to get inside." Spyro said.
"I'm really starting to hate Moneybags like Rarity does..." Rainbow Dash said.
"We couldn't get all the gems and eggs though; there was a part of the level we couldn't get into because of a sealed off portal. For the time being, we had to cut our losses and go to Seashell Shore instead. There, it seems some seals had stolen a rynoc's submarine and crashed it into a wall, making the rynocs lock the seals up. So, we set out to free the seals. Along the way, there was an area that Shelia took on that gave us another egg. We then freed the seals and got more eggs. Once we were out of the level, we were summoned to an area with a Balloon. We then used the Balloon to head towards the next hub world, however, the Balloon was stopped by a Rynoc that Bianca had transformed into a toad monster known as Buzz. Shelia helped us out during the battle, and unlike Crush, Buzz actually wasn't so easy to defeat. Sure, the first two hits on him were a cakewalk, but then he started using a ring of fire to protect him after everytime Spyro knocked him back. After another two hits, Buzz then began to spit fire though after this fact. Two more hits after that sealed the deal." Cozy Glow said.
"Dang, guess Bianca and the Sorceress weren't messing around." Rainbow Dash noted.
"They weren't. After arriving in the Midday Garden Home World, it wasn't long before Bianaca showed up again giving out a second verbal warning, though this time she did mention that the Sorceress was not happy regarding our progress so far and was getting peeved about it. It wasn't long into the new home world when we came across Moneybags who made us bribe him to release a captured penguin." Cozy Glow said.
"Well that's not very nice. Penguins are so cute." Fluttershy said.
"Well...the funny thing about this Penguin..." Spyro trialed off.
Memory
After being released, the penguin known as Sgt. James Byrd soon took the skies and flew over to Cozy Glow and Spyro.
"Wait a second brother, I thought Penguins were flightless birds." Cozy Glow said.
"Well aren't you the cutest little thing? Sgt. Byrd, nine-double o-six-eight. Awaiting orders, sir." Sgt. Byrd said.
"I think you'll have to find your commanding officer for that." Spyro noted.
"Hey, what are those things?" Cozy Glow noted.
"These are the latest military hardware. DBX9 rocket launchers, state of the art!" Sgt. Byrd said.
"So why didn't you use them to escape?" Spyro asked.
"More importantly, HOW exactly can you fly?" Cozy Glow asked.
"I...have limited ammo, and I wanted to conserve it...for this!" Sgt. Byrd said before blasting away Moneybags.
"I never did get the answer inititally on how Sgt. Byrd could fly, but we did find out from a humming bird that he specifically was trained by humming birds since birth. Which explains how a Penguin; a normally flightless bird; could fly." Cozy Glow said.
"I did read something that stated that the ancestors of the mondern day penguin could indeed fly, but they have since then regressed into being flightless birds." Twilight said. "Seems that the humming birds helped Sgt. Byrd tap into an ability long since lost to penguins." She added.
"I'm surprised Professor Fluttershy is okay with a penguin blowing up Moneybags." Smolder said. "Isn't she against cruelty?" She asked.
"Normally, but Moneybags was asking for it considering he made Spyro bribe the bear for the penguin's release." Fluttershy said.
"...It's always the quiet ones..." Smolder noted simply.
"Agreed." Celestia admitted. Now she was actually having more second thoughts about imprisoning Cozy Glow.
"Sgt. Byrd did some stuff in his homeworld and got us three more eggs and a bunch more gems though. Afterwards, we returned to Molten Crator as we recognized the entrance to his homeworld from there. With that, Sgt. Byrd helped us get two more eggs and some more gems that we had missed. This was still backtracking sure, but it wasn't near as bad as in Avalar." Spyro said.
"Oh look it's lunch time. Lunch time with friends is always fun." Cozy Glow said. "Oh, and I knew Sgt. Byrd was lying about the limited ammo thing. But I didn't have the heart to get on him considering he dealt some karmic justice to Moneybags after being freed." She added.
Applejack opened her mouth to argue, but then stopped. "...Ah can't argue with that logic..." She added.
"Well at least Karma seems to be catching up to Moneybags. I can't wait to see hear how the next ally you freed manages to top Moneybags getting launched away by a pair of rockets." Rainbow Dash said. "Oh um...no offense Fluttershy." She added.
"Moneybags is clearly taking advantage of Spyro. Why, I'm sure that if I got alone with him, I'd teach him a thing or two about taking advantage of others." Fluttershy said.
Lunch was being had by all, though Rarity had finished early as had Spike. So, Rarity pulled Spike to the side.
"So, here we are Spike. There's...something I need to tell you." Rarity said. This was so nerve racking. But she needed to say this, hoping that his crush wasn't gone.
"There's something I need to tell you about as well, Rarity." Spike said. Rarity's heart started to race. "I'll admit here, when I first met you, I had devoloped a sort of 'crush at first sight' thing." Spike said.
"And I failed to return your feelings. If you would allow me some time I..." Rarity said.
"Stop Rarity." Spike said. Rarity's heart slowed. "Smolder helped me get things straight in my head. What I had for you, was nothing more than a young drake's crush. Nothing more, nothing less." Spike said. "It wasn't true love." He added.
Rarity felt the first signs of emotional damage happening to her. "What...does that mean?" Rarity asked.
"It means that I have decided to move on from my feelings for you. It's high time I grew up and started seeking my own future." Spike said and then went to rejoin the others.
Rarity broke down into tears. If only she had figured out her feelings sooner. Now, she feels terrible. On one hoof, she should be mad at Smolder and take her revenge, but on the other, deep down she knows Spike was telling the truth. The dragon needed to grow up. And now, so did she.
Rarity would be late coming back.
"Where's Rarity? Did something happen?" Twilgiht asked.
"...You told her, didn't you? About our talk?" Smolder asked.
"Well I had to sooner or later." Spike said.
"...Seems Rarity will be delayed. She might be downing a few tubs of low-fat yogert." Twilight said.
"Sounds serious and personal, so I won't ask. Better not to kill the mood." Cozy Glow said. "And with our story, we didn't know it, but things were going to get serious for us too. Just not as personal." She added.
"After we went through Icy Peak where we simply had to get passed a bunch of ice walls to a fishing hole, the three of us; me, Cozy Glow, and Hunter; found Bianca practicing some spells in the Midday Gardens homeworld. She accidently turned a rabbit into a monster, so Hunter decided to save her." Spyro said.
"Though we encountered Money Bags in that level, we got a break from him in Enchanted Towers where we got to see a statue of The Sorceress before blowing it up. It was a nice preview of the one we were going to fight at the end of things. The Money Bags break didn't last long however, as he completely paywalled our progress in Spooky Swamp where we had to drive out the Rynocs." Cozy Glow said.
"Zoey let us know that there was something for Sparx back in Sunrise Spring. It was a place only Sparx could go into, what Cozy Glow refers to as a Sparx Level. We went back to Midday Gardens afterwards and I tackled Country Speedway before going to Bamboo Terrace. We had to clear out more Rynocs but we did find a sign by the Sorceress about a Yeti." Spyro said. Suddnely Rainbow Dash did a Spit take.
"A YETI?! THOSE EXIST IN SPYRO'S WORLD?!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed.
"Yep." Cozy Glow said.
"Anyways, after Babmoo Terrace, we were once again forced to go back there later, but for now, we took a Whirligig to Evening Lake, but the trip was interuptted by another transformed Rynoc. We would find out later, that this one was personally transformed by the Sorceress to be not only immune to Spyro's fire, too big to charge into, but was also immune to Sgt. Byrd's rockets. So we needed to use stuff Sgt. Byrd went to get us for ammunition against the transformed Rynoc known as Spike." Spyro said.
"Wait me?" Spike asked.
"Not you Spike; the ryonoc Spike." Cozy Glow said. "Not to worry, he's dead now. Kind of had no choice to kill him." She added.
"Understandtable. So, did Bianca show up as you entered Evening Lake?" Fluttershy asked.
"Yeah. But this time, she was actually a lot more concerned then last time. She warned Spyro specifically that The Sorceress has set a trap for him, but wouldn't say what The Sorceress would do if Spyro got captured. But because she refused to say, it didn't take much for my brother to know what she refused to say." Cozy Glow said. Twilight gulped.
"That's...not good. Between the rynoc and the willingness to just outright kill Spyro after trapping him, The Sorceress was starting to take things serious now." Twilight said.
"Yeah. She was twisted in her seat of power. Regardless, we soon met up with Money Bags and the Yeti mentioned before. His name was Bently, and he...said a bunch of really complicated words. Very big brain if you ask me." Cozy Glow said. "Everything he said was if he read one too many books." She added. "Just thinking about his dense vocabulary makes my head hurt." The pegasus filly finished as she massaged her head with her hooves.
"You were expecting something more like 'Me Bently, me smash things' rather than a walking dictionary." Rainbow Dash said.
"Rainbow Dash, that's rude." Twilight said.
"Considering his cultured nature, I doubt he took dished out Karma on Moneybags. How sad." Fluttershy said.
"Actually...Bently dished out karma on Moneybags. Just because he was cultrured didn't mean he was a paccifist. Not by a long shot. Bently smacked Moneybags with a club even bigger then the one Rynoc Spike was using. And he was using a pretty big club as it was." Spyro said.
Rainbow's eyes went wide. "How...big are we talking?" Rainbow Dash asked. Cozy Glow showed off a picture of Bently and another much smaller yeti with Bently having Cozy Glow on one sholder while leaning on a very big ice club.
"The other yeti is Bently's younger brother, Bartholomew." Cozy Glow said.
Rainbow Dash suddenly fainted. "...Yeah safe to say, that topped Sgt. Byrd's rockets." Fluttershy said for Rainbow Dash before faiting as well.
"There's the Fluttershy faint." Applejack. "And here I go too." She added before fainting as well. Before long, almost everyone there fainted. Only Cozy Glow and Spyro were still un-fainted.
"...Think I should've held back?" Cozy Glow asked Spyro said.
"Mmm...nah. Let them take a moment to recover." Spyro said.
"Still a little mischievous huh?" Cozy Glow said. "...I wonder if a certain black dragoness's father is coming soon?" She asked.
"I would like to see Cynder again, that is true." Spyro said.
After everyone recovered, it was time to continue.
"So after Bently, I decided to go ahead and do the speedway before much else. Then, we headed for Lost Fleet, where we had to help a prospector find his treasure. Which...some rynoc stuck an Egg in." Spyro said.
"That wasn't very nice." Fluttershy said.
"After Lost Fleet, we traveled to Frozen Alters where Spyro was given Ice Breath by the Ice Faries that live there. It was only for that world though. Moneybags had sold the locals a laser security system that they couldn't really operate but Spyro had no trouble using it. We managed to defeat the rynocs and living Snowmen--" Cozy Glow was saying.
"LIVING SNOWMEN?!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed.
"Evil, living Snowmen." Spyro connected. "Anyways, we did find Moneybags there AGAIN but after dealing with what he was blocking that time, we went to--" He started.
"Brother, you forgot somehting." Cozy Glow said.
"I...did?" Spyro asked. Cozy Glow nodded, then Spyro's eyes went wide. "Oh right, I did. So, get this, while we were at Frozen Alters, Hunter had gotten caught up in the trap the Sorceress made by accident. We couldn't really do much for him, Bianca had told us, but because the trap captured the wrong person, she would make sure the Sorceress didn't learn of what happened as a favor if we left the Forgotten Realms. But we didn't agree to that, so we went to Charmed Ridge. Instead of dealing with the Rynocs, this was the only level from the levels before the final home-world where The Sorceress was located. In this level, we had to save the Princess of the Fairies from Prince Azreal." Spyro said.
"Of course, truth is, the Princess was never captured, and that both the fairies and the wizards of Charmed ridge didn't want them to marry with one another. So, they decided to just elope instead." Cozy Glow said.
"Sounds like Star Crossed lovers." Twilight said.
"Gee, where does that sound familiar?" Rainbow Dash said, teasingly.
"Shut it Rainbow Dash. Until you get married to Soarin I--" Twilight then noticed the blush on Rainbow Dash's face. "...You mean...he already..." She trailed off.
"I...didn't want to say anything until this whole situation blew over but...yeah." Rainbow Dash said.
"...I...I see..." Twilight said.
"DOUBLE WEDDING PARTY!" Pinkie Pie announced.
"Heh...sure why not make it a double wedding? That would be totally awesome! First one in eqeustria!" Rainbow Dash said.
Twilight blushed. "I admit there is some appeal to that." She added.
"Plan your wedding another time would you?" Cozy Glow said.
"Sorry." Both Twilight and Rainbow said at once.
"So, anyways, after clearing Charmed Ridge, we then found the area for the Fireworks Factory Moneybags had mentioned with Sgt. Byrd. There we met back up with Greta. Seems the Sorceress had stolen plans for a Rocket the Professor had made. We didn't even know he was around at the time but we would find out later he was which explained why we came across Greta and Handel in the Fireworks Factory. We stopped the rocket, and then took the real deal on a course for Midnight Mountain. But, as we would find out later from Bianca when we beat the Sorceress herself, The Sorceress never planned on keeping the baby dragons alive; she just needed their wings for a spell to live forever and she was willing to kill to get them." Cozy Glow said.
"Wait, so, Bianca believed the Sorceress was just trying to restore the magic? I admit the methods weren't good, but they'd be understandable at least." Fluttershy said. "But wanting to kill dragons for their wings just so one could live forever?" She asked.
"The Sorceress has a temper with dragons. She was the reason why the Dragons left in the first place, using her magic to send them to the other side of the world. It was shortsighted though, as it ended up starting to deplete the magic of the world. Regardless, we had to team up with Bently to take down another transformed Rynoc that had become a flying monster named Scorch. We had to use missles to defeat him as he was just that strong." Cozy Glow said. "Bianca had freed Hunter and was willing to work with us to stop the Sorceress's twisted plans. First on the list, freeing the next animal buddy from Moneybags, in fact the last one. A monkey named Agent 9. He was...well...eccentric. It was like he was hyped on sugar." She explained.
"Well after Bently's club...wait no, not saying anything." Rainbow Dash said.
"Meh...while Agent 9 did dish out karmic justice, it was just to make Moneybags flee in terror after making the bear dodge laser blasts for a while." Spyro said.
"Really? REALLY? After all that buildup, THAT'S the note things leave off on? How disappointing." Rainbow Dash said.
"Once Agent 9 had cleared out his homeworld, and helped us clear out the Fireworks Factory, it was time for the rest of Midnight Mountain. We didn't come across any rynocs in these levels, which made sense as they were most all gone at this point more or less. Inbetween levels, we would have Sparx take care of more Sparx Levels. There was even one last speedway in the homeworld too." Spyro noted.
"Yeah sadly there wasn't much that could be said about the remaing levels. For the most part, we were just dealing with certain problems or doing tasks for others. Kind of underwelming after dealing with Rhynocs for so long. But eventually, it was finally time to take down the Sorceress herself." Cozy Glow said.
"And with Bianca's help, we got into her lair, and Agent 9 was willing to help us take down the sorceress. Her magic made her invincible to my fire breath, and she was too big for me to charge into. So, we had to rely on other methods. We had to use various vehicles to shoot at her and eventually, we knocked her into, taking the egg she was using as part of her sceptor in the process." Spyro said.
"Once we finished with her, one more Sparx level happened, before we came across Moneybags who had one of the last two eggs we were missing. But he wasn't williing to sell it to us at the very least. So instead, my brother chased the bear down and charged into him several times, and in the process, got back all the gems he made us pay him." Cozy Glow stated.
"Heh...I bet you were looking forward to doing that for the longest time." Rainbow Dash said.
"Oh I was. And it was a much better note to end off on for that adventure at least. A bonus area opened up afterwards, which had to be where the final egg was. After a series of challenges and much gem collecting, we eventually managed to gain access to the level's final area where, low and behold, we found out that the Sorceress wasn't quite dead and had survived her lava bath. Seems she had the 150th egg on her personally, and wasn't willing to give it up without one last fight. So, with Bianca providing us a saucer to take down the Sorceress's saucer, we eventually defeated the Sorceress once and for all." Spyro said.
"Oh my, it's almost night time already?" Luna noted the time.
"Wow...time flies when your finishing things up." Spyro noted.
"Yeah. Let's pick this up again tomorrow." Cozy Glow said.
As the new day began to dawn, a mysterious new portal began to show up in Twilight's castle.
"What the what?" Twilight said. Soon stepping through was not only the biggest four legged dragon she'd ever seen, but also a black four legged dragoness.
"...Yep, I see a pony. I think we're defaintly in the right place." The black dragoness said.
"Are you...friends of Spyro and Cozy Glow?" Twilight asked.
"Most certianly. Like I could ever forget those two. Spyro more so." The black dragoness said.
"Ah. Then we managed to find where they are right away. Not bad if I do say so myself." The big dragon said. He spotted Celestia in the doorway behind Twilight Sparkle. "...You...that coat." The big dragon went over to Celestia said. "...I see. I suppose that must mean you are Princess Faust's child." The big dragon said.
"So it's true then...you are the Lost Dragon Prince." Celestia said.
"Feels like a life-time ago, admittedly." The big dragon said. "I am Malafor, guardian of the Mystic Lands." He added. "And this..." Malafor gestured to the black Dragoness. "Is my daughter Cynder." He said.
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Sunny." Cynder said.
"My name is Princess Celestia." Celestia said.
"Yeah no. Gonna call you Sunny until you earn my respect. Good luck with that, Sunny." Cynder said.
Celestia looked like she was about to fly off the handle. "Does your daughter always do this, Mr. Malafor?" Twilgiht asked.
"Yep. She always asigns nicknames to eveyrone based on the first impresson." Malafor said.
"But safe to say there..." Cynder said, examning Twilight. "...I...got nothing for you yet. But I'll think of something." She said.
"My name is Twilight Sparkle, if it helps. And I enjoy reading a lot." Twilight said.
"Mm...yeah no. Sorry Ms. Sparkle, but I got nothing right now." Cynder said.
Sometime later, everyone including the two new guests were in the map room.
"'Sup Rook?" Cynder asked Cozy Glow. "How's things been so far?" She asked.
"Things here, things there." Cozy Glow said. "Been telling everyone here about our adventures though. Funniest thing, we were just getting to the Mystic Lands." She added.
"Hope you two don't mind if I join in, right Purple?" Cynder said to Spyro.
"Not at all...Black~" Spyro said.
Rainbow Dash laughed. "Ha! Their calling each other by their colors. That's hilarous!" She said.
"Watch it, Color Splash!" Cynder said.
"Looks like you've been hit by Cynder's nicknaming tendacy, Rainbow Dash." Twilight said.
"Well it's not the worst thing I've been called." Rainbow Dash said.
"Indeed. It's better then Rainbow Crash at least. Oops..." Fluttershy said.
But Cynder suddenly did a glare. "WHO DO I NEED TO GIVE A BUTT KICKING FOR SUCH AN INSULT?!" Cynder exclaimed.
"...Huh...Apparently she hates that." Rainbow Dash said.
"I have standards. I wouldn't dare use an insult for a nickname. And calling you Rainbow Crash is an insult!" Cynder said.
"Rainbow Dash really hates that nickname..." Fluttershy said.
"Meh...maybe not so much anymore. All the Wonderbolts have insulting nicknames too but for them, it's more supposed to be embarrassing then anything else. They say it's to keep them humble." Rainbow Dash said.
Fluttershy blinked. The yellow pegasus could not believe her ears right now. Her friend was letting the wonderbolts use the nickname that had been so hurtful to Rainbow Dash in the past and DOESN'T care?
"Of course, I wish they had mentioned that upfront before hand, but oh well." Rainbow Dash said. "At least with them, I can take it with a grain of salt." She added.
"I suppose if they are using it for humble purposes, I can't really have words with them for it." Cynder said. "But I'm still calling you Color Splash for your Nickname, Rainbow Dash. You seem cool enough for me to also use your real name. I get a familiar vibe of toughness from you. We should hang out at some point." Cynder said.
"I had a feeling you would click with Rainbow Dash, Cynder." Cozy Glow said.
"It's nice to see some of my friends getting along with Cozy's friends." Twilight said.
"Wait a second..." Scootaloo noted. "When you said your potential sister-in-law, you were speaking about Cynder?" She asked.
"Yep. She's the one that taught me how to fly the way I showed you." Cozy Glow said.
"I see you've passed on my teachings, Rook. Nice going. So Orange, got a proper name?" Cynder asked.
"Orange huh? Better then calling me a chicken at least. Name's Scootaloo. I may not be Rainbow Dash's biological sister, but I'm most certainly her protoge." Scootaloo said.
"Ah...yeah you definatly give off the same kind of tough vibes as your mentor Orange. Though calling anything with good wings a chicken is another insult. I have standards after all." Cynder said.
"That's kinda obvious in hindsight." Applejack said.
"Whatever you say, Farmer." Cynder said.
Applejack said nothing. "Do you got a name for me Cynder? My name is Pinkie Pie by the way! Before you go back, mind if I throw you a party later? You and Spyro both. It'd be a nice double party! I've never done any of those before." Pinkie Pie said.
"Whoa! Slow Down there, Jitters." Cynder said. "Your talking so fast I can barely keep up." She added.
"Oh god! She's worse then Agent 9!" Cozy Glow said.
"Yeah, she could defiantly give Sugar Rush a run for his money." Cynder said.
"Well, Cynder is um...quite unique, isn't she Darling?" Rarity said to Spyro.
"Consequence of growing up the daughter of Malafor I suppose. She's a bit hardheaded at times, but she means well." Spyro said.
"Stay back Marshmellow; Spyro is MY boyfriend! Get your own." Cynder said.
"M-marshmellow?! WHY YOU!" Rarity said.
"Calm down please Rarity..." Fluttershy said.
"Nice reign in, Butter." Cynder said.
"Oh...me? My name is Fluttershy." Fluttershy said.
"Meh. I like calling you Butter better." Cynder said.
"Not the worse thing Shy's been called." Rainbow Dash said.
"Wait, I got something for you finally!" Cynder said to Twilight. "Friendship. That's what I'll call you." She added.
And then everyone just stared. "Err...Twilight is the Princess of Friendship, just so you know." Apple Bloom said.
"Doesn't matter, she's still Friendship to me, Yellow." Cynder said to Apple Bloom.
"Well, that is Apple Bloom, you've already met Scootaloo, and I'm Sweetie Belle." Sweetie Belle said.
"AND WE ARE THE CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS!" The three fillies then yelled out, making Cynder get blown back.
"Father, why do three fillies their age have such strong lungs?" Cynder asked.
"I...don't have a logical explanation. I say blame the realm these ponies reside in." Malafor said.
"I see. Sweetie Belle...meh...best I got for you is Baby Marshmellow, but I hate reusing nicknames. So I guess I'll go with my second best of Bell." Cynder said.
"Wonder if anyone has even noticed we're here?" A female voice called out.
"I don't know Diamond Tiara, I don't think so." Another female voice said.
"Oh hey Deets, Silver Spoon." Apple Bloom said to her two friends.
"...Busted." Silver Spoon said.
"Took her long enough. Slipping Apps?" Diamond Tiara asked.
"Nope. You just haven't said anything. How long you been here?" Apple Bloom asked.
"Since the beginning? I doubt anyone even noticed." Diamond Tiara said.
"Some things don't change, do they Deets?" Apple Bloom said.
"Heh...you know you prefer that some things don't." Diamond Tiara said.
"Wait what?" Applejack asked. "...Actually you know what no. If my sister is a fillyfooler, ah ain't gonna get in the way of that." She added.
"Actually, we're just hanging out mostly." Diamond Tiara said.
"We're simply too young to get into that sort of stuff. Ah ain't stupid sis." Apple Bloom said.
"Besides, we're...not even sure if this is true love or not. So we're taking things easy for now." Diamond Tiara said.
"...Ah guess I don't have to worry then." Applejack said.
"...Congratulations Apple Bloom, mad props there." Cynder said without a hint of hestiation. "I didn't even see those two." She added. "Let's see...nah. I think you two don't deserve any nicknames from me. Anything I can think up will most likely be an insult somehow, so I forbid myself from giving you nicknames." The black dragoness said.
When it came time for breakfast, Cynder was staring at the meat. "So...which creature did you hunt to get this?" Cynder asked.
"Cynder, we've talked about this: Just because you've had to hunt animals due to that being the only way to get meat in the Mystic Lands, doesn't mean everyone hunts meat." Spyro said.
"It probably doesn't taste that good then if it hasn't been hunted." Cynder took a bite out of the meat anyways. "...I stand corrected" She said after she swallowed the bite she took before she began eating the whole thing.
"Cynder had to hunt for her meat in the Mystic Lands?" Spike asked.
"You can bet your highest value gem on that one. I would often times hunt stuff to get meat, and the best quality came from the animals that took me longer to kill. Of course I made sure to not hunt the same animals all the time, but unless I was really hurting for more meat; because the stuff I got from the tougher beasts lasted longer; I tended to avoid the more common animals unless they were actually challenging to kill." Cynder explained. "At least it was that way after I became as old as I am now. Early on, my father would have me hunt weaker creatures for meat, but at that point, I wasn't as much in development yet. Once I could finally start using Dragon Breath powers, then I could start aiming for more and more challenging pray." She added.
"I suppose that's just how you were raised. Your father had to adjust to his new world from what I understand. And he wanted to give you every advantage possible." Fluttershy said.
"Surprised your okay with this Fluttershy." Rainbow Dash said.
"These two are dragons from beyond our own world. Of course their animals aren't going to be like the ones we have here." Fluttershy said.
"Wait there's a reason you don't hunt animals in your world?" Cynder asked.
"Yes. Animals in our world are more sentient then what your most likely used to." Fluttershy said. "Besides, most Ponies are vegetarians anyways, but some meat does get made from the animals that aren't fully sentient." She added.
"Huh...Makes me wonder if you have any bears." Cynder said. Trixie Winced. The former magician had been there from the start, but she hadn't said anything.
"Trixie prefers that you don't mention bears again around her." Trixie stated.
"She had an...altercation with a bear-like creature when we first met her." Twilight noted.
"Fair enough." Cynder said. "But out of curiousity, what kind of bear were we talking aobut." She added.
"An Ursa Minor. They can be very big." Twilight said before showing off a picture.
"Wow...that is big. Bet I'd enjoy hunting one of those." Trixie noted.
"You do that, and your likely to upset an Ursa Major as they are the adult form." Twilight said.
"What do one of those look like?" Cynder asked.
"Trust me, you DON'T want to know." Twilight said.
"I know now, and now I wish I didn't!" Trixie said.
"...When Trixie drops her third person talk, you know she's serious." Rainbow Dash said.
"Okay then. Expect me to find out later anyways and then want to hunt an Ursa Major. I've been craving an actually challenging hunt, and I've gotten too used to all the animals back home." Cynder said.
"Fair enough." Twilight said. "That is, if you still want to after you realize what an Ursa Major looks like." She added.
"What makes you think I won't want to?" Cynder asked.
"I know, and I don't want to even try to fight an Ursa Major anymore." Trixie said.
"You defaintly seem like a tough gal Cynder. Once everything is explained, we totally gotta hang out later." Rainbow Dash said.
"Father, do you think?" Cynder asked.
"Ask me later, Cynder. Now is simply not the time. After all, there is a story to tell." Malafor said. Fluttershy could feel something there, but couldn't quite place it yet.
"So, how did things start in the Mystic Lands exactly?" Rainbow Dash said.
"Allow me to take this one." Cynder said. "One day, while Father was teaching me about his portal creating powers, he created one of the quick travel portals dragons from our world use to go everywhere. He was creating a new portal at Windy Vally, but when he created the portal, all of sudden these three jerks came out of the newly created portal. There was this big guy with a club, this green guy with metal armor, and this very small wizard guy." She added.
"Ripto and his cronies. Spyro mentioned when he was going over his first tangle with Ripto, Crush, and Gulp." Twilight added.
"Yeah. Using his magic, Ripto forced my father's abilities into overdrive, which started doing all kind of crazy things to the Mystic Lands. One such portal created a gateway to Spyro's world." Cynder said. "...I'll admit, when I first came into contact with Spyro, I was a bit hard-headed as I wanted to do things myself, prove to my father I could become the next Guardian of the Mystic Lands as my father repeatedly denied wanting to train me to become the next Guardian of Mystic Lands." She added. "So of course I was a bit mean towards him. I wanted to do things on my own. There was another reason too however: I knew that when my father was rescued from Ripto, the portals created from when my father's abilities went into overdrive would be closed up. So, I wanted Spyro to go back to his world because...because I didn't want to get too attached to him." The black dragoness said. "I convinced myself it was for his own good, because I didn't want to get attached to him, and him get attached to me, only for us to never see one another ever again after my father was saved." She concluded.
"You felt it was better for you two to stay as pure strangers at the time. I can hardly blame you. A lesson I learnt about once, is that sometimes the kindest act you can do, is push something away." Fluttershy said.
"In otherwords, your being reminded of the Breezies with this. I suppose in a way, that makes sense." Rainbow Dash said.
"While it was understandable now in hindsight what Cynder was doing, I didn't want her tackling Ripto on her own like that. And Cozy Glow didn't want to do it either. So we ended up sticking around anyways. Starting with Windy Vally, me and Cozy Glow started going around collecting the land's various Dragon Gems; mystical gems that power the very magic of the Mystic Lands; as well as their super special gems: The Power Crystals. These crystals were imbued with mystical properties, and had the power to undo powerful spells. Ripto had locked doors behind him as he was turning the residents of the various lands against one another but on a much more 'hands-on' scale. Cynder did warn us personally to stay away twice before attempting to battle us to get us to go home." Spyro noted.
"Needless to say though...I got my tail whipped. I underestimated Spyro's abilities and as such, I lost to him easily." Cynder said.
"In the next area known as Poison Swamp, as we were mostly doing the same there, Cynder got ambushed by a few of the residents Ripto bribed to take out Cynder. While she was a bit reluctant for our help, once we did help her out, she did help me learn how to fly. Though I had to ask her before she left if there were any Speedways in the Mystic Lands for me to try out my flying skills." Cozy Glow said.
"I didn't even know what a speedway was at the time as the Mystic Lands is completely devoid of speedways." Cynder said.
"Looks like you had to wait to start hating Speedways, huh Cozy Glow?" Scootaloo asked.
"Yep. Anyways, soon we caught up with Crush who stayed back to halt our progress. Once we got past him, we arrived in Fear Factory; a place in the Mystic Lands that was meant to help residents get over their fears." Spyro said. "The place however, was clearly offline and not in use." He added.
"That's because there was no need for it anymore once my daddy became the guardian of Mystic Lands." Cynder said. "Seems he became the guardian a few years before I was born." Cynder said.
"Given how old you are now, I'd say then that the factory had been abandoned for quite some time when Ripto invaded you." Smolder said. "Wait no, you don't look that old." She added.
"I'm 13 years old." Cynder said.
"...Never mind." Smolder said.
"I thought females didn't disclose their ages on purpose?" Spike asked.
"It's only rude to ask a lady for her age Spike. It is not rude for a female to say her age outright." Smolder said.
"Oh you two get a room would you?" Cynder asked.
"Says the dragoness that started falling for me after I patched you up when you recklessly tried to defeat Gulp without back-up." Spyro said.
"Yeah trying to defeat Gulp on my own...I thought I could do it after seeing how much of a pushover Crush was." Cynder said.
"Wait, Crush was still more or less a pushover?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"He was. But I knew Gulp wasn't going to be a pushover, even for Cynder. Still, I wasn't going to leave her to suffer so I patched her up." Spyro said.
"In the Mystic Lands, my father made me become very independent. So I thought I didn't need anyone's help which was another reason I tried to send Spyro away. But in hindsight, maybe I should've asked for his help sooner, and told him not to get any ideas. And yet...maybe if I did that, I wouldn't have...started to feel things for him." Cynder said. "It was the first time anyone had stuck their necks out to care enough for me. Even my father would not treat my injuries. And yet, my injuries this time were serious. Spyro could have left me for dead, but he chose not to. I'll never forget that. Ever. While he patched me up, he told me about his adventures. Once he did so, I...started to see just how naive I really was. And it turns out, Spyro and me weren't so different at our core. He had just been forced to discard his naiveté at a much younger age then I had to. So...I decided that...I would get his help against Ripto after all. I decided to say 'buck the consequences, if we grow close together because of this, I no longer care. My father is more important right now.' And I don't regret it either." Cynder explained.
"Cynder would catch up with us after we defeated Gulp at Shadow Castle, which is where Malafor had originally made his home. When we finally caught up with Ripto, he confessed to effectively making Cynder go with her nature to attack Spyro. It was something Ripto counted on happening which it did. We managed to defeat him, but he fled after a while. Once we had every last Dragon Gem and Power Crystals, I knew exactly where Ripto had hidden Malafor: In the very first arena back at Windy Vally. Becuase it'd be the last place we'd think to look again." Spyro said.
"But that's when the full truth came out. Yet, we all agreed to talk more about it later. Once Ripto was defeated once more, which was a lot tougher then the last time even though Spyro could flame him this time, Ripto used Magic to make himself bigger which made his attacks harder to avoid. After three rounds of it, we finally defeated him and he returned to normal." Cozy Glow said.
"Malafor did do us a solid though: As thanks for my help with Ripto, the portal connecting my world with The Mystic Lands would remain open indefinatly. It was a nice gesture from him." Spyro said.
"Safe to say, that allowed me to grow really close to Spyro for some time. Which is why I'm glad that perhaps not asking for his help lead to things turning out the way they did." Cynder said. "But this would not be the only time I'd be assiting Spyro." She added.
As food got prepared by Spike for lunch, Fluttershy approached Malafor.
"Um...excuse me...Mr. Malafor sir. A moment of your time...if you don't mind?" Fluttershy asked.
"I suppose I have time for a few questions. I will answer them to the best of my abilities. We are alone, so I will answer your questions with the utmust truth." Malafor said.
"Um...I suppose the first question is...what do you plan to do once the story ends?" Fluttershy asked.
"I will return home of course. That much was easy to guess." Malafor said.
"And what of your daughter? Will she go with you? Because I have a feeling...your about to do something with her that to you, is the only way you can get her to obey your commands." Fluttershy said.
"It's not about my commands. I promised my daughter I would take her to our world of origin. I just did not tell her that I would be demanding her to stay behind and explore our home world. It...is the only way she can still be with the dragon that has captured her heart once I am dead. And I don't have much more time." Malafor said.
"Wh-what do you mean?" Fluttershy asked.
"My choice was to keep the portal to Spyro's world open, despite what it would do to my body. I chose this, because my daughter...she does not have the same ability that I do." Malafor said. "When I die, the portal between our worlds will close forever, and I refuse to let my daughter and her boyfriend be forever seperated. It is better that she does not know that I am running out of time because I had chosen her happiness over my own life. But to be honest, Fluttershy, it is a sacrifice I am willing to make." He explained. "I can't deny my father's tyrant reign. I will not deny that I have had similar thoughts while trapped in the Mystic Lands." Malafor then turned to the pegasus. "...Which is why it is better that my daughter does not develop the same thoughts that plague our bloodline. I've seen how much being with Spyro has deterred her. Made her find something else to have her thoughts deter to. Her mother died during childbirth, 'tis sad but true. I am certain that my daugher will not suffer this same fate. But in order to make sure of that, she must be with her boyfriend and in our world of origin." The giant dragon stated.
"...You choose her happiness over your own life, because you don't want her to continue your bloodline's legacy." Fluttershy noted.
"I only ask you do one thing as a promise to a dying dragon." Malafor said. "Make sure my daughter never finds out that her being with Spyro is what took my life." He added before leaving the room.
"...I promise..." Fluttershy said before flying to catch up with him.
After Lunch ended, Cozy Glow got everyone's attention. "So, things kind of settled down for a couple of months. During this down time, Spyro was showing me, Hunter, and Bianca the various places in the Dragon Realms. However, before we could get to where Gnasty Gnorc had set up his first base of operations, a balloon with a letter attached floated towards us. Bianca managed to grab it and figured out it was sent with Fairy Magic. The letter attached to the balloon was from Zoey. It explained that someone had cast a spell over the fairies in the Fairy Lands trapping all one hundred of them in ice. To make matters worse, the Rynocs had returned and were busy searching for the scattered fairies." Cozy Glow stated.
"My father had sensed something going wrong in the Fairy Home Worlds, so he opened a portal to them so that we may find out what was going wrong over there. Which is where we encountered Spyro's gang." Cynder said.
Flashback
"Yikes!" Hunter said as the group entered the Autum Fairy Home.
"Cynder?" Spyro asked.
"Oh hey Spyro. What are you doing here? These your friends?" Cynder asked.
"If you must know, we're hear because a fairy friend of ours mentioned that fairies have become trapped in ice and that the Rynocs have started to spread out and look for the now frozen fairies." Spyro noted.
"Fairies have become trapped in ice? So that is what I sensed." Malafor said.
"Spyro, that dragon looks very scary." Hunter said.
"...What's wrong with your cat friend?" Cynder asked.
"I think it's your father." Spyro said.
"Do not be alarmed cat; I mean you no harm. Unless of course you are the one responsible for trapping fairies in ice." Malafor said.
"I recognize your magic; it's same kind that created that portal." Bianca said.
"What is this rabbit girl here for?" Cynder asked.
"That's Bianca, a friend of ours and she's a bit of a Sorceress in training you could say. Before you ask she--" Spyro said.
"In training? Then I doubt she could have pulled of a spell that could freeze the fairies so. But then why is she with you?" Malafor asked.
"She carries a magic spell book that she left behind at a library and now she's looking for it while me and Hunter try and track down the one responsible for this whole mess." Spyro said.
"Ahem." Cozy Glow said.
"Oh, and Cozy Glow too." Spyro said.
"Zoey is my friend too you know. She's the one that sent us the letter explaining everything." Cozy Glow said.
"I see. My daughter Cynder, I ask that you work with Spyro and his friends. Meanwhile, I will return to the Mystic Lands. From there, I will hopefully be able to use my dragon powers to track down the origin of the freeze spell." Malafor said.
"Of course father. Looks like I'm going to repay you for your help with my father sooner then I thought I would, Purple." Cynder said before Malafor left.
"So long as you stick close. I've fought the Rynoc Army before, so I know how to deal with them." Spyro said.
"Yeah I learnt my lesson from the last time. Still, you will most certainly need an extra hand. Who knows what's changed with the Rynoc Army since you last fought them." Cynder said.
"I honestly couldn't tell you. After the Sorceress's initial defeat at the hands of Spyro, the Rynoc Army sort of scattered." Bianca said.
"...The Sorceress?" Cynder asked.
"We'll talk as we rescue Faries, Black." Spyro said.
"Fair enough. Whoa Pussycat, where do you think your running off to?" Cynder asked.
"Going to see if I can find a few faries." Hunter said and dashed off.
"...Same old Hunter." Spyro said.
"I suppose I will go on ahead too and see if I can find my magic spell book. It is sure to hold the answers on whose behind this." Bianca said.
"I almost wonder if the person who cast the freeze spell and the one who picked up your book Bunny are one and the same." Cynder said.
"Bunny?" Bianca asked.
"Cynder tends to give out little nicknames to others." Spyro said.
"Ah. I see." Bianca said.
Present day
"The frozen fairies were easy to thaw out with Spyro's breath. I sadly couldn't do much." Cynder said. "Well aside from dealing with the occasional Rynoc." She added. "After all, my specaility is Shadow powers." The black dragoness said.
"Wait, but when we faught, you were using wind powers." Spyro said.
"Says the dragon who can now use other breath abilities I was using Wind powers because I didn't want to resort to my speciality." Cynder said.
"Well your goal was to get Spyro to flee not totally mess him up. In a way, kind of makes sense why you'd go for the non-lethal approach." Rainbow Dash said. "...Pegasi tend to be really good at combat stuff." She added.
"Um...well..." Fluttershy said.
"Except maybe Flutters, but that's because that's the way she is. Nothing wrong with it though. Not all Pegasi tend to study combat techs." Rainbow Dash said. "Just most of them do." She added.
"Just like how not every dragon turns out the same way." Smolder said, elbowing Spike.
"Why are you putting me on the spot?" Spike asked.
"Oh yeah, that feels good." Cynder said as Spyro was polishing Cynder's scales.
"...What in Equestria am I looking at?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"You wanna know something funny? Dragons have a funny way of showing each other tenderness. Even if they don't realize it." Cozy Glow said. "It's not mushy, because to Spyro's dragon-kin, asking another dragon to polish your scales is a sign of trust. When Cynder found out about it, it's not an uncommon sight for them to be doing this to one another." She added.
"Huh..." Spike said. Gonna have to remember that one... he thought to himself.
It looks...pleasurable. Maybe one day... Smolder thought to herself.
"So, while they are doing that, I guess I should continue. So, we found two portals to other areas connected to the Fairy Homes that were active. There were four portals that we couldn't go into because the magic that kept them running needed more fairies to be unfrozen. But then Cynder spoke up once we found out one of those areas had the name Lava Prarie: Apperently, Cynder is lava proof." Cozy Glow said.
"That's not surprsing. Malafor was originally from Equestria and dragons in our world are lava proof." Twilight said.
"Wait how do YOU know aobut that?" Smolder asked.
"Ember told me and Twilgiht about it once. Twilight was really wanting to learn about Dragon abilities and customs." Spike said.
"...You know what, that actually makes sense." Smolder said. Plus, if Ember told them, then as acting Dragon Lord she most certainly can do so. Even though Spike told me the real truth, the fact that that's being kept hidden so that Spike can stay with the pony who raised him is something I ain't messing with. Besides, the fact that Twilight didn't kick him out of the castle after the molt says a lot. She thought to herself.
"With Cynder able to just traverse lava, it was easy to split up. That's when we found out something interesting about the ice spell when Cynder used her previously mentioned Shadow Powers on one." Cozy Glow said.
"Yeah...I found out I can phase into them with my Shadow Powers and rescue the Fairy inside. But, I couldn't do that for more then one per area. The inside of those crystals wasn't normal ice." Cynder said. "It was like it was more of a deep freeze ice." She added.
"Deep Freeze Ice? There's a difference?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Indeed there is young Pegasus. Deep Freeze Ice can freeze dragons if they are effected by it too much too often." Malafor said.
"So whoever it was that cast the magic must be a very powerful wizard." Twilight said
"Yep. Once we cleaned up that area, we did notice that Moneybags had guarded one of the other portals. Which meant more bribes to pay out. Though this time it was for Sparx Levels. Seems some fairies had been outright captured by insects. Sparx was able to get the one that was at the Ant Farm. After that, we decided to go to the other area that was opened up at the start which was Mermaid Coast. Once again, there were more rynocs there though there was the fact we were asked to light up the lighthouses. Once we cleaned up that place, enough fairies had been rescued to unlock a speedway and I had never been more excited! Only to become disappointed quickly. The speedway was DIFFICULT. I don't know why I ever bothered getting excited. Seriously, I don't want to know how just ONE of us could've dealt with the speedways around the fairy home worlds." Cozy Glow explained. The anger on her face was clear as day.
"So, how did those speedways work? Just curious." Rainbow Dash said.
"The speedways were pure time-attack challenges where getting hit took away time from the clock. So I had to be careful not to go full on head collision with the enemies. There were two difficulties: A normal time-attack challenge with a fair amount of time, and a time attack challenge with half the time to start with from the beginning. It was a PAIN to get through but we managed it. We then came across a level where we enountered a Theif. It was Cynder's first encounter with thieves, and because she didn't know how to charge, Spyro attempted to show her how, but she was...very poor at it." Cozy Glow said.
"I guess being raised the way I was gave me better special awareness when I can't see where I'm going." Spyro noted.
"Yeah. So I often resorted to using my Shadow powers which made all thieves a joke." Cynder noted.
"Not that I ever complained about it." Spyro noted.
"I know you didn't. But I would've liked to have done it legit at least once..." Cynder said.
"Don't be so hard on yourself Cynder." Spyro said.
"Can we not have mushy stuff?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"I agree." Smolder noted.
"And on that note, after clearing up that level, there wasn't anything else to do so we headed to Bianca who with the help of the fairies we rescued, opened the way forward to the next Fairy Home World." Cozy Glow said.
After dinner, there was some down time so things could be started fresh the next day after bedtime. During this downtime, Twilight and Smolder were talking. However, Rarity was a bit concerned over Spike's recent concept of getting over the white unicorn, so she snuck up on the conversation which she seemed to be catching the tail-end of.
"I see. Thanks for your assitance. I'm glad we have a Dragon here." Twilight said.
"It's nothing really. Spike's a growing dragon, and trust me, he's going to need all the help he can get. Besides, I think I'm getting something out of it." Smolder said.
"I guess greed can be hard to overcome. But I am thankful that you are choosing to do something for Spike." Twilight said.
"Hey, if I don't help him, your potentially looking at repeating what did you call that super greed-induced form of his again? Spikezilla or something? Doesn't matter, your looking at that but on a much different scale." Smolder said.
"Well I am glad your here then. I just wonder what you hope to come out of all this." Twilight said.
"Heh...I won't lie; the guy's got his charms. If things happen, well then they happen. I'm not going to lie, I wouldn't mind it." Smolder said.
"Understandable. Well then, I'm off." Twilight said before leaving.
"...You should know better then to stick your nose in other people's business." Smolder said.
"How'd you know I was here?" Rarity asked as she came out of hiding.
"Dragons have a stronge sense of smell. Let me make something clear to you, Professor Rarity: If you really did love Spike, you would've already shown a lot greater interest before now." Smolder said before then leaving herself.
Rarity hung her head in defeat. Where had the time gone? Had she truly forever had missed her chance?
Meanwhile, in an unkown location, an unseen figure was viewing Rarity through some kind of crystal.
"Interesting..." A male voice said. "Very interesting..." The voice continued. "I may have just found a way to get my ultimate revenge!" The voice concluded before the owner of the voice did an evil laugh.
The next day, after breakfast, it was time for the story to resume.
"So we came upon the next Fairy Home World which was the Winder Fairy Home. Just like before, we went around the hub-world first collecting gems and rescuing fairies. Once we were done with that, it was off to the first level of Humming Bird fort where there were trapped Humming Birds. After that was Panda Gardens where not only did we come across another theif, but we also came across a pot all too familiar to me and Spyro. I didn't mention this earlier, but sometimes we came across this pot that as soon as Spryo charged into it, or hit with his flame breath vanished and appeared elsewhere. This would occur several times over before it finally broke and exploded into a whole bunch of gems. With this vase however, while the mechanic was the same, there was a panda inside of it." Cozy Glow explained.
"Once we were done with Panda Gardens, we then headed for Honey Marsh where we encountered the Professor. Though there were some wierd time-related shenanigans going on with him here, as we found two of him within the level, one from the future that we had to help get his time machine out from a pool of honey. After that was the next Speedway and Sparx Level which netted us three final fairies. It was then time to go to the next home world. Or at least, that was the plan." Spyro noted.
"Wait why? What happened?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"The travel to the next fairy home world got interupted by magic created by a two headed Rynoc Wizard known as Grendor. Despite his size, he was able to be charged into but that's not the real issue. He himself told us that he was the one who froze all those fairies with the spell before we beat him though he wasn't completly done yet as he fled the area before leaving us with one of the fairies we had been looking for. Now that we knew who was behind the frozen Fairy situation, it was time to rescue the remaining faries to put an end to Grendor's plans." Cynder said.
"Once we were in the Spring Fairy Home properly, we went around collecting gems and freeing fairies again before we went for the Time Machine Lab where we once again came across the Professor. There were Sporks we needed to collect there. Once we cleaned out that level, we went onto Roman City where we encountered our third theif and a second one of those vanishing vases." Cozy Glow said.
"After clearing out that level, we headed to the Twilight Bulb Factory where we had to turn on all the lights around the area. Once we did that and cleared out the level, all that remained was the Speedway and Sparx levels again. Though that's where Cozy Glow started to really struggle. She began to really hate speedways once we were done with Aqua Age Speedway." Spyro noted.
"At long last was the Summer Fairy Home, where we had the last fairies to rescue. After clearing it out, we went to Dusty Trails where we came across yet another theif. Once we caught them and cleared out the area again, up next was Star Park where we had to launch a rocket. Once we did so and cleared out the level, all that was left was Space Age Speedway and the final Sparx level." Cynder said.
"We weren't done quite yet, as now that we had all but one fairy rescued, it was time to stop Grendor once and for all. He put up more of a fight this time, but eventually we beat him for real this time. After we rescued Zoe from him, it turned out the main reason he wanted all those fairies was because he was the one who took Bianca's Spellbook and accidently read it upside down, which is what gave him his two-headed form and four headaches. But Zoe decided to use her fairy magic to return Grendor back to normal. At the very least, everything was all wrapped up in a neat little bow." Cozy Glow said.
"And just in time to wrap up that segment of our story. I do believe it is close to lunch time." Spyro said.
"Indeed it is." Twilgiht said before everyone started getting ready for lunch.
It was the next day and after breakfast, it was time for more of the story.
"So, after we had stopped Grendor, all of us decided to take a bit of a break at Dragon Shores for a few weeks. Cynder wanted to come with us both there and back to the Dragon Realms which Malafor gladly allowed. However, once there, it was discovered that the fireflies; the source of the flame breath of Spyro's dragon-kin; have gone mysteriously missing and now the entire dragon lands were going cold, turning all their breath to that of ice." Cozy Glow said.
"Safe to say that I wasn't going to stand by and let that happen. So of course, I decided to help track down the fireflies and the one responsible for taking them. Unlike with the the Frozen Fairies, I could actually help catch them more often though it wasn't long before we encountered the Rynoc Army once again. We didn't know who had hired them this time, but I had the thought that whoever hired them was behind the fireflies going missing. The first area we tackled was Country Farms where we rescued a cow named Daisy. With her rescued and quite a few fireflies rescuesd, Bianca was able restore Spyro's Fire Breath." Cynder said.
"It was the first time I could use different breaths, though right now I was only limited to the two different ones of Fire and Ice breath. Though once we had all the fireflies rounded up, I did lose the ability to use the Ice Breath for a time. But that's another topic entirely. Once Country Farms was cleared up we then would go through Shamrock Isle where we had to save a dancing horshoe. After doing that and clearing out the area, we then went to the Temple of Dune where we were tasked with getting rid of bombs littered throughout the area." Spyro said.
"After that was Tiki Tropics where we were tasked with burning away thorns. After doing that and clearing out the area, we came across Agent 9 who had an area he went to clear out for us which got us another Firefly and more gems. There was however, Moneybags guarding a portal that Shelia wanted to enter so we had to once again bribe him." Cozy Glow said.
"That bear was seriously starting to get on my nerves though. I was half tempted to want to use my shadow powers on him to teach him a lesson." Cynder said.
"Just half?" Rainbow Dash asked, curious.
"Anyways, after Shelia got another firefly and more gems for us, we came across Agent 9 again who once again cleared out an area for us which resulted in another firefly and more gems. We couldn't grab absolutely everything, so we decided to head out to the next area. However, our transportation to the next area was interuppted by none other than Crush." Spyro said.
"So...that basically gave it away, didn't it? The one who was responsible I mean." Rainbow Dash asked.
"You would guess correctly. Crush showing up meant that Ripto had returned, and this time he had the Rynoc Army at his disposal. Didn't change the fact that this was the third time Spyro and I were going up against Ripto. Crush had apparently been doing some training since our last encounter. This time Spyro had to flame Crush's projectiles back at Crush before charging into him. After three rounds, Crush was defeated once again, and Spryo's charge was strengthened by a fairy Crush had captured. This allowed us to clean up some stuff before we headed to the next homeworld properly of Celestial Plains." Cozy Glow said.
"So this is what you meant earlier when you had to face Ripto back-to-back in mere moments I think." Twilight said.
"That's for later. For now, we cleared out Celestial Plains. After that, it was onto Candy Land." Spyro said.
"Wait...Candy Land? What's a board game got to do with anything?" Scootaloo asked. The rest of the crusaders looked at her.
"You play board games?" Apple Bloom asked.
Scootaloo nodded "You don't know everything about me." She said.
"I have so many questions." Silver Spoon said.
"As do I; I didn't honestly peg you as the type, Scootaloo." Diamond Tiara said.
"Like I said, you don't know everything about me." Scootaloo said.
"Err...was that Diamond Tiara being mean, or just being genuine? I honestly can't tell." Rainbow Dash said.
"Actually, I didn't peg Scootaloo as being the type to play Board Games either." Applejack admitted, rubbing the back of her head.
"I guess I can take that as Diamond Tiara being genuine..." Rainbow Dash admitted.
"...I often have to play those games with my aunts but...it's honestly gotten old." Scootaloo said.
"I'm sure some of the rest of us can join in, right?" Cozy Glow asked.
"Your actually offering?" Scootaloo said.
"I don't see why I wouldn't." Cozy Glow said.
This...is not the same Cozy Glow. Not by a long shot. Celestia thought to herself. The evidence that Cozy Glow has become a totally different pony then before has only grown.
"Getting back to the story, I don't know anything about any board game, but there was an area called Candy Land that we had to rescue the residents who got captured by the Rynocs. After doing that and clearing out the area, we went to Haunted Hills where we came a cross a Ghost named Chatter." Spyro stated.
"G-g-g-ghost?!" Fluttershy said, suddenly frightened. "GHOSTS EXIST IN SPYRO'S WORLD?!" She suddenly exclaimed before diving under the table to hide.
"Fluttershy...I think considering everything, that's to be expected. I mean, Penguins who can learn to fly was already a big thing as it was. Honestly, nothing should surprise us anymore." Rainbow Dash said.
"Besides, they were friendly ghosts." Cynder Said. "And yes, there was more then one. For Chatter, we had to find his buddy Yoric for him. After dong that and cleaning up the level..." She hestiated when she noticed Fluttershy was still cowering under the table. "Uh...is she going to be okay?" Cynder asked.
"I...think we may need a bit of break. Fluttershy tends to be quite easily frightened and I think the concept of real ghosts sort of got to her." Twilight noted.
"I suppose that's only fair..." Cozy Glow said.
"I didn't think mentioning ghosts would've frightened anyone." Spyro said.
"Fluttershy's always been a bit of a fraidy cat if you catch my drift." Rainbow Dash noted.
It took until after lunch for Fluttershy to recover from the ghost incident.
"Sorry about forcing a break...I just reacted..." Fluttershy said.
"I suppose I can't blame you when ghosts aren't commonplace in your world." Cynder said. "Anyways, back to the story, once we were done with Haunted Hills we headed to Winter Mesa where we were tasked with escorting Andy home. After doing that and clearing out the area, we headed for Watertopia next." Cynder said.
"That place still reminds me of Sunny Beach for some reason. Anyways, at Watertopia we were tasked with taking out the Hippos of the Rynoc army. Once we took out all 15 of them and cleared out the area, we would then come across Moneybags blocking access to another area Shelia wanted to clear out. So we had to pay Moneybags once more, but we got another firefly and several gems out of it. We came across Agent 9 soon after which granted us another firefly and even more gems. Which helped us out because there was a second area Shelia wanted to tackle there as well. So after paying Moneybags for the third time this adventure, Shelia made it out with some gems that helped offset the cost and gave us yet antoher firefly. Which meant it was onto Starry Plains, thought as expected, our warp was interuppted by Gulp this time. Which meant another boss fight with him. Spyro had to use Gulp's own projectiles against him this go around. Once Gulp was taking care off, a fairy Gulp had captured gave Sparx the ability to take another hit for Spyro." Cozy Glow explained.
"Just like before, we cleared out Starry Plains first and foremost and then entered Moon Fondue where we encountered some mice. One of them tasked us with getting the rocket systems back online, which meant using the brand-new Lightning Breath power-up to get everything working. After doing that and clearing out the area, we headed for Gypsy Road where we were tasked by a cat to save their mentor Madam Meow from the Rynoc Army. After doing that, and clearing out the level, we headed for Dreamy Castle where we had to rescue Mayor Moony from a hot air baloon." Spyro explained.
"After doing that and clearing out the level, we encountered Agent 9 again who cleared out an area for us which meant more gems and one more firefly. We did encounter Moneybags for the fourth time though which meant bribing him so Shelia can get more gems and a firefly for us. But that was the last one so it was time to take on Ripto for the third time. This time, Spyro had to ultilize the super flame, super ice, and Lightining Power-ups to lower Ripto's shield before charging into him. Once Spyro had succeded in doing this three times, Ripto fled the entire realm for the time being. As such, we were able to bring back the fireflies properally to the dragon realms. Just in time too, the final festivities for the Year of the Dragon were about to take place." Cozy Glow said.
"I didn't want to miss them, so I gladly wanted to join in. The entire final festivities were going to last for a whole week as there were baby dragonflies that were going to be given out to those baby dragons Spyro rescued from The Sorcceress." Cynder said.
"...But I think that's where we're going to leave things off for now. It's supper time and it's getting late again." Spyro noted.
"...There's a reason isn't there? I'm betting this is when you had back-to-back Ripto battles." Rainbow Dash said.
"Gotta give him some credit: He was like a coakroach." Cozy Glow said.
Cynder was heading for bed the same night, when she was approuched by Smolder. "Oh hey there Smolder." Cynder said.
"What? Still haven't come up with some nickname for me?" Smolder asked, smirking a little.
"Nah. Besides, you and me Smolder, I sense we got a few things in common." Cynder said. "I mean, your not that much different from me, deep down." She added.
"What are you talking about? You got nothing in common with me." Smolder said.
"Let's see...a tsundre-isk personality, a purple dragon who can be pretty oblvious at times to social cues, and a want to have said purple dragon as your mate. How close am I? Judging from your blushing, I'm pretty close to the truth aren't I?" Cynder asked.
"Geez...how do you know so much huh?" Smolder asked.
"You think you can hide it from me girl? Like I said, we're more alike than you realize." Cynder said. "I can see the way you look at that other purple dragon Spike. Don't think I can't see the way you look at him. You think it's subtle, when it's not." She said.
"How...are you so well versed in the type of dragon I am? Dragons in this world don't do love." Smolder said.
"I'm the daughter of a dragon from this world. I know how easy it is to say that. But my father taught me something important about wanting to deny what I'm really feeling." Cynder said.
"What exactly did he say?" Smolder asked.
"He didn't really say anything. It was rather what he did that told me he knew what I was really feeling." Cynder asked. "Like the others have already said, I'm from a realm where hunting is basically required on a daily basis. So...Dad banished me to a more peaceful region for a whole week." She asked.
"What...what's that got to do..." Smolder started.
"The week alone without being able to say anything to Spyro...without even being able to so much as see him even..." Cynder said. "It...really drove home just how much my father realized that I was devoloping true love for Spyro. And I think this is because my father felt the same way about my mom." She added.
"Your mother...did you ever get to know her?" Smolder asked. "I can't imagine what that was like, not being able to know your own mother." She added.
"My mother was just a commoner from my grandfather's kingdom. At least that was her social status. And yet, father said that she had confessed that she was in love with him. But she also said that deep down in her heart, she and my father would not ever be able to become a real couple. Because my grandfather would've only let my father mate and marry with one of the noble dragonesses." Cynder said.
"Why was your grandfather that strict?" Smolder asked.
"I think it was to increase the chances of the next generation to have the ability to create portals. I've been trying to master the same ability all my life, and yet I can't seem to do it. But I won't give up. I'll master the ability for Spyro's sake. And my father's." Cynder said.
"Heh...I guess you do love Spyro with all your heart." Smolder said.
"And I know you love Spike as much as I love Spyro. Even if you're not fully ready to commit to those feelings yet." Cynder said.
"What?" Smolder asked.
"You are both still young, so who knows what's in your future. But me and Spyro are not just close enough in age, we're both a few years older than you think we are." Cynder said. "I'll give you a year or two with Spike, before you realize just how much you really do love Spike. And trust me, you don't want to wait if your feelings come from your heart. You may think you don't do love, Smolder, but take it from someone similar to you: You do do love, even if you don't express it the same way." She added. "After all, I noticed you had taken an interest in the scale scrubbing Spyro was giving me." The black dragoness pointed out.
"Oh...so you noticed..." Smolder said, embarressed.
"If you want, I can teach you how it's done so you can teach Spike how to do it. Think of it as a gift from one dragoness to another." Cynder said.
"What are you talking about? I don't want charity." Smolder said.
"It's not charity if you're going to turn around and use it to grow closer to the dragon you want to get together with now, is it?" Cynder countered.
"Why...are you even helping me?" Smolder asked.
"Because isn't that how friendship is made? I'm not really asking for anything in return really. I just feel like you are someone I can totally relate to." Cynder said.
"Gee...you've been here only a few days and you're already getting the concept huh?" Smolder asked.
"Daddy always said I tend to be a quick study." Cynder said.
"...Malafor obviously did something right by raising you all by himself." Smolder said.
"Heh...I know there's nothing that my father wouldn't do for my sake. But that's why I want to try and unlike the power to make portals between regions. I want to do it to make my father proud of me." Cynder said. "And also, to just be able to visit Spyro whenever I want. There's that too." She added.
"I guess...I can understand that last part. You know what? I can't just let you just gift me those details of the Scale Scrub thing. I'm going to help you unlock those portal powers in exchange. If you're going to help me, I'm going to help you. The dragon tribe I belong to repays their debts right. And this is one I want to pay back." Smolder said.
"If that's what you want to do, I won't stop you. I suppose having a friend to help would be great." Cynder said.
Unbeknownst to the two dragonesses, Malafor had overheard their conversation, and then went back to his room.
"...I wish I had the strength to tell Cynder she doesn't have the genes to unlock the power she wants." Malafor said. "But I can't tell her. If I do, everything I want for her will fall apart." He added before going back to bed.
"So, I'm guessing what comes next is that moment when Ripto did his whole near back-to-back take over." Rainbow Dash said. It was the next day after breakfast.
"You would be correct in this, as we had managed to get 90 Baby Dragonflies to come for the festival itself. There were simply not enough trained otherwise." Spyro said.
"The Dragonflied had to be trained? For what purpose?" Fluttershy asked.
Sparx opened its mouth. "No need to say anything Sparx." Cozy Glow said. "Dragonflies need to be trained to help protect the dragon they are assigned to. And it's one of those 'on instinct' things. The dragonflies will often choose their owners purely on instinct. In fact, that's what happened for the festival once we dealt with a certain familiar foe of ours." She added.
"So Ripto decided to show up before the dragonflies could be given out?" Sandbar asked.
"That's not all Ripto did, using some magic I've never seen before, Ripto had scattered all the dragonflies that were there; including Sparx; to the far corners of the nearby dragon areas. We were able to find Sparx right away with some help from Hunter. Seemed that cat was good for something." Cynder said. "And while I had to take a brief leave of absence to go check with my father in order to find the baby dragonflies, I was able to catch up with Spryo before the first area." She added.
"This time around, we weren't hopping through portals to find the dragonflies, as all the areas were close enough to be reached via more standard modes of transportation." Cozy Glow said.
"Indeed, also Bianca was able to use her magic to grant me access to more breath abilities. The dragon realms had warmed up enough to remove my Ice Breath entirely, but Bianca's magic was supposed to restore that plus some other breath abilities. Because she was still in training, we had to collect dragon runes to get a dragon spirit attached to a dragon statue in order for me to use more than just my flame breath." Spryo admitted.
"That just made things more interesting. Though it limited what we could get to and when. Because Baby Dragonflies tend to be shy and run away when startled; and let's face it, because of Ripto's magic they were; Spryo's Bubble Breath became the only thing that could catch them." Cynder said. Suddenly Rainbow Dash started laughing. "...Did I say something funny?" Cynder asked.
"Sorry, it's just...I can't take that seriously." Rainbow Dash said.
"I had to use that specific breath ability to capture pretty much every last dragonfly. And I was getting worn out from having to chase the ones that weren't just given out because of some of the challenges we faced. Or the tasks we did." Spryo said.
"...Wait, how many of them are we talking?" Rainbow Dash said.
"I dunno...I think it was around 70% of the ones we found we had to use the bubble breath for. And remember, there were 90 of these Dragonflies to find. That's a rough estimate though, as we did get some Dragonflies by completing special tasks, and some were even in sub areas. Speaking of, this was our last encounter with the Speedways before we came here. There were only two speedways and each one had two challenges each. We found them inside of the levels this time though." Cozy Glow said.
"Still, not only did we have to go through each area and deal with the troubles there; we were also doing other tasks and even having to search high and low for the dragonflies that were out in the open. It was basically nine areas of the same 'go to this area, do the main objective, find all the stray dragonflies, and do all the tasks' that we've just explained." Cynder said.
"When we finally had every last gem and rounded up all 90 dragonflies, we confronted Ripto. However, there was one level where we had to bribe moneybags. That was the only time we had to bribe him for this adventure however." Spyro noted.
"Just the one time? Dude must be getting lazy." Rainbow Dash said.
"Oh he made us bribe him plenty in the next adventure. But we were eventually able to confront Ripto who once again used magic to grow himself, only this time each time he grew, Spyro had to hit him with either his traditional Flame Breath, his reacquired Ice Breath, or his new Electric Breath." depending on what magic Ripto was using. Ripto could only be hurt by the same breath ability that was of the magic he was using." Cozy Glow said.
"Of course, we gave Ripto the boot once more, but after the festivities for the Year of the Dragon could be held, we had one final show-down with Ripto; though this one was more so because of an accident that occurred." Spyro said.
"Or you should say a malfunction." Cynder said. "That stupid butler robot going haywire was more than an accident." She added.
"Butler Robot?" Twilight asked.
"Let us start from the beginning here..." Spyro said.
"So you mentioned a robot butler. One of the professor's inventions I'm guessing." Twilight said.
"Got it right on the money there, Friendship. A few days after the ending of the Year of the Dragon festival, the Professor wanted to show me, Spryo, Cozy Glow, and Sparx a couple of things he has been working on. One of which was a peephole machine that locked onto Ripto's current location." Cynder said.
"Okay that is actually pretty smart: Creating something to spy on your greatest enemy." Rainbow Dash said.
"But you said that an accident led to a fifth round against Ripto. Exactly what occurred that could've caused that? Does this have to do with the robot butler you mentioned?" Gallus asked.
"I was just wondering that myself..." Diamond Tiara said.
"Actually it does. After doing a session in the Professor's training machine, he unveiled this robot butler unoriginally named Butler. The proffessor had asked Butler to make us some milk and cookies. At least, that was the intention." Cozy Glow said.
"The buck? How do you go from that to a accident that causes a fifth fight against Ripto?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Oh trust me Rainbow Dash, when I said that that accident was more of a malfuntion, I wasn't kidding. Bulter suddenly malfunctioned on the spot and we had to lure it into an electrical device to short curcuit the darn thing. The problem was that by doing that, it made the peephole machine suddenly expand and it brought Ripto and his Rynoc army to us." Cynder said.
"Are you bucking kidding me? Because of a malfunctioning robot that was asked to make milk and cookies for you guys, Ripto was able to make his third take over attempt in a row?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Yes. Sadly that is the case. Before Ripto had warped us out of the lab, the professor tasked us with gathering the Hearts of Land scattered throughout the world. This involved us going around the world and finding those who had the Hearts who would then task us with having to collect a specific set of items for the most part. We did find some vents Sparx could use to go to areas where Sargent Byrd and Agent 9 were located in some areas. We did also encounter Ripto in the library where he merged three Rynocs into a caterpillar Rynoc we had to destroy." Cozy Glow said.
"Of course that wasn't the only time he found Ripto wondering about. As we went about every area collecting various items, at one point we passed by a stormy area, which we would have to go back to after doing what we could in the wintery areas. However, as soon as we reentered the stormy area, that malfuntioning Butler robot showed up out of nowhere. This time we had to lure it into the storm clouds to short curcuit it. The only good news is that the Butler robot had opened up a path to the Theives Guild." Spryo said.
"Wait...you were on good terms with the thieves now?" Twilight asked.
"Well we did have to clear out their den of Rynoc Wizards during our baby dragonfly hunt, so it was more of a 'mutal respect' situation. Besides, we didn't get a free pass with the heart as it was locked in a safe the master theif needed his tools to open. Still, the theives for the most part weren't really stealing anything. They would do so again in our next adventure however. That's for later though." Cozy Glow said.
"I see. And what about moneybags?" Rarity asked.
"We encountered him a couple of times and we had to bribe him for specific items again. At once point, we even came across the dude's own mansion." Spyro said.
"On the way there, we did have to lob bombs at Ripto and while Moneybags initially wanted us to bribe him for entrance to his mansion, you would never believe what showed up at the last second that made that bribe null and void." Cozy Glow said.
"Uh...was it Crush? Maybe Gulp? I wonder what happened to those two guys..." Rainbow Dash said.
"Honestly...I'd probably bribe money bags to tell us. As the answer is neither of those two. Instead, the malfunctioning Butler showed up. This time we had to lure him into some water sprays around the entrance area to short curuit him. After that, while we no longer had to bribe money bags to get into his mansion, Butler had disabled the mansion's power grid so we had to turn that back on to get inside. And unlike the others who had the Hearts, Moneybags wanted us to bribe him 3500 gems for his heart. Which ended up being the last heart we nabbed because of it." Spyro said.
"God I really hate Moneybags now..." Rainbow Dash said.
"Oh he gets worse. Anyways, eventually we had enough stuff to get back into the Professor's lab, where we did some exploring but only really found some gems and some items we were after. So, with that, we went through the vortex that was created when we first battled Butler due to the peephole device breaking apart. With that, we made our way to wherre Ripto had stationed himself and eventually came across another caterpillar boss Rynoc. Once we dealt with that, we were free to fight Ripto for the fifth time. This time Spyro had to use the super powered versions of his three breath powers he had access to for this adventure; flame, ice, and thunder the latter two of which were given to him through various items we collected; and eventually we defeated Ripto. However, he was about to threaten the Professor when who else would show up but that malfunctioing robot again." Cozy Glow said.
"Wait again?! So what did you have to do this time?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Actually, the Professor took advantage of Butler's malfunctioing nature and told the robot to give Ripto a hug. Once Ripto was firmly in Butler's grasp, Spyro used the Warp device Ripto snagged from the professor to warp Ripto and Butler far, far away. We have not seen either of them since then. And that's probably for the best." Cynder said.
"Yeah, I SO do not want milk and cookies anymore..." Spyro said.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, the nearby wall was broken through by a robot butler. "Milk and cookies for Spyro...must make Spryo milk and cookies..." The robot said.
"YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME, IT'S BUTLER!" Cozy Glow shouted.
"No! I do NOT want milk and cookies!" Spryo said.
One very short tag team of all those present later, and Butler was nothing more than scrap heap. "Yeah that robot had nothing on the lot of us together." Applejack said.
"That's not what concerns me the most." Spyro admitted.
"...Come again?" Applejack asked.
"If Butler is here...then where in the world is Ripto?" Spyro asked.
"I don't see him..." Cynder said.
"He's not inside the robot that's for sure..." Cozy Glow noted.
"Then...we suddenly have a problem, if Butler is here and Ritpo isn't, then we have a concern on our hands." Spyro said.
"Chill out, I'm sure wherever Ripto is, he's still far, far away. I mean come on. You said this thing was malfunctioning a lot." Rainbow Dash said.
"Rainbow Dash is right. Let's not worry about where Ripto is right now." Twilight said.
"So, what's next? You mentioned Cozy Glow faced Gnasty Gnorc at some point, and we've yet to get to that." Rainbow Dash said.
"You had to go and hint at that of all things Spyro? But we just went through that not that long ago." Cynder asked. "Like, three weeks ago." She added.
"What's she talking about?" Ocellus asked.
"Ah yes, she's referring to when we had to deal with a plot by a certain disowned dragon elder known as Red." Cozy Glow said.
"Red? What exactly was he doing?" Rainbow Dash asked curious.
"Well Red had managed to get Gnasty Gnorc and his Gnorc army to place Dark Gems around the various realms. And with that knowledge, it wasn't long before Malafor got involved. After all, those Dark Gems were the source of Red's power, and with enough of it, Malafor feared that Red might go after the Mystic Lands and other various realms across the globe." Spyro noted.
"Yep. Of course, breaking those Dark Gems proved to be something Spyro had to learn how to do first and foremost. Once he learnt how to do that, we began in the Dragon Village going around finding the darn things. While we were doing so however, a bunch of thieves ran off with the eggs in the dragon nursery. They were eggs laid outside of the Year of the Dragon that had concluded a couple of months ago. While eggs would get laid all the time like I said, the numbers don't reach the massive numbers as when the Year of the Dragon occurs. The dragon nursery had 80 eggs still around, and the theives took them all though we did find one beforehand." Cozy Glow noted.
"Not only that, but a lot of the professor's new gadgets needed light gems. So we had three things to look out for: Dragon Eggs to rescue, Light Gems to find, and Dark Gems to destroy. At one point, we did come across Sargent Byrd again, and he did a speedway challenge that resulted in both a dragon egg and a Light gem. After that, we managed to destroy the last remaining Dark Gems in the Dragon village as well as picking up any dragon eggs and light gems we missed. Of course, the thing is, because we always had to buy lockpicks, we ended up going back and forth from Money Bag's shop. Eventually we managed to clean up what we could and then headed into Crocovile Swamp." Spyro noted.
"At the swamp, we found a super charge pad that needed forty light gems to activate, so we couldn't grab absolutely everything right away. We did manage to destroy all the dark gems in the area. In addition, we came across Blink the Mole who managed to get us another dragon egg and a light gem from an underground cavern. We also had to defend the fruit of a frog named Fred, getting us another dragon egg and light gem in the process. Sadly, we couldn't grab everything like I said so we had to return to the village where we could use the Professor's ball gadget to travel to Dragonfly Falls." Cozy Glow said.
"At the falls, we were able to clean out most of it, though we did come across a gate that needed seventy light gems to unlock so once again we couldn't get absolutely everything. There was an area Sparx could tackle which got us another dragon egg and another light gem. We did find hunter who went around in an area for another dragon egg and light gem. Once again, we were unable to get absolutely everything so we were forced to destroy the last dark gem in the area and move on. Which is when we faced off against Gnasty Gnorc." Cynder said.
"Gnasty Gnorc had become much harder this time around; dude must've done some training since I last saw him. We could only hurt him once he got his fancy new club stuck in the ground and only from behind. He would change it up every three hits, but we did eventually defeat him." Spyro noted.
"Of course, turns out the reason why his club had the power of electricity was because he had captured the electric fairy which renewed Spyro's ability to use the electric breath ability. With it, we were able to leave Gnasty's Cave and return to the village proper. Once we were in the village, we now could use a super teleporter. Oh by the way, Money Bags had remote shop pads out in the areas we had visited which just allowed us to do shopping on the fly. Though he did make things more expensive if we bought things through them." Cynder said.
"Guessing Bianca's spell had worn off by that point. Fair enough." Rainbow Dash said.
"Did make things more difficult. Briefly before moving on, I did remember a place where the electric breath could open up a passageway which netted us another dragon egg. Unfortunately, there wasn't more we could do so it was onto the area of Lost Cities." Cozy Glow said.
"There were ten more dark gems to destroy in the new region, scattered here and there. First, at the Coastal Remains, we found an Egg just laying around out in the middle of nowhere. After that, we came across Otto who wanted us to fix his pool. So we did, and all the while, we found a Dark Gem to smash and an Egg to collect." Spyro said.
"It wasn't long after that we came across Blink again, which meant he was sent underground for another Egg and another Light Gem." Cozy Glow began. "We also found a cracked tower where we found another Light Gem. We also found a Dark Gem to smash on our way back to Otto who gave us a Light Gem and there was another one just sitting out around his pool. We also came across a gate that required 20 Light Gems to open but we had more than enough to go through it. On the other side, was one of the Egg Thieves which Cynder quickly took care of netting us another egg." She added.
"We also found a pole jump area where there was a light gem at the end of. There was also a Light Gem near one of Moneybag's remote shops. We managed to break another Dark Gem and then found a dragon egg. Wasn't long before we smashed another dark gem and found yet another egg." Cynder said. "Of course though, shortly there after we found a mother turtle who tasked us with defending her children. Which meant another turrent mini-game with two rounds. First round gave us another egg, while the second round gave us another light gem." She added.
"Seems whenever there's one of those special things, it's always an egg first followed by a light gem. But it makes me wonder what's the point." Rainbow Dash said.
"The second round was usually some harder variant." Spyro acknoledged. "Of course, we were going to get all the eggs and light gems anyways. Cozy Glow was the one who suggested grabbing all of the light gems." He added.
"I simply just figured that the combined force of all the light gems might help us defeat Red is all." Cozy Glow said. "After all, if Red got his power from the Dark Gems, then my logic was that the combined power of all the light gems would remove all of his power." She added.
"Something tells me something occurred that made that logic null and void." Twilight said.
"Something did, but that's for later. Still, in fairness to Cozy Glow, her logic at the time was sound." Cynder admitted.
"True. It's why we went for them all anyways." Spyro said, giving Cozy Glow a hug.
"Seriously...I'm not a kid anymore." Cozy Glow said.
"I know that Cozy Glow. But can't I give my sister a hug?" Spyro said.
"...Only because it's you." Cozy Glow admitted.
"So, once we were done there, we traveled to Cloudy Domain. Right off the bat, there was a chest with a light gem in it. Then another locked chest with a Dragon Egg shortly there after followed by another Light Gem. It wasn't even long after that we came across a Dark Gem to smash." Spryo said. "That created a thermal which allowed us to collect a light gem before seeing the local elder who managed to teach me and Cynder how to use the Wing Shield Technique." He added.
"I got left out because my feathers just weren't able to do what dragon wings could. Not that it mattered, the Wing Shield ability is a situational ability. In a special training course for the ability, we did come across a dragon egg and a light gem. With the ability, we were able to get a light gem near the entrance and found an egg nearby too." Cozy Glow said. "We soon found a theif afterwards which had another egg, before finding another Dark Gem to smash. Afterwards, we found Sgt. Byrd again which meant him going through a speed way for another Dragon Egg and then a Light Gem." She added.
"Around that same area we did find another Dark Gem to smash, and Ball Gadget mini-game. Which meant getting another Dragon Egg and another Light gem for completion. With that done, we were on our way to the Sunken Ruins." Cynder said. "Once inside, we soon found a dragon egg next to a remote shop inside of a chest and soon after another Dark Gem to smash. That managed to open up a path to yet another dragon egg plus a Light gem. There was also a chest that contained another Light Gem. We found a gadget that made us invincible which we used to grab another Light Gem. There was also an area Sparx could get to exclusively, so he managed to get us another Dragon Egg followed by a light gem." She added.
"We then came across an area with another egg and a light gem. There was also an area with yet another light gem..." Spyro started.
"How many of those things did you even end up with? Because it sounds like you've been finding them like candy." Pinkie Pie said. "Mmm...candy..." She added before licking her lips.
"...Why do I suddenly feel scared of that one?" Cynder asked.
"It's Pinkie Pie, don't question it." Practically every pony there said besides Cozy Glow.
"Guessing that's a thing around here. We did find one hundred Light Gems by the end of this adventure. We still have all of them too as we never did get to use them for Cozy Glow's plan." Spyro said.
"ONE HUNDRED?! THERE WERE THAT MANY?!" Rarity said, her jaw dropping at the thought.
"Yep." Cozy Glow said. Suddenly Rarity couch fainted. "...Where'd that couch come from?" Cozy Glow asked.
"I don't know, but Rarity always seems to summon it in case she faints. It's her fainting couch." Sweetie Belle said.
"...Is there no end to the zany antics of these ponies?" Cynder asked.
"So anyways, shortly after getting that latest Light gem, we found the last Dark gem for the area and another light gem with it. With all the dark gems smashed, we could go right to the boss. This time around, we fought some kind of strange thing. I can hardly describe it." Cozy Glow said before taking out a picture.
"...What the buck am I looking at?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"That's exactly what Cozy Glow said when she saw it." Spyro said.
"We did eventually beat this thing, and thus we could now progress to the Icy Wilderness. Though, considering what happened there, I have so many problems with my brother." Cozy Glow said.
"Yeah. Turns out that my shadow powers could break the dark gems, so I went with Cozy Glow separately from Spyro. This allowed us to essentially cut the workload in half. While Spryo was mostly going around collecting eggs and light gems while he smashed Dark Gems in one area, me and Cozy Glow were doing things in another area. It didn't take us long to smash all the dark gems and collect everything we could there. Spyro even managed to learn how to Wall Kick too. But then after we smashed the last dark gem, he went ahead to the boss area without us." Cynder said.
"Yeah which resulted in him being captured." Cozy Glow said.
"I got cocky..." Spyro said.
"Way too cocky if you ask me. With some help from hunter we were able to free you and defeat the mammoth regardless. Of course after that, we came across Red of all things meaning we had to battle him now. Ironically he was supringly easy to defeat, but he managed to get away at the last minute." Cynder said.
"Which was fine, we didn't exactly destroy all his dark gems yet. The last batch was at a place the dragons sometimes referred to as the Wastelands: The Volcanic Isle area." Spyro said. "The Volcanic Isle area is sometimes referred to as the Wastlands due to how unforgiving and baren the area is to begnin with. It's said very few dragons if any live there. No more splitting up there because of how harsh it was. Plus, Cozy Glow is the furthest thing from a dragon there could be." He added.
"I won't lie, the Volcanic Isle are was rough. Like, really rough. I think I almost got my feathers singed a couple of times." Cozy Glow said.
"Not just almost. It did happen. We just didn't notice until we had already beaten Red for good." Cynder said.
"Don't remind me." Cozy Glow said. "We managed to go back and collect everything we missed first though, and then eventually found the rest of the dragon eggs and Light Gems in the Volcanic Area as we smashed the last Dark Gems." She added.
"Eventually we made our way to Red's underground lair, where the Professor had ended up being kidnapped and forced to turn Red's soldiers into mechanical monstrosities. Soon enough, Red himself was turned into a giant mech and we had to fight him. The professor tried to help but just ended up making Red stronger. Eventually the Professor did figure things out which signaled the end for Red when he was turned into just a teeny tiny little dragon." Cynder said.
"Which the Professor then put into a bottle. Cynder was admittedly quite pleased with the whole ordeal." Cozy Glow said.
"Can you blame me? Dude made Ripto look like a laughingstock by comparison." Cynder said.
"Ripto may have been downgraded by Red's scheme, but Ripto is much more resliant." Spyro said. He then turned to the ruined Butler robot. "...And I have the strangest feeling that he's coming back for one final round sooner then we think." The purple dragon said.
Ripto came across something he never thought he'd see in a million years.
"Hmm...you smell draconic, but your not at all a dragon." Ripto said. "Though with the state you're in, your no bigger than that purple dragon." He said, looking over a teeny tiny blue female draconic figure.
"Trust me, I used to be much bigger than this." She said. "I was once known as The Sorceress, I was the ruler of what became known as The Forgotten Realms until this purple dragon known as Spyro nearly killed me twice over. I managed to survive only by splitting a piece of myself at the last possible minute. Now I only have a small fraction of my power." She explained.
"Spyro you say? Then it seems you and I have an enemy in common Sorceress. So, what exactly are you exactly?" Ripto asked.
"Your nose wasn't wrong about my draconic relationship. There exists a race of creatures that while draconic in nature, are more like slaves to dragons. We are known as the Kobolds. Of course, my tribe of Kobolds cast me out because I got power hungry for the magic Dragons provided." The Sorceress said.
"Kobold huh? Well, at least your no dragon. I HATE dragons. But perhaps, there is a way we can help one another. But before we do that, we need to deal with our most common foe of Spyro the Dragon." Ripto said.
"I like you already." The Sorcerer said. "And it seems you are someone who just loves magic. Once this is over, I might be willing to make you my apperentice." She added. Ripto laughed. "Did I say something funny?" She asked.
"I've already learnt from the best of the best in terms of magic. Just watch this." Ripto said before growing to a massive size and then returning to normal. "And that's just the tip of the iceberg. I've got more things to show off then just that." Ripto added.
"...Interesting. With knowledge like that, you'd actually be more closer to an actual wizard and my equal. It seems we really can help each other out~" The Sorcerer said.
As the group began to prepare some final questions, suddenly a green female kobold burst into the room.
"Huff...huff...looks like...I made it..." The kobold said.
"What the...she looks kind of like The Sorcerer." Spyro said.
"Don't compare me to that witch. She ain't got nothing on me. Anyways, I heard what you did. My entire tribe did actually. My name's Karisha. The one you know as The Sorcerer used to be part of our tribe, but when we saw her become power hungry, we banished her from it. That was a thousand years ago. Of course, we then herd you laid the smack down on her, but I'm afraid you didn't finish the job: She's managed to create a facimile of her former self. And if she manages to regain all of her lost power, you and your entire dragon race is toast. Normally, my tribe tries to avoid dragon contact as much a possible, but this is a rare exception as we feel if she is able to become immortal for real this time, she'll come after us next." The kobold said.
"Guess it's time for one last Showdown then Cozy Glow. Are you ready?" Spyro asked.
"Do you even need to ask? Come on, let's go finish the job." Cozy Glow said.
Suddenly Flash Sentry; Twilight's lone guard; rushed into the room.
"T-twilight, we got a problem." Flash Sentry said as an injured Spitfire was brought in by Soarin.
"C-captain Spitfire." Rainbow Dash said. The wonderbolt captain had many injuries. "Soarin, what happened?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"There was this strange small wizard dude with this tiny reptile on his shoulder. They got a hold of Spitfire while we were doing some forest training when they attacked us. Within moments, that small wizard dude did a lot of damage to Spitfire." Soarin said.
"It can't be..." Cynder said.
"It has to be. Ripto's managed to return after all." Spyro said.
"Oh great, looks like the dude doesn't know WHEN to let up. Now he's gone and followed us here. Somehow." Cozy Glow said.
"Then you three need to come with. We need to get some payback for Spitfire's sake." Rainbow Dash said.
"Flash, help Soarin get Spitfire to the hospital. Every creature else, we're dealing this problem right here and now." Twilight said.
The young six, main six, the CMC, Cozy Glow, and the visitors from the dragon realms soon found themselves in the Castle of the Two Sisters.
"Why is it that this place somehow ends up the backdrop for some bad guy?" Rainbow Dash asked. She then shook her head. "Whoa...where did that come from?" She asked.
"Hey! I'm the random one. Saying random things like that is my job!" Pinkie Pie said.
"...Yeah. I think Pinkie Pie has rubbed off on me." Rainbow Dash said.
"Wonder how long that will last for you?" Ripto's voice said. He suddenly was in front of the entire group, and on his shoulder...
"...You can't be serious. She's not only still alive, but she's here too?!" Spyro exclaimed.
"The Sorceress...wait, wasn't she much bigger than this the last time we saw her?" Cozy Glow asked.
"It's because of you two that I have to be this size now." The Sorceress said. "I managed to siphon off a portion of my magic which ended up leaving me in this small state of affairs." She added.
"You just won't stay dead will you?" Spyro asked.
"Normally...I wouldn't be for killing any creature...but she was willing to commit mass genocide so...I have no problems if we have to end up killing her to do so." Fluttershy said.
Rainbow Dash whistled. "Damn. If even Fluttershy thinks you're a lost cause, then clearly you aren't going to change your ways any time soon if ever." The speedster Pegasus said.
"Doesn't even matter that you found us so fast. Fact of the matter is, we WANTED you to find us." Ripto said.
"...That doesn't make any sense." Spyro said.
"It's because I figured out the best way to get my revenge on you Spyro. And it's the perfect fool-proof plan. A little something I like to call the 'no win situation'." Ripto said.
"Exactly what is that supposed to mean, Ripto?" Cozy Glow asked before Ripto proceeded to hit her square on with a spell.
"COZY GLOW!" Spyro said. "Wait, that didn't do any damage." He noticed.
"Ripto, what in the dragon realms did you just do to Cozy Glow?" Cynder asked.
"It's quite simple really. Did you really think when you warped me and that Robot here that I spent my time just twiddling my thumbs?" Ripto asked.
"Warped you? Wait...you mean I had warped you and Butler to these realms?!" Spyro exclaimed.
"Exactly dragon. And while I was here, I spent some time gathering information, and found out who you sister really was. That's when I realized that she must have lost all of her previous memories when she came to you." Ripto said. "To your realms, she was nothing more than an amnesiac three-year-old, but to these realms, she was a large-scale threat that once tried to remove all of their magic to assert herself as the Empress of Friendship because she believed friendship to be power." He explained. "All my spell did was restore the memories she has from these realms to her." The wizard concluded.
Twilight's eyes went wide. "You...you didn't..." She said.
"Twilight, you know what he's talking about? What does that mean for us?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"It's like he said, it's a no win situation. Either Cozy Glow starts asserting her old ways all over again and manages to succeed by killing Spyro and telling a massive lie back in the Dragon Realms, or we manage to capture her and send her to tartarus which would piss off Spyro who has become too protective of her to think any ill of her. Either way, the end result is the same: A war between our realm and the dragon realms will occur." Twilight explained.
"...So, in other words, we're bucking screwed.." Rainbow Dash said.
"Exactly! That's why this plan is foolproof. Don't raise a hoof and Cozy Glow will kill Spryo and plant a lie thus causing the dragon realms to declare war with yours. Capture Cozy Glow to prevent her from doing any of that, and Spyro will become mad because you'd have imprisoned his adoptive sister, thus sparking a war between the Dragon Realms and your realms." Ripto said.
"No matter which way the cookie crumbles, the end result is the same. And neither of us can be seen as 'evil' because all that happened was that Cozy Glow got her memories back." The Sorceress said.
"You...you are insane. Your both insane." Fluttershy said. Cozy Glow slowly began to get up.
"...Heh heh...neat plan and all Ripto. Really, I applaud you for thinking so far outside the box." Cozy Glow said. "It's just...you forgot one little bitty thing." She added. Ripto was confused. "...I've spent WAY too long amongst dragons to even THINK of doing anything like that. Maybe if you had done this when we first met, things would have been different. But now while yes, I do have my old memories, I still have the new ones I made." Cozy Glow said as she fully got up. "And that means, I am not the same filly that once drained magic from Equestria. I grew up to be some pony else, some pony new." The Pegasus continued. "I GREW UP TO BECOME A FILLY AMONGST DRAGONS!" She shouted.
Almost at once, Cozy Glow rushed towards the pair of tyrants and punched Ripto right in the face with her right hoof.
"OOF! This wasn't supposed to happen. You were supposed to attack them, not me!" Ripto said. And then Cozy Glow connected again with another hoof strike.
"Yeah sorry, but seems my amnesia did a lot more than just remove a bunch of memories. Growing up with Spryo and repeatedly fooling each and every one of your schemes, not to mention stopping The Sorceress, Grendor, and Red, I've come to learn what power really is." Cozy Glow said, as she hoof striked Ripto a third time. "Friendship is power...what a load of pony crap I was spitting. I didn't even know what power was when I was saying that. But thanks to villains like you, The Sorceress, Grendor, and Red, I know what power is now. And trust me, Friendship is NOT power. In fact, Friendship and power are NOT the same." Cozy Glow said as she connected a fourth hoof strike. "So, I'll say it now, and I'll say it proud: FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC!" The Pegasus connected a fifth hoof strike, but then Ripto and The Sorceress fled deeper into the castle. Cozy Glow noticed every creature was looking at her. "...What? Now's not the time for small talk, those two are getting away." Cozy Glow said.
The group started chasing after the two villians, but Twilight quickly got to Cozy Glow. "Cozy Glow, just for the record, I would like to say I'm glad you changed for the better." Twilight said.
"I would like to say for the record, I would really like to go back in time and punch my younger self a few times for even THINKING Friendship and power were one and the same. They aren't." Cozy Glow said.
Twilight shook her head but smiled. Even if Cozy Glow was essentially reformed, some of her former self was still there, just no longer psychotic or evil.
The group soon arrived in the Throne Room where Ritpto and The Sorceress were in the middle of some kind of duo chant.
"There they are." Cozy Glow said. Suddenly a huge burst of magic shun forth and when it faited, there was a giant two headed monster that was half Ritpo, half The Sorceress. "...AND THEY JUST BECAME GRENDOR TWO POINT ZERO!" Cozy Glow exclaimed.
"...What's that got to do with anything?" Twilight asked.
"Grendor had two heads." Cynder answered.
"Huh...guess now I can see how you'd make that comparison." Twilight said.
The group did their best to doge the various spells from the conjoined villains, and yet their attacks did absolutely nothing no matter what they tried.
"Ha! Take this you pitiful dragons and filly. Face it, with our combined magics in this one body, we are truely invincible! None of your fancy breaths or even some fancy machinery will stop us this time." Ripto said.
"Yes indeed, this was our last ditch effort to get rid of you once and for all. There's nothing you can do to harm us now. ABOSLUTELY NOTHING! WE ARE INVINCIBLE! INVINCIBLE!" The Sorceress proclaimed.
"Oh yeah? Except we still have one thing we can do now that we're in these realms." Cozy Glow said, smirking as she gave a wink to Twilight who smiled and nodded.
"Oh really now? And just what would that be?" Ripto asked. The main six soon joined hooves and suddenly activated their rainbow power.
"...Wait what are we looking at?" The Sorceress asked.
"The greatest magic of all time. The one kind of magic this realm has in abundance." Cozy Glow said. "AND THAT IS THE MAGIC OF FRIENDSHIP!" She said before the two headed monster was struck with a pure beam of energy, seperating the two and outright killing The Sorceress for good this time.
"No! How is this possible? We were supposed to be invincible! Invincible!" Ripto said.
"It's like your a broken record or something." Apple Bloom said, approuching Ripto with the CMC and Cozy Glow.
"It's like my sister and her friends tell villains like you all the time." Sweetie Belle said as the CMC and Cozy Glow began to hold hooves.
"But it seems no matter what, none of you seem to get it." Scootaloo said.
"Honestly, it's like no matter how many times they say it, they just have to keep driving the message home." Diamond Tiara said.
"And boy, does it really get old, but it feels so good to say all the same." Silver Spoon said.
"AND THAT IS THAT FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC!" Cozy Glow announced before the six ponies soon bucked Ripto all the same time, launching him several feet, and right into Malafor.
"Dad, what are you doing here?" Cynder asked.
"Hmph, why else do you think? Tying up a loose end." Malafor said.
"Your lost majesty, what you planning to do with Ripto?" Twilight asked.
"I may have been a prince once. But that was a long time ago. It's time I took this one back to the mystic lands to face his sentence." Malafor said, creating a portal nearby himself. "And once I'm through, I'm closing the exits so he can't escape." Malafor said.
"Sure shows him right. So, let's get..." Cynder said, but when she tried to go to her dad, he swatted her away. "Hey, what's the big deal?" Cynder asked.
"You stay with Spyro, my daughter. It's been a nice ride and all, but you and he deserve one another. Good bye..." Malafor said and started walking through the portal.
Upon realizing what her father was implying, Cynder tried to go for him, but was stopped by Cozy Glow. "LET ME GO! NO! DON'T LEAVE ME DADDY! PLEASE, PLEASE DON'T LEAVE ME! PLEASE!" Cynder cried out, tears in her eyes. With all of her might, Cozy Glow held back the young black dragoness and soon Malafor went through the portal, which collapsed behind him. "COZY GLOW, WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT FOR? WHY DID YOU STOP ME?!" Cynder exclaimed.
"Because...I made a promise to Malafor." Cozy Glow said. "He made me swear not to tell anyone, but considering the circumstances..." She added. "...He's going to die soon. And he knows you can't make portals like he can. So he didn't want you to throw away the one good thing in your life like he once did." The pegasus concluded.
"Throw away the one good thing in his life? Whatever do you mean?" Celestia asked.
"Malafor told me the truth about what happened that day he went missing. The monster attack...it was orchestrated...by him. Because of his mate not being nobility. His father would've never have let the two wed, Malafor's father would've only had let his son marry a true member of nobility, not a mere commoner." Cozy Glow explained. "So, Malafor came up with a plan. He had a monster attack the kingdom, and made it look like the monster had sent him and his mate through a portal. When in reality, the portal was of Malafor's own creation." She continued. "His one regret...his only regret was not saying goodbye to his mother before he left. She was one who didn't mind that Malafor was in love with a commoner. Every other dragon of the kingdom bullied the commoner, shamed her even. It was getting to the point where it was likely to get back to Malafor's father about the two's relationship." The pegasus kept explaining. "So Malafor chose to leave behind the only good thing in his life: His mother. He made me promise to make sure Cynder wouldn't make the same mistake he did. To make sure she didn't leave the only good thing in her life. Because Malafor came to regret his decision. He continues to regret that decision to this very day. He didn't want his daughter to come to live with the same regret he has been carrying to this day." Cozy Glow finished.
"F-father..." Cynder said. She sniffled a bit. "...I...I understand father...thank you father...for everything..." Cynder said.
"So, what do you think Malafor is going to do with Ripto now?" Twilight asked.
"Beats me. But if you ask me, it's not our jurisdiction in the first place." Cozy Glow said.
"She's right about that. But I can't help but wonder..." Celestia said.
Meanwhile, Malafor was with Ripto in the very castle of the Mystic Lands. No portals were there to escape to, nothing there but the dragon and the wizard.
"And just what did you just do? What have you caused?" Ripto asked.
"I've prevented you from ever being able to carry out your revenge Ripto. All the portals are closed off. There is no escape for you. No chance to get revenge." Malafor said.
"And what makes you so sure?" Ripto said before Malafor began to caugh violently; spewing out blood. "...No...it can't be..." Ripto noted.
"I'm dying Ripto. Because of the way you supercharged me and made me open all those portals. I kept them open so long because of my daugther, but my time is coming to a close. All because of what you did." Malafor said, violently coughing some more. "So, this is your fate now: Forever stuck here in this castle. Unable to get revenge. Unable to go anywhere eslse. It's what you've always wanted right? A castle to call your own? But not like this, am I right? Your litterally a ruler of nothing. The residents of these lands have long since left. You'll be forced to live here alone for the rest of your pathetic existence, Ripto. It's a fate worse than death for you." Malafor said before coughing some more. "...My time is niegh Ripto. Farewell..." The dragon said before having the largest coughing fit ever and the collapsing dead in front of the wizard.
It was some time later at the Castle of Friendship, the portal to the dragon realms was still at the School of Friendship.
"There was one thing I never did mention before now. But I might as well tell you now. You remember those one hundred light gems that I grabbed alongside Spryo and Cynder when we faced Red? By combining Avalar's orbs with Dragon Magic, Bianca's Magic, and the light gems, we were able to create a permanent gateway from the School and the Dragon Realms. So now, if you want to, you can go visit them whenever you all want to, and I can be over here whenever I want as well." Cozy Glow said.
"That's so cool." Rainbow Dash said.
"As cool as it is, there just remains one last loose end now: What's going to happen with Cozy Glow?" Cynder asked.
"Yes. That is the question now, isn't it; Princess Celestia." Twilight said, turning to her mentor. "As one of the princesses ruling Equestria, considering Cozy Glow now remembers full well what she's done, the decision on what happens to her falls to you after all." The purple alicorn said and teleported a documentation of separation to herself. "Just remember, make the wrong choice, and all I have to do is sign one of these, and Ponyville will no longer be part of Equestria." Twilight said.
"Twilight, are you sure that's wise?" Applejack asked.
"Cozy Glow has been through hell and back. We only got a taste of what she's been through with Ripto and The Sorceress turning into that two headed monster. Not only that, she's not only just a filly, but she's also an orphan without her adoptive dragon father back in the Dragon Realms. To choose to imprison some pony like her, after she just helped save Equestria AND the dragon realms from total war, if that hasn't made up for the fact she almost drained all of the magic from equestria, then I don't know what could." Twilight said. "Not to mention everything else she's done while away from us." She added.
"...Yeah that's a fair point. Consider the apple family behind you." Applejack said.
"She did some bad things yes, but she's more then made up for it. I'm on board." Fluttershy said.
"I need to throw her a 'welcome back and congratulations on defeating a bunch of evil bad guys' party, so count me in too!" Pinkie Pie said.
"Well I would most certainly like to see how Cozy Glow is going to be now that she's basically reformed, so count me in as well." Rarity said.
"I always stick by my friends, and Twilight's my friend to the end. Don't care if you kick me off the wonderbolts because of this Celestia, but my friends are more important to me than being a Wonderbolt so, I'm with Twilight one hundred and ten percent. Yes Twilight, I know that's not mathematically possible. Just this one time, can you let that go?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"I actually wasn't going to say anything that time. Because I'm putting the same amount of support behind Cozy Glow." Twilight said. "So Princess, are you going to let the princess side of you be in control and lose me as a friend forever; or for once, are you going to do the right thing?" She asked.
"My employment is with Twilight, so yeah. What she says goes with me." Flash Sentry said.
"Aunty, please, for once, don't make a stupid mistake." Cadence said.
"Let me just tap in here. I know it's not my place to give my two cents, but my father willingly made sure I wouldn't throw away a life with Spyro as my mate because he knew I love Spyro to death, and didn't want me to regret leaving him. I realize that now. My father once made the mistake of making the wrong choice and not taking his mother with him to the Mystic Lands. She was the one good thing in my father's life. Just like how Spyro is the one good thing in my life. But my father made sure I wouldn't live with regrets. Do you want to live like my father Princess Celestia? Do you want to send Cozy Glow to prison so bad for what she's done, you're willing to declare war with the rest of your nation to do so? Do you want to be imprisoned in Tartarus forever, constantly living with the regret you had making the choice to imprison Cozy Glow? Because that's what it was like for my father: Constantly living in a prison without the one good thing in his life. Do you want to do the same, Princess Celestia? Do you want to throw away your friendship with Twilight? From what I understand, she's the one good thing in your life. My father made my choice for me. And he made his choice and the choice he made made him live forever in regret. You now have to make a similar choice: Do you throw away the one good thing in your life, or do you choose to keep it? It all depends on what you decide to do with Cozy Glow." Cynder said.
Every creature and pony in the room looked towards the white alicorn with baited breath; waiting to hear just what she was going to choose.
"...Fine...I'll make my choice..." Celestia said. And then she teleported away right then and there.
"...Good call Celestia. Good call." Twilight said.
The far future...
"...As it turns out, Celestia had made a judgement call: She could no longer rule Equestria, when she could no longer accurately understand how her country had changed. Equestria was entering an age where creatures of all sorts would mingle in the glow of the magic of friendship, and Celestia felt that in this approaching age, she and Luna were no longer fit to be Equestria's rulers. So, the crown was passed to Princess Twilight Sparkle in three months' time, and it's not uncommon to see her or Princess Sunset Shimmer wondering around chatting with the common ponies." Cozy Glow, now much older, said to a class of various creatures and students.
"Well done Cozy Glow. That was very well done for your first solo flight." Miss Cheerilee said. "Well class, does any creature have any questions?" She asked.
"So, why has Miss Cozy Glow chosen to become a teacher here instead of the Friendship School?" A male Kirin asked.
"Because someone needed to keep this school the CMC went to up and running. They are my friends. They would apricate it if Ponyville Elementary was no longer in service. Besides, it's technically part of the Friendship School, even if it's not on the same grounds as the Friendship School." Cozy Glow said.
"That's very thoughtful of you Miss Cozy Glow." A female Earth pony said.
"Thank you for that compliment." Cozy Glow said. The bell rung. "Oh, and everyone don't forget your projects on Equestrian history are due tomorrow." The pegasus said. The class left the schoolhouse.
"Speaking of choices, seems you made yours in a way." Cheerilee said.
"Yep. I'm a pony that goes between two realms. Because one thing still remains the same about me after all these years: I was raised as a filly amongst dragons." Cozy Glow said with a smile.
Uncut Scene - Passing of the Torch (Warning: Dark)
A little after the incident with Cozy Glow, Rainbow Dash joined her fellow wonderbolts and the wonderbolt higher ups in the hosptial at Ponyville. Spitfire still looked pretty bad.
"Heh...heya Crash." Spitfire said. "Trust me, this looks worse than it does." She added.
"You holding in there, Captain?" Rainbow Dash asked.
The captain coughed a bit. "Not really. Prognostics don't look good. That darn magic from those strange creatures." Spitfire said.
"They were known as The Sorceress and Ripto Ma'm. And don't worry, me and my friends already took care of them and then some. I have a LOT to report when you get out of here." Rainbow Dash said.
Spitfire coughed again. "...Hey Crash, remember that time I made you Lightning Dust's Wingpony? When I made that choice, I wanted to simply humble you a little; get you to get your priorities straight. Didn't think it'd lead into the tornado incident. You had every right to be mad after that. Trouble is, if I had known better, I wouldn't have made you some obvious rookie's wingpony. That...was a mistake. Plus, we pinkie promised over it after the Crash nickname: No more transparency, next time, I tell you things straight up and not make any more mistakes." She said before coughing again.
"I remember. But you're going to pull through this. I know you will." Rainbow Dash said.
"Like I said Crash...no more Transparency." Spitfire said. "...I don't think I'm going to make it this time. Those magic users got me good." She added. "And I didn't forget, no more mistakes. And you don't deserve to be some pony's wingpony anymore." The captain said before having more of a coughing fit.
"C'mon Captain, don't be like that." Rainbow Dash said.
"I'm serious Rainbow Dash." Spitfire said. Hearing her proper name, Rainbow Dash suddenly realized, this was serious.
"...You...really aren't going to make it...are you Spitfire?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"'Fraid not Rainbow. And like I promised, no more mistakes." Spitfire said. "And you're going to have to give up that teaching spot with the friendship school after this but, like I said, no more mistakes." She added. "I'm sure the higher ups won't mind you staying around Ponyville considering your best buds with Princess Twilight. They'd lose their jobs if they didn't let that happen." Spitfire siad.
"She's got a fair point." One of the higher ups said.
"Yeah...we got nothing this time." The second higher up said.
"Can't even argue with her." The third higher up said.
"Besides...I know you'll fill my shoes once I'm gone Rainbow. You have the true heart of a Wonderbolt in you. Knew it from the first day I met you. So...that's why..." Spitfire was starting to cough up blood now. "That's why I want you as the new captain. No ifs, ands, buts, or even excuses. I know you'll do right by my name. I trust you. More than I've ever trusted anypony from my team before." Spitfire said.
"I...I understand ma'm. I'll do you proud Captain." Rainbow Dash said.
"You...don't have to call me captain anymore kiddo...you're the captain now. Don't you dare forget that." Spitfire said.
"I know I don't. But it wouldn't feel right calling you something else. Just...let me do it one last time. A proper send off." Rainbow Dash said.
"Heh...heart of a wonderbolt indeed...alright, special permission, as I pass the torch to you Crash." Spitfire said.
Rainbow Dash nodded and then saluted. "I'll make sure the wonderbolts have a bright future ahead of them in your name, Captain Spitfire." Rainbow Dash said, smiling but crying. "Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye, I Pinkie Promise to make sure the future of the Wonderbolts is bright." She added.
"Heh..." Spitfire said and saluted herself. "...I pinkie promise...to watch over your progress...cross my heart...hope to fly...stick a cupcake...in my eye..." Spitfire said before she went limp as she passed on from the world of the living.
"...Still going to give that report to you. Just going to take a lot longer than I thought it would. That's another promise." Rainbow Dash said.
"...We'll need to know everything as well. But we have no objection. With the EEP's policy rapidly vanishing, we feel we need some pony whose interacted with other races." The first higher up said.
"So, guess you better get started on working on that, huh Captain Dash?" The Second Higher up asked.
"And we have a feeling, you won't disappoint us." The third higher up said.
"I won't. Because there's one thing you should know about a Pinkie Promise." Rainbow Dash said. "If you break one, it's the best way to lose a friend forever. So best not do something that could break this one." She added.
"We wouldn't dream of it." The first higher up said.