Of Mythical Proportions

There was laughter and merriment wherever one looked, the streets filled with bodies of all shapes and sizes, slowly getting into the swing of the first day of the Spring of Rebirth. As far as one could see, griffons and all manner of foreign species were either eating, drinking or simply playing in the streets.

Nova was none of the above, as he was currently running late for the tournament.

After a whole lot more running than one should do after just waking up, Nova finally caught a glimpse at the entrance to the arena, the only body in sight was a griffon guard standing outside the gate, holding a checklist.

The guard glanced up from his list, before sighing in frustration.

"I'm assuming you're Carolus Rex correct?" He asked, Nova giving him a quick nod. "Geez buddy, a few more minutes and I would have shut the entrance, but at least you're here, now, if you please hand in the forum you were given."

Nova rummaged through his pockets, handing in the handout of had been given, from what he had to fill in yesterday, it seemed to be both a rules list and questionnaire about how the fighter will be using.

The guard gave it a quick once over, his eyes almost looked surprised as he read the last part.

"Huh, that's a new one, didn't know.... well, it doesn't matter, as long as you keep it within the set rules, it should be fine, now get your tail in there and head to block D, the sign will point you the right way." The guard moved to the side, letting Nova stroll right on in.

Little did he know, Nova still hadn't read any of the rules, he took out the copy he had made the night before and started to read while he walked.

Elsewhere, Ares, Terra, Twilight, Rainbow, Applejack and, surprisingly, Pinkie had just taken their seats in the royal box above the arena stands, griffons as far as the eyes could see filled almost every seat available, every single one with an excited look on their faces.

"Quite the turnout ah see, ah think there's more griffons here than there were Ponies in Canterlot." Applejack said.

"Well, the tournament is the most popular event of the festival, since griffons are natural predators, they need a way to satisfy that part of their nature, this is one of the few legal ways." Terra explained.

Rainbow leaned closer to Pinkie "Uh, are you sure you wanna see this Pinkie, I mean apparently no ones gonna get too badly hurt cuz of the spell, but..." Rainbow said, worried for her friend.

"It's fine Dashie, I mean, sure I don't like it when others get hurt, or they hurt each other, but this is like, really important to them, and if it makes them happy I should at least give it a watch." Pinkie said, surprising everyone.

"Quite the mature response young one, you really are full of surprises, especially after how much you apparently help set up yesterday." Ares said. "Now, lets get this speech out of the way."

Standing back up, Ares walks to the edge of the box, clearing his voice.

"Silence."

The entire arena shook slightly as he spoke, followed by the complete silence and attention of everyone present.

"Today, we gather here to celebrate the passing of another harsh winter, one of the hardest we've had in recent history, but as always, our people have persevered and endured it!" A loud cheer went up through the crowd, before Ares silenced it by raising his claw.

"The winter is past us, and today is not about it, today we all gather here to see warriors of all sizes clash against one another in glorious battle, however, due to the overwhelming amount of participants this year, we have broken the battle royal stage into four different blocks to make sure we get through it in one day. Now, without further delay-" Ares turned mid speech and nodded towards Twilight, how began to release the spell she had been channeling. "Let the first battle of the Spring of Rebirth begin!"

On cue, Twilight let her magic flow, channeling it into the already present enchantment, the entire arena was suddenly cloaked in magic, marking the beginning of the tournament.

"Guess it's starting." Nova mumbled to himself. The cheering of the crowds was so loud it drowned out all the noise in the room he was in.

After having walked into the wrong room around three times, a guard had taken pity on him and not so gently dragged him to his assigned block, he found himself surrounded by mostly griffons, however he spotted the odd Pony, Dog and Minotaur every now and then.

The tension in the room was so thick you could cut it with a knife, everyone was standing or sitting in groups of those they knew, avoiding contact with their rivals.

At least most were.

"Well, well, get a look at this mutt over here boys!" A voice said.

Nova, assuming the insult was directed at him, looked up to see he was suddenly surrounded by a semi-circle of thuggish looking griffons.

"Is there something you need friend?" Nova asked, keeping his voice neutral, but inside he was laughing is arse off already.

"There sure is 'friend' how about you get your ugly mug out of here, you're stinking this place up ya' freak!" The assumed 'leader' said, getting a laugh from his friends.

By this point most of the other fighters were now focused on them, waiting for something to happen. However, Nova had just finished reading the rules, especially the part saying that any fighting before their match will result in immediate disqualification.

Nova stood straight up, then looked down at the griffon, before giving him a disarming smile.

"My, it seems you have bested me in the contest of words good sir, I shall retire from my spot and move elsewhere as you request." He said, giving his best nobles impression.

Nova slowly moved his body to tower over the griffons leader, his body visibly tightening in what looked like barely restrained fury, at least it looked like it, in reality, he was acting the part. He gave the griffon and snarl and frightening grin.

"Let's see how that shit talk helps you in the arena, bird brain." With that, he simply moved past the very frightened group of griffons to a more secluded spot in the room.

After the incident, most of the other fighters made a point to avoid Nova, which is what he had been aiming for, the less others interacted with him, the less chance they had to possibly figure out who he really was. He took a moment to stretch out his body to relax, just as he felt the bench he was sitting on shift.

Looking to his right, now sat a particularly large, red scaled, heavily armored anthropomorphic dragon.

He couldn't really help but stare at the sight, even with everything he had seen so far on his misadventures, there was a real live dragon sitting right next to him. He honestly felt like a little kid, lost in wonder over the sight.

Unfortunately, his very obvious staring (and maybe just the tiniest bit of drool) seemed to have caught the attention of said dragon.

"Excuse me, but just what are you staring at?" An annoyed, and feminine voice asked him. He mentally corrected dragon, to dragoness, before blushing slightly, embarrassed at letting himself get caught staring.

"Oh, sorry about that, it's just that, well, you're the first dragon I've really ever met, guess I was just a bit wonder-struck. I'm N-" He suddenly coughed, cutting himself off and stopping his mistake. "Sorry, I'm Carolus Rex, but you can just call me Rex."

It was obvious from the look on her face that she had expected either something rude or vulgar rather than a polite response. Finally realizing someone had just introduced themselves to her, she regained her composure.

"Well, then you may call me Ruby, I'll admit, the last thing I expected to find here today was someone willing to be friendly."

"Yeah, I get what you mean, just cuz were going to be beating the crap out of each other soon doesn't mean you have to be a dick." Nova shot a glance towards the group of griffons from earlier. "Seems not everyone thinks that way."

"I heard that commotion from the other side of the room, he's just talking tough because he managed to convince a bunch of other lowlifes that it had to be a griffon that won." Ruby said, the disgust obvious in her voice.

Nova took the chance to give her a proper once over, though she was mostly covered in sturdy looking armor, a lot of her red scales were still visible. Nova assumed that with her being a dragon, her scales alone were probably enough armor for most weapons, speaking of, she had a nasty looking spear resting against her right side, it was almost two times his size. What really caught his attention were her eyes, reptilian in nature, they were a blazing red, it was almost like looking into a ruby.

He mentally slapped himself for the terrible pun he just made concerning her name.

Nova and Ruby spent the better part of their waiting time mindlessly chatting about her first few days in Griffonstone, Nova being careful to avoid having her ask too many questions about him fake identity.

"That's enough about me though, what about you Rex? what wer-" Nova as already panicking.

Thankfully, their conversation was interrupted by a very loud horn blow, singling that it was finally their blocks time to enter the arena.

"Ah, looks like it's time to finally get out there, I'll save the questions till after I wipe the floor with you." Ruby said, a smug look on her face.

"Oh ho, feisty aren't ya? hmm, I'll tell you what though, wouldn't it be more fun for us to fight in the one on one matches, rather than the royale?" He suggested. Standing up and following the rest of the fighters.

Surprisingly, Ruby seemed to seriously consider this, eventually nodding her head.

"Alright then Rex, we have a deal, no attacking each other during this part, but you better promise me you'll make it to the finales, because I'll be waiting for you." She said, her already red eyes seeming to catch alight with passion.

As they finally stepped out into the open arena, Nova gave her a smile and thumbs up, before the guard yelled for their attention.

"Alright fighters, I know you're all excited, having to have waited so long for your turn, you lot are the final fight of the day, so make it a good one! Now, everyone spread out a nice distance from one another across the arena, hurry up now!"

Everyone rushed out to stake their position in the arena, as Nova was about to do the same, Ruby grabbed his shoulder to stop him.

"Hang on there, I'll take the far side of the arena, if you stay here, better chance we don't fight each other." With that, she suddenly took off in a strange mix of running and flying, making it to the other side before anyone else.

Nova rolled his eyes, but admitted it was a good idea, turning around, he claimed a small spot against the wall near the entrance. As the last fighter got into place, and the guards signaled Ares that they were happy with everyone's placements, Ares cleared his voice to speak once again.

"Today has been a great day of battle for us, we have had the honor of seeing some of the best warriors This year has to offer. Now, we are down to one last, glorious fight!" Ares looked down to each one of the fighters, as he eventually reached Nova, his gaze lingered a second longer, before snapping back into his speech. "Fighters, give us a good send off for the first day of the Spring of Rebirth, now, BEGIN!"

All at once there was an explosion of noise, the crowd roar to life in cheers and excitement, while more than a few of the fighters roared out in rage. The chaos began instantly, the sound of metal striking metal, bodies crashing against one another, each with the intent to kill their opponent. It took almost all of Nova's willpower not to let himself get carried away in the violent emotions himself, instead his attention was drawn to the two griffons who were quickly flying towards him.

As one got close enough to almost tear at his throat, Nova stepped to the side, and the griffons face got a nice personally one on one with the arena's wall, turning his attention to the one remaining, He quickly pulled out the blade he had been practicing within his dreams.

The blade went straight into the griffon chest, with him flying so fast, Nova didn't have to do much more than simply hold the blade up for him to impale himself on it. As he drew the blade back from the griffon, he noticed the lack of blood, checking the griffon, it seemed that rather than dead, he had been knocked out.

"Well, it's a relief to know they weren't lying about the spell then." He said to himself.

His senses alerted him to the sound of hoof beats quickly approaching him, he looked up just in time to see a unicorn summon an ungodly amount of arrows.

"Oh shi-" His words were cut short as the arrows were released.

Deciding that becoming a magic pincushion didn't sound all that fun, he rolled forward and under the magic volley, bringing his blade cleanly across the Unicorns throat. Once again, he quickly checks his blade, and once again finds no blood on it.

"So, I really don't have to worry about really hurting anyone here, huh?" He said quietly. A large grin crept its way onto his face as he looked out at the orgy of violence unfolding without him.

"I'd say it's time to cut loose a little." He announced, charging into the fray.

A long, bloodless battle later.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Ruby facing off against what looked like to be a Minotaur using nothing but a giant tower shield, this quick look almost got him skewered in the shoulder by a spear from one of the six griffons flying just out of his reach.

Most of the fighters simply laid knocked out on the ground now, the crowd was now divided into groups, each cheering their favorite fighter one. Although it was nice to have his own giant fan group, having someone constantly call your name in a fight was rather distracting.

Unfortunately, the group of griffons currently keeping his attention just had to be the ones from earlier today.

"Ha ha, look at the flightless mutt, what are you gonna do to us up here?" He teased as he tried to take a poke, missing like a fuck wit.

Although Nova could simply just jump in the air to take them, he could take a lot of hits doing it, and although such attacks would never really hurt him, it would make a lot of people wonder how he was able to still stand after that. Sighing, he decided he had no other choice but to use his trump card, concentrating on his blade for a second, the blade quickly morphed into a large crossbow.

Nova simply aimed up at the now very confused griffons, and shot each one out of the sky.

"Wait, what?!" Twilight exclaimed, having just seen the diamond dog named Carolus Rex seemingly pulled a crossbow out of nowhere.

"How did he do that? I didn't see him bring anything in apart from that blade, was that magic, and is that legal?"

Terra chuckled. "Very much so, you saw that unicorn at the beginning with the magic arrows, correct? Magic is perfectly legal as long as its not too much, it's listed on his profile as his 'magic' power."

"I haven't seen him use it this whole time though, why wasn't he using it?" Rainbow asked.

"Because, he was trying to save his ace in the whole for the finals, and if I had to guess, that crossbow isn't going to be the only thing he's going to pull out." Ares answered.

Everyone seemed to accept this, but Twilight, how now found herself unable to look away from the masked Diamond Dog.

After shooting down a lot more griffons, Nova quickly turned to shoot whatever movement he heard behind him, before Ares voice exploded to life.

"All fighters stand down, the match has been concluded! He announced.

Nova let his body finally relax, looking up to see he had almost shot an earth pony wearing nothing but leather armor, which is rather grim considering he's a Pony.

"Ha, close call, one more second and there would have been one less finalist." Nova teased the Pony.

"Yeah, almost planted your head into the ground there friend." He said, returning the snark.

Turning away from the snarky Pony, He looked around to see if Ruby had made it, only to see that she and the Minotaur with the giant tower shield had apparently still been fighting one another. Before he could go over to them two guards approached, then split off to him and Pony.

"Alright, congratulations on making it this far, now come along, we are going to show you where you'll be staying tonight." The guard explained.

"Wait, you mean we can't just go home?" Nova asked, the Pony already following his guard.

"Sorry, but this is to prevent someone attacking the finalists before their fights, or to prevent any... foul play."

Nova sighed in defeat, too tired to argue with the guard, and followed in tow.

After what seemed like forever, Nova finally found himself alone in the room he had been provided, at first he thought he was going to be stuffed in a cell, given that he was still in the arena. Surprisingly, it seemed that the finalists were actually given rather nice quarters to stay in, although the lack of a window was annoying, same with the two guards he could hear on the other side of the door.

Flopping down onto the queen sized bed, He gave a long, drawn out yawn, before smiling to himself. The thought of finally getting a proper nights' sleep after all the nights he had spent awake in his dreams, endlessly making weapons then practicing with them was finally over.

Tomorrow, he could finally fight at 100%.

In the early morning sun slowly began to rise in the distance, a lone figure entered a store.

"Uh, hello dearest customer, I knew opening early would pay off." The Unicorn greeted. "Now, what can I get for you today?"

The cloaked figure said nothing, eventually walking up to the counter and pointed at the amulet on display.