Sunset the paused and looked at him, realizing what he had said earlier. "Wait, Star Swirl, as in Star Swirl the Bearded?" She asked.
Mal nodded.

"Yeah it was him, not a good name if you ask me, he did however show a way to resist my soul removal."

"But, everything I've ever read says that Star Swirl was a good pony. He helped Equestria several times and revolutionized magic."

"Exactly, he only helped ponies. As soon as he saw I wasn't a pony he was ready to label me as evil."

"Wow, I can't believe someone as revolutionary as Star Swirl was racist. Are you sure it was him?"

"Oh, he made sure to tell me several times. But that's not important. He was able to resist my soul removal."

"Right, sorry." Sunset said, clearly embarrassed. "Star Swirl was a bit of an idol for me so that was a little hard to process. Well, Star Swirl was known for studying unorthodox schools of magic, he may have found one that actually strengthened his soul, or gave him some control over it."

Mal thought it over. "Perhaps... Then again he could’ve had an extremely strong will. I don’t know myself no one has been able to fight it off before." He finished.
The two headed back to the house. There, Trixie, Moon and Chrysalis saw that Sunset had found him.

"What happened?" Moon asked.

Mal said casually, "I fought Star Swirl the Bearded and claimed his soul."

Everyone was wide eyed. "What, how? I thought he had died." Moon asked.

Mal shrugged. "I guess he found a way to be of service for centuries later."

"That certainly sounds like something Star Swirl would do." Moon replied.

"So what was he like?" Trixie asked.

"He was an egotistical prick who was an utter racist." Mal stated.

"That's, disappointing." Trixie replied.

"Oh, and he was able to resist my soul removal. The girls' eyes widened at him saying this.

"How'd he manage to do that?" Chrysalis asked.

"I don't really know, and right now I don't care. I'm gonna go crash on the couch for a while." Mal said.

---------------- Twilight was once again in her library. She sighed at having to do Spike’s job. 'Spike are you alright?' She asked herself in her mind.

"Twilight Ya'll all right in there." It was Applejack with Pinkie pie and Rarity. She opened the door to see them.

"Oh I'm fine why wouldn't I be? It’s not like Discord just took Spike with him into outer space." Twilight said sarcastically. Suddenly an object fell from the sky in a glow. Right in front of Twilight was a letter.

Dear Twilight Sparkle, on star date.... You know what, let me tell you how Spike’s doing? Well he had accidentally became a God to a bunch of stone age squids.... Oh and I think we just caused a civil war, and a planetary invasion, oh and he got to destroy a planet! You should have seen his face, it was like lighting fireworks. Well we are heading to the next galactic arm cya.
Signed, the Starship Discord.

"What's the letter say Twilight?" Pinkie asked. Twilight could almost feel her mind melt from the contents of the letter in front of her. After a minute or so she was able to compose herself enough to respond to Pinkie.

"Enough to know that a certain dragon is going to get a long talking to when he gets home."

"What did Discord rope 'im into?" Applejack asked with a sigh.

"Apparently, Discord let Spike destroy a planet, and they caused a civil war, and who knows what else they did that he isn't telling me."

"Well on the bright side, at least Spike is safe, darling." Rarity offered.

"Yeah but who knows what they are doing now?" Twilight said.

In the void of space Spike and Discord were caught in a space fight.

"Time to go." Discord said as they FTL jumped phasing through the planet.

"So did anything positive happen at all?" Pinkie Pie asked Twilight.

Twilight rolled her eyes. "Would you call becoming a god to a bunch of stone age squids good."

Hmm, I don't know. That depends, were they good squids or bad squids?" Pinkie asked.

"What the hay is the difference between a good squid and a bad squid?"

"You don't want to know.” Pinkie said cryptically, shuddering for a moment.

"Let's just move away from squids." Twilight said, not wanting to know what Pinkie was talking about this time. "It seems like Discord is going to be keeping Spike in space for a while."

"Yeah, but Ah guess he'll be safe. Discord is a reality warpin' god after all." Applejack said.

"Yeah, shifting to another topic, I still haven't heard anything from Celestia." Twilight said, not wanting to think about her baby dragon anymore for the rest of the day.
She was right she had not received word from Celestia. Even when she had sent a letter about Prince Victor of the gargoyles, and Discord taking Spike.

"Oh Mr. Cake had a relative go to court and instead of Celestia it was Luna who was holding it." Pinkie pie Started. Landing right next to them was Rainbow Dash.

"Hey I'm back from Griffonia." She said. "So what did I miss?"

"We were talking about the fact that we haven't heard anything from Celestia in over a week. And Pinkie why didn't you tell us that Luna was holding court for Celestia?"

"Nobody asked me." Pinkie said with a shrug. "I didn't think it was a big deal, I just thought she might have a cold."

"Can Celestia even get colds?" Rainbow Dash asked. Twilight paused, she actually didn't know if Celestia could get a cold or not. She had never heard of it happening.

"I think we should go to Canterlot and check to see if she's okay." Twilight stated.

At Canterlot Princess Luna had finally finished court. The more interesting thing was a group of nobles hoping to do business with prance. Luna herself allowed it against her better judgment to allow it. Just as she was about to leave the door opened up showing Twilight Sparkle and her friends minus Fluttershy. "Twilight what can I do for you?" Luna said with a smile.

"Hello. Princess Luna. I was just wondering something, is everything okay with Princess Celestia?" Luna paled at the question. She had known that Twilight would wonder about this sooner or later. She had just hoped for later. Still, Twilight deserved to know the truth, if the worst came to pass then she would most likely need to call on them for help.

"Follow me Twilight, you need to see something."

They stopped right next to Celestia’s room. "This all started the day I brought my new 'stallion'friend to meet her." Luna started. Everyone paused at this.
"A stallionfriend you must tell us darling who is it?" Rarity asked.

"Well not to go over it into too much detail, it’s Discord." The ponies’ expressions ranged from confusion to shock to Pinkie's which seemed to be both and happiness, and excitement. Twilight was the first to ask.

"Discord?!" She half asked half screamed.

"Yes, I may find his sense of humor endearing every now and then." Luna admitted sheepishly. The others looks remained unchanged. "Look, my taste in suitors isn't important right now. What is important that my sister passed out and when Discord and I went into her dream to check on her she went into her own nightmare form that she called Solar Flare. And ever since then she has been unconscious. We have a barrier erected around her room to prevent her escape if she has succumbed to darkness, and she's under constant guard supervision to monitor her."

Everyone was shaken by this, Twilight more so. Celestia was her mentor and even almost a second mother to her. The fact that she had an inner evil side scared her.
"So you told Celestia you were with Discord and she's going to freak out and go all eternal sun and burn us all to death?" Pinkie Pie summed it up.

"What are we going to do hit her with the Elements?" Rainbow dash asked. Luna shook her head.

"No, like Nightmare Moon that will only postpone Solar Flare, the only way is to remove the Solar Flare part of her soul, and as we all know, there's only one being who can do that." Luna finished. Everyone minds returned to the angel who removes souls.

"So if Celestia goes evil we will have the Angel of death fight her? Are you sure that's a good idea?" Twilight asked.

"Actually, I do." Luna answered.

Twilight who was on the border of hysterics after all the stress she had been under cried, "How? How can you trust him so readily? He nearly killed you and Celestia the last time you met."

"Because I have been in contact with Nightmare Moon, and she is actually reformed now. Malthael actually took the darkness in my soul and turned her into a normal mare... for the most part, she does enjoy teasing me mercilessly. I'd be willing to bet that Malthael would be willing to help us with this problem, if it is in fact a problem. Celestia could overcome this on her own. We must all be patient." Luna finished.

--------------- Mal’s group finally came to the next town. The townspeople however were a bit of a surprise. The inhabitants looked like humanoid dragons many of them had spears, or pikes as Malthael realized. Next was a big building in the center which was made with some stone as was the towns wooden walls seemed a bit more advance being bigger and having towers.

"I'm betting Prance must either be sending elites troops against them, or they’ve heard about the attacks on the other islands." Malthael said. He and his group walked up. The guards’ pikes blocked them.

"Halt what be yea business here." The dragons had a kinda Irish and Scottish mix accent.

"I am Malthael, my group and I are travelers. I hear you may have seen four legged invaders." The guards looked at each other.

"Yes the invaders, our lord was in a meeting about them."

"Well then, would you be so kind as to let us in and allow us to meet with your lord? We have been helping around the islands with the invaders and would like to offer our services." The guards exchanged a look and seemed to have a telepathic conversation.

"Alright, we'll let ya see 'im, but ya better not try anything outsider, we may not be as big as our dragon cousins, but we'll still charbroil you faster than ya can blink." Mal nearly rolled his eyes at their threat, but didn't feel like antagonizing them. The guards led them to a long hallway where a large dragonoid was sitting on a throne.

In his hall the local lord looked over the maps showing his holdings and a few nearby holdings from other lords. Finally, it showed the invaders and the few lords who allied with the invaders. One of the guards came up. "Sir, we have travelers who have claimed to have dealings with these invaders before, they appear foreign, that’s for sure."

The lord's eyes rose. "Send them in I wish to meet them." Mal and his group walked in and each gave a small gesture of respect to the lord. "Greetings travelers, I am the lord of this settlement. I have been told that you have experience dealing with these Prench invaders."

"That's correct," Mal told the lord. "We've already taken out their forces that were attacking the Earthen and Goblins. Now, we're here to help your people."

"Those certainly are grand claims, how do I know you're telling us the truth?" Mal held his hand out a glowing object appeared. The orb was unlike anything the Lord had ever seen. He suddenly felt something creep up him, a feeling of primal fear. "What is that?" The lord asked.

"Oh, one of those Prench pony’s souls." Mal said. Suddenly the object started to say.

"What’s happening, where am I?" The soul said. The lord almost felt a need to beg for his life.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"Malthael, The Angel of Death, reaper of souls." He said adding a little something else. The guards bowed a bit in fear and respect.

"You’re death?" The lord asked.

"Well technically yes, I'm an aspect of death."

"If you're death then why are you helping us?" The lord asked. "Because I want to help defend your home, these ponies are extremely racist and see you as nothing more than beasts. I'm here to help you prove them wrong."

"What do you want in return?" The lord asked disbelieving that something like this was happening to him.

"We'll just take a few basic supplies when we're done." Mal said.

"Do you really expect me to believe this?"

"You can believe whatever you want. Right now, we should focus on driving out these ponies." Mal said with a shrug. The lord showed Mal and his group the map and explained their situation.

To say Malthael was a bit surprised was a understatement. "So they actually have a few lords under their thrall? How did that happen?"

The lord sighed. "They were vassals to bigger lords when the invaders came a few helped them in exchange for their higher deaths. The ponies use a fort as the base for them." The base was opened but bigger then th goblin fort. "With them is the bulk of their forces a few dozen mercs, and even members of my kind form the rebels, they even have a dragon, one of our cousins with them."

"Wow, this is going to be a bit of a challenge. Maybe we should try focusing on going after the smaller strongholds and getting these vassals back on our side. Unfortunately there will be casualties among your people. But hopefully we can prevent any deaths among the civilians."

"It doesn't matter, they betrayed our people, but I must agree about the civilians, the serfs have little choice in the matters of politics."

"Glad to see we're on the same page. Now our biggest problem is the dragon." Mal said picking up the piece representing the dragon. "I'm thinking that I should take it out on my own. That way, we can devote more of our forces to the other battles.”

“Do you really believe you can do this?” One of the council members asked. “Dragons are among the most powerful beings in the world.”

“That’s good because I am too.” Mal said with a chuckle.

The dragon ambush was about to happen. Malthael Trixie, Moon, and Chrysalis had looked up at the camp where the dragon was being kept. 5 unicorns and 5 pegasi were there with the dragon. Moon looked with surprise. "That’s an above average size dragon, an adult, and I'm thinking it has plenty of combat experience." Moon said looking though the telescope. Malthael took it. Indeed it had the scars of a beast who had years of fighting experience. It also had on some light armor on its neck and head with some of its chest also guarded.

"Well, that armor is gonna make things a little difficult. Still, as long as I find a way to pierce that hide, I should be able to remove its soul."

"Are you sure you can remove souls?" Chrysalis asked. "What if what happened with Star Swirl happens here?"

"If it does then I still have my Death Fog, not to mention a whole slew of other abilities that I haven't tried yet."

"You have more abilities?" Moon asked.

"What did you think I was a one trick pony?" Mal asked with a cheeky grin on his face.

"Trixie would be disappointed in you for making that joke, but she's just surprised that you didn't make it earlier." Trixie replied, facepalming.

"Alright, now we've got the pre-battle jokes out of the way, you girls take out the ponies while I go slay a dragon… and I love that I can say that without any form of metaphor or irony."

The small group nodded. With that, Trixie took to the sky on her broom and Chrysalis and Moon stayed on the ground. Malthael also moved around into the air as well. At the camp a unicorn require looked as he saw two beings walking up. Moon and chrysalis unleashed their magic sparking the fight. Up above Trixie unleashed her newest spell. Several false doubles appeared and the battle began in the sky. The dragon got up to see the battle, he turned to see Malthael who jumped up and attempted to remove the dragon’s soul via his blades shot into the shoulder. As the glow came up it appeared he was winning until the backlash happened that the soul returned, healing the dragon.

"I will not die!" The dragon screamed.

'I'm guessing willpower let him resist me.'

"Hey scales, your mother was a salamander and your father smelled of brimstone!" Malthael screamed, darting around the dragon. The dragon growled and let out a gout of flame at the angel. Malthael dodged the flames and rushed toward the dragon. Malthael stabbed one of his sickles into the dragon's eyes, causing blood and other fluids to gush from the wound. The dragon roared in pain and slammed one of his claws into Malthael. Malthael crashed and bounced off the ground. He picked himself up and took off, narrowly avoiding being stepped on by the dragon.

Malthael looked at the being he soon channeled energy into his blades. He was soon joined by the dragon in air. The beast fired flames at him, which malthael countered by flying away from it. Fire was soon unleashed from Malthael, the soul sweep soon covered the dragon. The beast gave a laugh at the attempt. "Fool I don't feel a thing." However his boasting was ended when the leather and rope bindings of his armor started to give. A few on his chest fell on the ground falling on top a unicorn. The leather mostly gave out losing his armor. Malthael then flew in. Using his blades he latched on the chest armor and cut the side off. The dragon threw him off but the armor soon gave out and flew again this time crushing an injured pegasus.

Malthael laughed at the dragon in return. "You really have to take better care of your equipment."

"You worthless, little maggot! I will have your charred bones between my teeth!"

"I doubt that." Malthael shot back at the dragon, blades at the ready. Malthael flew at the dragon and headed towards its underbelly. The dragon belched out more flames at Malthael. He dodged the flames and stabbed both of his sickles into the dragon's underbelly, attempting to steal the dragon's soul again.

The same light shined as the dragon cried out slowly it seemed Malthael was just about to win when the soul returned into the dragon he threw him off. "I have had enough of you!" The beast let out fires at point blank for a moment only fire was seen as Moon and Trixie looked on with fear. Until a fog of death started to push the flames was seen all around it the fires died in intensity until they were gone. A cloud of death formed around Malthael and the dragon. From the sky the bones of the dragon fell with Malthael in the middle, his sickles glowing. He saw the bones and was slowly debating. The other three saw as the fog started up. Moon, Chrysalis, and Trixie got out of the way, the glowing sickles started to be cover in his death fog. 'Here goes nothing.' He slammed into the ground. He pulled up his sickles and spread them, two streams of fog was formed which he waved around. Those not guarded were not killed but slowly decaying he finally waited until barriers were down and unleashed it a 360 death fog. Their souls soon added to those he already held.

Malthael panted slightly, he had never used his fog like that before. He looked over at Chrysalis, Trixie and Moon, with a slight small on his face. "Well, I got rid of our dragon problem, how'd you girls do?" The girls snapped out of their stupor and rushed over to Mal.

"Thank goodness you're okay!" Moon cried, throwing her arms around Mal. Mal was shocked, he had never seen Moon act like this. Mal returned the hug that Moon had him locked in, and stroked the back of her head.

"Hey, there's nothing to worry about. It'll take a little more than some fire to take me out." Mal told her.

"I know, it just looked like..." Mal cut her off the best way he knew how. He tilted her head up and planted a surprise kiss on her lips.

"Sorry Moon, but you're gonna be stuck with me for a long time."

The group returned to the nobles’ town. The noble himself saw the group return. "So is the dragon gone?" The Lord asked. Mal held his hand out showing the glowing ball.

"This soul says everything, the dragon didn't want to die so he fought me each time I attempted to remove but as they say, you can only fight death for so long." Malthael finished. He also reached into his magical bag. "Also here's a dragon’s tooth and a little something for you." He pulled out an Equestrian sword used by one of the unicorns.

"These should help a great deal. I may be able to turn this tooth into a dagger."

"Glad you'll be able to get some use out of these. Now, let's go plan our attack on the other settlements."

"Very well, let's go study the map."

The lord took Mal and the girls to the map room, where Sunset was waiting for them. "Mal, I'm glad you're okay!" She said rushing to his side. Mal rolled his eyes and put an arm around Sunset.

"Come on Sunset, I already told you that there's nothing in this world I can't handle."

"I know, but I still worry about you."

"I hate to interrupt but we really should work on our battle plans." The lord told them.

The map was a bit updated. It showed allied lords getting ready to attack the rebels. It also showed a sign where the dragon was gone. "Our scouts are reporting raiders Near the outer villages, the allies are reading their forces to invade a few rebels and the invaders lines are being raided by the local outlaws turns out they hate them more than us."

"I guess there is honor amongst thieves after all." Mal said.

"Perhaps, but we are keeping an eye on them. The last thing we need is for them to betray us."

"Good idea, now remember, we are to avoid civilian casualties at all costs." Mal stated.

"We know, we wish not to bring harm to the serfs either, they will be kept safe." The lord proclaimed.

Author's Note

You all get three chapters today because I like ya a lot