King of the Dead

The land was an odd mix of shadow and a blazing white moon. If it wasn’t pitch-black, it was almost illuminated with white light. Storm clouds rage overhead, exchanging furious rumbles that rattled the palace. Sitting perfectly in an open area between the clouds, was the moon itself. It had to be several times its normal size. Amongst it all, was Luna standing confidently. Black, magical smoke pours off every inch of her body, as if she was consumed with dark flames. White light streams from her mouth and eyes.

Zaran’s face was contorted in concentration. There was no way he had anticipated this. It was nice seeing him caught off-guard for a change. His muscles tense and he stands in a constant ready position. Luna walks casually towards him as if she’d already won.

Cadence rushes into the room and stops next to Celestia.
“Are we doing this!?”
Celestia shakes her head gently without taking her focus away from the vision orb.
“Not yet. We need to wait until the perfect moment. We have the shield, so now we need to watch and learn.”
Lucretia and Emeris exchange glances before Emeris walks over to the princess.
“What is she talking about?”
Celestia holds up a hoof.
“Not now Emeris, I shall tell you when it is time. Let us watch for now. I want to know what else Zaran might have up his sleeve.”

I walk over and stand next to Cadence. “Princess, if you don’t mind, I want to ask a few questions.” She stares at me curiously but nods.
“For starters, I’ve seen you alicorns combine your magic. Can you do that with Luna? Assuming she needs it?”
Cadence purses her lips and lets out a small sigh. “Technically yes, but ascending is different. It requires a constant balance. If we transfer our magic to her and she’s not able to keep stabilized, she’d be a massive magical bomb and not even the shield could stop that.”

Celestia chimes in without taking her eyes off the orb. “Even if she could keep herself centered, Zaran would certainly attack while she did it. We have to wait for a time where she’s putting out a lot of magical energy and Zaran is also not able to move in. It would certainly be easier for her to balance herself if she can just send all the extra power into a blast instead of holding it in.”

Luna continues to walk as slow as she can, drinking in Zaran’s fear. Her smile is oddly illuminated as white light spills out between her lips. “Tell me Zaran, did you predict this? Was it all part of your plan? I’ve always mused with Raiden over whether you honestly predicted all of this or you’re just good at thinking on the fly. Maybe you thought of your biggest obstacles, planned for those and a few curveballs in case something unexpected came up.”

Luna stops and her eyes search Zaran’s body. He still stands there silently, tense and waiting to react. Luna leans her head back and grins. “I saw that second element you’ve been holding onto as a backup plan. Let me see it.”

Luna teleports behind Zaran and mid backflip hits him with both her rear hooves. A blue sphere surrounds him right before contact, but he still goes flying. We hear him grunt painfully as he skids across the ground. Before he’s even stopped, Luna is on him with another punch from her right hoof. Zaran smashes through a tree and cries out painfully.

Emeris stands next to me, eyes locked on the orb. “I don’t think that shield blocks everything. I mean even if it stops him from getting hurt directly, being sent forward that fast would still suck. I mean is he slamming into his shield from the inside?”

I nod slowly, both consumed with watching Zaran get knocked around like a ragdoll but also waiting for him to pull out one last ace like he always does.

Zaran stumbles around on four legs, shaking his head gently as he stares at the ground. He looks up and with bulging eyes, leaps into the air. He gets about four feet before Luna appears above him. She stomps on his shield, sending him into the ground again. He collides against the dirt and bounces into the air with his eyes shut tight with agony. Luna flips in midair before he’s reached her and sends him flying with another rear kick.

His face strains and he stops himself in the air, panting wildly. Luna’s horn erupts in a devastating combination of black and white magic as a massive chain lashes out and wraps itself around his shield. She jerks her body to the left, pulling him along with it.

He gets slammed into the ground again and bounces off. Luna nails him midair with a blast from her horn. His shield bends inwards as he tries to keep himself in place. Luna leans back her head and laughs. Zaran narrows his eyes furiously. A red beam erupts from his forehead and slams into Luna’s chest. She screams and her wings bend forward as she flies back. Zaran rockets towards her in a furious rage.

Luna quickly lands on all four hooves and lets out a blast as wide as her body. Zaran easily dodges it but the beam suddenly erupts into a whirlwind of magical chains. The moment one wraps around him, a loud crackling fills the air. He screams in agony as even more chains tie themselves to him. He roars and a red shield forces itself out from his body, breaking the chains. He charges up a ball of energy as he flies at Luna. She teleports behind him but Zaran is ready for it. Before she’s fully behind him, he whirls around and sends her flying with a pointblank hit.

She leaves a trail of black smoke while rocketing through the air. Surprisingly, Zaran doesn’t follow her. He does the exact opposite and lands on the ground as fast as possible. He balances on his rear legs and starts tracing strange invisible symbols into the air in front of him with his hooves. Luna banks to her left as she recovers and begins another attack run. Zaran still keeps tracing symbols and muttering to himself.

Cadence is by my side and watches the orb puzzled. “If I’m not mistaken...is that a spell? He can’t do that right? He’s not an actual unicorn so he can’t do magic. Didn’t Starswirl say something about that?”

Lucretia inhales with frustration. “Whatever he’s doing, it’s important enough to leave himself exposed while he does it.”

Luna’s wings flare and her horn ignites with power. As her wings flap, the black magic that normally trailed off, swirls in front of her into the shape of a pony skull but much larger than her body. Zaran locks eyes with her but keeps tracing symbols. Suddenly, he stops and a crackle of purple electricity erupts between his hooves. Luna roars as her black skull launches itself at Zaran. The ground rumbles as it moves closer and closer.

Zaran points one hoof down and another up, then uses both hooves to trace a circle. The electricity stays where he traces the shape. Inside the circle, our vision of Zaran gets bent and distorted. Moments before impact, he yells in some foreign language and the circle expands several times its initial size. The skull collides with it and dissipates across the circle’s surface. Blue and red glyphs appear around the edge of the circle before the entire design glows.

A nasty dark red beam erupts from the middle and closes the distance between Zaran and Luna so fast, she only has time to toss up a black shield. It pushes her back as fast as we’ve seen her fly. The beam splits into smaller versions of itself and ricochets all over the place, striking the ground and even the palace shield a few times. The structure shakes and a few pieces of the stone ceiling fall to the floor around us.

The beam lessens as the circle grows dark, eventually dissipating. Luna flaps with exhaustion in the air. Her confident expression was absent and is replaced with a sharp, focused glare.

Lucretia kicks a piece of ceiling across the floor. “How many tricks does he have?!”
I run a hand through my hair. “He came prepared with everything he could get his hands on. An army, production, magical power, allies and a very long plan. He’s gotta run out sometime though.” There’s no hiding the defeated anger in my voice. We were all mentally exhausted from his mind games. We had everything in play now and it was up to Celestia and their vast knowledge of magic to turn the tides.

Luna’s face contorts into fury as she charges up another attack. It doesn’t form a skull this time but becomes a black version of the same circle Zaran made. She creates it in seconds which makes Zaran try and hide a nervous swallow. He starts tracing some of the same symbols again but doesn’t move from his spot.

The land is temporarily illuminated in so much white light from the moon, all the shadows disappear. It becomes almost as bright as the sun itself but with an ominous ambience to it. Luna’s circle is the size of a house and at least a few feet thick.

Celestia turns to Cadence. “Tell Shining to reinforce the shield immediately!”

Cadence runs out of the room.

Luna’s face strained with concentration before she stretches her legs in every direction. “Absorb this you novice!”
The beam from her circle is terrifying and borderline instant. Zaran creates the same circle as before but it shakes wildly as it soaked up the beam. His eyes are wide with uncertainty as he does his best to laugh menacingly. “Well thank you princess! I mean I’d think the last thing you’d want to give me is more power but hey it’s not my place to tell you how to fight!” His circle starts sending out purple arcs of power that strike the ground, tossing up buckets of soil when they connect. He wrenches his head to the left and right in panic.

“No...no this can’t be happening…” He mutters in sheer panic. His mouth makes a horrified circle as the only thing separating him from Luna’s colossal beam, is a quickly destabilizing symbol. We hear Luna roar and in a horrific display, her beam turns into a furious train of smoke. As if it had a mind of its own, it wraps itself around the edges of Zaran’s circle and jets towards Luna, making the circle bounce a few times. Zaran’s eyes burst with panic and he’s pulled off his hind legs briefly while straining to hold onto his magical creation. Zaran stares at his forelegs in shock. He then does the unthinkable: he turns around and runs as fast as he can, looking over his shoulder in bewilderment.

The smoke shakes violently before consuming the circle and returning to Luna. She laughs maniacally and the smoke forms its own ring around her several feet deep and as wide as a town block.

“You really thought you could just wing Alrian magic against an ascended alicorn?! It takes years to master, years I’ve had!” The inside of the ring distorts just like Zaran’s, making Luna look like a vicious shadow inside. The smoke forms a solid ring with its own symbols that rest on its surface. Zaran skids to a halt and stares up at Luna as the color drains from his face. Instead of forming any kind of his own magic, he reaches into a pouch on his side. It was so small, we had never noticed it before.
Lucretia groans angrily. “Okay now what is he doing?!”

Zaran fishes out a gem and smashes it on the ground. He grunts as a teal energy surrounds him and seeps into his fur. Luna’s shadow ring unleashes a devastating beam that seems to absorb the moonlight from the ground below, cloaking everything nearby in shadow. Zaran tenses up his body and his own beam erupts, made up of a dark teal. They swirl around each other as it collides with Luna’s attack.

Emeris stomps angrily. “Is that my element?! Has he been syphoning my element?! Is that why I’ve had such a hard time using it?! I’m going to kill him!” He shrieks. Celestia calls out to the hallway. “Get everypony in here! It’s time!” The clicking of hooves is deafening as Cadence, Shining Armor and several other unicorns fill the room. They surround the orb and Celestia stands up on all fours. The palace shakes violently from the magical tug of war. Shining stops several pieces of the ceiling from falling on us.

Outside, a colossal dark beam of shadow battles against a tidal wave of teal destruction. Zaran’s beam occasionally gets slightly off target and bounces off, sailing into the clouds. There’s no denying Luna’s attack is gradually getting closer. Her gaze almost pierces through the attack and she doesn’t move except for the calm flapping of her wings. Zaran grits his teeth as he struggles to keep his focus. As Luna’s attack gets closer, red and blue flames start pouring off Zaran’s fur.

“You want it all?!” He yells over the noise, “You can have it all!” Suddenly, numerous rocks and sticks around him are flung away. His beam turns into a mix of darkened version of red, blue and teal that quickly pushes back against Luna’s attack. Her face scrunches up and her beam widens slightly. Beneath it, globs of black fall to the ground, leaving fires in their wake like molten metal that disappears on contact.

Zaran yells angrily, rears up and slams his front hooves into the ground defiantly. His beam doubles in size as his temples throb. It starts forcing itself through the black cloud. Luna’s face shows less focus and more a look of terror as the dazzling tri-beam gets closer and closer to her.

Lucretia puts her hands on the side of her head. “What?! How?! How did he get more power?! Where does he keep getting this crap from?!”

My eyes flinch a few times and I stare at the orb carefully. There had always been a very subtle shimmer around Zaran roughly in the shape of a sphere. It wasn’t there this time. I tap on the orb with my index finger while mostly keeping my arms crossed. “His shield! He got rid of his shield for more power! That’s how! He’s vulnerable!”

Celestia turns to her company. “Now! Focus your magic into the orb!”
Every horn in the room lights up and in a dazzling display, the orb is hit with almost every color of the rainbow. Luna screams as her beam not only doubles in size but let’s loose a fierce multicolored beam that combines with her dark magic. Zaran’s eyes bulge as they dart back and forth.
“No...no I was supposed to win…” He mutters in a slightly higher pitch. Luna’s beam easily plows through Zaran’s and at the last moment, Zaran turns around and flings himself away. A colossal explosion erupts, sending him sailing at least a hundred feet. He hits the dirt and his legs flail helplessly. A mix of crimson and soil kicks up into the air in his wake.

Zaran lays on the ground covered in all sorts of burns and open wounds. He keeps one eye closed and his mane is caked in blood and dirt. He coughs furiously scattering crimson across the ground. There’s no longer a red glow around his body and he starts trembling from both fear and pain.

Luna stands twenty feet away and she pants heavily, still staying in her ascended form somehow. The smoke coming from her body ignores the gentle breeze that swims through the trees. She’s confident but keeps eying him over in case he has one last trick up his sleeve.

She starts circling him, occasionally checking around for any last combatants she might not see.

“So Zaran, any last words? You’ve been awful quiet while I’ve been tossing you around like a ragdoll.”

Zaran closes his eyes and chuckles.

“Actually, I do have one last card to play. It may have taken longer than I wanted but hey, an ace is an ace am I right?”

Luna snorts condescendingly.

“Sure it is, Zaran. Arrogant to the very end.” We all jump in the throne room when a loud thunderous crack is heard outside. A hundred feet behind Luna, a red circle with all sorts of lettering appears. In the middle is Starswirl and another stallion that looks like he means business. He’s built like a horse from Taraska but has the same color scheme as Zaran, except with warmer colors. His mane is auburn with milky-white fur. He looks at Luna with a lethargic expression while Starswirl recoils.

Zaran trades off between laughing and coughing.

“I always win! I told you! I always win! This fight always goes the same way!” He lays on his side while gasping desperately for air. Luna eyes the new stallion curiously. In a red flash, the newcomer is by Zaran’s side, towering over Luna. She takes a few steps back and cocks an eyebrow. Starswirl runs up and holds his hooves defensively.

“Now hold on you two, we didn’t come here to brawl. I mean initially we did but it looks like the fight’s already over so can we please leave it that way?”

The stallion takes in a deep breath.

“I am Prime. I have come for Zaran.”

Starswirl walks over to Prime’s side.

“Easy Prime, let’s not escalate things. We’re just here to finish this.”

Zaran laughs like mad.

“It’s the same every time! He tells you to back off, you tell him no, you fight, he wins, I go to prison and break out! Every time! You’re all so easy!”

Prime takes in a deep breath.

“I’m here to take Zaran away for his crimes. Please let me-” He stops and furrows his brow. He looks straight at us as if seeing us through the orb and his iris’ glow red. The orb in the room explodes violently. Celestia recoils then sits there in shock.

“That’s...that’s impossible!” Without wasting a second, we all dart out of the palace and run across the field to where Luna is. She’s in the middle of exchanging angry words with Prime. He stops and stares at me as I come to a halt right next to her.

“You must be Raiden. I’m what you would consider your...better half.”

I look him over in confusion and a billion questions race through my head. Starswirl takes a few steps forward and locks eyes with me.

“Prime here...let me start from the beginning. I infused both Zaran and Prime with raw magical energy. While they can’t cast spells or do any advanced magic, their ability to control kinetic magic is unrivaled. After Zaran escaped, Prime agreed to be augmented even further to hunt him down. He managed to trap Prime here in some kind of arcane prison until I freed him. I assure you, Prime is more than a match to deal with Zaran, so if you don’t mind, we’d like to end this once and for all.” He says happily.

Everyone else is quiet except for Luna.

“And when you say end this, you mean he gets a nice comfy cell while we have to rebuild most of known civilization?”

Prime narrows his eyes and keeps a rock-solid composure.

“I don’t have the patience for a debate. Zaran is coming with me.”

Luna turns to me.

“Why is every one of your alternate selves a total jerk?”

Zaran cackles on the ground and Luna glares at him. Her horn flares and a nasty beam erupts. It quickly collides with a red sphere that encompasses Prime, Zaran and Starswirl.

Prime cocks an eyebrow and his face shows a hint of irritation.

“I know completely how strong alicorns can be and you won’t stand a chance against me. Don’t do that again. I’m taking him.”

Luna grits her teeth and even Celestia’s horn flares with magic. Celestia takes a few cautious steps forward.

“I apologize, but Zaran has much to pay for. It doesn’t seem fair that he just gets to walk away.”

Zaran keeps laughing while holding his side in agony.

“You...you all keep talking, someone crosses the line and you all die! This always plays out the same!”

Prime looks down at Zaran without moving his head.

“Quiet.” He says in a solid, unshaking voice. Luna still has her ominous shadow fire emanating from her fur. The ground starts to shake and the moon flares up with more light. “No, Prime. He gets executed here and now.”

Prime keeps his head pointed at Zaran while his eyes shift to Luna. “I assure you little princess, I have destroyed entire planets. I am not something a mere alicorn should mess with.” Celestia, Cadence and Shining both take fearsome steps forward, glaring at Prime.

Celestia lifts her head up high. “Except she’s not alone.” I have to control my left leg from wanting to hammer up and down. They were all completely taxed. none of them even had enough energy to teleport us out here, but Prime didn’t seem like the type to back down. He also clearly seemed more powerful than Zaran. I’m standing off to his right, with the royalty to Prime’s left. He naturally made everyone feel insignificant and we very well could be in comparison.

Prime moves his head and examines each of them with a cold, angry stare. He towers above us, being much larger than any Equestrian I had seen here. Was he permanently ascended as well? He lets out a small sigh. “If this is the fate you choose, then so be it.”

Starswirl waves his hooves anxiously. “Prime, wait! This isn’t an alternate universe though! This is one of the main worlds! You can’t fight here! You have no comprehension of the damage it will do!”

His eyes begin to let out red light, the same way Luna’s eyes do. The black storm clouds overhead begin to take on a crimson hue, as does the moon.

Lucretia cups her hands over her mouth “I thought you were supposed to be the good guy!” She yells.

Prime doesn’t move a muscle, not even tensing up for a fight. “I do what I feel is right.”

Without realizing it, my body starts to shake. My skin feels like it’s on fire again. Prime sudden looks straight at me. His eyes move up and down my body rapidly. Zaran’s eyes bulge and he tries to lift himself off the ground. “Wait...no...don’t! Prime, it’s the Equestrians you want!”

Prime looks over his shoulder at a mangled Zaran. “And this matters to you...why?”

The ground starts to rumble, and I feel every muscle become tight and solid. I hold out my hand and a ball of red flame that seems to feed off itself appears in my hand almost effortlessly. Zaran shakes his head rapidly while looking at the ground as if he was burning. He laboriously gets off the ground and that same red energy starts coming off his fur as well. His eyes are a disturbing mix of fury and fear. He looks between Prime and I. “Stop! We can’t do this!”

Prime cocks an eyebrow and keeps looking at Zaran. I clench my fist and the fire pours its way back into my skin. “I want Zaran.”

Prime yanks his head back to me. “No, you will stay put.”

Zaran glares at Prime. “Prime, stop!”

An orb appears above Prime’s head. Zaran does the same while pointing it at him. I see my opening and take a single sprinting step towards him with an inferno erupting from my body. My other foot hasn’t even left the ground when all three of us are sent flying at least twenty feet in each direction. Hitting the ground doesn’t even compare to the sensation of my skin boiling from the inside and out. I put my hands to the side of my head and scream. My body flails and convulses wildly as every survival instinct I have goes on overdrive.

I can hear Zaran screaming in agony the same as I am in the distance. I’m able to barely open one of my eyes when I see a sight truly baffling. Prime is on his back, flailing like mad. Red smoke pours from his body and collects in the middle as he gets smaller and smaller. I look down at my feet and see the same smoke coming from myself and Zaran, all going to the same place. In just a few seconds, Prime is the same size as Zaran and clearly back to being a pony. The red smoke begins to form a solid shape. Before long, something lifts itself out of the fog as if standing up from a kneeling position.

It’s vaguely human but at least fifteen feet tall. Its head has ram horns on both the front and back. Its entire head looks like a bull’s skull but with fangs that had to be a foot long, stemming from both the top and lower jaw that rested outside its mouth. The smoke quickly takes shape and forms two legs with reversed knees. A long tail forms with spines running down it. It raises its bulging arms and roars in triumph.

Zaran shakes his head and his face is that of a child who’s just seen a murder. He flails his legs briefly before getting up and trying to run away. Without turning its head to look, the beast reaches out a hand towards Zaran. A chain covered in barbs juts out and wraps itself around Zaran’s neck almost instantly. Zaran claws at the ground with his hooves as he’s dragged to the beast. It lifts Zaran to its face, but it has no eyes, just dark sockets that pierce through your soul. Zaran hangs there motionless, completely frozen and staring at the creature.

“Well hello little pony.” Its voice is deep and powerful, like a boulder rolling down a cliff.

“As I said before, eventually I will be free, and I shall drag you down to The Pit. I am the Element of Tenacity in my full form. You could not hold me forever and now it is time to reap what you sew.” Zaran slowly shakes his head in disbelief. The creature chuckles, making a helpless Zaran bob up and down on its chain.

Prime barely manages to get on all fours. “Serves you right, Zaran.” Tenacity stretches his free hand out and another chain wraps around Prime, pulling him up where Zaran is. Prime flails in angry protest. He stops when Tenacity exhales angrily.

“It is time you finally realized the truth Prime. In your quest to stop Zaran, you as well cause destruction. You both fight, the planet gets torn to pieces and when Prime wins, the heroes of that planet try to take him down, unaware that killing Zaran would release the elements he’s harnessed very violently. Forced to defend him, Zaran escapes during the battle. Or maybe you imprison him for a while then he gets out using some strange means or while you sleep.”

Prime’s face slowly drains of color and a look of remorse creeps out. Prime turns and faces Zaran.

“Did you know the Elements of Nova are much more powerful than you thought? We have our own dimension we can reside in while we discuss the champions we’ve chosen. There is even a special place for former champions who abused their power. I’ll be taking you there seeing as how I’ve stripped you both of your power.”

Zaran’s face looks like he’s about to vomit. Tenacity turns to Versa, Lucretia and Emeris.

“Secondly...I’ll need to take these.” His mouth opens, revealing rows of jagged teeth and a throat that looks like it leads to somewhere far darker than a stomach. They all scream as the color of their elements drains from their bodies and into Tenacity’s mouth. Everyone falls to their knees panting. The elements swirl like mist into the monster’s mouth and disappear.

“Sorry, the elements of Nova eventually lead to war, no matter how close you all are to each other. They do not belong here and wish to return home.”

I look down at my hands that no longer have a constant vibrating sense of power. Lucretia looks up in terror.

“You can’t do this! We need them! What if we return to Nova with them?!”

Tenacity slowly shakes his head with a stern expression.

“I’m sorry but that was the deal. The elements of Nova are more powerful than the elements of Harmony and are much harder to predict. At any time they could leave you and find new champions. They are also stronger when they’re together but it’s rare they’ll do that...unless someone threatens their existence.” He says while motioning with his head to Zaran. Emeris holds his forehead with his fingertips.

“That’s what Zaran’s amulet was for that Nightmare destroyed. He was going to drag out the fight, so we’d come to the rescue and steal our power.”

Tenacity nods slowly.

“More than that, the Abraskis Amulet can absorb even alicorn magic. Tirek had one magically implanted into his body. If Zaran didn’t have to keep the amulet hidden from Nightmare Moon, he could have ruled the world. Luckily, she knew about it, otherwise the moment you defeated her it would have been game over and Zaran would be unstoppable, even to me.”

Starswirl starts walking to the palace.

“Very well, let me grab a few items I left-” Tenacity leans back and roars as his chest opens up, showing jagged ribs. Another chain leaps out of his chest and wraps around Starswirl, dragging him slowly to Tenacity.

“I’m sorry Starswirl but you’re not innocent either. You’ve been impersonating the real Starswirl the Bearded.”

Luna furrows her brow.

“We figured as much. He was too much of an emotional wreck to pass for Starswirl.”

Tenacity motions to Starswirl with his head.

“Starswirl here is also to be imprisoned and stripped of his magic.”

Zaran chuckles as Starswirl looks around helplessly.

“What have I done wrong?!” Starswirl asks in panic.

Tenacity shakes his head with disappointment.

“Starswirl...while your goals were noble, your actions were criminal. You abducted Prime and Zaran. I read Zaran’s journal as he wrote it. He was hoping he could control me, but this was always doomed to fail. I cannot be imprisoned for long.”
Zaran angrily beats his hooves in the air while groaning.

Prime looks over at him with a sense of pity and does his best to balance himself so he can face Zaran.

“Zaran, I understand and on a personal level, I forgive you. You were like a brother to me. Starswirl didn’t allow you to leave and return to your former life even after you begged him. You are what you are because you never want to be vulnerable. However, that’s not an excuse for what you’ve done. We’ve chased you across dozens of planets and alternate realities and we’ve accidentally obliterated a handful of them. So, while I understand, this is still unforgivable...I never hunted you out of anger, but merely a desire for peace.”

Tenacity turns to Starswirl.

“Star, you literally forced Zaran to be an experiment. I’m sorry you lost your husband, but you literally dragged them against their will to go fight in wars they wanted nothing to do with. Prime personally wanted to be a hero but instead you made him a war machine. You teleported them wherever you wanted, despite their protests.”

Tenacity looks up at the clouds in thought.

“I did enjoy defeating villains for a while, but you eventually escalated it to destroying entire countries in the name of peace. Not once did that end the way you thought it would. Did you care? No, they were just failed experiments to you, written down in a notebook, reduced to variables and left to time.”

Tenacity looks back from the clouds, then glares at Prime.

“Then there is you.”

Prime purses his lips, apparently hoping he was going to get off easy.

“Your intentions were to stop all evil, including Zaran, but with my power, you’ve annihilated armies and done irreversible damage to numerous planets, even causing a few chain reactions that ended the entire world. You all, by nature, are monsters. No matter where you go, you cause destruction. You both have no place in this multiverse anymore. Starswirl...you have doomed them in ways you cannot fathom and now it is time to pay the toll.”

Starswirl's horn lights up over and over with white magic but nothing happens. He tries to run and gets about five feet before the chain stops him. He digs his hooves into the ground as Tenacity pulls him close.

Tenacity chuckles once and shakes his head.

“There can be no peace where violence is ignored, Starswirl.”

Zaran kicks wildly and he even tries pitifully to punch the chain. He wiggles around with a pathetic clank of his restraint. Tenacity grins as a circle appears around him on the ground.

“Where we’re going, there will be no mercy, but there will be peace. We are all evil in some way, despite thinking we’re the savior. Villains never think of themselves as villains, there’s always a justification. Always a reason, always an excuse. Today, those excuses end and the multiverse gets to be free of us.” His mouth opens and he begins dissolving while sinking into the circle. Prime, Zaran and Starswirl scream while flailing. The chains gain slack and all three of them try desperately to run away, only to get about ten feet away.

A disturbing smile spreads across Tenacity’s gaping mouth and a large spike erupts from the circle, piercing through Starswirl’s thigh and out his back. Starswirl screams in agony and freezes his frantic clawing on the ground. The spike turns its tip into a hook and retracts back, digging itself into Starswirl, dragging him bit by bit into the circle.

Zaran stares at the mess with bulging eyes. A spike shoots towards him, piercing through his throat. Zaran gags and pounds on it impulsively with his hooves. A second spike pierces through his ribs. Both turn into hooks and drag him into the circle. Prime opens his eyes as he slowly sinks into the magical abyss.

“But you Raiden, you get to be free. You never used my power to your knowledge. No matter how bad it was, you always fought with an internal desire to fight back. Luckily for you, you never fought Zaran or you’d likely be coming with us. No matter who you are, remember that you were the best of us. You were never powerless, and you never will be. You had everything taken from you and yet you were the luckiest one.”

Tenacity lets out a fierce roar that makes everyone cover their ears impulsively.

“Do not worry my minions. Where we go, I will not allow you to die until you pay for every life taken. It is a place made of the same rage you’ve inflicted. A place where only monsters can call home. A place where you will never die or grow old...or escape.”

A red spike juts out of the circle and impales Prime straight through his skull. His eyes stay open and his mouth hangs with his tongue draping out the side as he goes limp. Starswirl's eyes are wide with panic and he flails his forelegs at us desperately while screaming at the top of his lungs in agony. All we can do is watch as they’re dragged into the red abyss. Once they’re all submerged inside, it vanishes, leaving no trace of them behind.

Emeris turns to me.

“Is every variation of you a total ass?”