Death Dealer

'Oh no, Princess Celestia knows I held back information from her. I have betrayed her trust and perhaps even committed acts of high treason! She is going to lock me up just like she did Gath, or maybe she will banish me to the moon, or worse yet, she may just order me to be publicly executed...' Twilight's thoughts were filled with a frozen grip of fear as Princess Celestia led her off into the kitchen away from the prying eyes of the young spike, and the burning gaze of the ancient man.

As they entered the kitchen Celestia closed the door and looked her pupil over. Her hair flowed slightly as it always did, the only movement in the kitchen as neither princess nor pupil even breathed. The two looked into each other's eyes, one gaze held a mix of shame and fear, the other was calculating as if sizing up the other. Finally the silence was broken.

"Did he hurt you?" Celestia said.

"W-wha..." Twilight fumbled out weakly, not understanding where Celestia was going.

"Did he hurt or threaten you not to send word?" Celestia repeated, concern apparent now on her face, along with the slight presence of building tears.

"What! No! He saved me... I figured... I mean... I owed him and he asked me not to tell you..." Twilight weakly finished as her outburst died down as she went, until the last few words were but a mere mumble. But in the silent kitchen Celestia heard her perfectly well.

"Please don't be mad at me, I was going to send word eventually... I'm sorry I betrayed you..." Twilight said, tears starting to roll down her paler than normal cheeks.

Celestia did not say anything in response, instead reaching forward and pulling Twilight into an embrace. The stunned sorceress just stood there with tears flowing at a constant pace as her mentor and princess hugged her. Twilight was thoroughly confused as to what was going on, why would Celestia be hugging her when she had betrayed her trust as she did? Was it a trick to get her guard down before she punished her?

"P-Princess... I swear I can explain-" Twilight began before being cut off.

"No Twilight, there is no need. You did no wrong, I was merely afraid of what he could have done to you. Gath is from a time where murder was a daily occurrence. He is a relic of a darker time and I hoped him sealed away forever in the old dungeon. The things he has done to people in the past, I could never imagine what to do if he did them to you..."

"But Princess Celestia, he has not done anything too violent since coming to Ponyville... Sure he killed a few timber wolves, and he attacked Trixie, but how bad can he be exactly?"

"Twilight... He once single handedly routed an entire invasion on a city. He killed hundreds of men in one day, over a woman he desired. Gath may be calm now after over a thousand years of meditation in solitude, but if he gets the feel of blood again, I fear nothing can stop his blood lust." Celestia explained.

Twilight openly gaped at this revelation. Gath had come off as tough, but strong enough to kill that many men, least of all in a single day? He had to be a monster, no wonder he was kept ion such a cell. Celestia opened her mouth to further explain the atrocities Gath had inflicted upon the world when the pale blue haired sorceress burst into the room with a look of panic on her face.

"He's running!" Trixie yelled. Celestia took note of the bruise around Trixie's neck, then remembered what Twilight said about attacking the young woman.

"Oh no... We have to find him before they do!" Celestia exclaimed.

"Before who finds him?" Twilight asked.

"No time to explain, find him!" Celestia said, her voice steadily rising in panic.

The wind sent caused Gilda's skin to goose bump slightly, the breeze was not complimenting her current situation of being soaking wet. She had definitely learned her lesson about trying to make a meal of the wildlife close to Ponyville. Some pink haired girl from the Pegasus tribe shoved her into the lake and began yelling at her when she tried catching one of the tame rabbits to make some stew for herself. Normally Gilda would have given her a piece of her mind, but she distinctly remembered her being one of Dash's friends, and Gilda was not going to blow her second chance.

Gilda wrung her shirt out and draped it on a tree branch. She had gone off a ways from Ponyville to dry herself off, seeing as she did not have a place to stay as of now and did not wish to be seen in the nude around town as her clothes dried. While brash, Gilda was not that devoid of common decency.

Gilda grasped her shoulders with her arms wrapped in front of her as she sat in the grass, drying in the sun. She had at least laid down her supplies and camping gear before being shoved into the lake, so she should be fine for the night without freezing to death. The clearing she found in the woods was perfect, especially because it was on the less dense part of the forest that the dangerous animals did not venture into.

Gilda's muscles tensed as she heard a twig snap off in the woods, and she reached quickly for her dagger as she stood in a lowered defensive stance, covering her breasts with one arm and holding the dagger in a backwards grip with the other. The sounds of metal boots could be heard now and Gilda swore at herself for being stupid enough to forget about the bandits that frequented these parts. But she wasn't going to let some lowlife get away with sneaking up on her while she was nude. Whoever it was, was up for a fight if they thought they could take her.

"You should know better." called a voice from the forest.

Gilda squinted at the darkness, and tensed her muscles as she waited for an attack. The voice belonged to a male, perhaps her fighting in the nude could be an advantage if they got distracted.

A corpse was then thrown from the trees at her causing her to jump slightly, and she even nearly let out a yell, almost. The corpse landed face down revealing the cause of death, a massive wound that had severed the spine between the shoulder blades. Gilda looked up from the corpse as the sound of metal boots drew closer. Anxiety grew in the pit of Gilda's stomach until the owner of the boots came into view, and she sighed in relief.

"Thank Celestia it's you..." Gilda said under her breath as Gath walked up and stopped short of the corpse.

"You were being watched, I had suspected you to be more capable..." Gath grunted out in his deep voice.

Gilda's face turned from a show of relief to one of rage as she raised a fist and shook it at him, "I was a little preoccupied with not freezing to death! Besides I could easily take that dead little dweeb there!"

Gath gave her a flat stare, and Gilda's rage turned to confusion until she realized what she had just done and jumped back recovering her breasts with the hand she was just shaking angrily at Gath. Deep shades of crimson slowly bled into the color of Gilda's face as the embarrassment set in.

"Don't just stare! Look away damn it, don't you have any common decency?" Gilda yelled as she attempted to retain any sense of pride she had left in a show of anger that seemed too forced.

"What?" Gath said, cocking his head slightly to the side.

"I'm naked! Stop looking!" Gilda shot back.

Gath merely grunted in response and turned back into the shade of the forest as he stored the information that customs on nudity have changed since he last walked freely in the back of his mind. But he could not stay around and chat with the young warrior girl for too long, if he stayed put in one place for too long he might be found and then he would have to talk to Celestia. Gath hated talking...

Gilda watched Gath leave with a moderately surprised look on her face. She had not expected a man to actually stop watching a girl when they were naked, least of all actually leave. Gilda looked over to her clothes and noted that they were for the most part dry now. Throwing on her shirt, pants, boots, jacket and gloves she then threw on her pack and raced into the forest in the direction Gath had gone.

It had not taken Discord very long to find a few sets of highwaymen and bandits roaming the dangerous forest. And after he located these ragtag groups, he would place his pointer finger to their mind and pit his will against their own. Of course no sane mind could combat the sheer lunacy of Discord's own and they all fell into the mad mage's spell. In only a few hours Discord had a patchwork raiding force of twenty men. Hopefully they could either deal with the horned helmets bearer, or distract him long enough for Discord to make his move and extract the helmet.

Chrysalis in the meantime was busy casting her own spells, creating her own army. However, instead of capturing and twisting the minds of helpless fools, she raised demonic spirits who fed off positive emotions and drained them from their prey. She had once amassed a truly overwhelming number of these demons, but after her defeat at Canterlot she only had the power to maintain so many of them.

"Don't you worry, I will definitely show him how truly chaotic the world can be..." Discord said playfully at the start, morphing into malice in his voice.

"Just try not to play too much, every time you have someone in the palm of your hands you let victory slip between your fingers." Chrysalis said with a taunting smirk adorning her face.

"You would know wouldn't you?" Discord smirked back, earning him a murderous glare from the witch.

Discord merely waved to Chrysalis and then snapped his fingers, sending the order for his brainwashed men to head out, "Try not to over exert yourself, I will have the helmet in no time at all."

With that, Discord followed his men out of the cave and into the Everfree Forest.

Gath strode the through the forest unopposed, the bests had learned of his presence and found not long ago that he was not meant to be trifled with. The only sounds to be heard other than Gath's boots crushing the undergrowth was the flapping of a large set of wings. Gath had chosen to ignore the flying girl known as Gilda, not appreciating the attention in the least. He had dealt with village girls before he became a prisoner to the horned helmet, but once he had donned it, he had successfully scared away all advances on him. Until now apparently.

Gilda on the other hand was taking in the view of the forest, not understanding why they were not being attacked this far into the forest. She could have sworn she even saw the shadow of a manticore off in the distance. But nothing seemed to be eager to get near Gath, aside from her.

"No wait, there's something..." Gilda mumbled, talking to herself.

"Hmm?" Gath finally looked back to address the flying girl behind him as she unsheathed her dagger. This caused Gath to unsling his axe and stand ready for whatever she had seen, "What is it?"

The Griffon tribe had far superior sight to any other, years of hunting lifestyle had evolved them to be predatory, increasing strength sight and hearing. Gilda pointed into the deep forest where she saw several shadows moving towards them, their pace not hurried nor slow more of a march if she had to guess. Marching in the middle of the forest? That was a bad sign.

"There are a lot of people coming straight at us..." Gilda said in a hushed tone.

Gath looked at her and let out a deep rumbling laugh, "Good, I needed this..."

Gilda was about to ask what he was referring to when Gath tore off in the direction Gilda had pointed. He was fast, it took him only a few seconds to meet up with the strangers in the forest. Gilda was at a loss for words until she snapped back to reality and flew swiftly to where the fighting was. There looked to be about twenty armed men, all of them had a grayish hue to their clothes and skin. This mattered not to Gath however, limbs were severed left and right by the arcing blade of his axe.

Gilda was only able to watch the berserk axe wielder for a moment before a sword flew into the periphery of her vision, Gilda was barely able to pull her dagger up to block it. Gilda grabbed the wrist of the bandit's sword arm and flipped her dagger into a backwards grip as she plunged it into the side of his neck. The man fell immediately liefeless to the forest floor and the color returned to his skin and clothes.

"What the..." Gilda muttered, before she whipped around to plant a heel into the crotch of a charging bandit.

Gath in the meantime was letting go of held in rage. Holding himself back from violence had built up stress in the man, and it felt good to let his anger manifest in the wholesale slaughter of deserving men. Even in his state of venting he kept his head in the battle however, fighting around trees and using obstacles to prevent him from being flanked or surrounded. These men were ametuers, they charged blindly, and were too weak to block. Gath was surprised when one of the bandits jumped from a tree he was fighting under and landed on his back. The man drove a knife blade aimed for under his armpit, but the blade was intercepted by Gath's shoulder as he struggled to throw the man off. Gath was unable to get a hold of the man however as he also fought off another two that had attempted to grapple with him. One man he simply jabbed with the flat head of the axe to his diaphram, winding him and causing the bandit to stumble back and trip over a root. The second man in front of him he kicked in the stomach. As the man bent over Gath grabbed his head in between his hands and thrust his thumbs into his eye sockets with a wet popping sound as his reward.

As the now blind man fell back clutching at his eyes, Gath ran at a rather sturdy looking tree and spun around as he jumped. Momentum carried him into the tree, the man on his back cushioning the blow with the sickening crack as a spine broke. As the man fell limp off Gath's back the warrior now slick with blood, most of which was not his dripped. The remaining handful of men approached cautiously. Gath was too focused on searching for openings in their advance to see the magical bolt sail straight at his chest, and were in not for the helmet he would be sporting a smoldering new hole in his chest. The helmet however did its job and the magic dissipated upon touching his skin.

Gath glared off from where the bolt had come from and beheld an astonished looking mage. The man had a crazy look in his eye, and he was wearing a robe of multiple colors stitched together across different segments of his body. Gath growled as he saw the cowardly tactic that was just used against him.

Discord was unable to remove the look of shock on his face. Sure he had heard the helmet would protect the wearer in more than one way, but it was only supposed to fend off the years and stop aging along with stopping any blow that reached it. But complete protection from magic? That was no pushover blast he had used too, even Celestia would not get up from one of those.

"Fuck me..." Discord said as his fear brought him a moment of sanity.