Anger.
Anger was all Chrysalis could feel.
Anger for her failed plan.
Anger for losing her title as queen.
Anger for having to live in a dirty, dark cave in the middle of the Badlands with nothing but mushrooms all around her.
Anger for not having a reliable source of love to consume.
Anger for that wretched unicorn.
"Curse that Starlight Glimmer... Grumble," rambled the female changeling.
The plan had almost worked. Almost all of Equestria's most powerful ponies were oh her grasp. They had enough love to last for generations. Chrysalis would soon rule everything.
And what happened?
An aprentice, a stage magician, a draconequs and a traitor invaded the hive and ruined everything.
It was like a joke, only that the punchline was "make Chrysalis miserable."
And now there she was. in a cave, all alone, with nothing but anger to keep her company.
How she hated that unicorn. At least with the royal couple, all she received was a blow to her pride and some broken bones after being thrown out of Canterlot. But Starlight removed her royality and made her an exile. That's why the changeling promised vengeance on her, and not on the ones that helped her.
For now, though, the former queen was content on just sitting in the cave, complaining.
After mumbling to herself, she finally decided to stand up and take some action.
"Well, enough rambling. I have some revenge to enact," Chrysalis thought out loud.
But how would she do it? She's not exactly in shape to face against any of those cursed ponies. She needed some strategy to make Starlight suffer without being blasted to oblivion.
Maybe it'd be better by doing something she was good at:
Getting someone else to help.
After all, that's why she wanted to be queen. Doing everything by yourself is too hard.
And she knew who would be the first one she'd ask for help.
"You better enjoy your victory, Starlight Glimmer! For soon, you shall suffer by my hooves! Mwahahahahaha!"
Suddenly, as she was doing her evil laugh, she stomped on a mushroom, releasing spores on her face.
"COUGH! COUGH! HACK!"
"... I need a better place to live..."
"So, can you help me, Tirek?"
Sneaking through Tartarus was surprisingly easy. All you needed was an inflatable ball to distract Cerberus and the rest was a breeze. Maybe someone should improve the security there, considering that IT HOLDS SOME OF THE BIGGEST THREATS TO EQUESTRIA. If even Tirek could escape there devoid of magic and looking more frail than a Breezie, something was definitely wrong.
"So let me get this straight... You want to release me to suck the magic of one unicorn?" Asked the centaur.
"Yes! In that way, Starlight won't be able to fight back against whatever form of torture I'll use on her!" stated the changeling.
"Can you even get me out of here?"
"Ha! This will be larva's play! Watch!"
Chrysalis charged her horn and pointed it at the chains that were holding Tirek. She fired a mighty magical beam...
... Only to it hit back at her face.
"Gaaaaaaaah!"
Chrysalis was thrown back a few meters away from her position. Stumbling, she slowly got back on her hooves.
"You didn't even know those chains are immune to magic?"
"Errr..."
"... You didn't think this one through, did you?"
"Shut up! At least I am free, while you are just rotting in this place!"
"And at least I am not about to become some dog's chow."
"What are you talking...?"
"Grrrrrrrrrrrrr..."
Chysalis felt her throat very, very dry.
Cerberus was staring down at the changeling, three sets of sharp teeth in display. She slowly turned around...
"Ahem... Nice doggie?"
Cerberus lifted a paw and tried to squash the former queen, but she acted fast and bolted out of there. Cerberus proceeded to chase her.
"... At least she's not as annoying as Discord..." Commented the frail centaur.
Days later, in a cave near the Crystal Empire...
"Alright, after putting the horn on the drawn circle I place the candles around the circle..."
It was hard, But Chrysalis managed to find the horn of the Unicorn Tyrant, King Sombra.
With his knowledge of dark magic, subduing Starlight would be easy!
But Chrysalis needed to resurrect him first. Strange that he was the only villain that got killed...
Luckily, she came across a book of necromancy after she escaped from Tartarus. And really cheap too. Who knew these kind of books could be easily bought like that?
After reading the instructions, the former queen started the ritual. As she read the book, the circle started to grow brighter and brighter, until an engulfing light shined in the cave. When the light went out, Chrysalis saw...
A duck near the horn.
"Quack?"
"WHAT? What happened? This wasn't supposed to be the result?"
Chrysalis read and reread the book, looking for answers. She found none.
"Maybe I did this wrong. I should try this again..."
Later...
"Quack."
"WHY? WHY DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING?"
The cave was full of ducks. There were big ducks, small ducks, yellow ones, black ones, white ones... And the horn was still there, without an unicorn.
"Grrrr! This book is USELESS! I should get a..."
However, she found a small note on the book that read "No refunds :)."
"NGAAAAAAAAAAH! CURSE YOU, FLIM AND FLAM! HOW COULD I LET MYSELF BE FOOLED BY YOU?!"
"Quack."
One of the ducks was near the changeling, trying to comfort her. After seeing this adorable display, she sighed.
"What am I going to do with all of these ducks?"
Fluttershy was not expecting a delivery. In front of her cottage lied a huge box with holes. When she opened it, she saw dozens of ducks.
"Awww... Hello, little ones! I wonder who sent all of you to me?"
The pegasus saw a note attached to the crate. It read:
"To Butter Pegasus,
You take care of animals, right?
Signed, someone not suspicious."
"... And I know that you are one of the most powerful beings right now. So, will you help me?"
"Gaah!"
Chrysalis didn't really know too many villains. The only one left was Discord, And she didn't want to be near that freak of nature.
So, she resorted to infiltrate the Crystal Empire to find one of the most horrendously powerful creature that she has ever seen:
Flurry Heart.
She remembered the reports of her soldiers responsible of taking control of the area during the takeover. All of them were pleading for help against the little ball of cuteness and magic.
Many lifes were lost against that foal.
It was risky to enter the castle. Thankfully, nopony questioned the extra maid wandering around, asking where the baby was.
Those ponies were so trusting...
So, there they were, a changeling and a pony foal in a room, alone.
"Well, it doesn't really matter what you want, right? You don't even know what's going on."
"Abubu..."
"This plan is going to be perfect! Not only will I have a deadly weapon against that wretched unicorn, but i'll also train the daughter of the ones who first defeated me to follow my orders! A double revenge! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA..."
"Chrysalis?"
Startled, the changeling turned around to see Princess Cadance by the door.
"What are you doing here with my baby?"
"Uuuuuuum... IWASNEVERHERE!"
With a blindly flash from her horn, Chrysalis jumped through the window and flew away, attracting the attention of everypony in the empire.
"Cadance! What happened?" Shining Armor, who ran to the scene, asked.
"Chysalis was here with our baby!" Answered the princess.
"Should we go after her?" questioned the prince
"No need. She's harmless right now. Besides, she's already long gone..." stated the pink alicorn.
"What should we do?" wondered the white unicorn
"Alert the other princesses and tighten the security of our daughter."
"Yeah, our security around here is kind of like the one in Tartarus..." commented the former captain of the Royal Guards.
"...Why didn't we do this sooner?" Cadance asked
Shining Armor could only shrug.
So, getting help was out of the question...
But it didn't matter! Chrysalis worked plans in worse situations!
... Well, that was a lie, but still she woudn't stop now. Rules of being a villain stated that all promises of revenge must be fulfilled.
Whether it worked or not.
So, the insect-pony hybrid started thinking of a plan...
And thinking...
And thinking...
And thinking...
And...
"Ngaaaah! Why is it so hard to come with a plan of revenge against an unicorn with enough magic to rival that of a princess?"
Chrysalis usually was good at coming with strategies against tough opponents. But now, she had nothing to rely on. If she wanted to make Starlight suffer, she'd have to be subtle about it.
But how?
Suddenly, an idea struck her.
"Aha! I know what to do!"
"Starlight? What's that pile of letters?"
In the Castle of Friendship, Princess Twilight Sparkle saw her pupil near a pile of letters in the library.
"The mailmare dropped these on me earlier. There's no signature, and they have basically the same message," Starlight answered while reading a book.
Curious, Twilight used her magic to levitate one of the letters to her. It read:
"lol u suck"
"What's this... atrocity to grammar?" Asked the purple princess, who was offended by such an insult to language.
"I have no clue." Starlight was still reading the book, seemingly uninterested by this ordeal.
"What are you going to do with those... miswritten letters?"
"I don't know. Burn them or something." Starlight deadpanned.
"... You seem pretty uninterested by these letters." Twilight stated.
"Meh. This looks like a foal trying to get somepony's attention by insulting me and failing horribly at it. It's no big deal."
"What!? You're supposed to feel bad about those insults! You'd feel so down that you wouldn't notice me sneaking upon you!"
Both ponies were startled by the addition of this third voice. They started looking for the source of it, but they couldn't find it. After a while, the two ponies concluded that it must have been a passerby pegasus with really deep lungs. When they left the library, Chrysalis got out of her hiding spot... A convenintly-shaped lamp.
"All right, time for plan B..."
"Wow, look at all those apples!"
Starlight wasn't expecting such a generous gift. The sender was anonymous, but whoever sent that basket full of apples must've been a friend.Wasting no time Starlight went for a bite...
...Only to see a tiny hole in the apple.
"Ewwww! This apple has worms! I bet it's a prank from Rainbow Dash..."
Starlight throwed the basket in a trash bin outside of the castle. Chrysalis saw that, and wasn't pleased by it.
"Drats! She must've found out that sleeping enchantment on the apples! No matter, I shall enact another plan!"
"..."
Starlight was dumbfounded by what was in front of her.
A cupcake under a box erected by a stick, which was tied to a thread that leaded to a nearby bush.
A bush that was constantly saying:
"Eat it! Eat the cupcake!"
Chrysalis was clearly out of her mind. She kept snickering, waiting for Starlight to fall on that "ingenious" trap.
"Om!Nom!Nom!"
As quick as a lightning, Chrysalis pulled the thread, trapping the pony eating the cupcake.
"Ha! I did it! I finally have you at my grasp!" Gloated the changeling.
The former queen approached the box like a predator. She lifted it, to reveal...
A wall-eyed pegasus.
"Wow! This cupcake is delicious! Can I have some more?"
"GRAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
With an enraged cry, Chrysalis left the place, flying faster than a Wonderbolt.
"...So, no more cupcakes?"
Chysalis lost count on how many plans she tried to do.
Starlight was far smarter than the changeling thought. She had no more ideas to get revenge.
"Curse that unicorn... Grumble..."
"Chrysalis?"
At the entrance of the cave, Starlight looked at the miserable creature that was once a proud queen.
Chrysalis smirked.
"So... you found me. Ready to submit to me?"
"No."
"Oh, come on! I've been trying really hard to get you!"
"Yeah, I kinda noticed that after the third try. It was becoming ridiculous by the fifty-third try..."
"Humpf... If you want to ridicularize me, I'm going to force you toleave."
"Actually, I want to give you a gift."
"What!?"
Starlight materialized a wrapped box with a ribbon. Chrysalis was shocked to see it.
"Why are you..."
"I know that I ruined your life. But I don't want to be enemies with you. So, I want to give you this gift, hoping that you want to give friendship a try."
The unicorn put the gift near the changeling and teleported afterwards. The former queen opened the present. Inside, it was a crown like hers, only with some gems in it.
After all of the attempts to crush her, Starlight was still willing to forgive the changeling. Maybe this was a sign to give redemption atry. Maybe life could be better if she tried to become something better. Maybe... Friendship was something worth to try...
"...Nah. Time to think of a new plan."
