Bragging Rights 2: The Art of Bragging

Part 3

It’d been six months since the events at Prideful Falls.

Twilight’s life had, for the most part, returned to a status quo. There’d been some excitement when she and Rainbow had announced their relationship, but given most of the country had either seen, heard, felt, or smelled their ‘therapy session’, it wasn’t much of a surprise.

The usual Ponyville shenanigans had come and gone. Twilight and the girls had met Daring Do, who’d turned out to be a real pony. Rarity had briefly gone mad with power thanks to an evil spellbook. Fluttershy had been turned into a bat/pony hybrid for a short time. Pinkie and Applejack found they were distantly related. Rainbow found out she had a partial eidetic memory, and the Equestria Games had helped Spike with his self-confidence, no crazy bragging spell required.

Then, Twilight had been summoned to Canterlot. Celestia, Luna, and Cadance had warned her of a new evil. Lord Tirek, an ancient and sinister centaur sorcerer who’d turned himself into an energy vampire with the aid of a forbidden ritual, was free once more. The other princesses gave Twilight their magic for safekeeping, and while Twilight didn’t fully understand why, she returned home and went off to practice controlling her newly expanded power...

...only to find Lord Tirek had acted faster than they’d realized.

Now, Twilight and Tirek were locked in magical combat on the outskirts of Ponyville. Their struggle was visible from both Canterlot and Cloudsdale alike, and the very earth was trembling beneath their colossal clashing beams. There was no finesse, no nuance, only power against raw magical power.

Blood roared in Twilight’s ears. The remains of a smoldering tree stump still burned in the center of Ponyville. She could still smell the charred wood. She could still feel the debris in her coat. Burning pages and fluttering ashes fell like rain in her mind’s eye. Her favorite pillow, the dishware her mother had given her, her father’s old telescope, her older brother’s bookbag, her little brother’s comics, all the photos of her friends—

Twilight screamed. She pushed against Tirek’s beam with a fury that surprised even her. Arcane energy crackled throughout the entire valley in multicolored lightning bolts. Rippling clouds fled from them in a wide ring. Birds flew from their struggle in flocks, ponies hid in their homes, and the world held its breath as the two titans warred. Tirek grunted and strained beneath her assault, but he soon began to retake the lead, his laughter echoing over the sizzling struggle.

“Pathetic!” Tirek shouted. “Is this the might of the legendary alicorns?!”

Twilight saw red. She shoved his beam back again, this time even harder. She gained the upper hoof again for a few seconds, but like before, the advantage was short lived.

“Give up, Princess.” Tirek took a step forward, his thundering steps as loud as an adult dragon’s. He grew larger and larger with each bit of magic he stole, and now, his hoof alone was wider across than Twilight’s whole body. “The power of your entire country is mine, amplified even more by my dark pact! Even now, my strength grows by the second!”

Twilight grit her teeth. Her wings were aching, she was sweating like mad, and she swore he was siphoning her stamina somehow. Or perhaps he just had more stamina in general due to being so huge? She did recall that when she and Rainbow—

Wait.

“So much for the vaunted Elements of Harmony.” Tirek wasn’t straining any more. He’d covered half the distance between them, his great red and black body filling Twilight’s vision more and more. “This is your last chance, Twilight Sparkle! Give me your magic, NOW, or I’ll siphon it from your corpse!”

It was a terrible idea. Reckless, idiotic, and embarrassing. It’d certainly result in more harm than good, no question. What was she thinking, considering something so extreme?! There was no telling—

Rainbow’s six-month anniversary present had been in the library.

“AAAAAAGGGGGHHHH!” Twilight rolled right. Tirek’s beam sailed past so close it singed her tail, but the terror was drowned out by an inner scream of rage. She didn’t even register the sound of it drilling into a far-off mountain echoing behind her. She hit Tirek with a potshot, used the pause to teleport in front of the sun, then chanted out a certain spell with the combined might of four alicorns.

Tirek squinted at Twilight’s silhouette. “The light won’t save you!” He fired another beam right at Twilight’s fuzzy muzzle, but she was ready for it. She teleported to the side and braced herself, just in time to endure the desperate, clenching need going from zero to eighty inside her.

Twilight panted for breath. “Stubborn jerkwad… been living under a rock...” Time slowed to a crawl around her. An electric tingling ran through every inch of her body, her coat standing on end from the sparks inside her. “Only respects the strong!"

She knew she needed time. Thinking quick, she cast an illusion to appear like nothing was happening. Then, she gathered her strength and resumed her beam with everything she had.

Tirek frowned. “What are you up to?” He caught her attack mid-way and began overtaking her once more in seconds. “You’re either toying with me, or you’re a buffoon!”

Twilight’s eyes glittered. “You think you know power? HA! You might just be the weakest creature I’ve ever seen! It’s time for the smartest egghead in the world to—nnnfff— teach you a lesson you’ll never forget!”

Tirek felt Twilight push back again. He put more force into his blast and started walking forward, his eyes fixed on her toy-sized stature. “By all means, try.”

The sensations made it hard for Twilight concentrate. Her vantage point was rising, her magic growing even faster than the rest of her. “I’ve never seen someone so blind. You want our magic because it’s powerful, but you don’t even understand why! What kind of sorcerer are you?!”

Tirek sneered. “A better one than you’ll ever be. All magic is the same when broken down! I don’t need to understand anything else!”

Her sensitivity was so high she could feel the air displacing around her. Rivulets of honey flowed freely down her inner thigh, the heat in her groin only matched by the tightness in her chest. “You’ve always relied on yourself, haven’t you? Never trusted others, only ever saw them as t-tools! You don’t care about others’ accomplishments—only your own!”

Tirek narrowed his eyes. She was pushing back even harder, to the point he actually had to try. “The last time I put my faith in someone, I wound up rotting in Tartarus! I’ll not make the same mistake twice!”

Twilight shuddered. Not because of Tirek’s words, but because the world got smaller every time she blinked. Steady, sensational strength flowed into her at a rate beyond measure, and it was just the beginning. “That should’ve been a wake-up call! Real friendships go both ways; they’re not just one-sided! Your brother got tired of being your—”

Tirek roared. He poured everything he had into his attack with a rage that Twilight couldn’t help but respect. It was sudden enough that she let him regain quite a bit of ground over it, but like she’d experienced earlier, Tirek’s rage only gave a quick boost.

“Friendships are about working together!” Twilight shouted. “My friends’ accomplishments are mine, and mine are theirs! That’s how we’ve—ohhhh—overcome every challenge, and how we’ll overcome you!”

Tirek growled. His march forward had slowed to a crawl, and the strain had crept back into his voice. “Your friends... aren’t… here! YOU’RE ALL ALONE!”

Twilight eased up a tad. She couldn’t overwhelm him yet—not without knowing where he was keeping the others. “It doesn’t matter. They’ve already helped me innnnnnn ways you’ll never understand, just like I’ve d-done for them! Nothing you do will ever change that! Your power is limited by how much you’ve s-stolen; ours is limitless!”

Tirek couldn’t move forward anymore. He planted his hooves and focused, his muscles quivering just to keep the ground he’d gained. “Then show me! Show me this… errrrgh... limitless power!”

Twilight bit back a moan. She’d just felt her expanding hooves touch the ground, some seventy feet below her illusion. Her arousal was starting to pool in the fissures around her legs. Her tail twitched with every foot she claimed, doubly so when upon realizing she’d already outgrown her foe. She could feel every tingling muscle, every jolt along her skin, the endless energy flowing into her enlarging form!

Tirek felt Twilight’s beam start to ‘weaken’, but he knew better. “I see through your scheme! Your pathetic jibbering is just a ploy to buy time! Whatever you’re plotting won’t work!”

He may as well have been speaking in another language. Twilight’s eyes had rolled back, her first peak rolling over her in desperate spasms. Her heated marehood was twice the size of a pony and growing, her divine size pushed higher by the thought of Rainbow between her thighs. The spell’s effects were intensifying, each ascent making her loom higher and higher, and already, her beloved Ponyville looked like a playset to her.

“You’ve no i-idea what you’re up against.” Twilight’s titanic hooves shattered stone and made buildings shake. The air was getting wavy, her glamor struggling to conceal her two hundred foot splendor. “My friends and I, we llllllearn from each other! We call each other out on our m-mistakes! We tell the hard truths nopony will say! And most of all, we protect each other the bessssst we can… EVEN FROM OURSELVES!”

It was at the word ‘ourselves’ that Tirek felt himself shoved back. He yelped and poured everything he had into his beam, but it was like pushing against a brick wall. “What is this?! What have you done?!”

Twilight couldn’t hear over her mad laughter. Lavender legs like white pines lurched outward in every direction, then again a second time, then a third, and a fourth! The last was punctuated by a fresh peak that made her legs quiver, the delectable explosions echoing in her floaty mind over and over! Tirek didn’t even come up over her hooves anymore, and where before he could squash her flat under his hoof, the tables had now been turned.

“THIS is true power!” Twilight paused to shield Ponyville, then...

FWOOM!

...she detonated her illusion like a bomb. Onlookers in Cloudsdale and Canterlot had to shield their eyes from the blinding flash of Twilight’s godly magic. The roar of the blast came some seconds later, but it was heralded by a rumbling whoosh that sent ponies diving for cover. Clouds were vaporized, trees snapped like twigs, and acres of land were torn up to form a crater like someone had taken a scoop out of the valley. The surge was so great it sent up a gargantuan pillar of light. It was visible all throughout Equestria, ponies everywhere turning to behold its prismatic wonder shining in the sky...

...including a familiar group in Ponyville, now cheering within their magical prison spheres.

“That’s usin’ your noggin, Twi!” Applejack raised a weak hoof in the air. “Now kick his sorry keister!”

“Yeah!” Pinkie said. “Twizilla to the rescue!”

Spike swiped at the air. “Go, Twilight! Get that tree-torching jerk!”

Fluttershy put a hoof behind her head. “E-Erm, I know twe’re not sure what she’s doing, but if that is the bragging spell... doesn’t it make you... y-y’know…” she glanced at Spike. “H-O-R-N-Y?”

They had a front row seat to the whole thing thanks to Tirek ensorcelling their spheres. Something about ‘witnessing their friend’s failure’; they’d been a little too dazed to hear. They could see and hear everything through the images on their spheres, and with the pillar of light now blazing high in the sky, they knew they were watching in real time.

Spike gave Fluttershy a flat look. “No offense, Fluttershy, but it’d be pretty hard to write Twilight’s letters if I couldn’t spell.”

“She’s just trying to be proper, dear,” said Rarity. She looked over at Rainbow, who was sitting up, leaned forward, eyes glued to the action. Her mouth was half open while her pink tongue swiped her lips, her hoof quivering centimeters away from her crotch. “Unlike some other ponies.”

“Eh, proper-shmopper.” Applejack glanced at Rainbow as well, but didn’t bat an eyelash. “I’ll take randy over enraged any day. Can’t say I enjoyed seein’ Twi go berserk like that.”

Pinkie winced. “To be fair, he diiiiiiiid blow up—”

“I know, I know," Applejack said. “I’m not sayin’ it ain’t justified. Just worried for her, is all.”

Fluttershy wiggled her wings. “Who isn’t?”

…

…

…

“She’ll be alright,” Spike said. “Take it from your friendly neighborhood dragon—Twilight was right when she said Tirek is blind. Blind with greed.”

Rarity’s look soured. “Kind of like how we were blind to Twilight’s predicament six months ago?”

Spike blinked several times. “I don’t—how’d you even get that out of what I—”

“Because it’s true!” Rarity burst out. “What kind of friends are we?! We didn’t notice Twilight was so anxious until Rainbow took drastic measures! We should’ve intervened long before that!”

Fluttershy chewed on her lip. “Rarity… have you been stewing in guilt this whole time?”

There was a very pregnant pause.

Applejack sighed. “Listen here, all o’ya. Learnin’ from your mistakes is one thing, but I ain’t gonna sit here and fixate on what we should or shouldn’t have done. The past is over and done with, and like my ma used to say: ‘should is a dangerous word’. Y’all wanna things right for screwing up? I’m all for that. But unless you can change the past without breaking causa-whoosit or whatever, I suggest ya stop dwelling on it.”

Pinkie snickered. “‘Screwed up’... I’d say Twilight and Dashie were the ones that did the sc—”

“OKAY,” Rarity all but yelled. "A-Ahem… you make a good point, Applejack. I didn’t mean to get anyone’s spirits down, I just… well, I suppose Twilight’s not the only one with a habit of being hard on themselves.”

A smile tugged at Applejack’s lips. “Best get it sorted, then, cause I ain’t lickin’ your vagoo.”

Rarity’s squawk was drowned out by Pinkie’s laughter.

“Well, I never!” she huffed. “You’d better hope this little stunt’s given Twilight what she needs to beat that brute, otherwise—”

Just then, their screens shifted to zoom in on a crimson forcefield. The dust and smoke made it hard to see any details, but Tirek’s silhouette was visible within. He didn’t look any worse for the wear, far as the girls could tell...

But outside the forcefield was another story.

The blast radius was acres across. A great heat rose up from the cherry red rocks over a hundred feet below. Tirek’s forcefield was a tiny island amidst a sea of ruin, and everything outside the crater sight showed signs of damage, from the far off forests to even the nearby mountains.

“HA!” Rainbow’s yell made them all jump. “Hope you enjoyed the warm-up round, dirt-for-brains! Better throw in the towel now, or Twi’s might break out the counterspell!”

…

…

…

“Counter… spell?” said Spike.

Rarity went whiter than normal. “You don’t mean…”

Pinkie laughed even harder. “I think she does!”

Rainbow rubbed her hooves together. “Hold onto your horseshoes, ladies. We’re in for a BIG show!”

***

Tirek coughed within his shield. The smoke, dust, and mana residue hung heavy in the air, but it’d cleared enough that he could see vague shapes. But he didn’t need eyes to tell where Twilight was—her immense, stifling magic was impossible to ignore.

“What backwards logic is this?” Twilight’s energy radiated like a star to his corrupt senses. “This was your plan? To give me even more magic to devour?! You’ve only hastened my rise to godhood, foolish pony!”

There was a heavy pause…

“By all means,” Twilight’s booming tenor said from on high. “Try.”

An impulse struck Tirek like lightning. Desperate and manic, dread pooled in his stomach like lead and urged him to bolt. It was sudden enough he almost heeded it, but he shoved the impulse aside and tapped into his vampiric—

A monstrous telekinetic power forced him to kneel.

“But before that,” said Twilight. “I think you should show a little respect. You may be a lord, but I’m part of the royal tetrarchy.”

It felt like Tirek was like trying to lift an entire continent. He was so caught up in trying to resist her power, he didn’t he notice the skyscraper-sized silhouette within the smog. “Vile witch… you DARE—”

“You’ve invaded my realm, assaulted my little ponies, have taken my friends hostage, razed my house, tried to kill me AND my number two assistant...” Twilight sneered at Tirek squeaking below her like a rat in a trap. “I suggest you zip the lip before I introduce you to a spell called ‘Nailed to the Sky’.”

The rock cracked beneath Tirek’s legs. He managed to raise his head and look at her, but when he did, he almost fell over entirely. Legs several times bigger than silos, hooves that dwarved houses, and a thick purple coat like a field of grain. Twilight’s glittering ethereal mane was like the northern lights, and her glowing, wrathful eyes were each thrice the size of his whole body. She had to be at least six hundred feet tall, and she was still growing!

“This land is defended by the powers of harmony, friendship, and love.” Her thundering voice seethed like a volcano. “That’s why our magic is so strong, Tirek. Nightmare Moon... Discord... Queen Chrysalis... King Sombra… all of them refused to understand where our power comes from. You’re just the latest of the bunch.”

Tirek looked up… up… up her purple slope of a chest to her grim, beautiful face. She was a living effigy of power, an irate avatar of magic, and her furious magic pressed down on him with the weight of his sins. Her bristling, colossal horn was veiled in clouds of hazy ozone, the sparks jetting off each larger than beach balls.

“You’re going back to Tartarus.” Twilight took a tremendous, earth-heaving step forward. A wild, hungry look had crept into her face, and she kept having to widen her stance, look down at a greater angle. “Either give up the magic you stole peacefully, or I’ll rip it out of you. Slowly.”

Tirek muttered a curse. He could sense whatever strange magic she’d used now, making her larger and stronger with every word. Her exhales alone hammered him like storm gales, and they only became stronger as the space between them dwindled.

“The longer you wait, the worse it’ll be.” Tremors shook both her body and the land with each fresh spurt of growth. The amount of power flowing into her was staggering, yet she soaked it all up like a sponge. “I wasn’t kidding when I said this power is lllllimitless—I really am just going to get bigger, and BIGGER—”

Suddenly, hundreds upon hundreds of Tirek clones apparent around Twilight. The real Tirek vanished with a FLASH and reappeared behind her in mid-air, her tantalizing power beckoning like a moth to the flame.

“Arrogant brat!” his mirror images yelled. Tirek opened his mouth wide and ‘reached’ for Twilight’s energy. “Your magic is MINE—”

“Time Stop.”

VWITT-VWITT-VWITT!

Tirek blinked. Why... did it suddenly feel like several minutes had passed in an instant? And what was that incredibly bright glow?

“Time…” Tirek looked down. Countless arcane runes had appeared throughout the entirety of the crater. The glow of magenta magic could be seen for miles as dozens of concentric circles thrummed with the energy of the arcane. The eerie hum of their activation made his hackles rise, and before he could even blink, hundreds of thousands of multicolored mana threads sprung from the runes to gather above him like a divine storm.

“Say hello to D-Dazzleshine’s Directed Disjunction...” Twilight smirked as the filaments swarm the Tireks. “Angry Princess Edition!”

It wasn’t even a contest. Tirek tried to have his copies draw the strands away while he claimed his prize, but the fibers outnumbered his clones hundreds to one, and they moved with the speed of a Sonic Rainboom. The sound of rushing wind drowned out the wails of copies disintegrating like dry parchment over an open flame, and the original Tirek was forced to flee.

“ERRRRGH!” It took everything Tirek had to evade the gossamer strands. Every spell he cast to stop the threads was disjoined at the base level, and every close call he had, the magic of his profane ritual wavered. He could feel it getting harder to contain the stolen magic he had, the swathes of wrathful fibers chasing him like an enraged, prismatic hydra.

Meanwhile, Twilight was trying to locate her friends. She knew they couldn’t be far, but she wasn’t sure how to track them when they were all drained of magic. A scrying spell, maybe? She’d just need a personal item from each of them for that... although, if they were all in the same place—

A mouse-sized weight landed on her withers.

Twilight almost laughed. She concentrated on the source and redirected the spellthreads to fall on him. Tirek, who’d appeared amidst a lavender chest-height 'field', couldn’t even nab a shred of magic before he had to teleport again. He opted for the ground this time beneath Twilight—

“ARGH!” He’d forgotten the rocks were still red hot. His yell alerted the supersonic projectiles to his position, and once again he had to teleport, this time choosing to reappearing on the smoking edge of the crater over a thousand feet away.

“Were you hoping the—oooooh—th-threads would hit me?” Twilight fidgeted and rubbed her thighs together, that insistent itch building along with her spell. A fresh growth spurt hit her to make her now seven hundred foot body blot out the sun to form a corona around her outline. “Sorry, but the spell doesn’t work that way! Just another thing you d-don’t... unnnnnderstand!”

Tirek’s burned hooves made him wince. Even from here, the ground was so hot he could barely stand it. “I knew of her kind's resilience, but this is absurd..." He expected the spellthreads to keep chasing him, but instead they stayed around her to envelop her in a glittering protective web. Twilight’s monstrous shadow engulfed him and continued on towards Ponyville, inching closer and closer to the city limits as the seconds passed.

“You sh-should’ve waited until I was bigger to land on me.” A shudder raced through Twilight that sent an aftershock through the ground. She was nearing another peak, fast, but she had enough focus to track Tirek’s teleport and face him. "Better start shaping up, or n-not only will you be the easiest bad guy I’ve fought, your name will be mmmmmmmud when I send you packing!”

Tirek clenched his fists. It wasn’t easy from this distance, but he managed to extend his consciousness enough to try and unravel the bizarre spell coursing through her. It was an amalgamation that seemed like a mistake more than anything else, though a counterspell should—

His thoughts were interrupted by Twilight’s stilted moan. Her shimmering, waterfall-sized tail raised up, her rear legs locking while her front legs threatened to bend. Seven hundred twenty-five feet… seven hundred fifty… seven hundred seventy five… eight hundred! She rocked her hips in time with each shuddering surge of growth, her glowing white eyes never leaving Tirek’s dwindling form.

“You kn-know, it’s funny.” The quiver in Twilight’s voice betrayed the torrent still present between her legs. Her growing magic seethed like tendrils of plasma, so hot that the rocks beneath were becoming a molten lake. “I’m so turned on I can barely think, and I’m still... wh-whooping you! What’s wrong, Tirek? Don’t tell me you’re—mmmhhh—s-scared!”

Tirek’s pupils shrank. He’d just caught wind of her sweet, sticky scent, and the smell only strengthened as she grew another seventy-five feet. His eyes drifted beneath her to see how soaked her back legs were...

“I thought you were this b-big, nasty tyrant like allllllllll the others.” Twilight growing hooves sank little by little into the deliciously warm lava. That mounting tightness in the pit of her stomach was morphing into a tingling that made her fur stand on end. “You’re—mmmmmf—not so big. In fact, I’d bet anything you can do, I c-can do… BIGGER!”

At this, Twilight reached out her magic as far as she could. The air grew heavy for miles, stretching out farther and farther until her magenta aura encompassed the entire valley and beyond. It was like a thick blanket covering the entire countryside!

Tirek gasped. He made to teleport to safety, but everything had turned wavy around him. The valley's dimensional space locked in place with an echoing CLICK, and just like that, he was left stranded in the valley.

"I’d make a joke about a ‘captive audience’, but that’s beneath meeeeeee..." Twilight’s eyes rolled back as Tirek’s red and black speck dwindled even more. Every muscle in her body was getting tense as tense could be, her haunches quivering from the delicious one hundred and fifty foot increase. "I hope you know a v-voice sssspell, Tirek. I just broke a thousand feet; I may n-not hear your surrender...”

Tirek clenched his fists. He racked his brain on how to apply a counterspell, but it was hard to focus amidst the smell of sour sweat, the overwhelming magic, the humid, sticky-sweet pony need, and the sheer spectacle of it all. An idle part of him noted Twilight’s primary feathers alone had to be over two hundred and fifty feet long, but the rest of him told that part to shut it.

"Still entertaining delusions of grandeur?” Twilight took another step towards him, and then a third. Each hoof fall was heavier than the last, and each impact splashed more warm lava up Twilight’s legs. “I f-figured. I’d hoped you’d see reason, but you’re not the fffffirst baddie that’s needed c-cut down to size. You lost this fight a while ago, you j-just don’t know it yyyyy—ESSSSSSSSS..."

Tirek could hardly stay standing amidst the rumbling. Twilight blew past twelve hundred feet with a long, lewd cry that was heard all the way in Canterlot. It felt like gravity had tripled from her magical aura alone, and it was only getting stronger by the second! Tirek was forced to shield himself with another forcefield, but the air was so laced with Twilight’s humid need, her body heat alone making it feel like it was summer in the tropics...

“Nggggh!” Tirek’s concentration slipped. He was left panting and struggling to stay upright while Twilight grew, and grew, and GREW. Over thirteen hundred feet tall now, and several hundred thousand tons heavy. The valley trembled with her every thunderous thud, and even something as simple as her breathing now carried the strength of a tornado. The entirety of the crater was filled with lava, but it may as well have been bathwater for all it was affecting her!

“Such power…” Tirek weighed his options. Did he keep trying to consume it, or try for the counterspell?! The latter seemed like the better option, but all the magic might disappear in the process! The very thought made every inch of him cringe!

But on the other hoof, so did the thought of rotting in some infernal cell again…

He did it while Twilight was lost in ecstasy. It’d been many, many years since he’d woven together a proper counterspell, but pony magic was primitive next to the mystic arts of the centaur. Sweat dripped from his brow as he studied the strange spell making her grow in size and strength. Twilight didn’t react to his proddings, as her thoughts were consumed by rose-red eyes, a sky-blue coat, and a multicolored mane.

“No one makes a fool of me...” Tirek’s gaze travelled up, up, up the mountain of Twilight’s fuzzy chest, bellowing loud so she could hear. “Do you hear me, witch?!”

She didn’t react. He was having trouble seeing her head anymore, especially with the sun perforating through her wings and turning everything violet. Grumbling, Tirek cast a voice spell and tried again. “YOU THINK YOU’VE BESTED ME?! I’LL… by the gods...”

It was a memory that would be burned in his mind. Twilight, fourteen hundred feet tall and counting, looked down at him with that same eager, insatiable grin. Her starry ethereal mane was virtually seamless with the sky Her vast eyes were white holes that fueled her growth to infinite heights. She was so large he didn’t even come up past her hooves anymore, and when she spoke, she didn’t do so with her voice... but her mind.

“There’s an old Equestrian saying.” Twilight’s thoughts echoed around Tirek. “‘The wise fear three things: A day that never ends, a night with no moon, and the wrath of a gentle soul’. You insist on opposing our very way of life? Very well. Prepare yourself, ‘Lord’ Tirek; you’re about to be the wisest creature that ever lived...”

Tirek balked, then. It was a subtle thing, but few things were subtle to Twilight’s ascended senses. Her magic held him fast while her spellthreads spiralled down to surround him, each now as big around as a train car.

“You brought this on yourself.” Twilight winced a little upon seeing Tirek panic, but then her latest brag started her on the way to two thousand feet tall. “I-IIIIIIIIIII… ”

Tirek saw his chance. His horns glowed...

***

“For Pete’s sake, Twilight!” Applejack yelled at the screen. “Haven’t ya heard of snatchin’ defeat from the jaws of victory?!”

“Yeah!” said Pinkie. “Less yap, more zap!”

It was hard to make sense of their screens with Twilight being so huge. But the feed was more for audio at this point, considering all of Ponyville could see her heart-shaped, six hundred foot rump. There were some that frowned at Twilight’s sopping, one hundred thirty foot slit winking in plain view, but those same individuals wanted their magic back with everyone else, so...

Rarity ran a hoof down her face. “Powers beyond our understanding and she’s giving him a lecture. Twilight, Twilight, Twilight...”

Spike was quiet. He hadn’t said as much, but his draconic senses could see the ‘temporal afterimage’ Twilight had made upon stopping time. It was like a blurry mirage that revealed many things about what she’d done during the freeze, and that, combined with his familiarity with her...

“Don’t worry, everypony.” Spike rested his claws behind his head. “I’d say she’s got this.”

Rainbow was quiet, as well. She might’ve had a comment on Spike’s statement, maybe supported his vote of confidence or somesuch... but she was a little preoccupied furiously masturbating.

As for Fluttershy, well… she wasn’t watching the battle at all. For a while now, she’d been busy consoling the seventh and most miserable of their lot. It’d seemed like a lost cause at first, but in the past moment or so, they’d actually started to talk back.

“We both know I don’t have a future,” Discord said. He was curled in a mottled ball with his back turned, his bleary eyes looking at nothing. “My future’s set regardless of who wins.”

Fluttershy’s face was like stone. “Listen to me. You’re not entirely to blame for all this—it takes two to maintain a friendship, and we didn’t hold up our part of it.”

Discord’s eyes darkened. “We both know I wouldn’t have accepted it. I’m nothing but a—”

“Stop it,” said Fluttershy.

Discord fell silent. He scratched the side of his face, but nothing more.

A flash of… something, crossed Fluttershy’s face, but it was gone quickly as it’d come. “I’m not going to lie. Forgiving you for this is… hard. You hurt us, Discord. You hurt me.”

The words felt like a knife in his chest.

“But we didn’t give you a fair chance at friendship,” she went on. “How could we expect you to be loyal when we kept accusing you of things? Why put the past behind you when everyone kept holding it over you? Why ever help us when we ignored you at best, and bossed you around at worst?”

Silence. The rumbling in the distance was getting louder, but they didn’t pay it any heed.

“We all made our beds one way or another,” Fluttershy said. “You say you wouldn’t have tried, but I think you saw the situation was doomed from the outset. We shouldn’t have put you in that position, Discord. No one, especially not someone trying to improve, deserves that.”

Discord closed his eyes. It felt like he was hanging above an abyss he’d only just clawed out of, and there’d be no coming out if he fell back in. Storms raged in his mind. Heavy weights shifted in his gut. The medallion he still wore around his neck was heavy, it's cold, polished metal pressed against his chest.

“I suppose I didn’t do myself any favors.” He raised his head with the speed of a snail. “The ‘tests’ … the griefing… the attitude… the skulking... I guess I should’ve realized harmony and chaos weren’t going to get along straight out of the gate. I think… I might’ve set you all up to fail, too.”

Fluttershy watched him turn to her. “I know we can all get along. Let’s start over with a clean slate, okay? We give each other’s values a chance, we forgive each other for the past, and most importantly, we forgive ourselves, too.”

Discord was quiet for a long time. He held up the medallion he still wore, its dull golden sheen molded into strange shapes.

Innumerable years as a statue, all filled with hateful leers and hushed insults. A past haunted by mistakes and ghosts.

‘Worthless,’ Tirek said.

‘Traitor,’ Shining Armor said.

‘Monster,’ Celestia said.

‘Failure’, his conscience said.

He was still hanging by a claw above the dark pit, but right as his grip began to give, a silhouette above him held out a yellow hoof.

Discord’s eyes watered. He yanked the medallion off, tossed it away, then smiled at Fluttershy. He put his claw on the curve of his prison, and Fluttershy put a hoof on hers—

ZZZZZZZT!

They all nearly fell over. An ear-splitting sizzle had just gone off from the south, followed by spike of magical power unlike anything they’d ever felt. They looked just in time to see another shockwave collide with the forcefield around Ponyville with an impossible WUMPH. Ambient energy flowed around the town like multicolored water… and a few seconds later, everything started to rumble.

A lot.

“Ngggh!” Rainbow thrust her hips. Her hoof was a blur as Twilight’s colossal form in the distance glowed brighter than ever.

“Did Twi just do what I think she did?!” Applejack called over the noise.

“That wasn’t her!” Rarity’s horn was emitting sparks. “I think Tirek is—”

Spike’s odd laugh made them all pause.

“Blind, blind, blind,” he said. “Seriously, how could a spellcaster like Tirek forget you can cast multiple spells during Time Stop? It’s like he’s got tunnel vision!”

The other girls didn’t quite get what Spike meant… but the realization hit Discord like a train. He’d heard about the first debacle with this tangled mess of a spell, but now that he examined it proper, he realized just how... chaotic it was.

“She took my advice.” He looked at Twilight like he was seeing her for the first time. “She hoped for the best, but planned for the worst…”

Spike’s fierce, emerald eyes met his. “You’ve got a weird way of doing things, Discord. Your tests and junk taught Twilight a lot, but you sure didn’t make it easy for her.”

Discord hung his head. “I’m... sorry.”

Spike studied Discord for a long time. “But, I think Fluttershy’s right. If we’d been more friendly to each other, things might have been different. You deserve another chance. We all do.”

Rainbow moaned as Twilight’s ass took up even more of the horizon. Her rose-red eyes were wild, she was panting like mad, and her hind legs twitched with every stroke of her sex. She breathed Twilight’s name like a mantra as the rest of the world passed by in a fuzzy blur.

Discord chuckled and turned to his screen for the first time. “So, what’s Mister Chain Gang up to?”

***

It all happened in under a second. Tirek fired a crimson ray at Twilight, but as he did, a ward set into Twilight’s disjunction spell activated and sent a pulse into their respective tendrils. Said tendrils then intercepted Tirek’s counterspell in the blink of an eye, first twisting and warping it into something new... then empowering that new thing several times over!

Tirek’s ray exploded like a firework. Realizing he’d been had, he tried to cancel his spell... but the magic wasn’t his anymore. The altered magic pierced Twilight’s three foot thick coat and flowed into her, and...

ZZZZZZZT!

Words had failed Twilight the first time she’d cast this ‘counterspell’. This empowered version did much the same, her voice giving out amidst an ocean of power swirling into her. The sensation of being too small for her own skin set in again, only it was amplified beyond reckoning. Every sexual nerve in her body fired off in a peak beyond description, and then, the first growth spurt expanded her frame to make room for more… SO much more!

Twilight moaned, low and lewd. A tower-sized phallus of pure magic formed behind her, and she fell back on its ridges in a clenching, blissful frenzy. Everything about her rocketed up and out: Her bones lengthened and thickened to support the manifesting tons of mass. Her muscles swelled to new sizes that dwarfed not just Tirek, but anything he could ever hope to be. Her heavenly wings we getting longer and larger in proportion to the rest of her, their indigo and pink tips rippling with the power of the cosmos.

The sky pulsed like it was alive. The sun and moon appeared on opposite horizons, and every last star became bright and visible in the semi-dark sky. Love energy filled the air and enveloped Equestria in a colorful protective shroud. The land rumbled more than ever, but the tremors soon dulled like they were far away, even as Twilight’s growing weight crashed down on her equally-scaling toy. She’d doubled in size already and showed no sign of stopping, her hulking front legs bulldozing the crater’s edges with every new foot she claimed!

Tirek was paralyzed. He wasn’t standing in front of Twilight anymore—he was practically in her lap! Purple legs like vertical cruise ships swelled ever-thicker and longer in his peripheral. Acres of fuzzy underbelly sloped over him like an upside-down hill. Twilight’s impromptu dildo was over two hundred feet long and growing, and she was taking all of it at once. Her stuffed nethers slid up and down with immense WUMPHS of air that made his ears pop, and every crash of her colossal rump made spherical, stadium-sized depressions that grew larger and deeper.

But also, each crash kicked up lava tsunamis towards Tirek. Fortunately, as the magma was about to descend, it parted down the middle under Twilight’s magic. Searing heat scorched Tirek’s hide and stung his face. The stifling air was heavy with the smell of molten rock and spicy scent of horny mare. Twilight’s tremendous sex grew closer (literally) every time she hilted herself, and she was ascending so fast that now, even her clit was bigger than him!

Tirek pupils shrank. He was going to be caught by Twilight’s growing dildo at this rate, or crushed by her titanic labia. Even if he was lucky enough to slip inside, her powerful inner muscles would make short work of him. He was having difficulty grasping the magnitude of Twilight’s power anymore, and the realization made him feel short of breath—

“RAAAAAAAAAAGGGGHHH!” A vertical crease formed down the center of Tirek’s chest. A grotesque, alien, fang-filled mouth opened with a sickly squelch, its unholy scream rending the air like a blade. A vile, seething hunger welled up from the ravenous depths of Tirek’s hidden maw, and his mind blanked as the vampiric energy demanded he FEED—

“There was a time that would’ve scared me. Now, it’s just sad.”

The vile energy vanished. It wasn’t counterspelled at all, it just simply ceased to be. A psychic force like iron slammed into Tirek’s mind and silenced the all-consuming hunger, then flipped off his magic like a switch. His second mouth was forced shut and re-sealed without a trace, and he was forced to his knees again as great magenta bindings appeared around his arms and legs.

“You called the Elements of Harmony ‘vaunted’ before.” Now a mile in size and climbing, Twilight’s head was higher than the wispy clouds. “Vaunted: To praise or boast about something, especially in excess. How ironic.”

Tirek found himself being lifted into the air. Up, up, up, past the gentle curve of Twilight’s thighs, past her wide hips that took up his field of view, past her windswept chest with a tuft bigger than a city block. At last he beheld her face again, and it was even more divine than before. Her ethereal mane pulsed with the power of creation. Her five hundred foot horn crackled with reality-warping energies. Each of her eyes were over eleven times his size—scratch that, twelve, and while her smile wasn’t anywhere near as wide as a mile, a fresh thousand foot surge brought her that much closer.

“You think friendship and harmony are a waste, that relying on others only holds you back.” Twilight’s mental voice was calm, but her expression grew lustier with each monumental bounce. “Few things in life are so black and white, Tirek. If we all spent our lives being so closed-minded, we’d never grow as individuals.”

Tirek said nothing. He couldn’t. A distant part of him was screaming defiance, roaring with curses and vowing revenge, but Twilight’s words overrode it all. He was a fifty-foot warrior with the magic of an entire country, yet he was like an ant to her. The meek, naive foal was gone—in her place was this goddess of magic and harmony.

“Maybe someday you’ll learn, just like I did, that sometimes the things we’re convinced are bad are simply misunderstoooooood..." Now even Twilight’s mental voice wavered amidst a thousand... no, two thousand foot surge. “E-Even... Discord managed to learn that lesson, and he embodies the vvvvvery opposite of harmony! I wouldn’t be here right nnnnnow without him and my other friends, so I know th-there’s hope for—”

A miniscule flash glittered over Twilight’s muzzle. It was a golden medallion—the same one Tirek had given Discord. She almost lost track of it thanks to another growth spurt putting her over two miles, but she retrieved it from her fur right as it transformed into an elegant key.

“Is that the…” The key’s glowing, prismatic energies calling to Twilight’s ascended senses. “Wait, right now? Really? I mean, I-I suppose I could, but… oh, fine, why not. Not like it’s gonna hurt anything...”

She summoned the crystal box the Tree of Harmony had given them. The other five keys were already inserted, so she took her key, fitted it into the final slot, and turned them all of them at once.

FWSSSSSHHHHHH!

Light. Incredible, heavenly, valley-encompassing light. Tirek would be a liar if he said he knew what just happened, but he did know Twilight’s grip on him was now slipping. Eyes closed and flailing, he wormed out of her restraints while slipping out of her mental hold. He was soon in freefall towards the earth, but he cast a flight spell and slowed to a halt.

But he didn’t flee.

No, of course he wouldn’t run. How could he? There’d been only one thing on his mind this whole time—the same thing that’d consumed him for years innumerable! The strange light burned his vampiric powers, but he didn’t care. He extended them towards Twilight, found her irresistible magic, opened his drooling mouth—

“My goodness!” came Fluttershy’s deafening voice. “Twilight, what did you do?!”

Tirek paused. That... wasn’t Twilight’s magic at all! It was... a SECOND source of mind-boggling power?! His eyes were only now starting to adjust to this blasted light; who was that?!

“It better not be permanent, that’s for sure!” said Applejack, her voice just as loud. “How the hay am I supposed to applebuck like this?!”

Pinkie’s giggle was like a peal of thunder. “Quick! Someone grab Rarity before she goes mad with power! Again!”

Rarity scoffed behind Tirek. “Worry about yourself, Miss Jumps-Everywhere. Do be a dear and stay still for a change, hmm?”

Tirek’s jaw dropped. Where once there was one pony titan, now there were six! It was the bearers of the Elements of Harmony, but not only were they all equally gigantic as Twilight, they’d undergone some kind of… transformation? Their manes and tails were longer and streaked with bright colors. Mystical sigils shaped were emblazoned along their legs. Their cutie marks had been altered into greater forms, and most notable of all, the magic radiating off them—

“Oh look, a centaurfly.” Rainbow raised her island-sized hoof over Tirek. “I hate those things.”

“D-Don’t!” Twilight managed to say. She put her hoof over Rainbow’s and coaxed it down. “NNNNNNot… w-worth it.”

Rainbow’s mouth twitched. She didn’t try again, but she did use her pegasus magic to create a prison of deadly-fast air around Tirek.

“Ever hear of slicing winds, jerk?” She ran her wing across her throat. “Go on, steal some magic now. I dare you.”

Applejack wasn’t sure whether to sigh or facehoof. “Right… well, uh, let’s... zap him? I s’pose? Pretty sure the Elements are overkill at this point, but I’m pretty sure that’s what we’re supposed to… um, yeah.”

So that was what they did. Calling it was a ‘zap’ at that scale was putting it lightly, but the result was all the magic of Equestria flowing out of Tirek in one fell swoop. To him, it felt like his body was being rent apart at a fundamental level, and true to Twilight’s word, not quick in the slightest. He may have yelled something during the middle of it—something about revenge or whatnot, but when the light cleared a few moments later, the great Lord Tirek had been reduced to a shrunken, shrivelled up shadow of his true self.

“Okay.” Twilight banished Tirek to Tartarus with a mere thought. The Ego spell was still on her, but using the Elements had cleared her head a bit. “Now that that’s over with, let’s get back to normal... before…”

She saw Rainbow was giving her the look. Twilight knew she should say no, but damn those come-hither eyes and that cheeky grin! She was already imagining the strong embrace of Rainbow’s downy wings, their warm lips pressed together, their desires rising point for point...

“Always did wanna bang a goddess.” Rainbow ran her nose through Twilight’s cosmic mane. “How about we celebrate our anniversary a day early?”

Twilight’s legs almost gave out. “O-Oh…”

Okay, now Applejack facehoofed. “Here we go again.”

Rarity got an idea. She beckoned Fluttershy over and whispered something in her ear.

Fluttershy bit her lip. “I... suppose I could try.” She cleared her throat. “Erm… Discord?”

A pause…

“Thank you for calling the Reformed Spirit of Chaos Hotline,” came Discord’s voice. “My name is Discord, how can I help you?”

Fluttershy giggled. “Are you alright? Sorry about up and vanishing like that. I imagine you can see me, wherever you are. Kind of like… so many… other ponies… everywhere... ohhhhhhh, no…”

Discord chuckled. “I wondered when that would occur to you. I’m afraid that gaudy rainbow power is too powerful for me to dispel, but! How’s about you and the others come and stay at my place while the lovebirds elope? We can sort out the size shenanigans once they’ve had their fun.”

At this, a two-mile tear in reality opened up behind Fluttershy. Twilight and Rainbow were dimly aware of the others leaving through it, but it was forgotten amidst a heated kiss. Rainbow could tell something was happening, her skin tingling and buzzing with Twilight’s magic, but she couldn’t tell what it was.

Or at least, not until the scenery changed.

The plains outside of Ponyville were gone. They were in the heart of gray, barren wasteland that extended as far as either of them could see. The sky was blank, the ground was bare stone, and the wind was listless and stale. There was no sign of civilization anywhere, even from their lofty vantage point, nor was there any sign of life in general.

Rainbow squeaked in Twilight’s mouth. She pulled away and looked all around. “What’s…”

Twilight waggled her eyebrows. “Barren parallel reality. Remember what I said at Prideful Falls?”

The End

Author's Note

“Nooooo!” I can hear you say. “You have to write the sexytimes!” Well, see, that’s the thing. Yeah, I can write them banging, but the whole mechanism and fetish of this story is bragging-induced growth. When I try to think of what to have these two brag about to each other while getting it on, I don’t know what hasn’t been covered up to this point. Retreading it here would feel forced and uninteresting, and considering the bragging is the crux of this entire story, I figured it was better to just end it here rather than hash out something forced.

Also, when I’m trying to write things that I’m not into, not only does it take me even longer than writing usually does, it’s INCREDIBLY draining.

Characterization is very important to me. It’s debatably the thing I spend the most time on getting right with my stories, and here, it felt like these two would be more interested in banging than bragging. Granted, they’d be banging while humongous with no regard for collateral damage, and I get a lot of people would be into that. Heck, I’d probably read that if someone else wrote it…

But reading and writing are two different things.

This story is something of an anomaly. If I had to give it a classification, I’d go with ‘porn with a moral’. And if you think combining those elements sounds challenging, you’re right. Maybe someone else could’ve hammered this out no sweat, but not me. The only reason this chapter exists at all is because I had Azure’s help, and even then, we both racked our brains trying to figure out how the hell we were gonna make certain things work. Did we enjoy it? Yes, but that doesn’t mean it was easy.

So yeah, I’m gonna end it here while it’s still good. Huge thanks to Azure Dreamer for working me on this chapter, and of course, huge thanks as well to Charyb. It’s because of them that this story and the original Bragging Rights exist, so if you haven’t checked out either of their stories, go to their user pages and check them out!

Thanks to all of you as well for reading! I hope I did the first Bragging Rights justice!