A Day with Discord

The attack that had occurred in the castle dining room, had delayed their plans to search for the missing prince Emerald had set our heroes back by a couple of weeks. Within that time Discord had taken the opportunity to recover from his physical wounds. With some help from Sketch Melody and Opal Song, they discovered which of his abilities were taken from him and what had remained.

He could still teleport from place to place in short bursts; create items or weapons out of thin air, and a lot of his usual stuff. However, he lost his ability to traverse dimensions, open portals or pull stuff from Equestria. Which had meant that they were not going back home to Equestria for a while.

During his recovery, Discord even managed to teach King a few tricks as he had promised, but he could only teach him so many due to his limited power. But this was one of his ways of making the most of the situation he and Sketch Melody were in.

The next step they had taken was getting the proper equipment and supplies. Asher had decided to train Talon and Sketch Melody, showing them a few combat moves and getting Talon fitted for armor. Sketch Melody opted out of wearing armor, it since she wasn’t much of a physical fighter and couldn't move as freely with the heavy armor that Asher wanted her to wear.

To keep the minds of Discord, Talon, and Asher at ease about her safety, she had gotten basic lessons from Opal Song, including how to make a magical force field and basic magical blasts. Asher on the other hoof was not too keen on the idea of Sketch Melody being without armor.

The three males in the group were packing up their wagon while the griffin general was ranting his frustrations to Discord and Talon.

“I still say that wearing armor would be a better choice,” Asher grumbled.
“Maybe not for you, General Sourpuss,” Discord yawned, messing around with a Rubix cube he had conjured. “Sketch Melody is not as strong as us when it comes to her muscles.”
“And she's smaller than all of us.” Talon pointed out.

Asher grumbled silent insults under his breath, walking over to the wagon that King Obsidian had procured for them and placing his luggage inside. The griffon general was slightly regretting accepting the quest from the king to travel with these three to find the prince.

In Asher’s eyes Discord was a powerful being, with a large ego that annoyed him to no end. Talon was a kindhearted hippogriff that meant well but he wasn’t good in a high-pressure situation, it was something that Asher was going to have to help him with. And his thoughts on the unicorn mare, Sketch Melody you ask?

She was an odd Unicorn that he couldn’t quite describe, she was very kind, she didn’t seem to bug him as much as the lord of Chaos, and she seemed to have a good head on her shoulders and he is impressed with how she acted when the shadowy creature had attacked, but she was very stubborn causing a few small fights between the two of them during the weeks of Discord’s recovery, and always being separated by one of the castle staff, Talon, Queen Opal Song or King Obsidian.

“Speaking of,” Discord looked around. “Where is Sketch Melody?”
“I believe the queen wanted a word with her before we left,” Talon spoke. “Something about a gift?”
“She better get here soon,” Asher growled.
“Take a chill pill.” Discord replied, tossing a now solved Rubix cube over his shoulder.
“I will not take a chill pill,” Asher gave a deadpanned look at the lord of chaos. “We should have left already.”

In a small flash of light, the king appeared next to Asher. “They’ll with you soon, the Queen sent me with a few extra things to put in your cart!”

The king had a couple of boxes in his arms and placed them in the cart with some help from Discord.

“Extra armor and potions.” the king smiled.
“Why would we need potions?” Discord asked.
“Potions in this world are very useful,” Talon explained. “They can do a lot of things in an emergency.”
“Besides, not all of us are overpowered beings,” Asher added. “So we need them.

“Noted.” Discord yawned.
“Sorry we’re late!” the Queen announced.
“About time!” Asher snorted, turning his head to the two approaching unicorn mares, his eyes landing on Sketch Melody.

The mint green unicorn stood in a new outfit, a blue top that matched her eyes, a black belt around her waist, light brown pants and brown boots on each hoof, on her back was her saddlebag, Asher could feel his face grow warm, but he shook it off. Still sore about their tardiness.

“Love the new threads!” Discord grinned, flying over to the unicorn.
“You look very nice Sketch!” Talon smiled.
“Thank you.” Sketch grinned. “Queen Opal gave them to me this morning.”
“I enchanted the clothes.” Opal Song chimed in. “Since General Asher is concerned about Sketch Melody’s choice about not wearing armor.”
“A very good idea your Highness.” Asher nodded.

“Thoughtful as always my dear.” Obsidian grabbed his wife and hugged her.
“Thank you, dear.” Opal nuzzled his cheek, allowing her husband to set her down on her hooves. “I wanted to make sure she was properly prepared,”
“And thanks to you we are.” Sketch placed a hoof on the queen’s shoulder. “We will find your son, you can count on us!”

Opal Song’s eyes teared up, she wrapped her front legs around the young unicorn mare letting her tears running down her cheeks, a mix of emotions playing on the queen’s face. Sketch Melody gave the queen a hug in return before pulling away and giving her a handkerchief from her saddlebag.

“Be sure to contact us with the orb if you find anything,” Opal told Sketch Melody in a motherly tone, wiping her eyes with the handkerchief.
“We will,” Sketch promised. “You guys do the same if anything happens on your end.”
“We most certainly will,” Obsidian confirmed.

With one last round of goodbyes, our heroes set off, Talon is pulling the wagon with Sketch in the cart with their map acting as the group's navigator, while Discord and Asher walked in front of them. Their first travel site the first of many in on the journey to find Prince Emerald.