Corddis snaps his fingers, the world goes dark. Moon Shadow feels the dreamscape try to engulf her. Instantly Moon Shadow knows that it isn't the true world of dreams, but merely a construct created by the misshapen creature before her.

She smiles wickedly as her instincts take over and she shatters his dream world before it can even fully coalesce.

"Th- that is impossible!" Discord roars, his true form now exposed for all to see.

Moon Shadow smirks at the confused Draconequus, "No, Lord of Chaos, merely improbable."

Before Discord can react, she tears a hole in the fabric of his reality and, stepping through, drags him screaming into the true World of Dreams with her.

Shadow focuses on Discord, reducing his near omnipotent powers to nothing. As she does so, she makes herself seem to disappear, grinning to herself at how she has turned the tables on the monster before her.

She makes her voice seem to emanate from everywhere all at once, "Dreams, Discord? Are you serious? I may not be Princess Luna, but I am a Mistress of the Dream. Here, to me, your powers are as nothing. Here, I am the power to be reckoned with. You hold no sway."

With only a single moment of thought, she traps Discord in a nightmare. He is now stuck, powerless, treading water as he feels something trying to take bites out of his scaly hide. He begins to shriek in terror.

"It's not so pleasant when it's you who is on the receiving end, is it?" Shadow laughs.

She let him thrash about in the nightmare for what seemed like forever, then, when he was about to give up and let himself be eaten, she dispels it. She walked up to where he is lying, bleeding on the ground. He looks up at her with tears fresh on his face.

She looked at him with disdain, "How many?"

Confusion blossoms on his face. She smacks him across his nose with her hoof, "How many ponies did you banish to this world?"

He doesn't answer immediately. Instead, he spits out a tooth, blood flowing freely from his gums. He's vulnerable, she thinks to herself. Her hoof strikes him a second time, sending him in an end over end tumble. She magnifies her size until she towers over him, many times his size.

"How many ponies?!" her voice booms as she screams in his face.

Discord cringes, looking down, "Many, many thousands. I have no idea how many. It's not like I kept detailed records, you know."

"Tens of thousands?" she asks in a low, threatening voice.

"Possibly more. I was at it for years. There are surely ponies that are still under my curse. There are likely some just born humans that were ponies." he responds weakly.

"You will pay for what you have done. I will make you pay. You have no idea the suffering I can bring you, here."

"Ha. I may have erred trying to best you in the World of Dreams, but you are not the all-powerful goddess you picture yourself to be. I will escape. I always escape. You and your friends will regret setting eyes on me once I do," Discord sneered.

Moon Shadow growls as her rage rises, she lifts him up in her magic, preparing to deliver a death-stroke to end the misshapen beast once and for all.

In her anger, she made the mistake of using her horn's magic, not the Dream magic inherent to her. Discord senses the weakness and strikes out, driving a spike of pain deep into her mind.

Fearing she would regain control and capture him once again, Discord flees the Dream World, slithering through a rift he created that was the size of a mouse-hole.

"Discord! You bastard!" Moon Shadow screams, unleashing a massive bolt of power that shattered the construct around her, dumping her in the void between worlds.

She puts a hoof to her head, comforting the pain that Discord caused, and the aftermath of her bolt of power. Ouch, that hurt. She shakes her head to clear it, and then sees Discord fleeing. The fact he's doing it under his own power is telling, he must be waiting for his powers to fully recover. She looks around, they are in the space between worlds, where the dreams of the people and the ponies reside. Moon Shadow smiles, she still can have control here. She wills herself to move. The lights of the individual dreams flash past her as she draws closer to Discord.

"You can't get away that easily, you demon." She shouts, "You are still in my realm."

He laughs as he calls over his shoulder, "The realm of an apprentice, you made your mistake, I'm not going to allow you another."

She curses as she flashes towards him. Attempting to form a construct around him, but enough of his powers are back, allowing him to evade them easily. She finally tries to trip him up, throwing anything she can think of, so she can get just one more moment, so she can get him back fully under her control. But after several minutes he stops and turns.

"I have enough power now, I may not be able to take control from you, Moon Shadow, but you aren't the only pony stuck in the dream. I will win in the end."

"You bastard!" She screams, charging her horn and throwing the most powerful spell she knew at him. A white bar of liquid fire emanates from her horn and flashes at the draconequus. She pours everything she can into it, and as the beam reaches him, he's snapped his fingers, and is gone in a flash of light.

"Damn!" She shouts. Trotting over to where he was. Her horn alights as she tests the area. The only thing she feels is chaos magic, not a lick of the residues of balefire. He got away in time. Damn it! She looks around. We have to finish this. She steps out of the dream and into her body in Washington DC.

Author's Note

This chapter, and the one previous, was actually written a few years ago, for when Phenrys got to this point in the story. I'm glad to reveal these chapters over the last few weeks. We are in intercampaign at the moment, which means I have much less time to write than I usually do. Will do a blog post to explain further in the upcoming time.