Slayer

Following The Slayer was trivial, as his path of carnage was easy to track even in the midst of the flesh-covered city. There were still a few stray demons and possessed ponies here and there, though, forcing Luna to take care of them while Twilight did her best to remain out of the fight. While she knew combat spells, she was still hesitant to begin killing living beings, even if they were demons.

Luna's combat prowess was still more than enough to get them through the city unscathed, constantly following The Slayer's bloody path. Even though he was gaining far more attackers, he breezed through them with relative ease. The few times they caught up enough to catch sight of him again, they both noticed that he was managing to advance forward at the same time as fighting off the hordes; if he ever stopped, it was only long enough to cave in a demon's skull, before they'd lose sight of him in the chaos once more.

The number of demons slowly grew fewer, and by the time Luna and Twilight finally caught up to The Slayer for good, they had a brief moment of peace. Now that they weren't in immediate danger, Twilight tried to observe where exactly they were going.

While most of the buildings were now unrecognizable, due to either their collapse or the demonic influence overtaking them, the one that The Slayer stopped at appeared to be a shop of some kind. The entire front wall had been demolished by the ground in front of it erupting, but it was still largely traversable.

In the midst of the rubble and bloodshed, Twilight could make out what looked like cages, as well as a few signs that were just intact enough to make out animal silhouettes.

"A pet shop..." Twilight muttered to herself.

"It appears so," Luna said. "Mr. Slayer, why did you stop here?"

As expected, he did not answer, but this time he didn't even move at all, as if he didn't hear her.

Concerned, Twilight walked to his side. "Are you... okay?"

He just remained rooted to the spot, staring at a certain corner of the store.

Twilight followed his gaze, and spotted the remains of a cage, twisted apart as if it were nothing more than plastic. The nearest legible sign held the figure of a rabbit, and now that Twilight looked closer, she could barely see a severed rabbit's foot caught on an edge of the cage.

She winced. As much brutality as she saw today, the thought that not even the animals were safe hit her slightly.

Slowly, The Slayer reached down and took the rabbit's foot off of the mangled metal, and brought it up to his helmet.

By now, Luna also noticed what he was so fixated on. "Vile creatures, not even sparing the pets. But was this really worth stopping for?"

Twilight didn't give any sort of answer, however, as she noticed that The Slayer's hand was starting to shake, ever so slightly. Not only that, but the hand that wasn't holding the paw was starting to ball into a tighter and tighter fist, to the point where she was afraid he'd manage to snap his entire hand off from the pressure.

And then, for the first time since his awakening, Twilight heard The Slayer make a noise.

Breathing.

Breathing that slowly got heavier and heavier, yet remained perfectly steady.

All the while, his shaking was slowly becoming more noticeable.

"Is everything alright?" Luna asked, concerned. "Should we-"

Before she could finish the question, a demon crawled into the open front of the store, and let out a hiss.

The instant the demon made a noise, The Slayer dropped the paw, threw aside his weapon, and leapt straight to the store's front.

The demon didn't even have a chance to react as the Slayer's fist impacted its chest, instantly reducing its entire body into several chunks, leaving the legs to awkwardly flop to the ground as the most intact piece.

Twilight and Luna's eyes both went wide. As strong as they had seen the Slayer to be, this was on a whole other level.

Instantly, the Slayer was moving again, sprinting back into the streets to meet a small horde of demons that had amassed during the downtime. The Slayer went to work, reducing several demons to the same state as the first one, while others were executed in far more brutal ways.

One demon was unlucky enough to be cleanly bisected down the middle, while another had a hole punched straight through its chest. Next, The Slayer jumped onto the back of a particularly large demon, where he proceeded to tear off the beast's entire right side of its torso. Without missing a beat, he then ripped its horned head from its neck, and jumped down to impale another demon on the horns, before reducing the result into a pile of meat with a single stomp.

Luna and Twilight could only watch, dumbstruck, as the carnage continued. This was unlike The Slayer's usual fighting style; if he was brutal before, this was absolutely barbaric. He no longer cared about avoiding damage, instead ignoring fireballs thrown by the demons entirely in favor of clearing the distance as soon as possible, where he would enact whatever swift, bloody end he felt like.

Once the violence became too much for her, Twilight instead shifted her focus to The Slayer's discarded weapon, and picked it up in her magic to inspect.

This was the double barreled one, which seemed to be a favorite of his based on his earlier fights. Mindful not to pull the trigger, she instead operated a lever on the top of the weapon, which caused it to fall into two separate pieces, connected via a hinge. The moment she did that, a pair of red cylinders popped out, rattling on the floor.

The cylinders in question appeared to be made of some sort of plastic, with a metal cap of some kind at one end. A quick magical deconstruction revealed that it was used to store a number of small metal balls, and what looked like black powder.

Her study was interrupted as a demon was sent flying into the store, landing at her and Luna's hooves, still alive. It tried to claw at them from the ground, before The Slayer grabbed its legs. The demon let out a cry as he pulled it back into the fight, where he immediately swung the demon so hard that its leg was amputated, while the rest of his body went flying. The Slayer then used his newly acquired limb on another demon, jamming the leg bone straight through its skull with a sickening noise.

Twilight fought down the urge to vomit, and dropped the gun and its ammo from her magic immediately.

Even Luna found herself taking a cautious step backwards. "By the stars... What has come over him? Has he always been this powerful?"

Twilight did not say anything, as she simply closed her eyes to try and block out the gruesome imagery. It only did so much, however, considering she could still easily hear the sound of tearing flesh and snapping bones.

Eventually, the sounds of battle stopped, and Twilight opened her eyes to see The Slayer standing in the middle of a massive pile of gore and viscera, his armor completely drenched in blood. He was still tensing himself for a fight, but when no more demons presented themselves, he slowly started to calm down, and after a moment, he started walking back towards the store.

Twilight and Luna both gave him a wide berth as he went to pick up his weapon. He gave Twilight a glance upon seeing that it was unloaded, but simply replaced the dismantled shells with new ones without pressing the issue.

Before he left, he knelt back down and grabbed the rabbit's foot again. After looking at it for a moment, he surprisingly gently closed his fist around it, before placing it on a section of the store counter that was still standing. Once that was done, he nodded at both ponies, and continued walking through the rear of the store. Though still confused and perturbed by his behavior, Twilight and Luna still followed.

The Slayer's path appeared to be the faster route to the heart of the city, and he cut through a few other buildings in the process. The closer they got to the center of the city, the more twisted and corrupted the architecture became. There was even a flow of lava making its way through a few parts of the city. Twilight and Luna flew over it easily, while The Slayer was able to cross with previously unseen acrobatic skill, easily hopping from one chunk of building to the next.

Twilight had a little trouble processing this. Just how many tricks did he have up his sleeve? Was there even a limit to what he could do?

Was he genuinely on their side, or only using them?

As they traveled, fighting off the odd demon here and there, they eventually came to the edge of a cliff, which led down into the most heavily corrupted part of the city.

The buildings' old forms were no longer recognizable at all, as they twisted and bent around each other and themselves, held together with pillars of flesh and strange bolts of red lightning. The lava flowed down into what was essentially a crater, creating an infernal lake that only certain sections of buildings could penetrate above.

And near the middle of this mess was a large, glowing structure of some kind. The shimmering around it confirmed that it was a portal, and Twilight was disturbed to notice that it looked like an altar that was comprised entirely of mangled and mashed-together flesh. Several possessed ponies were lingering around the portal, while other demons hopped from building to building or lazily glided through the air, while even more slowly filtered from the portal itself.

None of the demons had spotted them yet, and Twilight was surprised to see that The Slayer didn't immediately jump down into a fight. Instead, he was looking from one end of the crater to the other. Perhaps he was studying the placement of the demons? Or was he simply trying to get a grasp of traversable terrain?

"So, that's what they were trying to do last time," Luna whispered, just loud enough for Twilight to hear. "Have you seen this before, Slayer?"

He just nodded, and kept scanning the environment. Eventually, he seemed to find what he was looking for, as he took a few steps back, preparing for a running jump.

Neither of the ponies stopped him, and he leapt an incredible distance down into the crater onto an exposed collapsed building, the landing seemingly doing nothing more than making him stumble slightly before he got back up.

Both Twilight and Luna hesitated to follow him in immediately. While they could easily avoid the lava by flying, the heat was starting to get to them, and being grounded in any way would most likely be a death sentence.

Instead, they decided to hang back and watch The Slayer work.

It wasn't long before demons spotted him, but he largely ignored them and charged for the altar, only killing demons that happened to be in the way. Once he was at his target, he thrust a fist into the fleshy structure, and tore out... something, causing the entire portal to shake, and followed by many more demons flooding into the crater, either through the portal or by teleporting in with a brief storm of red energy.

They all advanced towards The Slayer, and the slaughter began.

From their vantage point, Twilight and Luna watched him go to work. He was no longer showing the same sheer strength and lack of self-preservation that he had in front of the pet store, and was instead back to his "normal" level of brutality as he effortlessly carved away at the incoming demons, often hopping between sections of buildings.

However, the number of demons kept growing, and The Slayer was taking slightly more hits than usual in his fight. They still weren't enough to provide any actual damage, from what they could see, but it was getting to the point where demons were coming in slightly faster than he could put them down.

One such demon, a large, red flying sphere, apparently spotted the ponies on its way towards The Slayer, and decided to go after them instead. Luna noticed this, and quickly sent her sword into its single eye with her magic, before retracting it. The blinded beast began to freak out, spitting balls of energy in random directions until it careened into the side of the building they were perched on, where it ended up tumbling into the lava.

When it didn't come back up, Luna cleaned the blood off her blade and faced back towards The Slayer. "I shall assist him once again. If..." She paused. "If I am unable to return, contact Celestia immediately."

Before Twilight could offer any sort of response, Luna was off, flying above and through the hordes of demons as The Slayer fought them back on whatever solid ground he could find.

Twilight was very tempted to join in, as well, but decided that she lacked the killer instinct that The Slayer or even Luna held. Instead, she prepared a remote teleport spell and kept a close eye on both the fight and her surroundings. The moment Luna appeared to be in mortal danger, she planned to bring her back before too much damage was done, hopefully.

The Slayer... well, he's clearly been able to handle himself, so far.

Even if he seemed rather unstable. Why did the death of a rabbit trigger so much sheer rage from him? What did the demons do to inspire such anger in the first place?

...what would he do once the demons retreated from Equestria?

'You do not understand the things that you tamper with.'

Twilight's eyes bugged out as her head whirled around. "Who's there?!"

'Because of your actions, The Doom Slayer has been freed, and we will forever torment your realm as a result.'

Realizing the voice was coming from within her own head, Twilight began to cower. Who was-?

Wait, the voice called him "The Doom Slayer."

Fearing the answer, she asked, "Are you... a demon?"

'You should not ask questions you already know the answer to.'

"But- how-?"

'When you freed The Hell Walker, you were in his mind for a brief time- and now, through that, we can contact you as we so please.'

The Hell Walker... another title for The Slayer?

She shook her head, steeling herself. "Whatever you're here for, I won't agree to it."

'We shall see. After all, this suffering and torment upon your land... it is your own doing.'

That gave her pause. "I..."

'The blood of the innocent is yours to bear, Twilight Sparkle.'

Tears started welling in her eyes. "No! I didn't... I..."

'No mortal ever understands the gravity of their actions. However, we can offer you a method of... redemption.'

She said nothing, and the voice continued.

'For now, The Doom Slayer is free once more, and will certainly return to Hell to continue his eternal crusade against our very existence.'

At that moment, The Slayer's chainsaw echoed over the sounds of battle, as if to punctuate the statement.

'If you are able to seal him once more, and keep him contained for eternity, we would cease our invasion of your realm, and leave you in peace.'

At first, she wanted to immediately reject the offer, but as Twilight thought, she realized the gravity of the situation. The Slayer, by fighting in Tartarus- no, by fighting in Hell, was able to protect other realms and dimensions from the demons. However, as long as he was still up and about, ponies were dying...

She was beginning to realize that the stakes were far larger than she ever could have imagined.

'We urge you to make a decision quickly,' the voice pushed. 'We know the power is available to your kind, and the longer you are indecisive, the more innocent souls we claim. And who is to say that The Doom Slayer will not see fit to punish your kind alongside us?"

Gritting her teeth, Twilight Sparkle made the most difficult decision of her life.

"I..."

"I will never help you, or any other demon. Not now, and not ever."

'Foolish mortal,' the voice growled, making her fold her ears back out of reflex. 'We saw fit to provide your realm with a way to escape damnation, and yet you refuse out of arrogance. Once we have conquered your world, we will see to it that your soul is sentenced to only the most unforgiving and unthinkable torment. Untold agony and suffering shall be your fate, as well as the fate of your loved ones, for longer than time itself. We suggest that you carefully weigh your options and reconsider.'

With that, the voice went away, and Twilight let out a breath she didn't notice she was holding.

And then she started hyperventilating as what she just did dawned on her.

What had come over her? Why was she so quick to dismiss the demons, and so bluntly? True, she would've decided that anyway, but...

She shook her head. She had more important things to worry about for the time being.

Looking back down at the fight, she was glad that Luna was still up and fighting just fine. She had more than a little blood on her by now, but judging by how she was still able to move and fight at full capacity, it was likely that none of it was hers.

Of course, The Slayer was also doing just fine for himself, even as swarmed as he looked. He never gave the demons a stationary target, and he hopped between buildings effortlessly as he fired into the hordes. On more than one occasion, he even used one of the flying demons as stepping stones, after jumping up to tear them apart like their brethren on the ground.

The portal looked even less stable than it did before, too; evidently one of them had damaged it more during the fight. On top of that, the demons were finally started to lessen in number. Looked like they were finally about to end this nightmare.

At that moment, the portal seemed to shimmer in place, as a large group of sizable pink demons came forth. In fact, Twilight recognized them as the same kind as the one that The Slayer had dueled in the past, before the Elements banished all of demonkind back to where they came from.

Only now there were several of them.

They roared in unison as they stepped forward, even treading lesser demons under their hooves as they marched towards The Slayer.

Luna was the first to challenge them, trying to fly from behind The Slayer, but unexpectedly, he grabbed her by the tail and yanked her back to the ground, behind him. She clearly protested, even if Twilight couldn't hear what was being said, but she was far more interested by what The Slayer did next.

Like usual, he simply put his current weapon behind him and another one just "appeared" in its place. However, this was a new one, and it was quite big, from what Twilight could see.

Big, and glowing a bright green.

The Slayer fired, and Twilight almost had to shield her eyes from the ensuing flash of green light. The space around the end of the gun literally appeared to distort itself, before an even brighter green ball shot into the air. This time, Twilight did have to shield her eyes.

When she looked again, there was not a single trace of any of the large demons. The only thing between The Slayer and the portal was several pools of blood and a few pieces of melted flesh, along with a genuine red mist spreading into the air.

Twilight's jaw dropped as her mind tried (and failed) to process what just happened. Did that weapon just "erase" the demons? Vaporize them, even?!

Luna was equally bewildered, but quickly shook it off as she joined The Slayer in mopping up whatever demons were left. Once the area was clear, The Slayer went straight to the base of the portal, and ripped out yet another piece.

The portal began to flicker in and out, before the entire altar collapsed into itself, the portal vanishing with it.

Almost as soon as it did, it released a red-hued shockwave, and Twilight gasped as she ducked down in response. When it passed over her harmlessly, she looked up, confused.

The shockwave spread throughout the city, and from what she could tell, it was similar to the one that the Elements had caused, getting rid of any demonic presence it passed over.

As it did so, the building Twilight was perched on started to plummet, and she yelped as she took to the air. All around her, other buildings shared the same fate, as the demonic growths holding them together vanished, leaving the rubble to fall to the ground, once again bound by the laws of physics.

The lava likewise cooled down instantly, turning into solid rock before her very eyes. The crater remained, however; while the demons' influence was gone, their damage remained.

She flew down to meet back up with Luna and The Slayer, the latter of whom was simply walking across the now-hardened lava.

"Is... is it over?" Twilight asked.

"It would seem so," Luna answered, cautiously. "At least, in Manehattan. We do not know if the demons will try to open another portal elsewhere."

Thinking back to her earlier encounter, Twilight took a deep breath. "Also... something happened while you were fighting."

Luna tilted her head, and The Slayer ignored her as he kept walking. "What was it?" Luna asked.

"The demons... one of them talked to me."

The following silence was palpable, the only sound in the city being that made by the handful of leftover fires. This silence was then broken by semi-rapid footsteps, as The Slayer proceeded to quickly walk back towards the two ponies.

Though she could not see his face, Twilight still flinched away from what was no doubt a glare, as he stood right above her and stared down.

If Luna was concerned by his sudden proximity, she didn't show it. "And what did they say?"

Twilight found it in herself to look The Slayer in the face. "They... wanted me to reseal you. They told me that if I did, they'd leave Equestria for good."

Luna looked back and forth between them, as they stared each other down. "And what did thou decide?" she slowly asked, her magic already starting to form around the hilt of her sword, though she wasn't sure who it would be used on.

"I declined." The Slayer made no movement, but she could practically feel his gaze softening. "But it sounded like they were going to try to ask me again later."

Suddenly, The Slayer squatted down to Twilight's eye level, making her flinch back even more. Despite her fear, she still forced herself to stare him back.

Oddly enough, at this proximity, she could just barely make out the contour of a face underneath his visor, along with a pair of blue eyes...

One of The Slayer's hands moved, and Twilight instantly shut her eyes as she cowered, while Luna called out, "Stop!"

However, instead of the brutal execution she was expecting, Twilight just felt a hand pat her on the back, followed by footsteps heading away from her.

Twilight timidly opened her eyes, and she saw Luna looking just as confused as she felt.

"Did... did he just pat me on the back?"

Luna could only nod slowly.

It was a few more seconds before Twilight realized The Slayer was starting to climb out of the crater. "Wait, Mr. Slayer!"

He did not stop, so Twilight landed near the outer edge of the crater, to intercept him as he clambered up. "Where are you going?"

He gave no answer, and simply kept walking.

"Will you come with us? Equestria could still be in danger!" Twilight pushed, placing herself directly in his path.

Still no response, and he just nonchalantly walked around her.

Luna joined them. "Please, Mr. Slayer, we cannot hope to keep the demons at bay without your help!"

Evidently, he had his own plan for that, as he just continued walking away.

Twilight tried to think of a way to sway him. She knew he hated demons, but what would his end goal be?

As she thought, a few details sprang to mind:

Discord claimed that he had fought demons for "eons", and the demon had referred to him as "The Hell Walker"...

Putting the pieces together, Twilight blurted out, "We know where the entrance to Hell is!"

That made him stop, and slowly turn to face her.

Encouraged by getting any sort of response, she continued. "Not far outside of Ponyville, my hometown, there's an entrance into Tartarus. The same place the demons came from."

Luna caught onto her argument, and continued. "If we take you there, you can stop the invasion from the source, correct?"

After a moment, The Slayer nodded, and went up to them expectantly.

"Alright, so, let's just teleport there, and-"

"That will not work," Luna cut her off. "I tried to cast a few spells to assist him during our battle together. None of them took hold. I don't believe common magic is enough to penetrate his armor."

The Slayer looked at his own arm for a moment, before turning back to Twilight. She had little more than a sheepish smile to offer.

"We could... take a chariot, instead?"