Chapters Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
Prologue: Demon Incursion
It was a long peaceful night. As usual, Queen Twilight Sparkle uses her magic to raise the moon and lower the sun in order to keep her daily schedule in check. After finishing her royal duties for the day, Twilight ordered her night guards to patrol the palace for any suspicious activity that needs to be reported before she and Spike decided to go to sleep. All was calm, all was peaceful. Twilight thought for sure that all of Equestria will be just as peaceful as the night, or so it seems. When Spike went to bed, Twilight went to her royal bed and as soon as she had all four of her hooves on top of soft mattress, she used her magic to pull out the book of memories from the bookshelf next to her bed. After looking at the pictures inside her book for a few minutes, Twilight felt a bit relieved for a moment that her friends will always be by her side even when they all disappear. No matter what happens to them, her friends will always guide Twilight throughout the years to come. After going through her pictures inside the book of memories, Twilight finally falls asleep laying on her back on top of her bed, with the book held on top of her chest, slowly closing her eyes while being at peace.
Unfortunately, after 6 hours of sleep, Twilight's eyes opened as she was suddenly awoken by a loud ear-piercing bloodcurdling scream coming from the hallways outside of her throne room. Feeling a cold chill crawling up her spine, Twilight couldn't help but feel a bit scared and concerned over what just happened in the Canterlot Palace. The moment Twilight got out of her bed, Spike woke up too feeling startled by the scream as well.
"W-WHAT?? What was that noise???" Spike gasped in an alarming tone.
"That's what I want to know too, Spike!!!" Twilight shrieked in fear.
Wasting no time for anymore questions, Twilight puts on her royal armor regalia and her crown before heading out of her private chambers with Spike following from behind. The moment Queen Twilight and Spike burst from their private chamber and appeared behind Twilight's throne, a Royal Guard appeared before them.
In the midst of their horror, the grand purple alicorn and the teenage dragon saw bloodstains on that Guard pony's armor, his face had fresh claw marks on his left cheek with blood spewing out of it, his right leg got bitten, with a small chuck of his flesh missing, and a broken spear was lodged into his lower abdomen, with blood spewing out his stab wound. Overall, the Royal Guard is critically wounded before he came limping all the way into the throne room, leaving behind a trail of his own blood. Before Twilight or Spike could say anything, the wounded guard makes his speech immediately before passing out.
"Y-Your majesty!! W-We have a situation in the palace foyer!!~! The guard spoke before he coughed up blood and collapsed right in front of the purple alicorn.
In an instant, the guard suddenly dropped dead, bleeding all over the palace floors, much to Twilight's excruciating fright.
"GALLUS!!! WHERE ARE YOU???" Twilight shouted in a royal canterlot voice.
"I'm here, your majesty!!!" Gallus acknowledged as he is seen flying 15 feet above the floors.
"What's the situation, Captain?!" Twilight asked trying to spare herself from her fears.
"A huge chasm erupted from inside the palace foyer. When we got closer to the chasm, a swarm of dangerous creatures came out of gap and started slaughtering the royal guards stationed there. Several of our men were being possessed and started attacking each other without warning. It was a horrible mess!!!"
"Spike, send word to Luster Dawn!!" Twilight ordered her royal advisor before turning her attention towards the Griffon Captain of the guard. "Gallus get out of the palace and have the rest of the guards stationed outside seal off the entire palace. Don't let any creature in here until the situation is over!!!"
"Yes, your majesty!!" Gallus bowed before flying out the palace windows.
"Twilight, please be careful!!" Spike said, feeling worried over the concern of his elder sister.
"I'll be fine, Spike!!" Twilight acknowledged as she hugged the purple dragon. "Just head down to Ponyville and warn Luster about what's happening here!! And don't forget to take that ancient tome that I stashed away inside the safe back in my room with you. It might have something to do with what is happening right now; so hand it over Luster as soon as you see her."
"I will!!" The purple dragon replied.
After returning the hug back to Twilight, Spike flew off, leaving the Alicorn Queen all alone in the palace. In hopes of regaining her courage to fight back, Twilight's horn lit up in full fury, hoping to face whatever is causing the mayhem in the palace foyer. As she entered the palace hallways, Twilight saw large amounts of blood stains on the floors and severed body parts all over the corridors. There were many decapitated hooves, severed heads, and headless, mutilated corpses of the defeated Royal Guards. After seeing all of blood and gore in the hallways, Twilight started to vomit. However, she held her hoof up to her mouth just to avoid throwing up before she moved forward cautiously to the palace foyer, not wanting to trip over any body parts.
If only Twilight's friends are here with her, they might be able to stop the horrors in Canterlot before it even happened. Unfortunately, since most of her friends are living in Ponyville and that Twilight and Spike are living in Canterlot once again, she knew that she can't always rely on her friends to do anything for her sometimes, whether or not she is the Princess of Friendship; her royal duties are no exception. The loud crunching and screeching noises snapped the Princess out of her own thoughts, making her even more worried about what would happen if any of these hostile creatures leave the palace. While cautiously heading closer and closer to the palace foyer, Twilight is starting to suspect that something must've happened earlier before the chasm that Gallus mentioned occurred. Usually, it's not everyday that an rift or an earthquake would start shaking all of Equestria; there has to be a scientific reason why this is happening right now. She was thinking about conducting an investigation on the details surrounding the chasm. For now, Twilight has to keep the hostile creatures at bay first.
As soon as she entered the palace foyer, Twilight saw a horde of scary-looking monsters down below the grand stairwell from the right wing. From off-screen, Twilight's eyes widened with horror as she bear witness to a bloody massacre. There were monsters feasting on the dead ponies that they just killed recently while others were fighting over their ill-gotten gains, shouting at each other in language that Twilight couldn't understand at all. She also saw several of her guard ponies standing around next to the monsters. Just like what Gallus said, Twilight's Royal Guard somehow got possessed by something evil that came from the chasm. The moment Twilight went down the stairwell, all of the monsters and possessed guard ponies started staring straight at the alicorn Queen with hostility in their eyes. Just when Twilight is about to engage the monstrous horde while charging up her magic and posing a battling stance, she heard an evil cackle echoing throughout the palace walls.
"Hello, your majesty!! Did you like what I've done with the place ?!" The mysterious evil voice spoke, surprising the purple grand alicorn.
"WHO ARE YOU??" Twilight shouted in a Royal Canterlot voice. "What did you do to my guards?!!? SHOW YOURSELF!!!"
"Sorry for the intrusion and the mess your highness, but I'm hear to send in my regards to Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow!! You'll see very soon on who I am. In the meantime, let's have some fun, shall we?! Go get her my little pets!!!"
As the monstrous horde started charging towards Twilight Sparkle, she powered up her magic to the fullest before facing the hostile creatures head on.
Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
Meanwhile in Ponyville, a six hours earlier before Canterlot was attacked from within, a train stopped by at the Ponyville Train Station. As soon as the train let the passengers out, Luster Dawn and her friends appeared all tired and hungry after doing a hard day's work in trying to stop a group of diamond dogs from raiding a gem caravan en-route to Rarity's Manehattan Boutique. Despite feeling exhausted and groggy, Luster and her friends reached Ponyville only to realize it was already nightfall. Nevertheless, Luster's friends decided to chow down at Sugar Cube Corner. The moment they set hoof in the bakery, Pound Cake was seen at the counter going over the bits that are inside the register before he heard the bell ring, reminding him that more customers just showed up. Luster was the first to pick a sampler platter of cupcakes to share with her friends. The pink unicorn brought the platter up to Pound's counter before paying it with 8 bits. After Pound took the bits from Luster, the tan pegasus gave Luster the receipt before she took the platter with her.
"Enjoy your cupcakes, Luster." Pound said, cheerfully.
"Thank you so much, Pound." Luster replied.
The pink unicorn carried the platter all the way to the table where her friends are hanging out at. As Luster lowered the platter onto the table, the yak was the first to have 2 cupcakes while the kirin and the orange mane earth colt had one cupcake each. For Luster she ate one cupcake before the yak started cackling to himself. As for the black-grey feathered griffon, he was the last one to have one cupcake.
"Ya should see the look on diamond dog's face when me did yak smash on his back!!" The red, orange-haired yak snorted in amusement. "He sounded like a chihuahua making a screech as loud as a high-pitched xylophone!!"
Upon hearing what the yak just said, most of Luster's friends started laughing at themselves including her.
"Point taken, Vecron!!" The kirin giggled upon hearing what the yak just said. "When I charged at them as a Nirik, they all shrieked and started running like blind-crazy not wanting to challenge me to a fair fight!! I couldn't resist when they keep crashing into all those trees before they knocked themselves out!!!"
Luster started laughing her head off after what her Kirin friend just said in front of the group.
"It never gets old when making such funny noises!!" Luster snickered. "Anyway, thanks to Rubeth, we were able to save most of the diamonds from falling off that one cliff. You know, when the Diamond dogs are about to make it off with a gem crate while crossing that bridge in ghastly gorge."
"I couldn't agree more!!" Rubeth, the black griffon spoke in a positive tone. "At least we were able to escort the entire caravan to safety at Manehatten this afternoon."
"Say, Spring Light, how did you enjoy living in Ponyville so far?" Luster asked the green-haired kirin.
"I did my best not to get too angry. It was a little too easy for me to combust into a nirik in less than ten seconds flat." Spring Light told Luster. "I still did my best to attend Treehugger's meditation classes every Tuesdays and Thursdays just to keep my anger under control."
"What are you going to do once you head back to the Castle of Friendship, Luster?" Bright Vermillion asked the pink-orange haired unicorn.
"I'm going to send in another report to Queen Twilight about our successful attempt in our recent mission." Luster answered. "I hope she is still doing fine with managing the Council of Friendship in Canterlot."
"Well, I'm heading back to the School of Friendship!!" Bright announced. "I'll see you all in the morning!!"
After Bright got off his seat, he walked out of Sugar Cube Corner and disappeared into the night. As for Spring Light and Rubeth, they both said goodbye to Luster for now before they were the second to leave the bakery.
"Later everyone!!" Luster told the kirin, griffon, and the earth pony before turning her attention to Vecra. Without predicting the obivious, Luster sees Vecra making a huge burping noise after she gobbled up 3 more cupcakes from the sampler platter.
"Vecra!!!" Luster shouted, in a scolded manner.
"Well, do mind your manners Vecra!!" Luster told the yak before she takes her leave from Sugar Cube Corner.
"See you tomorrow, Luster." Vecra waved her hoof while Luster heads out the door.
Into the night, Luster Dawn couldn't imagine how excited she was when she and her friends went out of Ponyville to deal with the problems at her mentor's request. Even though Luster has long way to go in order to achieve what Queen Twilight did, she still felt pretty confident in being true to herself and her friends in both Ponyville and in Canterlot. While taking the scenic way back to Twilight's old Castle, Luster started whistling through the peaceful night before reaching the doors of the Friendship Castle.
The moment Luster entered the castle, she couldn't help but feel a bit lonely here due to how big the structure really is. It's just like when Queen Twilight told her how daunting it was when she first moved here after Tirek's evil rampage all over Equestria. Nevertheless, Luster still needs to make herself feel at home. As soon as she went up the stairs and before heading to her bedroom, she was greeted by a friendly falcon who was standing on top of the handrails of the grand staircase.
It was already been 2 weeks since Luster first met the falcon when he was seen with a crippled wing. Thanks to Fluttershy's lectures, Luster did learned a thing or two on how to treat the poor regal bird of his injuries. After helping the falcon recover, Luster was about to send it away back into the wild. However, after three days of releasing it, the very same falcon that Luster met actually came back for her, considering that it was just as lonely as Luster was inside the Castle of Friendship. So, Luster decided to keep the falcon as her pet, therefore naming him Gillory. The moment Luster heard Gillory screech, she knew that it just wanted to say "hi."
"Sorry to keep you waiting, Gillory." Luster said as she smiled at the falcon.
Moving on, Luster went into her room with the falcon following her from behind, flying 5 feet above her head. As soon as Gillory went to his perch, which was next to the window, Luster went up to her desk to write another report to Queen Twilight. After she finished writing her report, Luster looked at the city of Canterlot from her window, just wishing that one day she would find her destiny in Canterlot. After that, Luster went to bed to rest up for the next morning.
As soon as the sun finally risen, Luster wakes up after hearing the rooster crowing from the Apple Farms. After getting a good stretch, Luster gets out of her bed to do her daily routine before meeting up with her friends in Ponyville. Before Luster could make breakfast inside the kitchen, she heard loud knocking coming from the front castle door. Unable to ignore the noise for one minute, Luster stopped making pancakes and headed to the castle entrance. As soon as Luster opened the door, an exhausted Spike appeared panting and sweating at the same time.
"Spike?!" Luster gasped upon seeing the dragon acting exhausted right in front of her. "Are you okay??"
"No I'm not, Luster!!" Spike said breathlessly. "Something horrible just happened back in Canterlot!!"
"What do you mean??" Luster said, having a big question floating above her head.
"Twilight was under heavy attack by unknown monsters that came from underneath the Canterlot Palace!!!"
"WHAT???!!!!" Luster gasped in shock.
"Most of the guards have been either massacred or possessed!!" Spike added in before handing out an old book to Luster. "Twilight wanted me to give you this just so that you might understand what you'll be up against in your next mission. Also, your friends may need to drop by so that they may follow up on what is happening back at Canterlot."
As Luster used her magic to retrieve the book from Spike, she levitated the book closer to her for a careful inspection. The book happens to be a red tome covered in dust and a few cracks on its hardcover. It had gold linings on its edges and a as soon as Luster wiped the dust off the tome, it revealed to have an orange-red pentagram on top of the book cover. The pentagram is shown to have star and three small circles inside a big orange circle. Inside the star, Luster sees a drawing of the face of some strange goat-like demon. At the bottom of the image, Luster sees that the title of the book is called, "The Demon World of Hell!"
After staring at the tome for a few seconds, Luster opened up the book to see what was written in its pages. Before Luster had a chance to read the ancient tome, she noticed that a sticky note was seen on the first page of the book. As Luster picked the note with her magic, she started reading it to herself.
"Luster, if you're reading this book, it mustn't fall under the wrong hands or else Equestria... No! Not just Equestria!! But rather, the entire world will be turned to a mass horror of death and destruction!!! Also, don't let any pony else other than you're trusted friends know about what is written in this book.
P.S: It happened right after I went back inside the palace after seeing the former Royal sisters and my friends leave that one of the Royal Guards came up to me and showed me this ancient tome that he found in Chrysalis' makeshift prison. When he read it first, he felt really frightened, making him believe that I need to be the one to keep this tome safe and out of reach. When me and Spike both read it together, we couldn't help but feel a frightful chill crawling up our spines. So, we stashed it away into the safe until the time came when we to give that book to someone that we can trust completely; like you Luster.
Just when Luster finished reading the sticky note, she flipped to the first page of the book and started reading it.
After Princess Celestia banished Nightmare Moon in the Castle of the Two Sisters, she faced another new kind of horror that came from the dark depths of Equestria itself, 30 years later. Of all the villains that Princess Celestia has to face on her own without her sister's aid, she faced most terrifying of them all which came from underneath Equestria. Down below the surface lies another dimension that is most terrifying then Tartarus itself. It is known as the Demon Realm. Without warning, millions of demonic creatures came out of the realm without showing any sign of mercy. Much to Celestia's horror, about 6 million of her ponies fell prey to the denizens of the Demon Realm, along with an entire platoon of her royal guard. During her fight with the demons of hell, Celestia came face-to-face with a sinister deity who happens to be the Dark Lord of Hell, their leader. Eventually, after losing so many innocent lives Celestia used the Elements of Harmony to drive away the Dark Lord and his minions, as well as sealing the bridge connection between Equestria and the Demon Realm but not before the Dark Lord leaving behind a relic key that is used to reopen the runic portals stationed all across the entire land of Equestria and beyond. It was known as the Talisman of Sin. Also, as long as the Elements of Harmony are intact, the gateway to the Demon Realm will remain closed for all eternity or so Celestia thought.
After reading a bit of the first pages of the book, the relic key came falling out of the book and onto the floor in front of Luster's hooves. As she used her magic to pick up the key, Luster sees that it was made out of bones; it had a small skull with curved horns jutting out from its side and pointing downwards. After looking very closely at the key and comparing it to the book, Luster confirmed that the key in her hooves right now is actually the Talisman of Sin. Feeling nervous about what will become of the situation that she is about to be in, Luster continued to read more on the "Demon World of Hell."
Even though Celestia defeated the Dark Lord, his evil essence is still taunting her claiming that one day he will return to the Land of Equestria vowing that he will corrupt the Ruler of Equestria to serve at his side as his one and only Queen of the Demons. After months of mental torment, Celestia could no longer bear the nightmares infecting her revolving around the Dark Lord despite being the ruler of Equestria for more than a thousand years prior. After the Elements of Harmony are destroyed by a resurrected King Sombra, it is only a matter of time before the Dark Lord will return to finish off where he started many moons ago.
As Luster turned to the next page of the book, she saw that ex-Princess Celestia just wrote down several stuff revolving around the villains and the Demon Realm.
Celestia's POV: When I was put back in prison along with my sister, right after Twilight's friends and Spike escaped, I overhead Tirek saying something about conjuring up a magical fail-safe that might be useful if anything happens to them when they fail to conquer Equestria again. I didn't know what were they jabbering about but they all used their magic to summon forth a magic window that leads to a familiar dark world that neither my sister, or the pillars even knew of. But before I knew what was going on, I saw a familiar shadowy figure appear before Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow. It was the Dark Lord that I was forced to face off alone 300 years ago. I don't why, but for some reason, they already met him somewhere during their trek to retrieve the Bewitching Bell of Grogar and made a pact with him earlier. I couldn't help but feel horrified that there were other fiends and ponies that are actually in league with another villain that they would rely on, than rather a creature impersonating a tyrant. After I helped Luna and Discord imprison the three behind stone, I can't imagine myself being that stupid to realize that I actually made another mistake. However, I did my best not to tell Twilight about it. If she ever finds out about how they made a pact with the Dark Lord before their defeat, she probably will never forgive me. So, after the coronation, I secretly had one of the guards give Twilight and Spike this tome and the Talisman of Sin so that they can keep it safe from plain view. I wish I could've warned her about what they were planning but I just couldn't do it because she might get too overwhelmed in dealing with another threat that once existed hundreds of years ago. Instead, I just told Twilight not to read this book; anything but that.
After reading Celestia's POV, Luster turned to a few more pages only to see all sorts of demonic inscriptions that she couldn't understand. However, when she held the Talisman on top of the inscriptions, it started lighting up in a bright-red, ominous hue as it started shooting out a red beam at the tome. As the tome started flipping up pages by itself, it spewed out a huge red orb of magic. Sensing that it's a bad sign, Luster immediately lit up her horn and unleashed another spell to stop the book from doing anymore. After that, Luster put the book and the Talisman on the floor, 20 feet apart away from each other. As she took several deep breaths, Luster held the book back into her hooves before taking another look at the sticky note on its first page. When Luster flipped the note, she saw more of her mentor's writings.
One other thing, Luster. Don't let the contents get anywhere near the inscriptions inside this book. Last time it happened, a portal leading to an evil dimension appeared before me and a barrage of hideous tendrils tried to grab me by the wings and by the neck. It was not worth the risk.
From Queen Twilight Sparkle
As soon as she is finished with reading what was said in the sticky note and from the first few pages of the ancient tome, Luster turned towards Spike before saying anymore.
"What should I do, Spike?!"
"Well, Twilight did managed to send an order from her best engineers and weapon smiths to create new wargear to help you fight against the demons from underneath Canterlot weeks ago." Spike explained to Luster. "Thankfully, they're not stashed anywhere in the Palace."
"Where would they be?!" Luster asked Spike further.
"I'll show you. But first, we need to get your friends up here too." Spike added in. "You may need their help too in order for you to succeed in this new mission."
"I understand." Luster said, feeling anxious on what kind of creatures will be awaiting for her at the Canterlot Palace.
Several hours later, Luster went through all over Ponyville to gather her friends before taking the train to Canterlot. After making several rounds, Luster was able to get Vecra, Spring Light, Rubeth, and Bright to the Castle of Friendship, at Spike's request. After telling them what Spike just told her and while going over what she read in the tome earlier, Luster's friends felt a bit paranoid that they will be facing another new mission that is presumably more intense and more terrifying than anything they faced in Equestria.
"So you're saying that in our next friendship mission, we'll be facing a horde of demonic creatures that came from below the Equestrian surface?" Spring said, trying to summarize what Luster is elaborating.
"That and, if my theory is correct, this so-called Dark Lord might be going after Queen Twilight next in hopes of trying to corrupt her and using her powers against us as his new consort!!" Luster answered in a grim tone. "Well, we need to get ready as soon as possible before its too late!!"
"Vecra sense dangerous action!!! Vecra is going to enjoy!!!" The Red Yak grinned.
"Say Spike, where is this new war gear that you and Twilight stashed away?" Rubeth asked the teenage purple dragon.
"I'll show you guys. It's down at the armory basement below the castle. Follow me." Spike announced as he led Luster and her friends downstairs.
Without saying another word, Luster and her friends followed the Dragon Advisor from behind as he pulled out a torch and led them downstairs into the creepy darkness below the castle. Along the way, Luster's friends went in a single-file line not, not wanting to get lost. After a few minutes of walking through the dark underground castle hallways, Spike eventually led them to a dead end. Just when they think there is nothing to see, Spike lit up several torches that were hanging on the walls. When the torches started lighting up, Spike grabbed one torch that hasn't been lit yet. With just one downward pull, the walls in front of the dragon, Luster, and her friends started moving backwards and flew up to the ceiling. Much to Luster's surprise, she was the first to see a huge metal door with a DNA scanner next to its right. As soon as Spike approached the door, he placed his claw on the scanner. With just one beep, the door slowly opened up, unleashing a blind light upon Luster and her friends. After they covered their eyes with their hooves and claws for a few minutes, Spike went through the doorway first and into the room beyond it.
As soon as the blinding light faded away, Luster and her friends went inside the room only to all gasp in awe.
On their right, they see an array of weapons all racked up on the walls. There were combat shotguns, creepy sword grips, double-barrelled shotguns, assault rifles, and plasma guns. On her left, Luster sees an array of heavy-mounted weapons held on top of three large, metal tables: Chainguns, Rocket Launchers, Railguns, and a strange platform weapon loaded with an unstable green energy cells.
"GOOD GRAVY!!!" Luster exclaimed. "This is so amazing!!!"
"I know, right?!" Spike said. "One month after Twilight's coronation, she spent 10 weeks using all available research, crystals, and all sorts of forged metals to build all of these unique weapons and armor for the future generations of heroes before she stashed it all in this secret room v.i.a metal crates. I was there to unload all of it. She already told me not to let anypony or creature use any of this unless something bad happened back in Canterlot again."
"Well, this should be pretty interesting!!" Spring smirked.
"She also cast a spell on your armor sets, making them all fully adaptable to your natural abilities and talents." Spike announced. "Spring, why don't you try on your armor, give it a test drive."
Upon hearing what Spike just told the kirin, Spring went up to her armor rack and used her magic to put her helmet and armor on. As soon as she is done, Spring demonstrated how her armor functions. When she turned into a Nirik, the armor didn't get burned even by the slightest and that the color of the armor turned from dark-green to an obsidian black. After she turned back into a Kirin, Spring was surprised by her armor's after-effects.
"Wow, this armor is really good at handling my Nirik form." Spring said to herself in astonishment.
"So you see guys, these unique armor sets were only made just for you!!" Spike concluded. "They all have very high durability and can carry mounted weapons on your back."
"This looks great to use in our new mission!!" Bright said in excitement.
"Well, let's not stand around guys!!" Spike told Luster's group. "Gear up and head to Canterlot, I'll be meet you all there!!!"
After Spike flew off, Luster and her friends put their respective armor sets on and armed themselves with the weapons that were hanging on the racks and on top of the metal tables.
Author's Note
Since the names of Luster's friends haven't been officially confirmed, I decided to come up with names on my own.
Spring Light- Green-haired kirin with a beige body and a red horn (female)
Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
Canterlot Palace Apocalypse
Author's Note
For the enemies mentioned in this Doom/MLP Crossover, I'll describe some of them in demonic pony versions of themselves (Not every demon will be explained in a pony style due to common reasons, however). I'll be bringing out more of them in the later chapters. So, enjoy reading every pony.
Canterlot Palace Apocalypse
At the city of Canterlot, a battalion of unicorn Royal Guards were seen raising combined shield barrier over the palace while the rest of the earth pony and pegasus guards were lined up behind the unicorns in keeping the terrified crowd away from the area. The moment Spike arrived near the Palace, Gallus makes a full report on the situation at hand.
"Sir, we've lost contact on the rest of the nobles that were trapped inside the palace walls!!" Captain Gallus announced. "Several of our teams went in to find Queen Twilight but they haven't returned!! I think they got butchered up too along with the palace garrison. Did you did what her majesty just told you?"
"I have!! Luster and her friends will be here very soon!!" Spike acknowledged.
While the pegasi and earth pony guard were trying to disperse the crowd, most of the fillies, mares, and gentle colts couldn't help but worry about what's happening in the palace since some claimed that their loved ones are still in there. As the clamoring started to intensify, Gallus went back to his formation to help keep the crowd from coming closer to the sealed-off palace. As for Spike, he stood there in front of the palace feeling concerned for his elder sister's safety.
Meanwhile, inside the Canterlot Palace, after a few hours of fighting against the demons, before her time to rise the sun, Queen Twilight is starting to get tired every time she used her magic to send them back to Tartarus. No matter how hard she tried, one demon that she obliterated was replaced by two more. As for the guards that were possessed, they were shooting magic spells at their beloved Queen without even realizing the error of their ways, while those who don't use magic were hurling spears and crossbow bolts at the adult alicorn. Feeling outgunned by such odds, Twilight took flight and zoomed right past the demons and her possessed guard ponies into another room away from the palace foyer. The moment she descended from her flight, Twilight shut the doors behind her and sealed it off with her magic before using what's left of her power to raise the sun. After that, she dispelled her magic on the door but cautiously looked both left and right to make sure none of the demons or possessed guards are nearby. The moment she left the room, Twilight flew up in the air in silence as she glided through the hallways without flapping her wings too often, rather just with light flapping. She may have gotten away from the palace foyer, but the horrors inside the Canterlot Palace are still far from over.
While navigate through the palace corridors in mid-air, Twilight sees more dead ponies, laying on the floor bearing both noble and royal guard attire. She was felt even more worried of what will ever become of the palace staff right now since demons are invading the area from the inside. Thankfully, none of Twilight's friends are here to see this. Even though Twilight is on her own, she still did her best to get the other ponies who are still trapped inside her palace to safety. Since the rest of the nobles aren't aware of the hostile incursion, the least she can do is rescue her ponies before the demons find them. So far, Twilight wasn't able to find anymore survivors. Ultimately, she saw Fancy Pants running out from a nearby door along with two exhausted royal guards. They see Twilight come down from her flight before they could say anything to her.
"Your majesty, thank Faust you're here!!" Fancy gasped in fear. "I need help trying to find my wife Fleur. She's no where to be found when those monsters started wreaking havoc here!!"
"I'll find her, Fancy!!" Twilight told the frightened noble. "For now I have to get you and your men out of here."
"Good luck, then!!" Fancy said before Twilight used a teleportation spell on him and his remaining guards.
After Fancy Pants and his men disappeared thanks to Twilight's spell, the purple alicorn moved on and headed down to the guard quarters to see if any pony is still there. As soon as she arrived outside of the guard quarters, Twilight saw several of her remaining guard ponies still fighting against the encroaching demons and their corrupted, possessed brethren from a door window. So far, only a score of unicorn guard ponies were fending them off with their magic shields and rapid-fire beams.
"EVERY PONY THIS WAY!!! HURRY!!!" Twilight shouted to her guards as she opened up the door.
Upon hearing Twilight's royal command, the unicorn guards fled with their lives as they made their way out of their quarters, rallying under Queen Twilight's wing. After the guards got out of the quarters, Twilight slammed the door shut. The moment the door closed on the encroaching demons, they were screeching very loudly as they made futile attempts to break down the door with their claws and fireballs; likely when Twilight put a shield wall in front of the door. After seeing the demons run off, Twilight turns around to see her remaining guards trying to catch their breath.
"Is every pony okay?!" Twilight asked, trying to check up on her remaining guard ponies.
"We don't know for sure, your highness!!" A female guard sergeant unicorn responded, feeling traumatized from fighting against the unknown demons. "Those bastards just came out from the ground and causing a lot of damage under our roof. At least me and my squad were all at the mess hall during our night shift when we heard screaming coming from our quarters. By the time we head down to our quarters, it was too late!! Every guard pony sleeping there was already dead. Instead, we were fighting for our lives only to get cornered by the entrance behind us. They just keep coming!!!"
"We've got to get the buck out of here!!!!" Another guard shrieked while panting underneath his breath.
"Was any pony else in the mess hall?!" Twilight asked.
"Lady Fleur di Lis was there trying to get an early breakfast before the screaming started." The sergeant explained. "We ordered her to hide in the mess hall before we took off to the guard quarters, along with the rest of the noble ponies and staff there."
"Let's head down to the mess hall!!" Twilight ordered the guard ponies. "There is an escape hatch that will lead you and Fleur out of the palace!!!"
"Yes, your majesty!!" The female sergeant said, acknowledging Twilight's orders.
With Queen Twilight in the lead, the guard sergeant and 8 guard unicorns are following her from behind, grabbing their spears with their magic before heading down to the mess hall. Along the way, they quietly moved through the hallways when they saw the demons and possessed guard ponies standing idle from a mere distance away, unaware of their presence. The moment they went up to the two large doors of the cafeteria, the guards formed a line behind Twilight readying their spears. As for Twilight, she slowly opened the doors up with her magic by a mere inch of line. When she looked through the small gap between the doors, hoping that none of the demons or possessed guards are inside the mess hall. After surveying the area, Twilight felt thankful that none of them are in the mess hall.
Unfortunately, by the time Twilight turned around to signal her guards that the coast is clear, one of the guards accidentally knocked a nearby vase off a small table with his spear. In a blink of an eye, the vase shattered into a million bits, alerting the demons and possessed guards!!
"Shit!! Every pony!! Move!! Move!! Move!!" The sergeant ordered abruptly as the guards all went inside the mess hall along with Queen Twilight.
As soon as they're in the mess hall, Twilight sees an mob of demons running towards her group from the hallways. In a fast reaction, Twilight slammed the doors shut in front of the demonic mob with the guard ponies barring it with tables. Once the doors are sealed, Twilight finds Fleur di Lis, five noble ponies, and the chef hiding inside the cafeteria. The moment Fleur saw Twilight, she felt very frightened into thinking that her husband Fancy Pants didn't make it. However, Twilight told the frightened unicorn noble that Fancy is outside waiting for her. Feeling relieved for a bit, Fleur was hoping to escape the palace as soon as possible. Without further a due, Twilight found the escape hatch behind the kitchen counter. The moment Twilight used her magic to open the hatch, the Guard sergeant ordered Fleur and the escapees down into the hatch as they made a run for it through the underground passage leading away from the palace. By the time the chef pony went down through the hatch, Twilight and the guards heard violent banging coming from the doors that they just barricaded. Realizing that the doors are not going to hold for long, Twilight and 7 of her remaining guards turned their attention towards it.
"Sergeant, get the ponies out of this place!! I'll hold them off!!" Queen Twilight ordered. "The rest of you guards with me!!!"
Just as the Guard Sergeant went down the hatch, Twilight immediately sealed it off, ensuring that the demons will not follow them from behind. As the doors are slowly opening up after every intense banging, Twilight makes her final stand against the demons inside the mess hall.
"SPEAR FORMATION!!!" Twilight shouted in a royal Canterlot voice as she went into another battle stance, with her horn charging up with her magic once again.
Upon hearing Twilight's command, all of the guard ponies formed up in front of her and aimed their spears at the doors.
"FOR EQUESTRIA!!!!" All of the ponies shouted in unison!
The moment the demons got closer to the guards, they lunged at the demons with their spears, piercing their hearts and killing them. As soon as they let go of their spears, the guards unleashed every bit of battle spell and shield spell at them without holding anything back. While the guards were engaging the encroaching demons, Twilight unfurled her wings and flew up above the demons, unleashing a powerful chain-lighting spell from her horn, zapping most of the demons from entering the mess hall. However, it wasn't enough to keep her remaining guards alive as they fell one by one.
In just one minute of shooting out a lighting bolt from his horn, a demon came behind one of the guards and slashed at his neck with its claws, killing him as blood came out of his neck. Out of the remaining six guards, another one was getting hammered by a barrage of spears, hurled by his possessed comrades. Eventually, as soon as his shield went down, one spear punctured him in the skull before he went down instantly. Two were trying to hold the demons back with their spears, thrusting and whacking them at will. Three of the guards are continually casting battle spells at the encroaching possessed guards, without any more remorse. As the bodies of the enemy fell, two tall, tough, bulky-looking demons came into the mess hall and whacked away the two Royal Guards, who were armed with spears, with their bare hands. As they were both sent flying, the two guards slammed into the back of the wall and with full force, making them fall on the floor lifeless. Before they even knew it, they hurled a few huge blue fireballs at the three remaining guards only for Twilight to raise a shield wall with her magic, blocking the fireballs at will. Queen Twilight hovered above them and fired a barrage of magic missiles, vaporizing a group of possessed guards and demons, stunning the two huge demons as well. Before the huge demons are able to snap out of their stunned effects, Twilight used her magic to lift both of them off the ground and slammed them into each other's skulls, killing both of them at once as blood started spewing out of their brains. As soon as Twilight landed on her hooves after seeing the mess hall clear, a huge hellish, swirling vortex opened up right below her. Much to the guards' horror, they see Twilight get restrained by a group of tentacles that came from the vortex. The moment they see their alicorn queen getting dragged into the vortex, the three remaining guards ran up to her without thinking.
"YOUR MAJESTY!!!" The guards shrieked in horror as they tried to pull her out with their magic.
"Stop, guys!! You've done enough!!" Twilight ordered. "I'm not going to let any more of my guards die in vain. So, just get out of here while you still can!!"
"No, your highness!! We can't leave you here!!!" One guard said in a panic.
Before long Twilight sees another group of demons coming in from the hallway hurling fireballs blindly at the unicorn guards. Not wanting to take anymore chances, Twilight lit up her horn once more when her lower half gets sucked into the vortex.
"Just tell Luster and her friends to come find me in hell!!!" Twilight ordered as she fired her magic at the three unicorn guards.
As the guards both gasped, Twilight used the last ounce of her magic to lift the guards up in the air as she felt the lower half of her body disappear into the vortex. At the same time, Twilight was struggling to hold on while her muscles are getting tightened by the pressure of the vortex's tentacles.
"NOOOOOOOO!!!" The guards screamed in fear for the queen's life.
With just one flash from Twilight's horn, they both disappeared from her sight before the demons got to them.
"Forgive me, every pony!!" Twilight smiled weakly as she closed her eyes with tears coming down her face.
As the tentacles completely wrapped around the rest of Queen Twilight's body, she gets pulled down immediately, disappearing into the vortex.
The moment Twilight vanished into the floors, a flashing pillar of light spewed out from the vortex. After the flashing stopped the vortex disappeared without a trace as the demons and possessed guards moved into the mess hall not know what to do anymore since the surviving guards ponies have all disappeared.
After spending several more minutes in keeping the crowd under control, Spike sees that Luster Dawn and her friends finally arrived. The moment every pony turned their attention towards them, they see Luster and her friends all wearing strange marine armor with their helmets hanging behind their heads and their with weapons mounted on their armored backs.
"It's about time you guys showed up!!!" Spike said, feeling a bit impatient.
"Sorry, Spike. It was hard for some of my friends to decide what weapons to bring for our mission in Canterlot." Luster said, feeling a bit ashamed for their awkward behavior.
"Did you make sure that tome and the key are safely hidden?!" Spike asked grimly.
"I have!! I put it in a safe place in my room back at the Castle of Friendship." Luster answered confidently.
"Good. Anyway, your mission right now is to help retake the Canterlot Palace and look for any survivors still trapped inside its walls. While you're at it, I want you guys find Twilight and......"
"LORD SPIKE!!!!" One of the guards shouted as he came from behind the dragon, along with two of his comrades.
"What is it?!" Spike asked, seeing that the two guards were exhausted after trying to make a run for it outside.
"Queen Twilight got dragged into a vortex leading down below the surface!!" The guard exclaimed.
"WHAT???!!!" Spike gasped in horror. "Oh Faust. NO!!!"
"She wanted us to have Luster Dawn go find her!!" The guard added in.
"That's exactly why I'm here guys!!" Luster said, understanding the situation at hand. "First we secure the palace, then we find a way down to the demon realm to save Queen Twilight Sparkle. Is every pony and creature ready?!"
"We're ready for anything Luster!!" All of her friends said in unison.
"Let's go!!" Luster said as she put on her helmet, with the rest of them following suit.
When Luster's group approached the shield barrier, she took out her combat shotgun before proceeding into the palace; on her side, Luster had the strange, big energy gun with a huge holster whom she calls it the BFG 9000. As for the rest of Luster's friends, Vecra drew out her chain-gun; on her armored back, she is carrying a mounted rocket launcher. Spring Light armed herself with a plasma gun with a small flamethrower turret mounted on her right shoulder pad. For Rubeth, he took out a super shotgun and held it up with his two claws while hovering in mid-air. Bright attached the sword grip on top of his right hoof; the next thing they saw from the armored earth pony was having a mounted assault rifle on his back.
The moment Luster and her friends met the guards holding the shield barrier, they used their magic to lift it up 10 feet above them before they proceeded into the palace. From that point on, Luster's new mission starts now as she sees her group disappeared into the side entrance of the palace v.i.a Memorial Gardens. For Luster, she looked back one more time to see Spike and Gallus. Both the dragon and the blue griffon waved goodbye to Luster, wishing her luck in bringing back Queen Twilight and saving the Canterlot palace from the hooves of the hostile demon army. As Luster waved back to the two, she turned back towards where her friends disappeared into and head inside the Memorial Gardens.
For a few minutes of trotting through the gardens, Luster and her friends all held their guns up to their face as they proceed slowly into the garden maze, preparing to face whatever threat will stand in their way. With Luster right behind her group, she activated her identity scanner with her right hoof, which is one the left side of her helmet. In an instant, Luster left the scanner on automatic just in-case she won't have time to analyze her foes before dealing with them. Spring went ahead first, with Bright and Rubeth staying very close to her. For Vecra, she readied her chain-gun, turning on its laser-sights in hopes of maintaining her aim. Through the garden maze, most of Luster's group felt pretty shaken since it was too quiet and foggy to see. By the time they reached the palace square, Luster felt a sinister, cackling noise coming from somewhere in the fog. She felt her blood turning as cold as ice, feeling that they'll be fighting against the horrors very soon. In a fast response, Luster held up her hoof, ordering her group to halt in silence.
"Listen!!" Luster whispered as she held her combat shotgun with her magic close to her face.
After one minute in silence, Luster felt the silence and the suspense scaring her. Before Luster or her friends could go a step closer into the fog, a grotesque earth pony figure came out, grunting horrendously. At first, Luster thought it may be one of the ponies that were trapped inside the palace when the incursion occurred. However, just when Luster cautiously approached the pony, it revealed to have a scary, pale-looking face. His eyes were bright as red, he was speaking in a scary gibberish tone, his skin was totally pale with green veins running through his skin, and his mane was missing. He was still wearing his Royal Guard armor and helmet while carrying his spear around. Unfortunately, without warning, the guard pointed his spear directly at Luster's face. When the scary-looking guard pony snarled at Luster, she yelped in fright as the unicorn jumped away from him. It was one of the guard ponies that were possessed.
"Sir!! It's me Luster!!" The pink unicorn exclaimed only to be met with act of aggression from the pony guard.
"RRRAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!" The crazed guard roared as he lunged at Luster with his spear.
Without thinking too much on what to say anymore, Luster suddenly fired her shotgun at the possessed guard. With just one blast, the guard's brains blew out from his head, killing him in an instant. After the guard was sent flying backwards and fell flat on the ground, Luster started sweating over the fact that she just killed a pony that used to serve as a guard in Equestria, or so she thought. After seeing what Luster just did, the rest of her friends have all gasped that the guards somehow turned hostile without showing any sign of consciousness.
"They must've been the possessed guard ponies that Spike was warning us about!!" Rubeth muttered in shock as he held up his double-barrelled shotgun close to his chest.
Before any pony or creature could say anymore, they heard distant roars coming from all sides in the garden maze. As the screams get intense, Luster realized that they'll be fighting for their lives inside the Canterlot Palace. When her group aimed their guns at the fog, Vecra was the first to see the possessed guards in her sights.
"HEADS UP!! HERE THEY COME!!!"
Much to Luster's horrified surprise, more possessed earth pony guards came out from the fog. They were all bearing similar, grotesque-looking features like the one that Luster just brought down. They were all carrying spears and swords posing to strike at Luster's group without hesitation and without mercy.
"Open fire!!!" Luster shouted as she unleashed more firepower upon the possessed guards with her combat shotgun.
At the same time, Rubeth and Vecra fired their double-barrelled shotgun and chain-gun, spraying a barrage of bullets at the charging possessed guards.
For Spring, she transformed herself into a Nirik the moment she started opening fire with her plasma gun. While spraying a barrage of energized heat at the possessed guards, she ran right through them and unleashed a small spray of flames, causing several of them to scream in agony as they felt their flesh being burned away. In addition, Spring let loose a flaming roar at a nearby guard, turning him into ashes in a blink of an eye; even his spear was totally vaporized by Spring's Nirik powers.
After Luster fired off 5 more blasts with her shotgun, she attempted to reload her weapon only to see three possessed pegasus guards fly straight into her direction. In addition to their grotesque appearance, the possessed pegasi guard are now seen with their wings mutated into horrible bat-like appearance with spots of exposed flesh showing on their wing-spans. As soon as the possessed pegasus guards hovered above Luster, they opened fire with their crossbows. In one quick swing with her horn, Luster let loose a magic shield to block off their fire while she finished reloading her shotgun. After her shotgun gets loaded again, she returned fire by firing several shots at the possessed pegasus. In just five seconds, all three of them exploded into a mangled, bloody mess as they fell down from their flight and crashed into a nearby garden hedge.
"Let's head to the palace guys!!!" Luster told the group as they all ran through the maze gardens shooting down every possessed guard that popped out from the shadows.
Along the way, every possessed guard pony that Luster's group shot down left behind massive blood stains all over the trees and plants inside the palace gardens. Just when Luster and her friends were sent to Canterlot to secure the palace, they just couldn't do that without getting their hooves and claws dirty nor leave behind so much destruction in spilling blood in their wake. Their fight with the armies of hell was apocalyptic in the Canterlot Palace.
As soon as they reached the side entrance of the palace, they were greeted by another group of hideous creatures. They started making a very loud screech as they made their full appearance. They were seen with brown skin, glowing red eyes, and have spikes coming out of its back. From Luster's dna scanner installed in her helmet, she received data from their first demon encounter the moment she sees them in her sights:
Imp: The low-class ranked demons that serve as foot soldiers of hell. They shoot out fireballs and sometime leap at their prey like hunters on the prowl. When they get closer for the kill, they lash out with their claws and teeth.
"Watch out guys!!" Luster told the group. "These imps look really vicious."
"Me handle this!!" Vecra growled as she charged forward, aiming her horns at one imp. "YAK SMASH!!!"
In such fast movement, the imp didn't have the chance to claw at Vecra as he was met with a horn impale straight into its jaws. When Vecra's horns came out of the back of the imp's head, it let out a gurgle before the demon fell limp. After Vecra flung the dead imp into the air, she jumped on top of another Imp, crush its body to a pulp before shooting out her chain-gun at the other imps on her left.
For the other imps that aren't close to Vecra, they hurled a dozen of fireballs at the rest of Luster's group before they were met with a duo shotgun blast coming from Luster's and Rubeth's shotguns. Just when one of the imps tried to leap at Bright, he activated his mounted assault rifle from the back of his armor and sprayed a hail of bullets at the imp, killing it. With Bright's mouth, he pulled out his sword grip that was holstered on his right side. As he held onto it tightly, the sword grip spewed out a long, energy blue lighting up in a purple, blue hue. With just one swipe of Bright's energy sword, he cut one leaping imp in two before it fell on the ground behind him. Seeing himself awestruck by the sword's power Bright couldn't help but feel so excited in wield the energy sword at will.
After all of the imps are taken down, Luster's group finally went inside the palace, opening and closing the side doors behind them. For just a few minutes, they explored the entire room to see if any pony or creature is still hiding nearby. Seeing that there is no one else here at the moment, Luster and her friends decided to take five.
"Wow, that was brutal!!" Bright Vermillion exclaimed.
"You guys should seen the look on that Imp's face when I send him flying into the sky!!" Vecra laughed.
"I can't believe I was spread flames already even before I start shooting out my mounted flamethrower." Spring grinned, insanely.
"Well, we still haven't seen anything yet, guys." Luster pointed out with her hoof. "Spike already told me that the demons came from a chasm that is in the palace foyer. We need to head to the foyer if we were to save Queen Twilight and this palace."
After taking a breather from their first fight with the demons and possessed guard ponies, Luster's group made their way into the great hall. However, as soon as they reached the great hall, it was full of dead ponies both left and right. The floor was completely covered with the blood of the pony corpses. Several chandeliers and statues have already fallen and shattered into pieces from the demon incursion. Just when they think that great hall is clear, they see something ghastly flying above them. When Rubeth took a closer look at the ghastly figures, he spotted a group of floating pony skeleton heads flying around screaming with orange flames protruding from their backs. As soon as Luster's DNA scanner activated itself again, she received new info for their new foes in the great hall.
Lost Souls: They happened to be undead floating spirits that have been damned to roam the depths of hell after they fell as original beings in the mortal world. Although they're fragile undead beings, these spectators can move around and strike very fast when they see their target in sight.
As soon as Rubeth got a little too close to one of the Lost Souls while taking flight, it started snapping its jaws at the griffon. The other Lost souls started chomping at Rubeth as well, forcing him to lose his flight as he makes an immediate, rough landing.
"ARRGGGHHH!!! GET THEM OFF ME!!!" Rubeth screamed hysterically as Luster's horn charged up.
With just one flash, Luster's spell immediately disintegrated the Lost Souls attacking Rubeth. After Rubeth catch his breath Luster makes a remark in front of him.
"Whether these creatures are big or small, we still shouldn't underestimate them!!" Luster scolded the griffon.
"Easy for you to say!!" Rubeth said, feeling a bit embarrassed of himself.
"Uh, guys!! I think I see a swarm of Lost Souls coming down from above the ceiling!!!" Bright Vermillion gasped as he pointed his hoof upward.
The moment Luster and her group looked up, they see like 50 Lost Souls getting ready to strike at them.
"You've got to be kidding!!!" Spring shrieked as she transformed into a Nirik once again.
Before the lost souls could even bite any of Luster's friends, Spring unleashed a massive torrent of purple flames. In just one second, the entire group of lost souls have all been vaporized by Spring's dark, nirik spell. Unfortunately, before they could they could even thank Spring Light for her immediate efforts, more possessed guard ponies came through the other side of the great Hall, barging through the doors from both sides. The moment the guards see Luster's group in their sights, they start firing their spells at them.
"I think I know why a kirin's anger will get us into trouble!!" Rubeth thought to himself as dodged the incoming spells while taking flight again.
As Luster raised another shield wall with her magic, Bright let loose another spray of bullets at the possessed unicorns with his assault rifle. But not only did Bright fired his assault rifle, he activated another weapon mod attached to it. The assault rifle also fired a short barrage of small missiles at the possessed guard ponies. When the missiles stuck their armor, the guards exploded into a bloody mess, followed by a small chain-reaction of explosions.
When the possessed unicorn guards started attacking Luster and her friends, they were unleashing all sorts of magic similar to what the imps had in store for them. They were shooting out not just fireballs, but rather all sorts of hellish fire-like spells from their horns. They were unleashing firebolts, red-energy beams, inferno spells, and blazing shield barriers. When Rubeth got too close to one of the possessed unicorns when they were raising a blazing shield barrier, both of his wings got caught on fire as his armor started burning up from the inside, making him lose his shotgun aim as he crashed into the pavement, screaming in pain while getting burned. At the same time, Rubeth looses his grip on the double-barrel shotgun; thankfully, Spring Light was able to retrieve it with her magic and strapped it next to her praetor armor. Upon seeing Rubeth getting burned by the possessed unicorn's spells, Luster moved in and protected the griffon as she fired her shotgun at the possessed unicorns, right in front of him.
After Luster took down all of the possessed unicorns, she picked up Rubeth with her magic and carried him on top of her back.
"Rubeth, are you okay?!" Luster asked, showing concern for the burnt griffon.
"I think my wings got roasted!!" Rubeth said, coughing up smoke from his beak. "I don't think I'll be flying for a while."
"We may need to get to the palace hospital wing!!" Bright suggested. "I know there has to be a map somewhere here!!"
"Vecra, cover me and Rubeth!!" Luster told the female yak. "Bright, you and Spring go on ahead and make sure there are no monsters that are going to get in our way this time."
After they left the great hall, they went down a corridor filled with rubble. At one corner, they see a dead guard pony laying up against the wall, with his lower half ripped apart from the rest of his body as blood was split all over the floors of the corridor. With Bright and Spring taking the lead, they forced themselves to bear witness to the nasty horror of the bloodied corridors. Not wanting to vomit at such a horrid scene, Bright did his best to not look at the guard corpse even by a mere inch. However, the earth pony couldn't help but feel nauseous from that fact that he, along with the rest of Luster's friends, are getting caught up in a bloody fight for their lives. He just wished such problems like that didn't have to be this scary, not when they were forced to spill blood belonging to their new enemies. He felt pretty shaken that they will be experiencing a situation similar to that of a horror-action movie, not to mention that they were all forced to put the afflicted Equestrian Guard ponies out of their misery. However, Spring slowly held onto Bright's arm, gesturing the earth pony that everything is going to be fine. Just when Bright is starting to get a hold of himself, they made several more turns in the corridor as several entries were blocked with ceiling rubble. Eventually Luster's group is finally able to reached the hospital wing without shooting down anymore demons or possessed guards. Unfortunately, three more imps are seen dawdling at the hospital's entrance, along with 6 more possessed pegasi guards.
As they thought about what to do them, Vecra and Spring decided to move in and mop up the demons, with Luster and Bright watching over Rubeth. After delivering several shots from their weapons, Vecra signaled Luster, telling her that the hospital is clear. Upon noticing this, Luster brought Rubeth to the infirmary inside the hospital wing. As soon as they entered the medical room, they were all surprised that there has been no blood stains or any corpses lying anywhere in the infirmary. When they closed the doors behind them, Luster had Rubeth sat on top of the stretcher and had him remove his burnt armor from his wings, letting the pink unicorn examined his burnt injuries. After some careful studying, thanks to Luster's good knowledge in medicine at Twilight's School of Magic, she confirmed that Rubeth needs to be treated for 3rd degree burns on both of his wings.
"Bright, I may need several IV fluids from the medicine cabinet!!" Luster told the orange-mane earth pony.
Without saying another word, Bright went up to a nearby cabinet that is in front of Luster and Rubeth. As soon as he saw an IV fluid bag inside, he immediately took it out and hooked it to a nearby post next to Rubeth's stretcher. Luster helped administer the IV fluid before injecting it into Rubeth's burnt wings. After taking a breather from Luster treating him of his injuries, the griffon felt more relieved that he may recover very soon. However, since this is the beginning of their new mission, Luster reminded Rubeth that he needs to take more precaution staying away from the demons.
While Rubeth is getting rest in letting the IV fluids flow through his wings, Luster turns to face her friends as she takes off her praetor helmet before making her announcement to the group.
"Since we have just made our first battle against the monsters from the underworld, we cannot do anything reckless here. What those demons did to this palace and to the guards stationed here is just only the beginning. We may not have seen anything from them yet. So once we head down into the Demon Realm to rescue our Alicorn Queen, they'll be throw at us more than just spears, or fireballs. So, we must always stick together no matter the odds!!! We won't burden ourselves with too much resources; we will only take what we need to stay alive down there. I was already reminded by Queen Twilight that without the support from friends, missions like this will be impossible for me to accomplish. So, as long as we are here together, I expect full cooperation from all of you. This isn't a game guys. When you have the chance to kill your enemies, do it!!! We all have to survive together if we were to succeed. Is that clear, guys?!"
After hearing what Luster had to say, they all responded in a positive tone. Next, Luster's group decided to remain in the infirmary until Rubeth is fully recovered from his burn injuries as they aimed their guns at the doors leading back into the corridors. In just half an hour later, Rubeth finally doesn't feel anymore pain from his burnt wings anymore. The moment the IV fluid is depleted, Luster picked up a bottle of pain medication for Rubeth to use in case the pain from his wings act up again. After taking the bottle of pain killers from Luster, Rubeth put his armor back on his wings
"Just remember not to use this pain killer until you feel the burns again."Luster reminded the griffon as Spring handed back his double-barrel shotgun.
"I understand, Luster!" Rubeth said after taking only one pill from the capsule.
"Let's move guys!!" Luster said. "The palace foyer is not much further!!"
As soon as they entered the corridors, Rubeth followed Luster's group from behind while walking on foot, sparing himself from any painful flapping from his wings. With Lusters now in the lead, she aimed her shotgun in front of her with the barrel pointing straight ahead. While cautiously moving forward through the corridors, the darkness within the palace continues to give Luster and her friends the chills. Nevertheless, they still keep true to Luster's suggestions during their mission. In just several meters ahead of the palace foyer, they heard more screeching and grunting coming from out of the corridors. As the darkness finally faded away, Luster was the first to enter the palace foyer from the left wing.
Down the grand staircase, the palace foyer is finally revealed to have a huge chasm on the palace floors right in front of the end. The rift was stretched out wide in front of the main entrance of the palace, with a 15 foot length reaching from the front of the flight of stairs all the way to the two huge doors leading outside of the palace. Shockingly, the rift's width reached towards both walls, considering that no pony can cross over it unless they can fly or jump over the gap. Surrounding the rift was a large mob of imps feasting on all the dead ponies that they have killed at the main entrance, the very same scene that Queen Twilight saw earlier. As for the possessed guard ponies, they were all just standing in front of the imps not doing anything. Shock at seeing such a horrible sight, Luster couldn't help that the only way to enter the demon realm is through the chasm she sees before her. With no other option Luster decides to clear out the entire palace foyer, destroying every single demon and possessed guard pony in the vicinity.
"Let's get e'm!!!" Luster snarled as she readied herself on top of the grand staircase right in-between the left and right wings. As soon as she aimed her shotgun, the rest of her friends all aimed their weapons at the demon mob before they turned around. The moment they see Luster's group above them, they all opened fire.
After several minutes of gunning down the imps and possessed guard ponies, Luster's group finally secured the entire palace foyer. However, before they could proceed into the rift, Spike and Princess Flurry Heart appeared at the palace's main entrance on the other side of the rift. As Luster turned her attention towards the purple dragon and the young teenage alicorn started to feel a bit worried of Queen Twilight's safety. Much to Luster's shock, Flurry is seen wearing strange, praetor armor too except that it is made of crystals, filled with purple shadings and blue linings. On Flurry's back, she has a rail gun strapped to her.
"I just received a letter from Spike about what happened to auntie Twilight." Flurry said in a worried tone. "It's not true is it?! She's not really down there is she?!"
After hearing what Flurry Heart just said while pointing her hoof at the chasm, Luster reluctantly admitted that Twilight is somewhere down below the surface with the demons. Feeling horrified and enraged, Flurry was feeling eager to blast the monsters to kingdom come with her railgun as she held it with their magic.
"There's no way I can take over after my mom and dad if I can't defend my family!!" Flurry growled as she hovered in mid-air, flapping her wings in anger.
"Are you saying that you want to come with us too, Flurry?!" Luster asked, thinking that she might have another teammate fighting by her group's side.
"I know this is against my mom's and dad's ideas, but I want to prove myself that I can do something brave and independent for a change." Flurry added in.
"I was trying to stop Flurry from doing this because I thought for sure Shinning Armor and Princess Cadence wouldn't agreed with it. However, I received a letter from them, claiming that Shinning already taught Flurry on how to use her magic for self defense. He insisted that this will be her final test to prove her bravery to deal with the demons that took her sister." Spike said, feeling lost that he is about to let his niece enter the Demon Realm. "Just don't let Flurry out of your sight."
"Very well." Luster said, before turning towards the young, white alicorn. "You're going to need to stay with us, Flurry!! Because one of my friends almost got burned to death because of his recklessness not too long ago."
"I'll do my best!!!" Flurry said with determination as she held the railgun with her two hooves.
"Let's go everyone!!! The journey in the Demon Realm is just beginning!!" Luster said as she, Flurry, and the rest of her friends went down the trail below the chasm.
As for Spike, he watched Luster, her friends, and Flurry walk down the path inside the chasm as they all disappeared into the red fog down below him.
Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
Inside a huge, metal cage, an unconscious Queen Twilight is trapped inside it. As soon as she slowly opened up her eyes, she stands up on all fours only to feel the metal floorboards with her hooves. The next thing Twilight knew is that she finds herself hanging 500 feet above the ground. Right above her, Twilight sees that the cage she's in is being held by a chain attached to a metal beam sticking out from a dark,demonic-like tower right behind her. In her horror, Twilight looks around to see a landscape of rocky pathways, massive demonic-like structures, volcanoes, and flowing streams of lava spewing out in a distance. All around her, the purple alicorn sees Lost pony souls and all sorts of flying demons hovering from every angle outside of the cage she is in. The moment they see Queen Twilight wake up from her beauty sleep, they all started laughing at her, humiliating the Alicorn Queen without giving it another thought.
Upon seeing the floating demons gloat at her, Twilight started growling in frustration from the fact that she has been taken by creatures that came from underneath Equestria. After looking further behind the demons and down below her, Twilight just realized that she is now in the Demon Realm. When she tried to use some of her spells to break free from the cage, they didn't do any damage at all. Seeing now that it is useless to use her magic, Twilight couldn't find any other way to escape from her cruel fate. Speaking of fate, Twilight still remembered about the evil, dark voice that spoke to her the moment she first encountered the demons at the palace foyer. Before she couldn't saying anything, a dark, evil entity appeared before Queen Twilight. Through a dimensional window, Twilight sees a shadowy, demonic creature with red eyes and minotaur horns on its head looking straight at her.
"Such an impressive world, is it my dear?!"
"What do you want???" Twilight shouted in anger.
"Everything!!! I was going to capture Princess Celestia and bring her into my domain so that she and I can rule Equestria together."
"Guess what?! Celestia is no longer ruling over Equestria!! She's retired!!"
"I see. It's a shame I won't be seeing Celestia again after she shoved me back into my realm. Though I must say, I didn't think she'd let you ascend the throne in Canterlot years prior, I only heard rumors about it from my collaborators. But since you're in my prison, you can only pray that your fate will be realized here in my world. Furthermore, you still have something that belongs to me, girl!!"
"It's not about that talisman key that one of my guards handed over to me is it?!" Twilight sneered.
"Oh yes it is!! That key is the only thing that can activate the portals allowing my demons to enter the mortal world, not just from your palace, but rather all over Equestria!! When I first faced Celestia, I almost won. That isn't until she used the so-called Elements of Harmony against me. But now that they're all destroyed, along with the Tree that created them, I am finally free from the bars that denied my entry into Equestria. However, I didn't strike just yet because I met three villains from Mount Everhoof who informed me of the situation at hand. So, I took my time in preparing my army to invade Canterlot. Also, I gave those three another opportunity that they couldn't refuse since I did liked the way they despised friendship and harmony as well as I do."
"Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow?!" Twilight gasped, remembering the recent villains that she faced in the past so far. "But how did they......."
"Well, my dear sweet Queenie, it's like this...."
Flashback, 30 years earlier before the attack upon Canterlot......
After Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow retrieved the Bewitching Bell, they found themselves in another blizzard at Mount Everhoof. Even though Cozy was still wearing her winter coat, the demonic centaur and the black Changeling are still freezing their flanks off so they went to a nearby dark cave to rest up before continuing their journey back to Grogar's Lair. Just after Tirek built another fire, illuminating the cave, Chrysalis spotted a strange gateway deep inside the care they're in. Curious, Tirek was the first to approach it. The gateway happens to be an stone-like archway filled with demonic inscriptions written on it. Before they knew it, the entire cave is filled with ancient writings and inscriptions all over the cavernous walls. Just when Chrysalis and Cozy aren't able to understand what any of the inscriptions are saying, Tirek had an idea of where it is heading at. As they listened closely at what Tirek is saying, he makes his speech as he is translating the inscriptions using his own words.
"Below Equestria's realm, lies another dimension filled with horrors beyond a pony's deepest nightmares. It is there that a whole new civilization of creatures are waiting to rise up before their master. To dominate, to conquer, and to enslave!!"
"That might something Sombra would definitely tried to do!!" Tirek thought in excitement before continuing to read the demonic inscriptions.
"In the realm of demons, it is ruled by the most powerful of fiends!!! The mightiest warriors of Hell loom over the horizons of the burning, leaving a trail of endless fire bathing in the world of mortals."
"Wow, Tirek!! Where did you learn how read all of that??" Cozy said curiously.
"Sendak did taught me several lessons over demonic literature and dialects when I was still in his study." Tirek chuckled. "From what those inscriptions say, there may be another opportunity for us to unleash another demonic army, for us to command. Of course, we have find a way to get stronger before facing our old enemies. But we always learned that "winning all the time" won't always be possible even if it seems like we could really do that."
"Oh really??" Chrysalis said slyly. "We may be able to take advantage of this, showing Grogar that we can really conquer Equestria without his guidance; who need him if we were to get another army to command on our own."
"And what about the bell? Are we still going to keep it or hand it to Grogar?" Cozy asked the former Changeling Queen.
"Well still keep the bell. In fact, the demonic army and the bell will both be our ultimate powers to use to conquer all of Equestria." Chrysalis presumed. "But how are we going to make contact with the demons from the dimension they're in??"
"I think I can fix that!!" Tirek smirked as he charged his horns with his fiery magic.
As soon as his horns lit up into a red-orange ball, Tirek fired his magic at the stone archway. When Tirek's magic struck the wall where the archway is at, it opened up a dark-red portal leading to the realm of demons. Out of excitement, the trio started grinning wickedly as they were about to enter the Realm of Demons to see what horrors will exist there. However, before they had a chance to proceed, a squad of imps emerged from the red portal, hissing and screeching. Before the either villains or demons could react, a bellowing voice erupted from within the cave they're all in.
"Hold on my little pets!! I sense great interest in our new guests."
"Who said that??" Cozy and Chrysalis exclaimed in unison.
"I am the ruler of the Demon Realm!! You may call me the Dark Lord!!! I never knew that some creature from the mortal realm would actually open the gateway to my domain. May I ask how and why?"
"That would be me sir!!" Tirek announced, even though he and the other two villains couldn't see his face. "I was once under the guidance of a corrupted centaur advisor that used to live in the homeland that I came from. He taught me lessons about ancient inscriptions and demonology back then. We enjoy being bad in a one many ways. However, since most of us got beaten more than once, I was thinking about coming up with a backup plan if they outnumber us again with their magic and their numbers."
"Well, ever since I was sent back to my domain after I was defeated by Princess Celestia, it was hard for me to invade Equestria again since she used the Elements of Harmony to seal off the gateway leading to this world. However, I felt a strange phenomenon that somehow my gateway is actually opening up once again."
"You're in luck, sir!!" Cozy Glow grinned wickedly. "King Sombra, who used to be with us, destroyed the Elements of Harmony and the Tree of Harmony, thinking that it may decrease the power of Equestria's heroes. We thought for sure they will be defeated under Sombra's hoof. But even that wasn't enough, they already defeated Sombra again. So, we all decided to find another way to get revenge on them but with different plans."
"THE ELEMENTS OF HARMONY ARE DESTROYED??!!! THIS IS PERFECT!!!" The Dark Lord roared in triumph. "You all have my thanks. So, you might you people be?"
"I am Lord Tirek, these lassies with me are Cozy Glow and Chrysalis; the ex-student of the School of Friendship and the ex-Queen of the Changelings." The demonic centaur said, introducing himself.
"We did tried to arouse our own armies to conquer Equestria not too long ago. But it was thanks to Princess Twilight Sparkle and her friends that our minions turned against all of us!!" Chrysalis hissed. "What's worse is that Twilight Sparkle is next in line to rule over Equestria with her ultimate ideals of Friendship and Harmony."
"Really now? Well since you and Sombra helped opened the doorway to my realm, I suppose I will reward you all with a desire at your own discretion!!"
"Well in that case, would you excuse us for a moment?!" Tirek grinned as he brought Chrysalis and Cozy Glow close to him.
After a few minutes of discussing their options in silent whispering, Tirek's group disengaged from their private conversation and approached the Dark Lord.
"My lord, we have all wished to grant immortal power in leading another army that will remain loyal to us all the way. We'll even deliver Princess Celestia to you in exchange for your ultimate freedom. Also, if we fall, we would wish for something that will deceive our enemies when they realized it is too late!!!" Tirek announced, with Chrysalis and Cozy nodding in agreement.
"As you wish!!!"
Before long, a massive orange warp appeared in front of the villain trio. In an instant, warp unleashed three massive tendrils that struck Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow sucking their all of their flesh and reducing them into mere skeletons of their former selves. However, the Talisman of Sin appeared from the warp before their very eyes. The moment it got near them, all three villains restored themselves into their normal forms. The only difference is that their eyes turned bright red for a few seconds before they turned back to normal. At first, they thought that nothing happened. However, before they could say anything, the Dark Lord spoke again.
"The spell that I used on all three of you will occur if you face defeat once again. Think of it this way, the moment you all meet your demise, I will collect all of your souls and bring them into my realm. As soon that's done, you will all be reincarnated to lead my demon armies as the Commanders of Hell!!! As long as you do what you all have to do in the mortal world, you have my permission to use the Talisman of Sin at your own discretion. It's meant to open up temporary portals that will allow some of my minions to enter the mortal realm. They will be your reinforcements to command just in case something goes wrong during your conquering campaign. I will stay in touch with all of you. Remember all this well. Farewell, for now!!!"
As soon as the Dark Lord finished with his speech, the imps went back into the portal before it disappeared from view. In just a few minutes of silence, Chrysalis took the Talisman of Sin with her green magic and smirked as she stared at it for a moment.
"We'll keep the Talisman of Sin hidden too; if they were to take the Bell of Grogar away from us, at least this thing will be used as our backup!!" The ex-Changeling Queen announced.
"Quite a perfect plan, indeed!!" Cozy smiled wickedly.
Upon hearing what the Dark Lord said to Queen Twilight, the purple alicorn's jaw dropped in horror after realizing that the villain trio just made a pact with the devil.
"So you see, my dear, I need that Talisman back since no one else could use it other than me and my new collaborators!!"
"YOU ARE NOT GOING TO GET AWAY WITH THIS!!!!" Queen Twilight shouted in a Royal Canterlot voice.
"It's already done your majesty!! Yet, even now it's not too late. It's your choice my Queen, you can join me as we both rule Equestria and Hell together or you can continue to watch your fellow subjects get butchered up by my people!!"
"I'm not your Queen!!! Why don't you just go buck yourself, you vile wretch?!!" Twilight snarled as her hooves were suddenly clapped in irons.
"You asked for it!!!" The Dark Lord hissed.
As soon as the Dark Lord disappeared from her view, along with the dimensional window, the metal cage Twilight was in turned into a metal board. With Twilight clapped in iron shackles, she felt her body held on tight to the metal board, with her limps stretched out wide as they reached to every corner of the board. She felt herself and the board slowly descend all the way down to a rocky surface before it stopped. Behind her, a goat-like demon appeared from the shadows and pulled out a cat-o-nine-tails whip from his waist. At the crack of every whip, Twilight started feeling beatings coming from her back. Feeling the burn pain from the whip, Twilight started grunting in pain, feeling the anger building up from inside her while the sounds of getting whipped are being heard from a mile away.
Meanwhile somewhere on the other side of the Demon Realm after walking downhill from the surface above them, Luster and her group finally reached the main gates of the realm at the end of the trail. The gates are seen with two huge, thick wooden doors strapped to metal bearings on all over its edges. In the middle between the two doors, a huge demonic goat skull is seen 25 feet above Luster. When she first saw it, Luster yelped when the skull started lighting up in flames from inside its huge eye sockets. However, Luster still needs to control her fears when entering the demon realm. She is still Queen Twilight's only hope left.
After the flames died out from the skull's eye sockets, the skull was pulled upward by a heavy chain attached to a gatehouse which lies right above the main gates. As soon as the giant skull disappeared underneath the gatehouse, the main gates slowly opened, prompting Luster's group to ready their weapons before getting ready to venture into the land of demons. As for Flurry Heart, she hovered in mid-air while readying her crystallized rail-gun. Feeling determined to get her aunt back, Flurry narrowed her eyes before proceeding from behind Luster's group.
"Hang in there Auntie!!! We're coming to save you!!!" Flurry said in determination.
Before Luster and her friends could pass through the gate, they started hearing a sinister cackle coming from inside the gate.
"Greetings every pony and creature!! Welcome to the Demon Realm!! Hope you have fun here because it will be your last!!!" The Dark Lord bellowed, followed by an evil cackle echoing throughout the realm.
When Luster entered through the open gates, she sees a large brick road with lava streams following down the same direction she is facing. On both their left and right, Luster's group see a row of huge demonic statues behind the metal gates. The structures are made out of marble stone; all of them are standing on two legs holding onto their spears with only their right hand. Up above them, Luster sees that the sky has turned from clear-blue to an ominous orange sky filled with red clouds and from the ground lava started spouting from its holes as they reached up to the sky. From miles away, Luster and her friends could also see huge, buildings with shadowy demonic features, ranging from spikes to tall stakes and huge demonic pony skulls to tall pillars of blazing fire from within.
Judging from the hellish environment they're in, Luster couldn't imagine that she and her friends have just entered another world that is a thousand times more worse than in Tartarus, making them all shiver in anxiety and horror. Unlike Tartarus, however, Luster could see all sorts of demons flying through the sky freely from miles and miles away, flying and circling around several creepy, shadowy structures from a long distance away. Nevertheless, she still can't let her guard down since most of these demons will not show any mercy to her or her fellow ponies; the same goes for any other creature outside of Equestria.
"Remember what I said, guys!!" Luster said, trying to remind the group of the situation at hand. "We all have to stick together in order to stay alive. Queen Twilight is still counting on us, the same goes for you Princess Flurry!!!"
"Uh guys?!" Spring Light asked, interrupting Luster's speech but with a good reason. "I think Flurry just took off!!"
"WHAT??!!!" Luster shrieked. "Where is she going??"
"Me see Flurry head towards some sort of temple on the left!!" Vecra said, briefly as she pointed her hoof towards Luster's right.
The moment the group saw Flurry, the young alicorn flew towards the temple before she disappeared through a teleportation spell.
"FLURRRRRRRRYYYYYYY!!" The entire group groaned in annoyance after seeing Flurry enter the temple without even thinking.
"Let's not stand around guys!!! We better head down to the temple and get Flurry Heart before another demon does." Luster told the group as she trotted towards the temple, readying her shotgun.
For the rest of the group, they followed Luster from behind.
Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
In a dark corner of the Temple, Flurry heart just appeared while still flying 6 feet above the ground. While gliding with her wings she activated her own personalized dna scanner, along with a mounted plasma turret on top of the back of her purple, blue Praetor armor. After she disengaged from her flight, Flurry landed on top of the marble pavement and uses her magic to activate the map from her helmet's visor. At the same time, Flurry did her best to look closely at the structure she is in. It appears Flurry found herself inside a small room with a tall candle next to a runic doorway. As she readied her rail-gun Flurry quietly marched forward hoping to confront the demons that kidnapped her auntie.
"I'm feeling a bit excited for some adventure!!" Flurry giggled.
Just when the young alicorn opened the runic doorway, she was met with a huge fireball hitting the floors inches away from where her hooves are at. The next thing she sees is a huge flying red demon appear in the next room, which happens to be a large area with three hallways heading towards different directions. On the ground, Flurry finds herself walking on top of a huge rectangular floor where dark, flaming lanterns are placed in between the entrance of each hallway. The red demon had one big, green eye, small horns coming from the top of its head, and huge jaws with razor sharp teeth that can crush a little filly in an instant. The demon was hovering right in front of Flurry as it started snarling before shooting out another fireball. Thanks to Flurry's DNA scanner, she receives intel on the flying demon.
Cacodemon: An wandering demon that hunts its prey due to its unstoppable hunger for flesh. A disembodied form that shoots out huge fireballs from its blue maw.
"What funny, ugly-looking demon!!" Flurry giggled. "Hey fatso!! YOUR MOMMA IS A DUMB CYCLOPS!!!!"
Enraged by Flurry's insults, the Cacodemon hissed in anger as it launched another fireball at the blue-haired alicorn. Thanks to her early experience in magic, Flurry uses her yellow shield barrier to shrug of the fireball before it even had a chance to hit her. By the time the fireball exploded above Flurry's shield, she aimed and fired her gauss cannon at the floating demon, straight into its maw. In an instant, the demon's floating body got split in two by the gauss cannon's electrical slugs.
After defeating her first demon, a group of imps and possessed pegasus guard ponies appeared in the same room that the cacodemon was in. As the opened fire with their fireballs and crossbow bolts, Flurry unfurled her wings and returned fire while in mid-air with her gauss rifle. In a few well-placed shots, Flurry blasted almost three imps or guards with just one shot with her Gauss Rifle. In its after-effects, Flurry could feel the vibration of her weapon shaking her while flying above the heads of the enemy corpses. Despite this, Flurry still kept flying through the temple like a way in the park, shooting down every single Cacodemon, imp, and possessed guard pony on sight. Upon seeing her enemies fall before her Flurry also enjoyed spitting raspberries at them all.
"I know auntie is out there!!!" Flurry said in herself in excitement. "If I get to rescue her, every pony will address me as a hero. No, not just a hero. They're going to call me Flurry Heart the Demon Slayer of Equestria!!!"
While Flurry is having fun shooting down the imps, cacodemons, and possessed guard ponies, Luster's group entered from the other side of the Temple, which they now find themselves inside a rotunda. All around and above them, Luster sees stained glass windows of scary demons rising from the depths of the abyss. One of the stained glass windows shows a demon puncturing a poor little pony by the gut with his barehands, must to the disgust of Rubeth. On the floor they're all standing in the rotunda is connected with two passages leading to the west and to the east. Luster couldn't decide which passage to take in order to find Flurry Heart. Much to their surprise, they could hear Flurry heart shooting her weapon at the demons from a distance away from the rotunda.
"I can't believe that little alicorn is taking all the glory here!!" Rubeth muttered in embarrassment.
"I thought for sure she understood us." Luster thought. "But apparently, Flurry still has a lot to learn about adventuring!!! Let's find her quick before we continue to find Queen Twilight."
"Yeah, we do that alright!! Because if anything happens to Princess Flurry, King Shinning is going to kick our flanks!!!" Rubeth spoke in agreement.
"Since there is more than one passage to take in this temple, let's split up in two groups!!" Luster told her friends. "We'll be able to cover more ground in this demonic temple conveniently."
"Okay, me and Vecra will head down the right of the temple." Bright said, acknowledging Luster's new decision.
"Me and Rubeth will go with Luster!!" Spring Light said confidently.
"Let's more out!!" Luster said.
Just like that, Luster Dawn, Spring Light, and Rubeth head towards the west passage from the rotunda. For Vecra and Bright, they ventured to the east passage from the same room they're in.
In the east passage, Vecra and Bright find themselves in a stone walkway that leads to a wide-rectangular room filled with extra ammo and a backpack lying in front of them against the walls. But before the had time to stock up, six holes just opened up as Lost Souls started popping out from their right. When the spectators started clamping their jaws at the earth pony, Bright turned his back and kicked one of the Lost Souls with both of his hind legs, sending it pummeling backwards straight into the wall behind him. For the other Lost Souls closing in on Bright, he shot down the rest of them with his Assault Rifle.
For Vecra, she made a mad dash towards the ammo, not paying attention to the Lost Souls charging towards him. At such coincidence, Vecra knocked every Lost Soul away from her with her horns and smashed into the last one with a headbutt. After all the lost souls in the room are destroyed, Vecra reloaded her chain-gun before it was Bright's turn. While Bright reloaded his assault rifle, Vecra spots another arch door on their right, thinking that Flurry might be in the next room. After Bright picked up the backpack and strapped it to his armor, Vecra opened up the door only to be met with a small group of imps, with one of them preparing to leap at the yak. However, thanks to Vecra's natural yak strength, she slammed her skull into the imp's head the moment it tried to get the jump on her. Because Vecra's strength pressurized the imp more than the other way around, the imp's neck snap before it collapsed right in front of her. For the other imps, they backed away before they hurled a volley of fireballs at the yak.
Thankfully, Vecra jumped out of the way for Bright to open fire with a volley of missiles coming from the assault rifle's weapon mod. In a blink of an eye, a few imps got blasted by the missile volley as they bust into an explosion of blood. For the rest of the imps, they wet met by another bash in the stomach by a charging Vecra. At the same time, three imps were smashed up against the walls by the female yak, making them all yelp in pain as they feel their ribs cracking by the yak's brute strength.
In the west passage, Luster spots another Cacodemon flying all over a huge room filled with lava and several flying platforms floating above the burning environment from where Luster and her groups is standing all the way to an altar-like room. Seeing limited space around her and her friends, Luster had Rubeth and Spring hide behind cover before Luster aimed her shotgun at the huge, hovering demon. But before Luster could take her shot, two more Cacodemons appeared from behind the first one, forcing Luster to have Spring join in the firing line. As for Rubeth, he activated his flame Belcher from his praetor armor and sprayed a long stream of fire at one of the flying red demons. In an instant, all three of the Cacodemons were set aflame as they started screeching and crashing into each other blindly, making the black griffon snicker. While they're distracted, Luster blasted one Cacodemon with three shotgun blasts. At the same time, Rubeth activated the Super shotgun's meat hook, snagging the hook to the second Cacodemon and blasting it away in just a mere inch in front of it, the moment the griffon got close to it.
However, for the last Cacodemon, it gave out a wide smirk as it shot out a fireball in which blasted the platform that Luster and Rubeth are standing on top of. Before long, the platform started cracking as it split into three separate ones, isolating the pink unicorn, the green-mane kirin, and the black griffon away from each other. As the Cacodemon started laughing at the latter, Luster teleported herself in front of Rubeth and helped him get to his feet while heading to the next platform, not wanting to get burned by the lava from below. Enraged by such a foul trick, Spring Light lunged at the laughing red demon in mid-air and stabbed it in the eye with her horn. At the same time, the kirin combusted into a nirik before its blue flames caught the demon on fire. The Cacodemon scream in pain from both burns and stab wounds before it disintegrated. After the red demon disappeared, the Nirik landed right on top of the lava. At first, Luster and Rubeth thought that Spring is going to get burned and incinerated.
However, because of Spring's Nirik form, she didn't feel any burns from the lava that she is standing on top of, much to their surprise. It's as if the Nirik is immune to all aspects of fire. While the Nirik reached to the other side undamaged, Spring reverted back to her Kirin form before waving at Rubeth and Luster to keep up. If only Rubeth's wings wasn't burned back when they entered the sacked palace in Canterlot, he would've been able to fly across the lava without delay. However, since Rubeth still needs his wings to heal, he will have to put up with leaping from platform to platform, along with Luster and Spring. After making several leaps, Luster and Rubeth finally made it to Spring's side. Although, Spring couldn't help but feel angry about what that Cacodemon just did.
"Stupid demons!!!" Spring snarled as short bursts of dark-red flame came out of her horn. "I just want to kill that thing over and over again!!!"
"Let's not get too angry, Spring. We still have a job to do, ya know!!" The Griffon reminded the kirin of the situation at hand.
"Oh sure!! Anyway, I hope Vecra and Bright Vermillion are both hanging in there." Spring said as she followed Luster and Rubeth from behind as they made their way into another area within the Temple of the Damned.
On the other side of the Temple, after Vecra and Bright Vermillion took care of the imps recently, they find themselves in a zigzag of corridors that led to another rectangular room of imps waiting just waiting for them. Realizing that they're in luck, Vecra stepped on a pressure plate that triggered the ceiling falling right on top of the demons. With just one slam from above, the imps were turned into a bloody paste. As for Bright, he just stood behind Vecra watching in amusement that the imps weren't clever enough to dodge any booby traps inside the temple.
"Now that's what I call automatic YAK SMASH!!!" Vecra shouted in triumph.
While Vecra was cackling in excitement, it also attracted a group of 15 Lost Souls that came from below the balcony outside of the room that she and Bright are in. As soon as the Lost Souls tried to lung at Vecra, Bright shot a volley of missiles from his assault rifle, obliterating them all before they moved on.
At the balcony, they see Flurry Heart shooting down a few more imps and Cacodemons with her gauss rifle while still in mid-air, right 30 feet below them. Even though, the young alicorn is really enjoying herself, Bright and Vecra . So, Bright and Vecra, went down a long, crumbling winding stairway. Just when Vecra makes one step down the stairs, she immediately started sliding down very fast, much to the fright of Bright Vermillion. However, when Bright tried to stop Vecra from sliding, he actually made it worse by bumping into the yak. Just like that, both the yak and earth pony were screaming their heads off as they fell straight down the winding stairs
"YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!"
In just less than 10 seconds, the yak and earth pony crash landed right on top of the pavement, several feet behind Flurry Heart. The moment, she turned around Flurry noticed that both of them are having stars swirling around their heads.
"Hey guys!!! I did managed to help clear most of the area from you!!" Flurry giggled. "You should see the look on that Cacodemon's face when I lifted him up with my magic!!!"
"IT DOESN'T MATTER, FLURRY HEART!!" Bright snapped at the young alicorn, making her flinch. "You still can't run off like that!! This is a very dangerous, alternate dimension and your father is going to kill us if something happens to you out here!!!"
"Sorry guys!! I just want my auntie back!!" Flurry said, cowering before an angry earth pony.
"Anyway, let's go find Luster and the others and get out of here. This place gives me the creeps." Bright told the yak and the alicorn.
The moment Vecra and Bright got back on their hooves, they went through another hallway with Flurry Heart following from behind. Through the hallways, Flurry Heart descended from her flight and decided to take a walk alongside the earth pony. In the next area, from within the temple, the three find themselves in a circular field where several dead ponies were individually hung against a set of metal crucifixes. In Flurry and Bright's shock, they see their fellow ponies already gutted out while their fore hooves are stretched out wide on the crucifixes; considering that some of their bloody insides are missing. However, right below the hung pony corpses, several of their intestines were laying all over the field. As they looked around, the yak, alicorn, and earth pony see metal walls all filled with spikes and faces of screaming ponies. Next to the walls, there are an array of arched gateways sealed off behind metal bars. Up above the walls, a huge crowd of imps and flying demonic creatures were all screeching in excitement as they're about to witness another violent, terrifying event. Upon seeing all of these surroundings, Flurry came up with an educated guess.
"UH OH!!! I think I know where we are right now!!!" Flurry exclaimed in horror. "This setting is very similar to the arena that was being used for ponies to participate in the Equestria Games back in the Crystal Empire!!"
"You don't mean......" Bright muttered in shock.
"We're inside a temple-like coliseum!!" Flurry Heart told the group. "And I don't think we're alone here!!!"
Before either Vecra or Bright could say anything, they start hearing a low-growling noise coming from within the shadows behind the sealed-off gateways surrounding them. In front, Flurry's eyes squinted as she is trying to see what kind of creature is emerging from behind the dark gateways. As the creature made its appearance, the metal bars lifted themselves up before the big, muscular, boar-like demon with medium tusks steeped into full view. The moment it approached the trio, it snarled at them as he kicked its feet backwards, getting ready to charge at them. Upon seeing a new horror before Flurry's very eyes, she finally realized that is just like what Bright just said to her: "we're in a dangerous, alternate dimension." It all points out that Flurry's overconfidence will be her undoing if she isn't careful.
"Oh Faust, please save us all!!" Flurry murmured in horror.
After Luster, Spring Light, and Rubeth made it past the lava flows, they came across a huge altar. On the round floor of the altar, Luster sees more blood red star-like insignias. In the middle of the altar, the group sees a huge, black portal with an orange exterior line circling it.
When they made another step forward, a loud shriek came from beyond the portal. Upon hearing it, Luster raised her shotgun and aimed it at the portal. A new pony-like demon appeared from the portal. In plain sight, Luster's eyes widen with unbelievable shock. The pony demon is seen with twin-rockets launchers mounted on the back of it's guard armor. In addition, his guard armor had a jet pack attached to it. His face is seen will skull-like features, glaring at Luster's group with evil-yellow eyes. In next minute it approached the group, the pony-demon jumped up and activated it's jet pack, making him hover 20 feet in the air.
At first, Luster thought that it was another of those possessed guard ponies but since had a more demon-like appearance instead of a normal pony being afflicted under a grotesque state, Luster activated her dna scanner from her helmet to analyze it's data.
Pegasus Guard-Revenant: A necro pony-demon that shoots out missiles from medium to long range. Just like the Royal guards of Canterlot, these guard ponies have also been possessed by the evil essence of hell itself. Their moderate evasion abilities are maintained by the use of their jet-packs in exchange for their pegasus wings.
As the Guard-Revenant flew around Luster, it started shooting out small missiles at the group, making the unicorn, griffon, and kirin scatter in avoiding its blast radius. While the Guard-Revenant continued to fire upon the three, Luster aimed her shotgun at the demon. However, despite her efforts, the Revenant was dodging every buckshot that came from Luster's gun since Luster was being forced to keep dodging the Revenant's missiles. Thankfully, Rubeth finally gained the upper hand when he was able to fly again. Right behind the Revenant, the griffon grabbed him by the head and pulled his neck backwards, making him snap as the demon losses his flight and collapsed onto the altar. Before Rubeth could celebrate his little victory against the Revenant, several more Revenants flew down from the ominous, blood red sky and landed right behind Rubeth. Fortunately, by the time they unleashed a volley of missiles upon Rubeth, Luster cast her shield wall spell to protect the griffon from behind blasted.
As Rubeth jumped up in mid-air, he turned around and blasted one Guard-Revenant in the face with his super shotgun, turning his face into a bloody chunk of meat before it fell backwards.
For Spring Light, the Kirin fired up a heat wave from her plasma gun, making another Guard-Revenant totally stunned. When the Kirin charged at the stunned demon, she immediately burst into a living flame that engulfed the pony-demon at will. In an instant, the Guard-Revenant was shrieking in pain as the flames were burning him alive, failing its hooves around. The next thing he knew is that the Revenant was met with a stab in the head by Spring's retractable wrist blade coming from her armored hoof. After the Revenant fell backwards dead, Bright leaped up into the air and did swiped his energy sword in a wide arc, cutting off two Revenants by their waist, dissecting them before they succumbed to Bright's mortal blows. Luster finally teleported herself right in front of the last Revenant and before he could jump backwards, he was met with a full blast by Luster's shotgun, puncturing him in the stomach as pieces of his armor came flying off, making him bleed to death. After the last Revenant fell on his back dead, Luster, Spring, and Rubeth regroup as a nearby metal door opened by itself, allowing the group to proceed further into the temple's dark corridors.
As they made their way through the corridors, Luster and the group did their best not to get too distracted by anything disturbing in the temple. In between the group, there is more horrid demon statues and razor sharp teeth jutting from the ground. In addition there are a lot of creatures in the demon realm that Luster couldn't really described, despite her study of Equestrian Creatures. In fact, none of these creatures living in this realm we're even heard of for more than a thousand years. It's as if the realm they're in is very ancient, insidious, and mentioned with limited history. However, Luster and her group stumbled into a temple library filled with black walls and red bookshelves. In a curious manner, Luster went up to one of the bookshelves and discovered more strange tomes. Some of them are even more sinister-looking than the one that Spike gave to her. After skimming through the book shelves, Luster found a parchment at the end of the bookshelf and made a quick scan through the documents.
In the Realm of Demons, it is he who watches all. He is without remorse! He is without mercy! A sinister being without weakness. Mysterious and Relentless. He who destined to bring Doom to the worlds of Mortals. For he is the DARK LORD OF HELL!!!
Upon reading the parchment briefly, Luster started sweating underneath her breath. She feared that whoever this Dark Lord is, he must've been the one behind the abduction of her beloved Alicorn Queen of Equestria. Luster couldn't imagine what kind of terrifying fate will Queen Twilight meet if they don't rescue her in time. This may be the most scariest mission Luster has ever participated in all her life. However, because the Queen's life is at stake, Luster knew that there is no time to be afraid. She remembered that Twilight did taught her how to not only use magic for self-defense but also taught her on how to fight with alternate means, than rather just using magic. It took Luster back 5 years ago when she was still living with Queen Twilight during her first days as her student that Twilight privately taught her and her friends on how to use firearms with extreme caution and responsibility. She never knew that it will be the time for Luster to put all of her firearms skills to the test. Of course, every time Luster takes a break from firearms training or when she takes her leave, the Queen always ordered her to put away her training firearms in a secure vault so that there won't be any mishandling firearms.
In such realization, because of the situation at hoof, Luster gained firearms training from the Queen because it was considered to be a last resort when dealing with creatures that won't show any mercy or any friendship beyond all reason. Therefore, Luster's mission will put all of her fears and her use of firearms to the ultimate test. After scanning the ancient parchment, Luster collected the information in her helmet's database just in case she needs to go over it again. However, now is not the time; her Queen is in mortal danger and Luster and her friends need to keep moving. Speaking of friends, Luster still needs to regroup with the others since its been only a half-an-hour since they separated to find Princess Flurry Heart.
After they left the temple library, Luster, Spring, and Rubeth are finally outside of the temple. Moving on, they made their way through a rocky trail leading up to a wooden bridge, connecting from where they're standing all the way to another trail surrounded by small, rocky mountains. Below the bridge, lies a chasm filled with red fog. Up ahead, they see a strange coliseum beyond the trail. Before they knew it, Luster saw a yellow beam shooting straight up into the blood-red sky. It was Flurry's alicorn magic, indicating that Flurry might be somewhere inside the coliseum and that she might need help big time. With no time to lose, Luster and Spring decided to cross the bridge, with Rubeth taking flight across wooden bridge. Unfortunately, as soon as they made it halfway across the bridge, several Cacodemons, Guard-Revenants, and possessed Pegasus guard ponies came out from the red abyss below the bridge and started shooting at them with their projectile weapons.
Sensing that the bridge will not withstand such an overwhelming barrage of firepower, Luster raised her magic shield, protecting her and Spring from enemy fire while trying to make a run to the other side of the chasm. Thankfully, Rubeth is still able to flying and grabbed one of the Cacodemons by the claws. By such brute force, the Cacodemon screeched as he felt his one big eye get pulled out by Rubeth, making him wail in pain as it disintegrated into a big combustion. Enraged after seeing on their own go down in flames, the other Cacodemons were chasing Rubeth all over chasm. With such bad luck, the demons were met with several more shots made by Rubeth's double-barrelled shotgun. At the same time, Rubeth did his best to draw the Cacodemons away from the bridge that Luster and Spring are standing on.
Behind the unicorn and kirin, the Guard-Revenants and Possessed Pegasus Guards landed on top of the bridge before they started chasing them. To make matters worse they heard a loud roar which was coming from inside the temple. The next thing they saw was that a horde of imps and possessed unicorns came out of the temple and joined in the chase across the bridge, making both Luster and Sprin running for their lives. They were getting ready to pounce on the two as they held up their claws and spears, all armed to the teeth.
"SWEET CELESTIA!!!" Luster shrieked upon seeing the demon horde closing in on her and Spring. "RUUUUUNNNNN!!!!!"
With Spring running ahead of Luster, Luster aimed her shotgun at the enemies behind her with her magic and started shooting at them while galloping across the chasm. They could both feel the bridge breaking apart as they heard the wooden crack underneath their hooves. For the demons and possessed ponies chasing them, it keeps getting worse. The imps were stupidly hurling fireballs at Luster and Spring. Instead, of hitting them, their fireballs struck on wooden boards and the ropes, setting the bridge on fire. While Luster did her best not to look back, she saw that the wooden snapped in two right below Spring. The kirin screamed in terror as she is about to fall off the bridge through a huge gap in the wooden planks. Just in the nick of time, Luster suddenly grabbed Spring Light with her telekinesis and carried her all the way to the other side of the bridge, making a soft landing on top of the rocky ground. While she felt relieved that Luster saved her, Spring sees the unicorn still on top of the bridge when the demons are getting close to her.
"COME ON LUSTER, YOU CAN DO IT!!!" Spring shouted, trying to encourage the unicorn to run like hell.
As Luster resumed her galloping across the bridge, she leaped over the gap first. Just before she got close to the other side, the burning ropes on both of Luster's sides start coming off. In such a fright, the bridge finally fell apart taking most of the imps and possessed unicorns along with it.
After Rubeth took down the last of the Cacodemons during his flight, he saw that Luster's is about to fall of the collapsing bridge, he swooped down below the fall wreckage in hopes of saving the pink unicorn. With Luster losing her footing over the wooden planks, she started screaming in horror as she fell straight into the chasm.
For the Guard-Revenants and possessed pegasi, they flew up off the bridge before they turned their attention towards Spring.
"LUSTER!! RUBETH!!!" Spring Light shrieked.
In such grieving rage, Spring turned into a nirik and let loose a loud roar that engulfed all of the Revenants and possessed pegasus guards, reducing them into charred pieces of flesh. Even though Spring won against the flying demons, she still couldn't stop staring at the destruction that assumed to claimed the life of Luster and Rubeth. After seeing the bridge totally destroyed by the foolish destruction of the imps and possessed unicorns, Spring thought that she will never see Rubeth or Luster again. After she reverted back to her kirin form, Spring is about to cry in anguish. However, after one minute of grieving, Rubeth finally came out of the fog from down below the chasm. The kirin felt totally relieved that Rubeth is actually carrying Luster with both of his claws. Upon seeing them survive the fall, the kirin couldn't help but cry in as she started hugging both Luster and Rubeth.
"Sweet Celestia!!! You both almost gave me a heart attack!!!" Spring said exasperatedly before she let go both of them.
"Sorry about that, Spring!!" Luster said, feeling a bit traumatized after facing a near death experience.
"We have to keep going. The rest of our group is still ahead of us!!" Rubeth said, after taking a few deep breaths from their current fiasco.
"We better head to that Coliseum and fast. We don't know how long with Flurry Heart will last there!" Luster suggested to Spring and Rubeth.
Moving on, the three now ventured down the trail leading straight to the Coliseum.
Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
After getting whipped for eight times, Twilight couldn't tell if she wanted to cry or grunt in pain. However, she still did her best to stay strong despite that she got dragged down to hell. With every crack of the demon's whip, Twilight could feel the pain of the whiplashes burning through her skin and underneath her flesh. Even though her tears came coming down from her eyes, Twilight's anger is still flowing within her mind. She hoped that one day she'll make the Dark Lord pay for everything he did to her and to her palace. Before the demon could make the ninth whip, the Dark Lord ordered him to stop, which is what he did without question.
Just when Twilight no longer feels her back getting whipped, the board that she was strapped to moved back onto the floor. By the time the shackles came off, Twilight attempted to pounce on the demon whipping her only to get restrained by two huge, tall and brute looking demons from behind. Before she knew what was going on, the Dark Lord appeared before the alicorn Queen once again and this time, he cast a binding spell on her horn, stripping Queen Twilight of her magic.
"It seems that you protege and her friends have arrived in my realm to find you, eh?! Well, I doubt they'll ever find their way here because I have plans for them all. Not too mention that another alicorn princess is accompanying them here."
"Flurry Heart?!" Twilight gasped as she was strapped onto a metal post with all of her hooves clapped in irons and tied around behind her back.
Upon realizing that her niece is in the Demon Realm with Luster, Twilight snarled at the Dark Lord with merciless anger in her eyes.
"If you hurt her, I am going to kick your damn flank once I get out of this mess!!!!"
The Dark Lord started bellowing with laughter after hearing what Twilight just said to him.
"She won't get far anyway!! Neither will your protege student!! In fact, I have a lot of surprises for her to show!!"
The Dark Lord cast another spell in front of Twilight. This time, he summoned a huge projection screen which shows Flurry, an earth pony, and a female yak inside an arena. Upon seeing this, Twilight's eyes widened with horror as she is about to witness Flurry getting caught in a fight for her life.
"I wonder how will she survive in the Arena of Blood when I'm hosting a pack of Pinky demons there. Let's find out shall we?!"
Back in the Coliseum, Vecra, Flurry Heart, and Bright came face to face with a pink demon that is seen with big tusks and horns on its head, razor sharp teeth, thick plates of armor on its skin, and a relentless desire for fresh meat from the oven. As it circled around the trio, Flurry activated her dna scanner from her helmet to see what kind of demon they're dealing with right now!!"
Pinkie: A hulking, demonic-like boar that charges at full speed, mauling and mutilating its prey with horrendous ease. Most of its body is protected by a thick set of bone-like armor and can gouge its enemies with its tusks while they're down.
"If Pinky Pie heard about this, she would've been thinking that we just had run into another of her clones when it isn't!!" Flurry thought.
The Pinky made a bellowing roar before it charged straight into the group. While Flurry and Bright attempted to make a run for it, Vecra stood her ground as she dropped her chain-gun.
"Vecra, what are you doing??" Bright gasped in shock. "That thing is going to kill you!!!"
"Did you forget, that we yaks also charge too?!!" Vecra hissed as she lunged at the charging Pinky.
In sheer force, Vecra and the Pinky rammed each other with their hard skulls, with Vecra piercing one of Pinky's eyes with her yak horns, making him roar in pain. With such strength, Vecra lifted the Pink demon off the arena floor and hurled it into the crowd of imps. Just when the Pinky collapsed, beaten. Several more Pinky Demons appeared from the very same gateway that the first one came out from. Despite being outnumbered by a pack of charging Pinkie's, Vecra refused to back down as she continued to charge at the Pinkies head on.
Since Vecra made her move, Flurry and Bright decided to back her up as they opened fire with their ion cannon and assault rifle. At the same time, they both shot at the Pinkies while on the move all over the arena. Apart from the alicorn and the earth pony, they both noticed that the female yak is having too much fun, smashing headbutts into every single Pinky Demon standing in her way.
Every time Vecra headbutts a Pinky, their armor breaks off, giving the yak the opportunity to pound in their weak spots. In a gory fashion, Vecra drew out her wrist-blade from her armored gauntlet and stabbed it into the one of Pinky's eyes, killing the demon in the process. Behind her, another Pinky tried to charge at Vecra only to see the yak jump over the demon. Before the Pinky could even react, he was met with a powerful body slam from Vecra. Thanks to Vecra's armor durability, the spikes on the Pinky's back did little damage to the yak as they only made minor scratches on her Praetor's breastplate. After getting pounced by Vecra, the Pinky slammed flat on its stomach while grunting in pain coming from its back.
While Bright continued to fire his assault rifle at the charging Pinkies, Flurry unfurled her wings and took to the skies above the bloodied floor of the arena. During her flight, Flurry opened fire at the Pinky demons that are still chasing the orange-mane earth colt. Unfortunately, after delivering two or three shots at the demon boars, one Pinky sneaked from behind the white alicorn and attempted to leap at her, trying to pin her down by the wings and back. Luckily, Flurry flew upward in a fast reaction, missing the leaping Pinky by a mere hoof. In a split second, Flurry aimed her rail-gun right on top of the Pinky's head and blasted his skull in a bloody paste, slamming him straight down into the arena floor.
"WHO'S NEXT??!!!!" Vecra roared in triumph.
At first, Vecra thought that she may have the upper hand in winning this arena fight. However, Flurry spotted something break out from the ground behind the female yak. It was another Pinky who is getting ready to strike at Vecra.
"VECRA, BEHIND YOU!!!!" Flurry yelled in fright.
The moment Vecra turned around, she was met with a big whack across her head, knocking her out into submission as the yak was sent flying across the arena. As she slammed into the wall, it made a huge crack before Vecra gets knocked out cold.
In a rage, Flurry blasted the Pinky with her magic at full power, sending him flying into the red sky before she and Bright decided to check up on Vecra. Unfortunately, when Bright and Flurry reached by her side, they get surrounded by another pack of Pinky demons.
"There is just no end to these monsters!!!" Bright said in horror.
To make matters worse, both Flurry's weapon and Bright's weapon are all out of ammo. However, since Vecra didn't even fired any shots with her chain-gun or rocket launcher, Flurry and Bright need to grab those weapons when they still have ammo in them. But Bright is still cornered by the Pinky demons so he can't leave Vecra for one second or else they'll finish her off while she is out cold. So, Flurry used her magic to teleport herself, Bright, and Vecra away from the Pinky herd all the way to Vecra's discarded weaponry. The moment Bright picked up the chain-gun and mounted it onto his armored back, the Pinkies continued to charge at the trio without delay. Thankfully, Flurry formed a shield barrier around her and the two before the Pinky demons continued to pound on it nonstop. Unfortunately, Bright is having trouble trying to load the chain-gun with his bare hooves. Since he doesn't use magic, loading a gun may be more harder to do than that of a unicorn or a yak. As the pounding continues to batter down onto Flurry's shield, it started cracking up, much to the horror of the young alicorn. At every crack, Flurry's eyes widened with horror that her shield is not going to last much longer.
"I'm sorry everyone!" Flurry whimpered, realizing that she is heading towards her doom along with Vecra and Bright. "Mom, dad!! Please forgive me!!!"
Just before one of the Pinky demons attempted to break through Flurry's shield barrier, a huge pillar of dark fire erupted from underneath the Pinky herd. In such a unexpected sight, all of the Pinkies went sent flying away from Flurry Heart and her group. As soon as the pillar of fire disappeared, Luster, Spring Light, and Rubeth appeared in the arena.
"Luster, guys!!" Bright exclaimed, feeling relieved that his friends finally caught up to them. "Thank Celestia you all finally made it. We were about to get mauled!!"
"I know!!" Luster acknowledged. "We just saw Flurry's magic shooting up into the sky from a mile away. We ran as fast as we could only stumble into another swarm of Lost Souls. Since we didn't have time to deal with them, Spring teleported us all the way into this arena but rather through a fiery entrance."
"Vecra is knocked unconscious!! We need to get out of here!!!" Flurry told the group.
"Let's head to that arena exit!!" Luster ordered her group as she picked up the unconscious yak with her magic.
As Luster's group made their way towards the exit of the arena, the Pinky demons finally got back on their feet again and attempted to chase after them. However, as soon as Luster and her friends left the arena, she cast a spell on a nearby switch, closing the gate in front of the Pinky herd. After ramming themselves on the gate in futile efforts, the demons finally gave up and left the arena.
In the aftermath, Luster's group and Flurry find themselves inside the arena breakroom where they decided to take a breather after struggling to find a safe place away from the mayhem. While they're taking a break, Flurry Heart lit up her horn and conjured a healing spell on Vecra, treating the yak of her physical injuries. Even though Flurry finished, the yak is still unconscious.
On the shelves in the break room, Luster found more ammo to load up her firearms, along with several extra medkits. Even though Flurry said it herself that her mother taught her on how to use healing magic, it still takes up most of her energy when doing so. It was decided that Flurry and Luster will be keeping the medical kits strapped to their Praetor armor just for emergency. After every pony and creature finished loading up their guns, Vecra finally woke up in a zealous fit as she blindly attempted to charge at Luster.
"COME HERE YA DAMN PINKY!! VECRA'S GONNA......"
"Vecra, please calm down!!" Luster ordered that female yak as she held her down with her magic. "The Pinkies aren't here anymore!!"
"L-Luster??" Vecra gasped, snapping out of her rage the moment she sees her female unicorn friend. "What happened, where did they go??"
"We ran in here as fast as we could before we closed the gate on them." Rubeth explained to the confused yak. "But they're still out there so we can't let our guard down yet. We have to leave this arena now!!"
"Rubeth's right guys. We just managed to find Flurry Heart before we stumbled into this bloody arena." Bright added in.
Before they could say anymore, Luster's group started hearing some loud growling coming from the shadows outside of the break room. It could only mean that the demons of hell are not far behind them, which made Flurry's and Luster's bones shiver in fear. For Vecra, however, the yak snorted as she is about to get revenge on the very same Pinky Demons that outsmarted her earlier. Unfortunately, Rubeth shook his head in front of Vecra, not wanting her to come up with anymore reckless ideas right now since she almost wasted her life when smashing through the Pinky ranks back there.
"We all have to stick together this time. No wandering off anymore!!" Luster told the entire group before looking at Flurry straight in the eye.
Without replying to Luster's decision, every pony and creature mounted up once again. For Vecra, Rubeth and Spring handed her chain-gun and her rocket-launcher back to the yak. The moment they exit out of the breakroom, Luster, Flurry Heart and the group are now making their way into another dark hallway within the Arena of Blood. As they went down, they see that the hallways are all covered in dried blood stains, spider webs, stone faces of demons, and ominous glowing chandeliers hanging all over the walls. At the end of the hallway, they find themselves in an large underground arena. Unlike from above, the underground arena had spikes stick out from the ceiling above them with pony skulls and dried flesh danging. When Luster looked down to where she is standing, she sees a circular lava flow outside of the marble floors and several foothills that are 15 feet tall.
Luster realized that this underground area is just another part of the Arena of Blood. There are two levels of marble floor: with the bottom level is surrounded by the circular lava stream and the upper level above is a huge marble platform. In the middle of the upper floors, in-between the two foothills, there is a orange demonic-goat silhouette that is lighting up in a dark red hue. For her friends, their blood started to turn frozen as they feel like they're still in a game between life and death. No pony or creature will ever make it out alive without dealing with the demons who want to kill them first. So, as of now, Flurry Heart was the first to draw out her Railgun and aimed it at right where the goat silhouette is at, sensing that it may be where the enemies will come out from.
In just one minute, the arena started shaking from below their hooves. The next thing they see is several pillars of orange lighting striking down in random spots all over the area the Luster and her friends are in. A squad of Guard-Revenants and Lost Souls appeared from the orange pillars and started attacking the group at will.
"Here they come, every pony!!!" Luster shouted as she aimed her Shotgun at a group of encroaching Lost Souls.
Three more Pinky demons appeared out of the lighting pillars and lunged at Spring and Flurry Heart. Thankfully, Flurry cast a shield spell surrounding her and Spring. When the Pinkies started ramming their horns into Flurry's shield, Spring teleported herself behind them and opened fire with both her Plasma gun and flame belcher, setting the demons on fire as they all roared in pain. However, one of the Pinkies rammed at the kirin with its head and pinned her down before attempting gouge Spring with its tusks. But Spring transformed into a Nirik and blasted the Pinky with her dark-fire, sending it crashing into the ceiling as the demon gets impaled by several of its spikes.
After Flurry lowered her shield, she flew up into the air but not to high since she would risk getting hurt by the ceiling's spikes. While sweating inside her helmet, Flurry did some strafe-firing at the Revenants that were aiming their missile launchers at her. Even though she missed her shots, Flurry kept shooting at the Guard-Revenants until they dropped dead. But it didn't take long for the Revenants to ascend towards Flurry's position when they activated their jet-packs.
About three Revenants were opening fire upon the young alicorn, in hopes of blasting her sky-high. Ultimately, thanks to her flight training with her mother, Flurry was able to glide in a much more smooth, but faster pace. The missiles only hit the ceiling.
Down back on the ground, Luster saw that a falling spike came crashing straight down on top of a Pinky's head, puncturing his brain as he fell to his side dead. Sensing another way to beat the demons at their own game but in a much bigger risk, Luster raised her voice before calling out to the rest of her friends.
"EVERY PONY!!! TAKE SHELTER!!! Flurry, have them keep shooting the ceiling!!"
As soon as they all head with Luster told them, they all fled down below the bottom floor and underneath the top floor as Flurry started redirecting the Revenant's missiles towards the ceiling with holding up her shield. In such a display of chaos mayhem,a crack started to erupt all over the ceiling and the next thing Flurry saw is a massive shower of spikes falling right on top of the rest of the Pinkies and Guard Revenants. They didn't stand a chance as they all got impaled by the falling spikes. As for the Lost Souls, they all disintegrated as they feel their themselves break apart by the falling spikes. With Luster and all of her friends hiding underneath the platform, Flurry teleported herself away from the lethal shower of spikes and reappeared right where Luster's group is at.
As they struggled to stay underneath the platform, Luster's group could hear all sorts of painful, bloodcurdling screams coming from their enemies for several more minutes before the spikes stopping falling from the ceiling. Just as soon as Luster came out of cover, she was about to announce to the group that the area is clear. Unfortunately, the horror in the arena is just getting started. Right behind Luster, she heard another roar coming from a nearby sewer grate leading outside of the arena. Before they knew what it was, another demonic creature burst out of the sewer grate by force, along with a trio of his own kind.
Right in front of Luster's group, five huge, overweight demons are seen to have two huge dual-cannons with metal wires attached from their power packs and walk on two huge feet. As soon as they approached Luster's group, she activated her dna scanner from her helmet to analyze their bulky-looking foe.
Mancubus: A hulk-like demon that is seen in an obese manner. Even though they're the slowest of all demons in the Demon Realm, they are not to be underestimated with. Armed with massive, dual-cannon, these overweight monstrosities can unleash a barrage of flame balls that'll blast any foe apart in mere seconds.
Upon making a loud roar, one of the Mancubus started opening fire upon Luster's group with both of its dual-cannons.
"Watch out guys!!" Luster told the group as she aimed her shotgun at one of the Mancubuses. "They're firing on us!!!"
When the rest of the Mancubuses shot out a volley of cannon fire at them, Luster and her friends scattered from their cover, narrowly escaping its blast radius. Thankfully, Flurry and Rubeth flew up into the sky and became the first to fire back at the Mancubuses with their weapons. After shooting them with a dozen shots, the Mancubuses slowly collapsed as they fell backwards totally obliterated. However, three more teleported themselves in the underground arena and started letting loose a torrent of fire at Spring and Vecra. Luckily, Spring transformed into a Nirik once again and stood in front of their line of fire, undamaged as she shot back a huge beam of dark fire at the Mancubus in the middle of the demon trio, turning him into a huge pile of burnt flesh!!! For the two Mancubuses, Spring fired a wide, heat wave that made their heads explode in an instant before they both collapsed backwards.
After all of the enemies have been defeated in the underground arena, the wall north of Luster's group suddenly opened up, revealing a huge, wide staircase leading up back to the outside of the arena, or so they thought. On both sides of the staircase, a bottomless abyss lies below which gave Luster and her group a frightful chill in thinking that something scary is hidden somewhere in the darkness underneath the stairs. However, since Queen Twilight is waiting for them, Luster still needs to take terrifying risks as she went up the stairs first with the rest of the group following from behind.
"Don't let your guard down, every pony. These stairs may be leading us back to where we started from or worse!!" Luster warned the group as she held her shotgun close to her armor breastplate.
While heading up the stairs, Spring and Vecra held their weapons as they kept a close eye behind the group. Flurry ascended above Luster's group while aiming her rail gun at the top of the stairs. From a distance away, Flurry sees another doorway with a red goat-demon skull engraved on it. She aimed her rail gun at the door, just to make sure no enemies are going to poor out from it by the time Luster's group reached the top.
In the middle of the flight of stairs, Luster could hear rumbling coming from underneath where she was standing. Not wanting to fall into another trap, Flurry took flight and flew down below the stairs to see what is causing the immediate rumbling. The moment Flurry looked below, her eyes widened with horror that a swarm of huge tentacles came out from underneath the stairs, followed by a loud bellowing roar coming from the dark abyss.
"Every Pony!! RUN!!!" Flurry Heart shouted as she raised a shield bubble on herself, not wanting to get ensnared by the huge tentacles.
With every roar, the tentacles slammed onto the stairs trying to crush Luster and her friends. However, most of the Luster's group did their best to run as fast as they can up to the doorway leading outside, barely evading the tentacles. As the slamming intensifies, several huge cracks started churning all over the stairs, making the structure rip apart. Upon seeing the stairs breaking away from each other, most of Luster's friends were forcing themselves to jump over each standing rubble praying that they won't fall into the dark abyss and to their deaths. Thankfully, Rubeth was able to take flight while Luster and Spring both teleported themselves to the doorway.
However, the creature with the huge tentacles isn't giving up that easily as it reached towards Luster and Spring at the doorway. Luckily, Flurry blasted most of the tentacles with her railgun as they blew apart, making the creature roar in anger and in pain. For Bright and Vecra, they struggled to maintain their footing every time they jump from one remaining rubble to another. Horrifying enough, most of the stairs broke apart and fell straight into the abyss right behind the yak and the earth pony.
Thankfully, Luster was able to grab Bright and Vecra with her magic before they fell into the abyss too. After Luster lowered the two in front of her, the yak and earth pony moved ahead with the unicorn following from behind. As soon as they entered to the doorway, Luster and her entire group find themselves in another huge open circular area filled with a floor of dry dirt and cracks. In a more horrifying surprise, more tentacles came sprouting from the dirt and started whacking at Luster's friends more furiously than ever.
But Flurry cast a huge shield spell all over the group. For only a few minutes, the tentacles started whacking on top of Flurry's shield barrier before she expanded it very wide, smash the tentacles in such full force. After all of the tentacles disappeared back into the ground, Luster's group was about to advance only to see more possessed guard ponies appeared from the arena's bleachers and launched more fiery spells at them. In a fast reaction, Luster ordered the group to head towards the exit of the Arena of Blood which is right in front of them.
"GO! GO! RUN!!!" Luster shouted as she raised a shield spell of her own to block off the possessed guard's spells while running, with Bright and Rubeth coming up behind her for cover.
As for Spring, she returned fire with her plasma gun. Unfortunately, because the kirin is so far away from her firing range, Spring is not able to get a clear shot at any of the possessed unicorn guards. Instead, the Kirin put away her plasma gun and raised her own shield as well. Unlike Luster's shield, Spring transformed into a Nirik again before letting loose a fiery barrier surrounding herself with burning pikes jutting out of its exterior. With just one shout of the Nirik's belllowing voice, the burning pikes came shooting all all over the area penetrating every single wall and bleacher, impaling the possessed guards in a bloody, burning mess.
For Luster and her friends, they were running in a more terrifying manner than ever before, not just from the demons but also from a raging Nirik.
"GREAT SCOTT, SPRING!!! STOP THAT!!! YOU'RE GOING TO GET US KILLED!!!" Flurry shouted as she was forced to do all sorts of barrel rolls while in mid-air, trying to evade the burning pikes.
"YIKES!!!" Bright shrieked as a burning pike zoomed right past him by a mere inch of his body.
"EEEEEKKKKK!!!!" Vecra screamed while running and keeping her head low.
Up ahead, Luster sees a huge, blue portal appear at the exit of the Arena of Blood. Realizing that it may be their only way out of this death trap, Luster ordered her group to head straight for it without delay.
"Everypony!! This way!!!" Luster shouted as she was the first to jump into the portal before disappearing.
Once Luster left the arena, Bright went through second, followed by a terrified Vecra. For Rubeth and Flurry, they both zoomed into the portal at the same time while taking flight.
"RRRRRAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!" Spring roared, still shooting out burning pikes from her fiery shield blindly.
After screaming for 15 seconds, Spring finally exhausted herself as she dispersed her fiery shield and went back into her Kirin form. As she took several deep breaths, Spring looked around only to see huge gaping holes all over the dirt ground, the walls, and the bleachers, which were filled with bloody corpses of possessed guard ponies.
"Where did every pony go??" Spring asked in total confusion.
At first, Spring didn't see where did Luster and the others disappeared off to. However, just as soon as Spring saw the portal in front of her, the Kirin presumed that it may be where Luster and the other went. Wasting no more time, Spring drew out her Plasma gun once again before disappearing into the portal.
View Online
Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
Village of Slaves, Underground Mines of Mayhem
After making futile struggles against the changelings, Spring Light gets strapped on by a muzzle, with a red halo-like magic seal placed on top of her head, tied up by their ropes, and wrapped a paper bag on top of her head unable to see where she was going. For the Changelings, they hauled the restrained the Kirin all the way to a nearby village at the end of the burning forest. The moment the Changelings entered the village, they bowed before Queen Chrysalis. Ever since the Dark Lord brought Chrysalis' soul into his Demon Realm, he let Chrysalis regain her former glory. Unlike in the mortal realm of Equestria, the Changelings in the Demon Realm made themselves at home here since they, just like Chrysalis, rebelled against Thorax's wishes to share love with the ponies and the other creatures of Equestria. In order to distinguish from their counterparts, the Changelings in the Demon Realm transformed into their red versions of themselves, granting them the power to wield fire-based Changeling magic at will for impersonation and for fighting.
The moment Spring felt herself stop, the Changelings forced her onto her knees before Queen Chrysalis as one of them makes her announcement in person.
"Your Majesty, we have captured one of the intruders in Luster's group." The Burning Changeling announced as he took the paper bag off the Kirin's face.
The moment Spring looked up, Chrysalis held her up with her chin with her hoof as she made an evil smile.
"Well, I wonder who could this little Kirin be up to, trying to achieve what Queen Twilight did when she was still young?? OH BAH!!" Chrysalis spat. "I doubt a little living firebomb like you will ever live to see the light of the mortal realm."
"Don't think you'd win that easily!!" Spring snarled. "Wait until the others get here!!!"
Chrysalis started laughing at the kirin out of disbelief thinking that they will be no match for her in the demon realm. "I highly doubt that. Now that I finally got my army back thanks to the Dark Lord of this realm, I will regain the strength that was taken away from me and storm into Canterlot from below the surface, claiming that city as my own once again!!! Lock her up in the slave cages!!"
Without another word, Spring gets grabbed by two Changelings as they dragged her into a wooden cage inside a huge hovel in the southern corner of the village.
"Luster, I hope you and the rest of our friends come find me very soon." The Kirin thought as she made a silent prayer.
Back inside the Burning Forest, Flurry Heart, who is still hiding inside the bush, took out her rail gun and looked through the scope in case she sees any Changeling nearby. After surveying her surroundings in a 180 degree angle, Flurry confirmed that the area is clear. However, because she still feels a bit of a sting coming from her damaged wing, Flurry went on the ground with her stomach as she slithered out of the bush, trying to lay low before making her way through the forest once again.
"Man, that was really scary. Now that my wing is damaged, I need to find Luster since she has already studied several lessons revolving around healing magic." Flurry thought. "But I don't know where is she or the others. They could be anywhere out in this dense forest."
Feeling lost and nervous, Flurry couldn't tell if she wanted to crawl through the dirt to avoid being seen or stay in one place, hidden from plain sight. Nevertheless, the young alicorn continued to crawl all the way to a nearby tree before climbing up to the branches. As soon as she hoisted herself up to a thick branch, Flurry cast a cloaking spell on herself so that no one will see her from below the tree that she is hiding in.
Down below the ground, Vecra found herself grunting in pain as she felt her stomach churning. Last thing she could remember was when the changelings are all over her before the yak fell straight into the abyss. The moment she got back up on her hooves, Vecra sees a rocky ground all around her. Up above her, she sees a bit of light coming from the hole that she fell through minutes ago. Oddly enough, the changelings that were overwhelming her moments ago were nowhere in sight. It's as if something else scared them away before they had a chance to finish off Vecra. Speaking of which, Vecra raised her chain-gun up to her side in fright. However, since Vecra is surrounded by darkness, she can't tell if whatever creature scared off the changelings is a friend or foe. The yak still doesn't want to let her guard down regardless. Before Vecra knew what is going on right now, she could hear something breathing and growling behind her assuming that she is going to be next. While sweating underneath her helmet, the yak felt fear in making any sudden movement for it may be her last.
Just when Vecra felt that this could be the last thing she would ever witness, the creature behind did nothing to hurt her as it appeared in a very calm state. It circled around before it came to face Vecra in front of her. When Vecra aimed her chain gun at the creature, it appeared to be an old male Yak with scars on its face and with a sad expression.
"Are you here to get me out of this wretched place?" The old Yak asked Vecra.
"I don't know yet. We were sent here by the Royal Ambassador Spike to rescue Queen Twilight Sparkle. Unfortunately for us, we had a fiasco with a group of changelings earlier. The next thing I knew, a swarm of them were on top of me before I fell into a hole and blacked out."
"You mean those little wimps??" The old yak clarified when he pointed his hoof at a mangled pile of Changeling corpses. "Well, I may be old but I still have some strength left in me to crush those changelings."
The moment Vecra saw the dead Changelings, she noticed that all of their faces were beaten to a bloody pulp, all of them on top of each other.
"Well, I was stuck in this hole too for only Celestia knows how long. Speaking of which, who is this Queen Twilight??" The old yak asked further.
"She happens to be the newly appointed ruler of Equestria. Yes, Twilight ascended the throne in Canterlot after her mentor Princess Celestia stepped down." Vecra explained briefly.
"She's the new the ruler of Equestria?! The last time I could remember was when Princess Celestia was on the throne." The old yak gasped silently. "I guess a lot has changed while I was stuck here, eh?!"
"Why were you down here?" Vecra asked in a curious manner.
"I used to be one of Yakyakistan's most famous monster hunters. But on my latest assignment, I was trying to pursue a bounty of 5 thousand bits which was placed on a horned demon that came from Canterlot's underbelly. Unfortunately, during my time in this realm, I fell into this cave like you did by accident and was stuck here for 5 years before I ran into you." The old yak explained. "I swear, if I ever find my way out of this wretched place, I will quit hunting monsters for the rest of my life and go back to Yakyakistan to retire."
"That's terrible. Anyway, I'm Vecra. I'm sure we can find a way out of here together." Vecra exclaimed before introducing herself.
"I'm Rushauk." The old yak replied introducing himself. "I do think I might be able to find a way out of this cave but I may need your extra strength first. Follow me."
After hearing what Rushauk said, Vecra followed the old yak from behind as she picked up her chaingun and made her way through the dark cave. Luckily, the moment Vecra put on her helmet again, she activated her headlights to see what's in front of her.
Somewhere back in the burning forest, Luster was laying on top of a pile of leaves while Rubeth was keeping a close eye on her and tending to her injuries. After Rubeth was done, he sees an injured, unconscious Luster have a bandage wrapped around her head, with her helmet on the ground a few inches from her face. For Bright, he was hanging on top of a tree branch a couple of feet from where Rubeth and Luster are at while keeping a lookout for any more demons or changelings in the vicinity. After one hour, Luster slowly opened up her eyes, followed by a painful grunt coming out of her muzzle.
"Easy there, Luster." Rubeth said while trying to hold the unicorn gently with both of his claws. "I just managed to wrap your head injury recently."
"Urgh. What happened?? Where's Spring Light and the others?" Luster groaned in pain, unable to get up for a while.
"We don't know, Luster. We all scattered in different directions while you were out cold and Spring got taken away by those red roaches. We're sorry for letting all of this happen." Rubeth explained briefly while apologizing to the pink unicorn. "Flurry Heart has also disappeared again!!"
"DANGABIT!!!" Luster screamed in frustration. "How are we going to stay together if they keep hindering us??"
"Please calm down, Luster. I'm sure we'll work something out. After all, we're a team and we are in this together." Rubeth said, trying to sympathize with the stressed-out unicorn.
"Sorry, but still we're inside a new world that is terrifying than in the depths of Tartarus and we don't know how are we going to get back once we find Queen Twilight. I may be her best student so far but this is too much for me or us." Luster said, feeling ashamed of herself for dragging herself into this mess.
"Well, what would Queen Twilight do if she was in the same situation you're in?" Rubeth asked, trying to help Luster regain her senses.
"She would try to fight together with her friends." Luster replied, taking a few deep breaths.
"Hey guys!! I think I see a village out in the distance!!" Bright exclaimed.
"Which direction??" Luster asked.
"West!! Oh, and I think I see Spring Light there too. Uh oh!! I think she's being held captive!!!"
"Let's head down there to see what is going on in that village!!" Luster told her group as she grabs her helmet and puts it back on her head.
While underneath her cloaking spell, Flurry walked through the forest very slowly so that her movement isn't heard from a mile away. At the same time, Flurry struggled to hold her breath with her hoof so that no demon could hear her breathing. After hiding for several minutes, Flurry continued to crawl from her hiding spot, still cloaked. But she still fear that every step she makes may draw the wrong kind of attention.
No matter, she has already been trained by her father over a series of stealthy exercises back in the Crystal Empire because Flurry was already told that she may need to partake in battlefields that involve stealth if she ever gain the opportunity to rule over the Empire one day. So, Flurry needs to remain confident during the rescue mission. Eventually, Flurry spotted a nearby hedge face the edge of a nearby cliff. Taking her chances, Flurry peeked out from the hedge to see if there is anything she needs to be aware of from the other side.
In one second, Flurry spots a group of changelings eyeing on a group of pony slaves who were harvesting ore from the caves down below her.
"I wonder what kind of ore are they trying to mine here?" Flurry pondered. "Never mind, I need to regroup with Luster and the others as well as having them treat me of my injured wings."
"Flurry, are you there? Flurry where are you??" Luster's voice whispered from Flurry's helmet.
"I'm hiding inside a hedge somewhere at a cliff!" Flurry whispered.
"They got Spring Light held up in a nearby village. We're heading down there to see if we can find a way to rescue her. Have you seen Vecra?"
"No, I haven't." Flurry answered.
Before any creature could say anything else, Luster started hearing a beeping noise coming from her helmet. As she put her right hoof on it, Luster started hearing Vecra's voice immediately.
"Luster, any pony. Is anypony there??" The yak said, distorted.
"Yes, Vecra. I'm here!!" Luster replied. "Where are you right now??"
"I fell into some sort of unknown cave. I found an old yak that is willing to leave the cave with me. What about you??"
"We are still inside the forest a few miles from a nearby village. The village is being occupied by burning Changelings and they have slaves working for them there. What's worse is that Spring Light got capture and taken there as their prisoner!!"
"That's terrible!!" Vecra gasped in horror, fearing the life of one of her friends. "What do we do?!"
"We have to meet somewhere else so that we aren't being watched!!" Luster suggested to her yak friend. "We also may need supplies to treat Flurry of her injuries as well."
"It's fine guys. I'll hold onto to my injured wings until we see each other again." Flurry heart said, eavesdropping on Luster.
"Are you sure about this?!" Luster asked, feeling shocked about Flurry's stubborn will.
"I won't be seen for awhile so I'll be fine." Flurry said. "For now, just save Spring Light."
"Okay. Just try to stay in touch more often."
Back in the village, Spring Light, who is now chained up by the neck, is seen without her marine armor as it was removed and locked up in the village storeroom next to the slave cages. While heading down into the mines, the burning changelings were hauling the captivate kirin with every tug of the chain they're holding with their magic. The moment they stopped, Spring is left with two other enslaved kirin in small, isolated area.
"You are to help those two dig into the mines without question." One of the changelings ordered as he shoved a pick ax to Spring's chest before she held onto it with her right hoof. "And don't you dare try to run or you'll be whip-lashed nonstop!!!"
Feeling despair, Spring had no choice but to do as they say since they stripped her of her equipment and gear. However, since her friends are still out there, Spring can only pray that they will find her very soon. If that happens, the kirin would get revenge on her captors even if she were to burn the entire village of slaves down along with them.
"You won't get away with this!!" Spring thought as she held her pick ax with her mouth before hacking onto the rocks on the mine's walls.
On the east side of the village, Luster, Bright, and Rubeth made it out of the forest and skidded downhill from a small cliff but at a careful pace to ensure that none of the burning changelings would hear any noises. The moment they touchdown to a lower elevation the unicorn, earth pony, and griffon hid behind a nearby slave shack readying their weapons as they held them close to their chests.
As Luster slowly turned to her right, she sees several ponies hauling mine carts out from a nearby cave while being whipped by the burning changelings. After turning her sights away from the scene, Luster quietly activates her intercom to stay in contact with Flurry Heart.
"Flurry, can you see anything from your hiding place?" Luster asked in a whisper.
"I just saw Spring Light wrapped in chains as they dragged her into the mines, along with several other ponies." Flurry whispered back in a reply.
"I may need your help in providing distractions!" Luster told the young alicorn. "Stand by."
"I'm on it!!" Flurry grinned as she aimed her railgun, with its barrel sticking out of the bush she's hiding in.
In her sights, Flurry can see three burning changelings whiplashing a group of slaves whom are hacking several veins with their pickaxes without delay. Grunting in pain, the slaves can only beg mercy from Faust before they die. However, Flurry is eager to save the slaves from captivity at the request of Luster Dawn. In her crosshairs, Flurry sees a cart full of dynamite that isn't used yet which is placed on the left of the tunnel's entrance to the underground mines with only two Changelings guarding it with their lives.
Grinning underneath her breath, Flurry slowly squeezed the trigger of her rain gun as it shot out a blue beam of light at the dynamite cart. As the beam struck dead on, the mass explosion surprised the burning changelings in fright as they were all sent flying backwards into the tunnel.
At the same time, the other changelings heard the loud noise from their barracks before they flew down to the tunnels to investigate. In the confusion, the slaves didn't know what is going on as most of the changelings left their posts. Before they knew it, Rubeth, Bright, and Luster swooped in from their hiding place as they grabbed and teleported the slaves away from the worksite, bringing most of them into the forest.
While using her magic to release the slaves from their chains, Luster asks one of them the whereabouts of her captured friend.
"Has anyone seen a kirin here? Anypony??"
As the slaves looked at each other, they shook their heads not knowing anything about a kirin being held up in the village. No matter, Rubeth did his best to keep watch over the slaves inside the forest while Luster teleported herself and Bright back to the village to continue her search for Spring Light.
At the village, Luster and Bright reappeared behind another slave shack close to the entrance of the mines. When Luster slowly peered around the edge of the structure, she sees a group of burning changelings trying to help recover their disoriented comrades. Luster grinned as she turned to Bright before nodding the earth pony. Seeing Luster's gesture, Bright ran up to a nearby mining cart and kicked it with his hind hooves as it is sent crashing into the burning changelings with a big smash. Upon impact, the changelings all splattered into smashed up corpses before Luster and Bright went inside the tunnels while reloading their guns.
After seeing Luster and Bright disappear into the tunnels, Flurry teleports herself to another vantage point where she can give them both covering fire. This time, the young alicorn reappears right above the tunnel's entrance, in-between two jagged rocks where her railgun can maintain balance on top of. As Flurry went into position, she summoned a plasma canister to reload her railgun before concentrating at any burning changelings heading their way.
"Flurry where did you go?!" Luster's voice spoke from Flurry's ear-bud.
"I'm holding position right above the tunnel's entrance!!" Flurry responded as she held her ear-bud with her left hoof.
"Okay. Just don't let any burning changelings enter the tunnel. Shoot them down if they get too close!!"
"Copy that!!!"
Heeding Luster's request, Flurry Heart remains on top of the tunnel entrance while holding her railgun straight and true.
Once Luster and Bright are inside the tunnels, they activated their flashlights coming the right temples of their helmets before proceeding into the dark mining shafts. Even though there is torches lit up on their right, they're still not bright enough to illuminate the rest of the tunnel since most of it is still dark; not to mention that there is burning heat waves coming from deep within the complex layout.
For several minutes of descending into the tunnels, Luster and Bright find themselves in a huge area where more underground tunnels are leading to deeper parts unknown. Worse, the Burning Changelings and demonic imps are patrolling the tunnels in groups of 6, while about 12 of them are watching over the slaves to ensure that they do not slack off. As much as Luster wanted to help free the slaves, she still has yet to confirm the location of her friend Spring Light.
Since their ammo is limited for their weapons, Luster and Bright did their best to stay out of sight by hiding within the shadows of the tunnel's interior. However, because the imps' hands are glowing with a fiery red and that the changelings have glowing red eyes to see in the dark, Luster had to use a shadowy cloaking spell to make sure she and Bright cannot be seen.
When one enemy patrol got closer in about 20 meters, Luster cast a black spell engulfing herself and Bright as they both completely disappeared in an instant before the burning changelings got close. Just like that, one changeling scans the tunnel right where Luster and Bright were at using its red-light screen up and down. Seeing that no creature is here, the burning changelings and imps move on.
In the next two minutes after the enemy patrol disappears to the other side of the tunnel, Luster cancels out her spell before she and Bright reappeared again before moving on.
As Spring continued to mine for ore using her pick ax, one of the changelings heard some clanging noise from a distance away behind him. Distracted, the burning, bug-eyed creature flew away from Spring to her left. The moment the kirin notice this, she immediately held her pick ax to her chest before quietly leaped into the shadows to her right, seeing her chance to escape.
When the burning changeling sent to guard of the kirin tried to investigate the suspicious noise, he was met horn thrust into the right side of his skull by a stalking Luster Dawn. While lurking in the tunnel's shadows, the pink unicorn stabbed the changeling in the head with her horn, ending the enemy creature's life as his green blood came spilling from his head wound, dripping onto the rocky ground right where he was standing.
As Luster pulled her horn back, the dead changeling collapsed onto the ground before Luster and Bright continued their search for Spring. When they head towards where the burning changeling came from Luster almost got hit by a oncoming pick ax from the shadows only for the unicorn to stop the weapon from striking her using her magic in an instant.
"Luster, is that you?!" Spring gasped as she appeared from the shadows, still wearing her armor.
"Yes, its me you idiot. You almost hit me!!" Luster snapped before Bright shushed her, aware that there is still enemies within the tunnel complex.
"Sorry about that. I thought you were another one of those changelings." Spring said, apologizing for her foolish reactions. "Say, what happened to the others?"
"Well, Vecra got separated from our group and Flurry Heart is covering our exit. For Rubeth, he is helping the other slaves escape this wretched village."
"Do you have my weapons?" Spring asked, feeling exposed and empty-hoofed.
"Bright does. Well, you still have your magic, right?!" Luster said, feeling ashamed that she didn't find the kirin's plasma gun during their scour around the Village of Slaves.
"Oh yeah, right." Spring said, almost forgetting that she still has her natural born powers as a kirin. "Though, I need somepony to help me with these restraints."
Upon seeing that the Kirin still has cuffs clamped shut onto her front and hind hooves and her horn trapped inside a magic seal, Luster's horn hits up while still wearing her helmet as she showered Spring with her magic. In a small, silent light screen, Luster was able to remove the cuffs and the magic seal off her kirin friend before Spring rubbing her front hooves in releasing the pain coming out of both of them.
Next, Bright took out the plasma gun from his backpack before handing it to Spring. Upon seeing it, Spring's horn lit up as she held onto her plasma gun once more, reloading it with another plasma cell that is in the outside, front pocket of Bright's backpack.
"We may need to rescue as many slaves from this dark tunnel. Ever since I was dragged in here, I started to hear some ghostly cacophony that is coming from deep within this complex. It was making me shiver in fear!!" Spring chattered in fear.
"Well, whatever it is, I hope we can get the slaves out of here before whatever is down here comes after us!!" Luster said, sweating underneath her breath.
Once Spring is free from her restraints, the runes on her horn lit up as she proceeded alongside Luster and Bright as they continued their trek down the mines to help free the slaves.
As soon as they find themselves in an open, cavernous area down below the tunnels with small streams of lava coming down from above the underground ceilings. All around them, they see a huge walkway spiraling from either side lead down to the darkest levels, with huge, tall scaffolds standing next to them. Before they can proceed any further, however, the group spots a horrible surprise from a mere distance away upon hearing the scary whispers silently echoing through their ears. When Spring's horns lit up in a red-dim light to see an immense demonic-like skull jutting out from down the dark pits above them. It happens to be a titanic pony head with huge horns jutting out from both sides of its temple. However, the rest of its body is still buried underneath the dark pits. Luster sees that the slaves brought in this tunnel are being ordered to dig out bits of dirt surrounding its neck while others are excavating black ore from the veins all around the cavernous area underground.
With taking a keen look at the massive pony skull, Luster could see a burning orb flowing from inside its hollow eye sockets. She may not know what that thing it, but for some reason, Luster had a bad feeling that the burning changelings are obsessed in that huge, demonic pony skull for some scary reason. It wasn't long before Luster started to hear the ominous ghostly whispers coming from that skull she sees below her, realizing that it may be what Spring is talking about. However, Luster still needs to keep it together for she still has to help her friends free the prisoners here before sending them away from the Demon Realm.
Luster took a deep gulp before she leads her two friends to her right, ensuring that they trot quietly down the spiraling walkway to their left. In making their cautious trek to one of the slaves, they had to watch their right since that side has a very steep edge. All it takes is one slip for Luster or one of her friends to fall straight to their death in the dark depths. Nevertheless, they have to stay strong in rescuing these innocent creatures dragged in here against their own will.
Instead of using their firearms, Luster and her friends take turns in silently killing the Burning Changelings and Imps looming over the slaves. With moderate, swift movement, Bright raises his right, armored hoof as a small blade jutted out from underneath before stabbing the changeling in the neck.
With the blade penetrating the Changeling's jugular veins, it gurgled as green blood came down from his neck and all over its red body before Bright gently lowered it down on the ground. As the changeling bled to death, Bright's assault rifle became active again after the dead creature spewed out several ammo clips. Once Bright's mounted weapon is loaded, he smirked with sheer confidence in firing his gun once again.
For Spring, she rammed a nearby imp who didn't have the time to react when the kirin smashed the demonic creature with her pick ax, piercing its skull with the tool's curved-pointy blade. Once the imp went down and disintegrated in a fiery flash, several more plasma cells appeared as they got absorbed into the kirin, refilling her plasma gun in the process.
When it is Luster's turn, her horn lit up the moment she sees another burning changeling approaching them from the abyss down the spiral walkway. Before the changeling could see it coming, Luster snarled at it as she aimed her horn at the creature. As soon as Luster's magic went around the changeling's neck, the creature immediately heard a snap that occurred when his head got forcefully twisted. Just like that, Luster breaks the changeling's neck like a twig before it collapsed onto the smooth, rocky floor in front of her. As a result, a small bundle of shotgun shells appeared before the pink unicorn as they flew towards her, reloading her shotgun instantly.
With most of the burning changelings and imps dead, Luster and her friends are able to free about 15 slaves from the mines. Once that is done, Bright volunteered to help escort the slaves out of the tunnels as he left the area along with them. However, by the time Luster freed the slaves that are at the dark bottom level of the cavernous area before letting them meet up with Bright Vermillion, she started to hear low growling coming from the huge, demonic pony skull itself. The moment the skull snorted, Luster could feel it flowing through the back of her mane as her blood started to turn cold. In the next second, Luster is getting a frightful chill crawling up her spine. Luster froze immediately, thinking that the demonic skull is about to get on top of her. Since she is a couple of feet behind the huge demonic skull, Luster could hear some very intense but silent, ghostly voices that made her sweat in terror.
Not wanting to look back, Luster cautiously walked away from the skull that she is hearing the scary voices from. However, it wasn't long before Vecra and Rushauk appeared as they both smashed their horns together, creating a huge gaping hole that appeared in front of Luster.
"Hey there Luster, what's uuuuuuuuuu-AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! GIANT MONSTER!!!" Vecra said, waving at Luster only to see the giant, demonic pony skull behind her, much to the yak's fright.
"Vecra, not so loud!!! We are in........" Luster said, trying to shush the freaked out yak.
Unfortunately, it was too late as the demonic skull started to shower itself with a huge-flaming aura that came from within its eye sockets, covering its entire face into huge hellish flames that illuminated the entire tunnel. Before they knew it, the flames disappear all from the demonic pony skull only for Luster to turn around to see an even more horrifying appearance. It is now seen as a huge, demonic pony face with eyes are bright-red as the volcano and with huge teeth as sharp as tall, wooden stakes. The huge demon now glared at Luster, Vecra, and Rushauk with terrifying malice in its eyes. He wasn't happy to see them inside this dark cavernous complex.
When the huge demon's eyes narrow with horrendous fury, it let loose one thunderous roar. At the effects of the demon's roar, the entire tunnel is rumbling violently as rocks are coming down from above the cavernous ceiling. At the same time, Luster, Bright, and Spring started to gasp as they fell backwards during the vibration in sheer terror.
For the rest of the village outside, it started to cause quite an earthquake as the burning changelings nearly lose their footing, forcing them to take flight above the ground. The slaves are all blindly running scared as they immediately fled out of the tunnel and running out of the village impulsively. For Rubeth and Flurry, they exclaimed in horror as they could hear the loud roaring from a mile away.
While still on top of the tunnel entrance, Flurry could feel the vibration on top of her body as she struggled to maintain her balance while aiming her gauss rifle at any enemy interlopers. So far, the white alicorn only sees the slaves exiting out of the tunnel. However, Flurry has yet to confirm the situation that Luster Dawn and her friends are in back inside the tunnels.
For Rubeth, he did his best to watch over the slaves as he sees them approach towards his position in the burning forest while holding up his super shotgun in both of his claws.
In fact, even Queen Chrysalis could hear it too. However, ever since her minions discovered the huge demonic pony skull deep inside the tunnels years ago, during the time the dark lord brought her soul into the demon realm to regain her powers, it gave Chrysalis a wild idea much to her crazed excitement. She already came up with a plan to have the captured Kirin be brought into the tunnels not just a slave but also as living bait to lure in the rest of Luster's group where they will run into that pony demon trapped underground in the tunnels.
"I think that will be our cue to leave!!" Chrysalis smirked as she carried out her order to her fellow changelings.
"What about our slaves? They're all escaping!!" One of the Burning Changelings spoke.
With her eyes narrowed, she makes a cool reply without causing any further scenes.
"We're always going to get slaves from elsewhere. Besides, with Luster inside, we might as well seal this tunnel off. She'll never get out of that place alive." The changeling queen cackled.
"It will be done my lady!!!" The burning changelings exclaimed in unison.
In response to Chrysalis' orders, a group of 6 burning changelings and 8 imps ran past her and headed towards the tunnels that Flurry is guarding. Upon seeing them close in, Flurry opens fire with her gauss rifle, blasting some of the changelings and imps as they disappeared into a bloody mess of green and red goo. In Chrysalis' surprise, she sees that her most of minions and her demonic allies are all turning into a nasty mess of limbs all over the tunnel's entrance after getting shot at by Flurry's gun.
"WHY YOU LITTLE.......!!!" Chrysalis snarled as her horn lit up in a bright-red color. As soon as her horn charged up, it starts to fire a massive yellow-red beam at the white alicorn above her.
"UH OH!!" Flurry gasped as she withdrew her gauss rifle before her horn lit up with magic. Just as Chrysalis' beam is about to hit the white alicorn, she let loose a huge, yellow shield barrier that warded off the Changeling Queen's attack.
"Luster!! You've got trouble from above!!!" Flurry shouted as she spoke through her communicator on her helmet. "The burning changelings are trying to seal you and your friends in this tunnel!!"
"YOU TAKE CARE OF THEM, FLURRY!!" Luster's voice shouted back in a frantic tone. "I'm having trouble down below here already!!!"
Upon hearing Luster's panicked tone, Flurry didn't understand what is going on down in the tunnels. As much as Flurry wanted to teleport herself right where Luster's location is at, she is too preoccupied right now for the alicorn is coming face-to-face with Queen Chrysalis of the burning changelings.
Before long, Flurry jumped off from the top of the tunnel entrance before she lowered herself into an aggressive stance before facing the demons and the burning changelings alone.
"Hello Flurry Heart. Remember me?!" Chrysalis sneered maliciously. "I had you held prisoner in my kingdom above the surface many moons ago along with your mother and father!!"
"Wait, what??" Flurry gasped in confusion.
At first, Flurry didn't recognized the big female changeling as it approached her slyly. However, Flurry's eyes widened with shock before she recounted the images of her past back at the Crystal Empire.
"No way!! You're actually here too, in this twisted realm??!!" Flurry shrieked in horror.
"You heard me, my dear!!" Chrysalis added in, cackling like a maniac. "If you want to see your auntie again, you might as well face me first!!!"
Back inside the tunnels, Luster, Vecra, Spring, Bright, and Rushauk got up on their hooves immediately after the roars and vibrations stopped. Not a moment too soon, two two ponies all making a run for it as they are trying to head up back to the surface after seeing the huge demonic-like pony face at the bottom of the level. However, it is a long way up to the entrance in which is going to be a challenge for every pony and creature.
When the demon started bellowing in anger, several rocks came down from the tunnel's ceiling, destroying most of the tall scaffolds as the huge boulders came crashing down on top of them. Luster and Spring both used their magic shield barriers to keep the falling rock from crushing their friends and the elder yak. However, the falling rocks is the least of their worriers as a massive, swirling red-orange portal appeared above the huge demon pony face.
In Luster's aggravated fright, it unleashed lost pony souls, possessed royal Guards, imps, and cacodemons that immediately came after them from behind. On the run, the possessed guards and imps are hurling all sorts of fire-based attacks at Luster, Spring, Vecra, and Rushauk. However, Vecra was able to blast several of them with her mounted chain gun as the barrage of endless bullets turned them into bloodied corpses filled with holes the size of beehives.
"Keep going every creature. We have to get out of this tunnel!!" Luster shouted as she blasted another imp with her shotgun, the moment it came down from the ceiling above her.
As the shotgun blast ripped the imp apart in two, three possessed earth pony guards appeared from a hellish portal on Luster's right. Once they stepped out and snarled at Luster's group, they raised their spears at them and charged head-on.
However, Spring Light was able to advance forward past Luster and fired her plasma gun at the possessed guards. With the stream of superheated plasma cells showering the guards in their faces, their heads exploded into a bloody mush of splattered brains and shattered bone pieces as they fell all over the spiral floors.
Once the possessed guards are down and out, Luster and Spring pressed on while Rushauk made several stomps with his hind hooves, making the imps and possessed guards that are chasing them from behind lose their balance. As a result, the two groups of footsoldier enemies started to tumble backwards while several of them fell off the edge of the spiralling walkway.
However, more Cacodemons appeared hovering as they spewed out huge fireballs at the Luster's group from their left. In response, Luster cast a long-wide shield barrier to block their fireballs from hitting her or her friends as well as from hitting the elderly yak while continuing to run up the tunnel walkway.
"We're almost there!!" Rushauk grunted as he leaped forward, pouncing on top of a nearby possessed guard earth pony and crushing it into a bloody pulp with both of his front hooves. After that, Rushauk then he comes face to face with a pegasus guard-revenant who just appeared from a red-pillar of electricity.
Just before the revenant opened fire with its small-mounted rockets, the eldery yak sneered in fury as he small a huge, fast leap towards the pony demon.
"OH NO YOU DON'T!!!" Rushauk roared as he pounded on the Guard-Revenant in its skull-like pony face, breaking it into a million bone shards before it feel face-flat on the marble walkway.
Rushauk still isn't satisfied with his kills just yet. When three more Pegasus Guard-Revenants appeared from the electrical red pillars, the elder yak immediately leaped up into the air as his huge shadow loomed on top of all three pony demons. Before they even had a chance to fire their rockets or take flight with their fiery wings, the Guard-Revenants are all met with a bone-crunching body slam caused by the huge, elderly yak. Once he was on top of them, Rushauk smashed all of their skulls into the rocky floors with several powerful stomps with his front hooves.
Upon seeing Rushauk's brutal attacks, Luster stood there startled by such an act of aggression. It may be just how the yaks used their method of "Yak Smash" as part of their tradition but here, Luster thought for sure that the demons in their nightmarish realm will blast Rushauk apart before he had the chance to act. But for some reason, the huge yak is more faster than he looked.
"HOLY TARTARUS, how the hell did you managed to take down those demons so fast?" Luster gasped, seeing that the elderly yak just smashed the guard-revenant with its strong hoof.
"I was a demon hunter sent into this realm a few years back. I'll explain later, though. They're still after us!!!" The elderly yak said briefly before proceeding further to the tunnel's entrance.
Hearing what Rushauk said, Luster, Spring, and Vecra did their best to keep up with the elder yak while shooting their weapons at the demons and possessed ponies chasing them from behind.
Back at the Burning Forest, most of the escaped slaves are seen hiding in the woods along with Rubeth and Bright, who are readying their weapons in case any creature or demon is about to close in on them. Rubeth couldn't help but feel concerned over what was all that bellowing and vibration coming from below the surface of the Demon Realm.
For Bright, he did a visual scan with his helmet all around the burning forest. Thankfully, there isn't any other creature lurking out in the woods for now. However, Rubeth and Bright still have to be on their guard since the demon realm is no place for an innocent creature that is being forced into enslavement.
While Luster's group is struggling to get out of the tunnels, Flurry continues to block more of Chrysalis' magic. Unlike for her previous fights back in Equestria, Chrysalis' magic was shooting out torrents of inferno-like spells that is inches away from burning Flurry Heart alive.
With her yellow shield warding off the inferno spells coming from Chrysalis' horn, Flurry could feel the sweat coming down on from her mane as she is feeling the heat rupturing her defensive spells. In a few seconds of struggling against Chrysalis' inferno spells, Flurry screamed in rage as she repelled it with a yellow ray of widespread light that blinded the Changeling Queen.
"GAH!!!" Chrysalis exclaimed as she held her right hoof to shield her eyes from Flurry's screen of magic.
Before she was able to regain her sights, Chrysalis was blasted with a powerful rail slug coming from Flurry's gauss cannon which sent her spiraling into a nearby slave hovel. Upon impact, Chrysalis disappeared in a big smash as the hovel structure collapsed into a pile of building rubble. At first, the burning changelings felt horrified to see their queen get pummeled again. However, Chrysalis was able to punch her way out of the fallen rubble before she took flight 10 feet above the ground before she glared at Flurry in frustrated anger.
"IS THAT THE BEST YOU'VE GOT??" Chrysalis roared in fury before she dive bombed Furry like a missile aiming towards its target.
The Changeling Queen wraps herself into a huge, flaming arrowhead-like silhouette before descending straight into Flurry's position, aiming at the alicorn with the tip of her crooked horn.
Again, Flurry raised her yellow shield barrier up high in hopes of halting Chrysalis' dive bombing attack.
*SLAM!!!*
*BOOM!!!*
Upon impact, Flurry grunted as she struggled to push back against Chrysalis' powered charge. With the yellow barrier and the huge, flaming encase Changeling collided against each other, Flurry could feel herself getting pushed backwards slowly as she is getting a big headache while gritting her teeth in fighting against the Changeling Queen.
"RRRRRRAAAAARRRRRRGH!!!" Flurry screamed as she lifted both of her front hooves upon before letting loose a nova-like tremor that shoved Chrysalis back.
The moment Chrysalis fell backwards again, she is met with several more rail slugs coming from Flurry's railgun, forcing her to dodge every shot while up in the air, flapping her red-fiery wings vigorously. Even when seeing the Changeling flying in up in the red-orange sky, Flurry didn't give up in shooting at Chrysalis. Since she has yet to find a way to heal her wings, Flurry did not bother taking flight. Instead, Flurry did her best to hold her ground in front of the tunnel entrance, refusing to move aside.
As Luster and the group sees the light coming from the exit of the tunnel, a swarm of 20 lost pony souls got in the way only to be met with a heavy stream of shotgun blasts, chaingun fire. Just when most of them zeroed into the group in faster speed, the kirin stepped in and fired widespread heat blast coming from Spring's plasma gun's attachment mod.
With one squeeze of the plasma gun's trigger, Spring fired a wide burst of super heated waves of plasma energy that reached out a short distance of 5 feet. Ultimately, the burst took out about 13 lost souls as they all disintegrated into small explosions, in the size of baseballs.
Once all of the Lost Souls have disappeared after getting shot at, the huge demonic pony face came out from the shadows behind Luster's group and furiously roared at them. This time, it hoisted himself upwards using both of his massive hooves to move up the spiraling walkways inside the dark underground tunnels. Every time the huge demon reaches out one hoof towards the group, it lets out a huge stomp that is shaking the entire tunnel instantly.
"You've got to be kidding!!!" Spring shrieked as she sees the huge pony demon climbing closer from the dark abyss.
"RUN!!!" Luster shouted at the top of her lungs, ordering the entire group to head outside at once.
Seeing this, the group immediately disengage the demons and possessed guards in front of them as Luster cast a huge shield barrier around herself, Spring, and the two yaks, bashing their way past their enemies. For the huge demon, it continued to pursue them as he reached out his massive hooves towards Luster and her friends.
When Luster's group are able to get past the enemies standing in their way, they met their demise when the huge pony demon opens up its huge jaws. With the tunnel shaking violently due to the pony demon's massive hoof stomping, the possessed guard ponies came rolling downhill, along with the imps and guard-revenants. Before they knew it, the massive demon swallowed most of the demons and possessed guards that it just summoned with one massive chomp, leaving behind a huge stream of blood spilling all over the spiraling walkways.
Of course, Luster and her friends didn't bother looking back for they can't really picture how gruesome it is when getting eaten alive by a giant demon hibernating below the underground tunnel networks. While on the run, most of Luster's group didn't bother firing another shot when being chased by the huge horned pony demon since it will just slow them down before they get eaten alive.
After evading several more shots from Flurry's railgun, Chrysalis attempts to do another dive bomb attack upon the white alicorn when all of a sudden Flurry could hear the frightening voices of Luster's group coming out from behind her. Just when Chrysalis is getting closer, Luster shouts out at Flurry.
"FLURRY GET OUT OF THE WAY QUICK!!!"
The moment Luster, Spring, Vecra, and Rushauk finally came out of the tunnel's entrance, they ran to the left as Flurry teleported herself away from Chrysalis' charging range.
As soon as Flurry disappeared in a yellow flash of magic, the huge, horned pony demon's face appeared out of the tunnel's entrance with its massive jaws opening very wide. Upon seeing the huge horror appear before her, Chrysalis' eyes widened with shock as she is about to accidentally fly straight into the massive jaws of the giant, demonic pony face.
"WHAT THE?! YAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!" Chrysalis screamed in horror as she tried frantically to flap her wings in reverse, attempting to stop herself from blindly charge forward from the air.
*CHOMP!!!*
By the time Chrysalis turned around to fly away from the huge hungry pony demon, it was too late as the huge demon jaws clamped shut right on top of the Changeling Queen, trapping Chrysalis in its mouth.
"YOUR MAJESTY!!!!" The burning Changelings screamed, seeing that Chrysalis has disappeared into the huge jaws of the demon.
In sheer terror, they see the huge demon belch with satisfaction, still clamping its jaws shut. The demon then pulls withdraws its head back into the darkness of the tunnel networks disappearing from sight. Not standing around, the burning changelings frantically flew back into the tunnels in hopes of rescuing their Changeling Queen before she gets inadvertently digested by the pony demon.
As for Luster and her friends, they all took a breather while seeing the burning changelings all disappear back into the tunnels.
"That should buy us enough time to help the rest of the slaves escape this twisted realm." Luster pointed out. "Let's get out of here before they come after us!!!"
Seeing the changelings distracted, Luster's group and Flurry made their way out of the Village of Slaves to meet up with Bright and Rubeth.
Back in the Burning Forest, Rubeth and Bright led the slaves to a nearby small stone altar where they see a blue portal in the middle of the half-buried platform. At first, they felt hesitant of going through the portal because there is still a chance that it will take them somewhere deep within the demon realm. However, one of the slaves is practically staving due to the fact that they haven't eaten for several days when being put into slavery by the Burning Changelings. Thankfully, Bright still has some Crimson Zap Apples inside a small bag tucked within his backpack.
As soon as he dumped the apples in front of the slaves, they started grabbing as much as they could gouging themselves out of desperation. Bright couldn't blame them for only Twilight knew how long have they been trapped in this world for. For Rubeth, he few up above the trees now that his wings are finally healed from all of that burn injuries. Once he was on top of one tree, he could see from a clearing behind them that Luster's group is finally approaching them.
In just 30 minutes later, Luster and the rest of her friends are finally able to make it back to Rubeth and Bright. Though, they still have to think about how are they going to get the escaped slaves out of the Burning Forest. When Flurry notices the portal, she fired a beam of her magic at it in hopes of knowing where the portal will accurately lead to. In a startled surprise, the portal is another shortcut that leads back to the main gates of the Demon Realm, back to Canterlot's palace.
However, since Luster and her group still have a long ways to go to rescue Queen Twilight, Rushauk volunteered to lead the escaped slaves to safety.
"Are you sure you want to do this, Rushauk?" Luster asked, showing concern for the elder yak.
"What choice do I have?! I'm done demon hunting." Rushauk said, feeling breathless after all that running, leaping, and smashing. "I maybe old but I still refuse to hold back when facing foul creatures like that."
"If that's true, what were you trying to hunt here?" Vecra asked in curiousity.
"Well, there was a tall monster walking on two huge legs. It was armed with a giant cannon that fires multiple rockets that lies somewhere in the far northern fringes of the Demon Realm. They said that they guard the battlements of the Hell Keep for it is where the Dark Lord currently lives at. I used to be accompanied by a team of demon hunters as well, mostly yaks. We were sent by the Royal Family of Yakyakistan to hunt down those monsters and destroy the Keep. We managed to reach Hell's Keep and took down several of them, but we were immediately overwhelmed by the endless waves of the lesser monsters dwelling there. As a result, we were not able to accomplish our mission in destroying that demon fort. When we tried to escape from Hell's Keep, most of my team was eliminated and I was the only survivor left, being forced to hide underground for 10 years until now." Rushauk explained briefly.
"That was terrible!!" Spring said, trembling in fear.
"Hell's Keep is nightmarish stronghold that you all might as well stay away from in the Demon Realm. The Northern Fringes surrounding that fort is very dangerous."
"Dangerous or not, we still have our mission to rescue Queen Twilight from the Dark Lord." Luster Dawn said, feeling confident and determined once again. "They may be tough and relentless but since she's my mentor, I'll do anything to help the queen!! Anything."
"Well, if you happened to stumble into the Hell's Keep, you might as well take this!!" Rushauk added in as he handed down a small, orange pony skull. "This happens to be a skull key used to unlock the gates that lead to Hell's Keep!! Keep this with you since my mission in destroying the hell keep is now yours. So, if you think you can do this then try not to make the same mistakes that I did, okay?!"
"I know I won't Rushauk!!" Luster said as she took the skull with her magic before putting it inside her backpack. "Take care of the slaves!!"
"Thanks Luster!!" Rushauk acknowledged as he leads the slaves to the blue portal. "See you back to the surface!!"
Rushauk was the first to go through the portal. Once the eldery yak disappeared, the other slaves followed him from behind in a single-file line. As soon as the slaves all disappeared, Luster, her friends, and Flurry Heart continue on their journey to the Northern Fringes of the Demon Realm.
Author's Note
I apologize for the long chapter. I thought for sure that since I barely got any reviews or likes from this story, I would have it cancelled or on hiatus. Nevertheless, I should at least try to finish up on what I had started years ago, on the day I posted Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead.
I already had other important stuff to take care of anyway, such as finding a job worthy of my career goals in accounting and helping my parents maintain the house.
Anyway, thanks for reading MLP and Doom Fans. I'll be back to posting more on this story periodically.
Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
The City of Flames part 1
Back at the underground mines, a swarm of burning Changelings and possessed unicorn guards are able to hold the huge demon down by its massive hooves with several huge chains that they have summoned as the links came out of the ground. As they are restraining the pony demon by its massive head, three more burning changelings are pressurizing themselves with their magic in hopes of opening the demon's mouth by force.
Bellowing in agony, the demon refused to let the changelings open up its jaws as he continued to clench his teeth. Not giving up, more changelings volunteered to help their comrades pry the demon's jaws open. At the same time, about five more changelings attempted to use their telepathy to search for the Changeling Queen who is still trapped inside the demon's huge maw.
Just when their noses are bleeding out due to their overexertion, one of them was able to detect Chrysalis' signature coming from inside the huge pony demon. Eventually, 10 possessed unicorn guards are able to summon a few more chain links from above the cavernous ceiling to wrap the demon by underneath its upper jaws while holding its lower jaws in place on the ground floor. In anger, the huge demon roared in agony while thrashing itself in turning its head left and right to shake off the chains restraining him.
Despite the beast's struggling, the possessed guards are able to raise the chains upward as they successfully forced the demon to open its jaws wide. The next thing they knew, Chrysalis appeared from the huge teeth on the demon's lower jaw. She barely lifted herself up with the aid of her wings before Chrysalis flew out of the Demon's maw and collapsed onto the ground floor out of exhaustion.
Once they released the demon from holding its mouth in place, the huge monster clamped its jaws shut once more as it made a small shockwave that knocked out the Changeling Queen forward a few feet in front of the Burning Changelings and Possessed guards.
*GACK!!!*
*COUGH!! COUGH!!!*
As Chrysalis coughed out her lungs, clearing out her airways, she is now seen covered up in red slime all over her body. Annoyed by such a disgusted appearance, Chrysalis wiped off the slime before turning her attention to the Burning Changelings.
"Are you okay, your majesty?!" One of the Changelings asked only to get burned alive by the magic of an infuriated Chrysalis, whom finds it as a stupid question.
In the next second, Chrysalis faced the other Changelings who gasped in horror by the recent queen's frustration.
"What are you all looking at? Where's Luster and her friends??" Chrysalis sneered in anger.
"They all got away your majesty, along with the slaves!!" Once of the Changelings spoke out, much to Chrysalis' frustration.
"DON'T JUST STAND THERE, YOU FOOLS!!" Chrysalis snapped at the Changelings and Possessed guard ponies. "FIND THEM!! AND DESTROY THEM!!!"
Startled by such a personal uproar, the Burning Changelings and the Possessed Guard Ponies immediately bailed out of the tunnels before they continue their pursuit of Luster's group. As for Chrysalis, she turned around to face the demonic pony face in fury. Just when the demonic pony grinned with amusement, Chrysalis' eyes narrowed in anger and embarrassment before her horn lit up in a bright-orange hue.
"Remember your place, Icon of Sin!!" Chrysalis hissed as she raised an burning, orange skull up high with her magic. "I am your master now!! And if you try to eat me again, I'll blast you from your entrails even if its the last thing I do. UNDERSTAND??!!!!!"
Hearing this, the Icon of Sin grunted in agreement since he mistook Chrysalis as fodder when he tried to swallow up Luster and her friends inside the tunnels. With the burning skull in her hooves, the demon was able to read Chrysalis' mind through that demonic artifact. The skull lit up in a red-fiery glow, hitting the Icon the head as he started to feel its power entering his mind; it was an artifact that Chrysalis used to tame the Icon of Sin dwelling inside the Demon Realm.
"If I ever see that Flurry Heart again, I'll strip her clean of her wings while burning her alive!!!" Chrysalis hissed, feeling totally embarrassed that the white alicorn dodged her attack, letting the massive demonic pony head swallow her by accident.
As Luster's group continued to walk through the burning forest once again, Rubeth is flying above the trees as he is trying desperately to keep on eye out for any flying demons from a distance away. For Luster, she was able to do a wide visual scan with her helmet while holding her shotgun with her right hoof.
So far, she has not seen another demon, possessed guard pony, or burning changeling on sight. However, with Luster carrying two demonic artifacts inside her backpack, she still isn't out of the woods yet. Also, the rest of her friends are trying to be alert for any activity coming from within the burning forest. It felt disturbing to think that the group has been walking through the forest for like almost an hour and a half when all of a sudden, they see tall, ruined buildings from a distance away.
At first, they could see the ruined buildings another cliff out from a distance outside of the forest. In a grim sight, the buildings are seen to be surrounding by red-glowing chasms of spouting flames coming out from the cracked pavement. That isn't the worst part, for Luster's observation. When she tried to zoom in her scanners while still wearing her helmet, Luster sees a group of big huge brain-like demons are walking on four mechanical spider legs. Their exposed brains are being stuck on top of a metal platform where its spider legs are attached to.
Her eyes narrowed in a stern manner as Luster also sees them armed with two small machine-gun cannons attached to the front their small, metal walking platforms. Before long, Luster activates its scanner to analyze data of her new enemy seen in the outskirts of the ruined city.
Arachnotron: Half Arachnid, half robot. They happened to be the offspring and underlings of the Cyber Spiderdemon. Armed with dual machine guns and a mounted plasma turret on the rear of its body.
"Talk about fighting against a mechanical spider." Luster muttered in surprise underneath her breath.
Seeing that the Arachnotron is a distance away, Luster and her friends take their chance to navigate through the maze of wrecked, burning structures. However, the moment they reached the main road several more possessed guards and pegasus-guard revenants appeared as they started firing their weapons and fiery spells at Luster's Group. In retaliation, Luster and her friends are able to eliminate them all with their combined firepower and teamwork only to see a dozen Arachnotrons leaped out of the flaming entrance and the windows above from a ruined building on their left as they opened fire with their plasma turrets, screeching with fury in their eyes.
"Crap!! They see us!!" Luster shouted as she raised her magic shield in blocking the Arachnotrons' firepower. "Every creature, scatter!!!"
As Luster's group made a break for it, Luster, Rubeth, and Vecra ran to the right while Flurry, Bright, and Spring Light ran to the left, dodging the Arachnotron's firepower.
In retaliation, Vecra rammed into the side of one mechanical spider from its left, sending it flying as it made a horrified screech before it toppled over its buddies, making them crash into each other. See them unable to get up, thanks to their faulty mechanical legs, Vecra used this as a opportunity to fire her Rocket Launcher with a salvo of three missiles slamming into them. Once blasted, one Arachnotron disappeared into an explosion of flesh and metal that showered into its buddies, making the rest utter a mechanical roar as they turned their attention towards the yak.
In such bad luck, however, Vecra leaped over one encroaching Arachnotron and pounced on it by its exposed brain. Not only did her hooves pierced its squishy flesh, she shoved a grenade into the gaping hole she made with her right hoof. The moment she jumped backwards off the screeching Aranchnotron, Vecra landed on all four hooves before she sees the robot spider explode into a shower of blood and metal.
For the third, last Arachnotron, it made a frustrated screech as it tried to frantically open fire with all of its weapons. However, this gave the rest of the group enough time to shoot it down with the rest of their weapons as Vecra was distracting the blindly raging creature at the same time.
In an instant, the mechanical spider went down in flames as it exploded into a pillar of scrap metal and flesh before Vecra stopped to catch her breath.
"That was fun. Let's do it again!!!" The female yak cackled.
Groaning in embarrassment, Luster approached the excited yak in a look of dismay.
"I know you wanted to have fun, Vecra but this isn't a game!! We still have to find a way to rescue Queen Twilight even if we have to fight our way through city of flames!!!" Luster said in a reprimanded tone. "If it hadn't been for that old yak hunter, we would never see you again!!"
"Sorry, Luster!! I guess I got carried away." Vecra replied in embarrassment.
"Anyway, time to keep moving!! We still have just came into the city!!" Luster said as she and her friends continued further through the burning, urban area.
As they walked cautiously through the main road, Luster takes notice of several horse carriages toppled to the sides as they are set aflame, letting the black smoke billow up into the red sky before disappearing. Not a moment too soon, Rubeth and Vecra also see several burnt carcasses of various creatures lying on the city pavement. One of burnt carcasses was holding a little filly in its hooves, who is also burnt to a crisp.
Just when they like it's horrible to see such a husky sight, Luster and friends couldn't avert their attention away as they see several more similar, burnt corpses lying on the cracked, bloody pavements throughout the City of Flames.
"This is so horrible. There's no way my kind could cause that much devastation!!" Spring Light gasped in fright. "Who would do such a thing?!"
"Well, I did learn from Queen Twilight's lectures that there used to be ancient, underground cities that were built before Canterlot was founded. But in a dimension like this, I hardly doubt any pony or creature can live in place similar to Tartarus." Luster said, feeling nauseous after nearly stumbling into one of the burnt corpses.
Regardless, Luster still has to stay strong for her mentor and alicorn Queen throughout her journey in the City of Flames.
It almost seemed hopeless that there may not be any other innocent creatures to save in this horrible metropolis. In several big cracks on the city streets, Luster's group could see small pillars of flames spew out from the holes before they fall onto the pavement. Before long, more Pony Lost souls came out of the windows of a nearby burning wrecked apartment on their left before Vecra fired another barrage of bullets from her chaingun, making them all disappear in a small, explosive flames.
However, more possessed unicorn guards came out from that same abandoned structure as their horns lit up in flames. No time for any conclusion jumping, Luster's helmet starts aiming its targeting sights onto the group of possessed guards as the shoulder-mounted flamethrower is getting ready to fire its lethal jets of flames.
"Eager to fight fire with fire, eh?!" Luster hissed while glaring at her enemies.
Just as the possessed unicorns fired a volley of firebolts at Luster, Flurry came up next to Luster before her horn lit up, conjuring a yellow shield barrier, larger than the one that she once used when she was an infant back then. This time, the barrier shielded both Flurry and Luster as the firebolts exploded 6 feet away from them. After thanking Flurry for blocking off their attacks, Luster jumped forward outside of her barrier as her flamethrower shot out a strong jet of flames at the guards, making them all scream in pain as the fire eats their tainted flesh from the inside out.
"They may be possessed by the forces of Hell itself, but that doesn't mean the guards of the Dark Lord are immune to fire!!" Luster said in triumph as she sees the guards go down aflame.
Unfortunately, the mayhem is just getting started as a huge, demonic-like pony in brown colors appeared from the building while it swiped the dead, possessed guards away from his sights with its huge hands. It was seen standing 15 feet tall on two huge hooves as its muscular body mass is shown in full view. Its huge face is seen with the head of brown stallion except it has two curved horns from both sides of its temples and a long-pointed unicorn horn jutting out from the middle of its forehead. For his hands, they become engulfed with blue flames as the huge demonic pony gritted his huge, sharp teeth, getting ready to strike at Luster's group at will.
With one terrifying roar, the huge demon pony aimed both of its hands at Luster and Flurry as he let loose a huge beam of blue flames, forcing them both to jump away to different directions.
"SWEET CELESTIA!! That thing is massive!!" Vecra shrieked as she and the rest of Luster's friends circled around while trying to evade the destructive torrent of blue flames.
The next thing they knew is that, the huge, two-legged demon pony started to hurl one blue fireball at Luster, only for her to fire a beam of magic, making it disappear in a harmless shower of blue sparks before she firing her shotgun at it. However, the huge pony demon isn't done yet as he lunged at Luster in hopes of trying to either strangle her to death with its huge hands or eat her alive by biting her head off. Either way, Luster wasted no time as she teleported herself away from the pony monster as she reappeared in firing another shotgun blast at his face.
BOOM!!!
As Luster's Combat Shotgun showered buckshot shrapnel at the huge pony demon, he growled in fury as he is seen unfazed by the firepower of a short-ranged weapon. Freaking out, Luster's horn lit up as she raised her shield to block the demon from slamming its demonic fists onto the pink unicorn. With her pound, Luster grunted in confusion as she struggled to keep her shield barrier up above her head.
"Hang on, Luster!!" Vecra shouted as she aimed her rocket launcher at the demon attacking the pink unicorn.
With a triple shot, Vecra fired her rocket launcher at the huge demon pony as it slammed the explosion rockets into its chest. The demon then bellowed in pain as it staggered backwards a 5 feet away from Luster Dawn. Seeing this as her chance for a counter-attacked, Lusted disengaged her shield barrier as she leaped up high above the demon before slamming the butt of her shotgun into it skull, breaking off its front horn. With a heavy impact from her weapon, Luster pounced on top of the demon's chest as it collapsed onto its back, allowing her to get the upper hand.
Before the huge demon could get up, he was met with the barrel of Luster's shotgun shoving straight down into its maw before she pulled the trigger of her gun. With the loud blast ringing into Luster's ears, the pony demon's head exploded into a bloody spray of bones and flesh showering into her helmet and all over the front side of her armor.
The moment the demon lay lifeless below Luster, she collapsed backwards as the unicorn dropped her shotgun before trying to catch her breath. It couldn't get any worse as the demon they just saw was a smaller version of the Icon of Sin they recently ran into back at the Village of Slaves.
Nevertheless, the demon is a bit tougher than that of the possessed royal guards.
While Luster used her magic to wipe of the demon blood from her helmet and armor, Spring Light activated her scanners from her helmet to see what demon did Luster and Vecra just encountered.
In the next second, Spring's helmet shows a brief detail of the huge, horned pony demon.
Stallion Hellknight: As the first initiate of the Dark Lord's personal bodyguards, the Stallion HellKnight is a towering brute with sheer strength, endurance, and power. They are seen as one of best beast-like warriors of the hellish underworld, displaying utmost brutality and aggression than that of the lesser demons for the Stallion Hellknight directly serve the Nobles of Inferno; their higher-ranking counterparts.
"Whoever is tougher than the rest of these monsters, we still can't underestimate any of them." Luster announced after reading what was shown from the visual intel coming from Spring's helmet.
As they move on, Luster's party continued to walk down the road while seeing various cracks spew out minor jets of flame and lava. Even though, they felt startled fearing that they're going to get burns, Luster did her best to remind them all to keep themselves together as their journey to the other side of the Demon Realm is still a long ways, even beyond the City of Flames.
Before long, they reached a tall building that is somehow an abandoned library. Just like most of the other buildings around them, it happens to be a tall skyscraper with broken windows, with a few of them left ablaze up above several stories tall. At the grand entrance, Luster sees wide stairs leading upward towards the library. However, she still felt disturbed that there is like three pony demon-like statues that looked liked the very same one that Luster just blew apart with her shotgun earlier. However, because the statues aren't moving, Luster felt relieved for a moment as she continued up the stairs before seeing a wide clearing in front of the library's entrance. Nevertheless, when Luster checks her map interface from her helmet, she soon notices that another important key is somewhere inside the abandoned library.
Taking a deep breath, Luster turns towards her friends and Flurry heart as she makes her small announcement before proceeding into the library.
Author's Note
Author's Note: Sorry to keep you waiting Doom fans. I still have other important stuff to take care of in real life. Anyway, I can't say for sure when will the next chapter will come up after this one. Other than that, hope you all still enjoy reading this story.
Luster's Knee Deep in the Dead
Meanwhile, at the Hell's Keep, right where Queen Twilight was being held at, she watched the projections screen as her protege student, her friends, and Flurry Heart are able to make their way out of the Arena of Blood, much to the alicorn's relief. For the Dark Lord, the shadowy figure finds it rather unamusing since his minions aren't able to impress him enough by not killing any of them. No matter, he still has more tricks up his sleeve as he turned his back and headed towards the doorway behind Queen Twilight. When Twilight turned towards where the Dark Lord is headed, despite being restrained, she sees him speaking to another creature from the other side of the door. After they're done talking, another shadowy demonic-like creature appeared before Queen Twilight. As she looked closely at the new visitor, Twilight noticed that she looked very familiar. Before she could say anything, the creature revealed herself as a tall, dark-red changeling with insect-like wings, a red horn, holes in its legs, and a red sash wrapped around its body.
"Does she look familiar to you, Twilight?!" The Dark Lord smirked.
"No way!! CHRYSALIS???" Twilight gasped in horror, realizing that it is one of her old foes from the past, except that her nemesis has gone under a complete transformation.
"It's been a while hasn't it, Queen Twilight!!" The Demonic Changeling cackled, followed by a demonic hiss.
"That can't be!! Celestia already turned you into stone!!!" Twilight exclaimed.
"I told you we will always return!!!" Chrysalis grinned maliciously. "We're really grateful that the Dark Lord is able to collect our souls while still trapped behind stone. If he hadn't, we'll never make it up to the end of the bargain."
"What are you going to do then?? You already lost more than once. I wish you just give it up already!!" Twilight snarled, only to get whipped in the back by one of the demons, forcing her to stay silent.
"He already told me that your student and her friends came into the Demon Realm to find you. So, he wanted me to send in a little greeting before I face her." Chrysalis cackled. "I can't wait to have some fun with her!!!"
As she continued to laugh in an evil tone, Chrysalis disappeared into the red portal behind her before it disappeared along with her.
Before long, Twilight got teleported back into the cage that held her up earlier as she heard both sinister cackling coming from the demonic changeling and the dark lord at the same time. Twilight just couldn't help but feel even more angrier that she is being stuck here against her own will, completely restrained from using her magic to escape. Also, Twilight felt even more terrified that it is only a matter of time before Luster will come face to face will Twilight's old nemesis.
On the other side of the Demon Realm, a blue portal emerged from somewhere within the middle of the forest. The moment it opened up, Luster came falling face first onto the ground, along with Vecra, Rubeth, Bright, and Flurry all landing on top of the unicorn.
"UGH. Would you all please get off me?!" Luster grunted as she felt the sheer weight pressing her down on the dirt.
"Where are we?!" Flurry Heart asked, after every pony and creature got of Luster Dawn.
"I think we're in some kind of forest." Rubeth said, observing the group's surroundings.
As they looked far and wide all over the forest, they see red Maple trees mostly caught on fire. However, Luster noticed that none of the leaves on the trees are burning even when set aflame, which happens to be a bizarre sight. It's as if the trees are immune to fire beyond all possible reasons. Other than just the trees, they could see red smoke spewing from the holes in the trees. All around the group, small orange particles were floating above their heads harmlessly. In a huge surrounding, the whole forest is completely illuminated with bright red and orange, which is not a normal sight for any pony. Well, since they're in a demon world, all laws of the environment are deemed unnatural and full of terrifying wonders.
Most of Luster's group could feel intense heat coming from inside their armored suits, making them sweat from inside their helmets. Thankfully, they have an in-built A/C vent from within their visors. Up ahead, they see a road leading towards the north, assuming that it may lead to another place where Queen Twilight is held up at. Before any creature or pony could advance, however, Flurry Heart became the first to notice that one of Luster's friends is missing.
"Did anyone see Spring Light, the kirin?" Flurry asked.
"Uh oh!!" Luster gasped. "I think she got left behind back there."
"What do we do?" Vecra panicked. "We can't leave Spring behind!! We all have to stick together."
"I'm right here!!!" Spring shouted out loud as the kirin popped out from one of the burning trees behind Luster.
The moment the kirin came out, Luster got a little spooked when she turned around to see Spring making a cute, wide grin.
"Sweet Celestia, Spring!!" Luster gasped in fright. "I thought you got left behind. Other than that, you almost fried us back there. DON'T DO THAT!!!"
"Sorry guys!!" Spring apologized sheepishly. "I was just trying to buy you all time to escape that wretched arena."
"Well, at least try to keep up with us more often." Rubeth suggested the Green-maned kirin.
"Anyway, does any pony or creature know where we are?!" Spring Light asked.
"I think we're in the middle of some kind of strange burning forest." Flurry Heart commented.
"And I think I heard demonic voices echoing throughout this place." Luster added in as she heard ominous whispering into her ears.
As the demonic voices started to intensify, Luster and her friends drew out their weapons into thinking that more demons are being heard nearby. Before they knew it, they saw something frightening heading there way. At first, it was like a big ball of rolling flames moving straight towards Luster. However, after taking a good look at them, the unicorn realized that it's actually a huge ball of red changelings rolling down the forest trail.
"Changelings??" Everypony and creature exclaimed in unison.
"I thought for sure after Chrysalis' defeat that the Changelings stopped fighting against our ponykind!?" Bright thought.
"I think something was off when Chrysalis met her end. Scratch that, we can't stand around for answers; we have to run!!" Luster shouted as she aimed her shotgun at the Changeling cluster.
"Stay back, Luster!! Me Vecra got this!!" The female yak grunted underneath her armor.
In just one second, Vecra aimed and fired three rockets all at once from her mounted rocket launcher, making the rolling ball explode into a green gooey mess. From within the green blood, a swarm of red Changelings scattered out of the green goo and charged straight at Luster's group. In a clear line of sight, the red Changelings had orange glowing eyes and red insect wings set aflame, yet unharmed by its affects. It's as if, Luster and her friends are dealing with a whole new kind of Changeling Swarm unlike Thorax's clan or Chrysalis' clan.
The Red, burning Changelings made a loud, vile hissing noise as they used her magic to summon a barrage of fireballs aiming directly at Luster, Flurry Heart, and the rest of their friends.
"Oops!! I guess I made it worse!!" Vecra thought.
"GET BEHIND ME EVERY PONY!!!" Luster shouted as she raised a huge shield barrier with her magic. The moment Luster's friends went behind the unicorn, they hurdled together as the Luster's shield was being hammered by the exploding fireballs and the ground near it.
As soon as the red Changelings got closer, they rammed their horns onto Luster's shield in hopes of breaking it apart. But Luster managed to make her shield as wide as a huge dome, slamming most of the Changelings head first. Upon impact, the fire bugs got knocked out before slamming their backs onto the trees behind them.
"RUN FOR IT!!!" Flurry Heart shouted as she sees an opening from within the knocked out changelings.
While Flurry and Rubeth took flight, the rest of the group made a mad dash through the burning forest without looking back. During their run, the earth around them started shaking in total madness as the red changelings went back up and kept pursuing Luster's group across the forest.
Not wanting to get chased down, Flurry levitated her railgun and started shooting beams of lighting at the changelings, vaporizing them in an instant as they exploded into flames. At the same time, Rubeth and Luster blasted the changelings that got too close to them with their shotguns. Unfortunately, all three creatures ran out of ammo in less than 2 minutes, making them even more horrified that they're all going to get taken down by the changelings.
"This isn't good, they're getting closer to us!!" Luster shrieked as one changeling attempted to take a bite at her tail.
Thankfully, Flurry Heart and Spring Light stopped behind Luster's group as they both holstered their weapons and charged up their horns to the fullest. In about 20 feet away from the alicorn and kirin, the red changelings were met with a wide, powerful wave of bright magic, making them all vanish in an instant. Feeling triumph at first, Flurry Heart still hears screeching, buzzing noises coming from above the trees.
Unsure what is going on next, Flurry flew up above the burning forest only to see more Red Changelings flying straight at her and Luster's group, along with a swarm of chomping Lost Souls, hungry for flesh. Realizing that the horror in the forest is far from over, Flurry swooped down from her flight to warn Luster and her friends that more enemies are coming down from the red, burning sky.
"There's more coming, guys!! We have to keep moving!!!" Flurry shouted as she tried to protect the group while in mid-air.
"Sweet Faust!! They just can't give us a bucking break!!!" Bright panicked. "What do we do??"
"Let's find a safe place to hide in this forest, quickly!!" Luster suggested as she ran ahead of the group.
As they kept running, most of Luster's friends are losing their stamina due to the sheer weight of their armor and mounted weapons. This is could very bad if they stop to catch their breath since the Burning Changelings and the Lost Souls are hot on their trail. For Luster, she start to feel tired after running for more than a minute. Eventually, Luster was able to cast a massive slow spell on the Changelings, much to the relief of her friends and Flurry. However, in her previous try outs over that spell, it will only remain in effect for about 10 minutes. Luster and her group decided to hide inside the thick bushes which is adjacent to the road they're on. As soon as the spell wore off, the moment Luster's group went into their hiding place, the Changelings kept flying straight head unaware that Luster's group is no longer in their path.
From inside the huge, tall red bushes, Luster and her friends took a few deep breaths. While trying to recover from fighting through the temple all the way into the forest, one of Luster's friends felt a bit hungry after fighting for their lives.
"Man, I wish we were able to pack some food with us. This whole dimension is such a mad house I tell ya." Vecra grunted, hearing her stomach growling.
"Wait, what is that?!" Bright said, looking at the bush behind the female yak.
The moment the yak turned around, she spotted glowing apples hanging on the branches of the bush behind her.
"I look like some kind of apple!!" Vecra said, with her mouth drooling with relief. "Except that is is orange instead of red as usual."
The moment Vecra took the apple from the bush, she put it in her mouth and made several crunching sounds. Before they knew it, Vecra felt herself not just satisfied with her hunger but also felt totally energized as if she is getting high on crack. Too the surprise of her friends, Vecra is seen glowing orange all over her armored body from head to hoof, making her feel like she is totally all charged up.
"Wow, I never felt this pumped up before." Vecra said, totally shocked at what she did to herself.
The moment Luster activated her data analyzer from her helmet's visor, it scanned the rest of the apples on the bush behind Vecra. In the next minute or so, Luster gained new information from their new resources:
Crimson Zap Apples: Known to grant the user full adrenaline for the next 24 hours, as well as satisfying their hunger in the process. Very rare and very scarce. Can tolerate heat as high as 100 degrees Celsius.
"Since we just stumbled into a Zap Apple bush, we might as well take a dozen more with us and stuff them in our backpacks." Bright suggested to the group.
"Now that you mentioned it, we haven't eaten since we just went down here and made our way through two large locations." Spring Light added in.
"I guess its time we shall chow down first before moving on." Luster said as she took a few Zap Apples and chomped them down one by one.
While Luster was eating that Zap Apples, the rest of her friends took several bites out of the apples they picked from the bushes next to them. As soon as they're done, Luster and Rubeth filled their backpacks with 2 dozen Zap Apples, in case any of their friends are starving again.
As soon as they're ready, Luster's group went towards the forest trail up ahead, cautiously.
As Luster's friends and Flurry Heart all nodded, most of them lay low while navigating through the dense forest and the dense bushes all around them. Just like the trees, most of the bushes are all orange-red and every time Luster and her friends get too close to them, they could feel moderate heat coming from the inside of it.
After walking through the trail of the burning forest for three hours later, there was no sign of any demons, changelings, or possessed Royal Guards interfering their path. It was getting a bit too quite, despite the hot environment in the forest. Nevertheless, Luster and her ground still tried to be aware of any enemies lurking within the trees and bushes.
Before one of them knew it, Flurry Heart, who is walking alongside Luster and Spring Light, spotted some tall ruins up ahead. In such a sudden move, Flurry recklessly spread out her wings and took flight towards the ruins which are in the middle of a large, circular field surrounded by the trees. Across from the other side, the ruins are now seen spread out in a large, exterior square-like area. Right in front of Flurry, there were marble stairs leading down five huge stories full of cracked, concrete blocks, broken pillars, and dried-up dirt. Down at the 5th story, a small 12 by 12 floor is seen with a small stone platform in the middle.
As Flurry looked closer, the white alicorn sees some strange relic-like object floating a few feet above the stone platform. Before Flurry could fly in any closer to the stone platform, Luster spoke out to the white alicorn.
"Don't come up any reckless ideas, Flurry. We still don't know what is hiding underneath those ruins. It could be another horrendous trap or a demonic ambush."
"Come on, Luster. We're all heroes aren't we?!" Flurry said, feeling a bit prideful. "We still need to take risks to accomplish the bigger things. That's what Auntie Twilight told me when she faced off most of Equestria's enemies back in her day."
Feeling a bit anxious, Luster watched Flurry safely land a few feet away from the relic before taking a closer look at it. The relic looked with some sort of cross made out of bronze metal with a pony skull shown in the middle of all four sides. It was glowing in a bright, orange hue as red glowing eyes are coming out from the skull's eye sockets. Right in front of the relic, Flurry notices a small stone pedestal with marble tablet on top of it, written in an ancient inscription. Seeing what Flurry Heart just saw, Luster teleported right in-between the white alicorn and the pedestal.
"Hold up, Flurry. I think I need to translate this inscription myself." Luster suggested as she took a small handbook from her backpack with her telekinesis.
When the handbook lifted up and in front of Luster's face, she flipped the pages in order to find the words that she may use to compare with the inscription on the marble tablet. After spending a couple of minutes in trying to put that pieces of the words together, Luster finally came up with a possible conclusion.
For those who refuse to see the horrors leave this realm, the Skull Relic will be used to seal the gates of Hell from Equestria. However, it must be taken straight into Hell's Keep which lies in the Northern Fringes of the Demon Realm, close to the edge of the hugest mountain seen by all. Beware, those who claim the Skull Relic will be hunted down by the Realm's most toughest warriors in such unpredictable ways.
"It looks like we may have hope for all of Equestria, but at a much more larger risk!!" Luster told the group.
"Well, we still need to find Queen Twilight before we can use the Skull Relic to seal off this dimension first." Flurry suggested otherwise.
"Even if we could, we may not be able to find it again without getting killed along the way back." Bright said, controversial.
"Then, we're just going to have to take it with us!!" Luster announced. "It won't matter what they will throw at us. We will always find a way to beat them, whatever the cost."
"I hope you're right, Luster!!" Rubeth said, feeling agitated, followed by a low growl at the pink unicorn. "Because if we die down here, I'm going to kill you Luster Dawn!!!"
"Chill, Rubeth." Bright told the agitated Griffon. "The least we can do is stick together."
The moment the silence occurs, Luster puts away her handbook before turning her attention towards the Skull Relic. In one second, Luster uses her magic to take the Skull Relic from the pedestal and stuffed in her back. In the next minute after she jumped off the stone platform, flames started spewing out from all sides of the circular area of the ruins. Before they saw what was coming, three huge floating demons appeared from all four directions. As Luster and Flurry looked carefully at the new demons, they were seen with two huge horns coming from its head, with smaller horns on its brows and scalps, they each have one huge red eye staring fiercely at Luster and her group, and human-like mandibles seen from both sides of its jaws.
Before any pony or creature had a chance to aim their weapons at these new Demons, they started to roar as they spewed out familiar flame-like creatures from their mouths. Just like that, swarms of Lost Souls came appearing from the flying, horned demons, much to the surprise and horror of Flurry Heart. When Vecra activated her scanner from her helmet, she discovered more terrifying details about the hovering, horned demons.
Pain Elemental: Risen from the depths of the Demon Realm, these big hulking mandible freaks can spew out a swarm of Lost Souls, distracting its target as well as using them as a meat shield against its enemies.
"Oh hell no!!" Vecra shrieked in anger. "Me can't tell which monster is worse, a Lost Soul or the one who generates them!!"
"Hold nothing back, we'll keep shooting all of them until they drop dead!!!" Luster bellowed as she raised her shotgun at the Pain Elemental in front of her.
In a split second, Luster blasted one Pain Elemental in the eye with her shotgun as it burst into a white, liquidity substance before it screeched in pain and collapsed onto the marble stone. For the other Pain Elementals, they turned towards Luster and spit out several more Lost Souls in hopes of exploding in front of the pink unicorn. With barely enough time to react, Luster cast a shield spell on herself before the Lost Souls screamed and exploded on its barrier, making her unable to return fire. However, Flurry flew up into the air and drove straight into the second Pain Elemental, impaling the demon in the eye with her horn. Under such excruciating pain, the demon could feel the horn lodged into its eye as it came out of its back. At the same time, the Pain Elemental roared in pain so loudly that a nearby group of Changelings heard the noise from a distance away from the ruins.
Realizing that the demon is the only one remaining, apart from his slain brethren, the third Pain Elemental fled deep into the woods before trying to call out for the other demons hiding behind the burning trees. After Luster lowered her shields, she teleported herself away from the stone pedestal in back to where her friends are at.
"We still need to chase after that Pain Elemental before he recovers!!" Flurry Heart suggested.
"Actually, I think that will be the least of our worries!!!" Bright spoke in a horrified tone as he saw something else behind Luster and the others.
As the earth pony raised his hoof up and pointed behind Luster, she turned around to see another swarm of red Changelings appear above the forest with hostile looks on their faces.
"This is can't be good!!" Luster gasped the moment she turned toward where Bright is pointing.
"FOR OUR CHANGELING QUEEN!!!" One of the Burning Changelings shouted as he lit up his horn in a ominous red hue.
The rest of the Changelings did the same thing before they all charged straight at Luster's group and Flurry.
"Back into the forest, quickly!!!" Luster ordered as she fired her shotgun while on the run.
Consequently, by the time Luster's group went back into the forest, the Changelings immediately swarmed all over the trees and flying all over their heads before lunging at her friends one by one. Although, they managed to kill several oncoming changelings with their magic and weapons, two more come in after one gets taken out. In such an endless onslaught, the forest is getting covered up by changeling blood every single second.
For Vecra, she was running and screaming as five Burning Changelings were all on top of her armor.
"ARGH!!! G-G-GET OFF ME!!!!" Vecra shouted as she repeatedly kicked backwards and forwards blindly, unable to shrug the Changelings off her back.
Before she knew it, Vecra and the Changelings all fell down into a big dark hole and disappeared from plain sight, unnoticed.
As for the other five, Flurry was flying low below the tree branches while she was continuously shooting down the changelings that are chasing her from behind. The next thing she knew, Flurry accidentally slammed her wings into a very thick branch making her yelp as she crashed straight into the dirt ground. Luckily, the alicorn had enough time to hide behind a bush filled with amber leaves before the changelings flew past her, not knowing where she ran off too. Even though the changelings flew off, Flurry still kept herself hidden while peeking out for any of Luster's friends.
"UGH!! I think I sprained my wings!!" Flurry grunted in silence, feeling pain coming from one of her wing spans. "Where's auntie Twilight and Fluttershy when you need them.
On the other side of the forest, Luster, Rubeth, and Spring are once again isolated from the rest of the group, unable to figure out where Flurry, Bright, and Vecra are at. In such a frustrated effort, Luster sees that Spring was being held down by a group of four Burning Changelings, making her drop her Plasma gun in the process. What's worse is that the shape-shifters are actually immune to the burning sensation of Spring's Nirik Form. Things aren't looking good for Luster's Kirin/Nirik friend.
"LUSTER, HELP ME!!!" Spring roared in fright as she is getting hauled away by the Burning Changelings.
"NOOOO!!!" Luster screamed as she tried to jump in to rescue Spring.
In a desperate effort, Luster grabbed Spring's Plasma gun with her magic and attempted to shoot down the Changelings that are taking the Nirik away. Unfortunately, one of the Changelings cast an orange shield barrier that absorbing most of the plasma shots, not taking any damage from the overheating weapon.
As soon as the Plasma gun ran out of ammo, Luster charged up her horn and charged straight at the Changeling group only to get knocked out cold by an exploding Lost Soul that came from the mouth of the remaining Pain Elemental. After seeing Luster go down, Rubeth fired the hooks from his super shotgun and pierced the Elemental in the eye as he feels himself getting pulled by its chains. In anger, Rubeth slashed at the screaming Pain Elemental in the face with his razor claws and ripped its tongue out before it collapsed into a mangled mess of a corpse.
The moment Rubeth dropped down onto his feet, he went over to an unconscious Luster Dawn to see if she is okay.
"Luster!! LUSTER!!!" Rubeth shrieked upon seeing his downed friend bleeding from the side of her head. The griffon didn't know what to do at the moment: go after Spring and rescue her or tend to Luster's wounds first. Before he could make his decision, Bright Vermillion appeared only to be seen with a huge crack on his helmet.
"Rubeth, what happened to Luster?? And where is Spring Light??" Bright said, seeing such horror in Rubeth's eyes.
"Those damn fire bugs took Spring!! And Luster got hit by an exploding Lost Soul. I need help getting Luster Dawn to safety!!" Rubeth said in a panic.
Without reply anymore, Bright kneed down with his hooves as he let Rubeth put an unconscious, injured Luster on top of the earth pony's back. Once that's done, the griffin and the earth pony made a mad dash through the woods in hopes of find a safe place to tend to Luster's injuries.
For Rubeth, he stuffed the Plasma gun, BFG, and the combat shotgun into his backpack before catching up to Bright Vermillion. He hated himself from the fact that Luster's group got separated again and this time Luster need help from him more than ever. Since Vecra and Flurry are nowhere to be found, Rubeth felt horrified that Luster's group is in total disarray thanks to those wretched Changelings.
Meanwhile above the forest, Queen Chrysalis appeared standing on top of a rocky cliff watching the whole scene from where she is at. Upon seeing that most of Luster's friends are injured or hiding, the Red Changeling Queen couldn't stop laughing uncontrollably.
"This is just as exactly as I planned!!!" Chrysalis cackled with delight. "Hey Twilight, if you're watching this, then you can say goodbye to your top student!!! There is no place for such foolish rulers like yourself, Princess Celestia, or King Orion!! Very soon, once Luster and all of her friends are eliminated here, I can finally have my vengeance at last!!!!"
As she continued with her evil laugh, Chrysalis' voiced started echoing throughout the burning forest from over miles away.
