Azula paused, looking at all the choices. She'd seen, and used a musket before, even a bow and arrow, it was faster than reloading mid battle. But these? These looked elegant, designed for one purpose only, to kill, and to kill quickly. This new shop sold firearms, ones designated as legal for her people to have at any rate, she doubted any of these would do damage to the warriors in their odd purple armor, let alone the ones in the black armor. An odd machine waved at her, a ball with three arms, and three eyes, a glowing blue light below it as it hovered in the air as a bird might, but without wings. "Welcome to Otto’s Auto Rifles and Blasters! I'm Josh, what can I help you with today?" The machines voice was male in nature, but it acted as if it was alive, for all Azula knew it WAS alive. She didn't want to think about living machines and pushed it to the back of her mind for now as she observed the shelf lined with weapons, behind a glowing case.

"I've recently been hired to act as a personal guard to a Doctor working nearby, I was told to give you this." She pulled an odd plastic card from her pocket that had dozens of intricate little lines on it, each one shining in the light as she handed it over.

The Mr.Handy, who's name was Josh for some reason, grabbed the card and inserted it into itself, and hummed for a few moments as the card ejected into a trashcan. "Authorization for Military Grade firepower accepted, weapon requested, Submachine Gun, automatic." The machine turned around and grabbed something from a display behind it, and slid it onto the counter along with several boxes of ammunition, and several other drums. "This is a Submachine gun, rapid rate of fire, medium range, mostly useful for close quarters combat." Azula picked up the weapon, she'd been trained how to use one of these using some sort of simulator, so she knew what to do. "The order card you gave me also contained a payment code for the weapon and its ammunition, everything's all paid for, have a nice day and come again!"

Azula didn't entirely understand, as she hadn't given the machine any coins, but shrugged and loaded the weapon, flicking the safety off as she stored the other drums and the boxes of ammunition in a pouch on her side, walking out of the store. She already knew the Doctor, as she'd taken to calling him, had a set of personally fitted 'Combat Armor' for her awaiting at the hospital she was to meet him at.

-------------------------------------------Elsewhere On Leva-----------------------------

The Noble stood before Frank Horrigan, a glare on her face despite the fact this male was several times her height, and could easily crush her with a meaty fist, let alone the weapons he was likely to carry on his person. "I'm Edraks, current Matriarch of the Hiv'its House. We traded uncivilized Manuka for hard labor, or to toil away in the mines. Currently our House is losing money by the day since you've stupidly outlawed slavery, I want to see if we can fix this issue." She slid a rather.....hefty bag of golden and silver coins across the desk towards Frank Horrigan. "I'd also like to see my third daughter, Khicoit's released from custody and returned home."

Frank Horrigan looked across his rather large solid tungsten desk which was magically reinforced as much as runes would allow it to be, and stared, the eyes in his helmet glowing solid red. Then to the bag of coins on his desk, then back to the noble, well FORMER noble, in the eyes of the Empire, she looked smug, almost assured he'd accept the bribe and do as she wanted. "No."

Edraks huffed and slid another two hefty bags of coins onto the desk. "Perhaps this will change your mind?"

Frank lifted up his arm, the power armored fist now enveloped by a gatling plasma, and promptly blasted the bags to molten slag and ash on his desk, before lowering it. He was amused by the look of sheer terror on Endraks face as the molten metal slid down both sides of the desk, spilling over like a deadly waterfall. "No. In fact, you are now under arrest for attempted bribery of an Empire Official." He stood to his full height, then she did something he genuinely didn't expect. She raised a flintlock pistol directly to his helmeted face and fired. The massive lead ball mushroomed on his helmet for a brief second before ricocheting off and slamming into the water cooler. Shattering the glass and spilling water everywhere on the floor.

Endraks stared in mute horror as Frank's helmet only showed a slight scratch in the paint, as his eyes began to glow brighter than before. "That'll be the last mistake you ever make, Mutie, Now you've pissed me off." Before she could reload or think to flee, he reached over the desk and grabbed her by the torso, hefting her off the ground. She began to scream, in the vain hope someone would hear and rush to her aid. But everyone in the vicinity knew who's office she was in, and they damn well knew, you don't fuck, with Frank Horrigan and live to tell the tale. Frank's other hand grabbed her throat, and squeezed. Endraks flailed in his grip and let out a choked agonized squeal before blue blood splashed everywhere as her throat was crushed like a tin can in the man's grip. He kept squeezing, and a stomach churning snap was heard as her spine cracked, her body falling away heaving Endrak's ruined throat and head in Frank's grip. "This will make a good decoration." Horrigan set off to get the head cleaned of flesh and blood, so he could display it on his desk.

He left the body where it lay, the cleaners would deal with it. After all, that's what they got paid for, wasn't it?

--------------------------------------------Equis, Absorbed Changeling Territories--------------

Queen Chrysalis overlooked some status reports put onto the table before her, then looked back up to Blackfang. "I find all of these requests for improvement to the Hive's internal structures acceptable, they'll be implemented within a week. I also find the massive spike in population growth to be a tad alarming, but that's to be expected of our species when food is plentiful and easily available as it is now."

Blackfang still found the anthro version of the Chrysalis he knew odd, she acted nothing like the one from his world, but, she was near second in command to only Emperor Lorenzo himself, so he would be dickering with her over matters the other hives had thought needed dickering. The other former Hive rulers didn't need to come to this meeting, only he did. "Alright, I'd also like to note we've expanded the Hive's underground structures another three miles deeper, we hit a rather large vein of gems, and are gathering them for transport to the Empire Proper, for industrial use."

Queen Chrysalis nodded. "Good, I read that in the report, most of these gems seem to be rare, so they'll be worth a lot on the Equestrian market once they've been marked, and sorted, we've also gone ahead and installed several tanks to store excess love nectar, so you have a place to properly store any extra your changelings produce, so none of it goes to waste."

"Good, I'll see to it they are filled as soon as possible, it never hurts to have a backup." He shuddered, thinking about when the Crystal Empire had vanished off the face of Equis with no warning, leaving them only the supply of love-gems that'd been delivered a mere week before, rationing had gotten strict, and even with Equestrian help, a lot of changelings had went hungry for far too long, he wasn't eager to see that happen again anytime soon. "If that's all, I'd like to get back to oversee the construction of new tunnels below, and ensure some dumb grub doesn't accidently collapse the air-ventilation shafts."

Chrysalis nodded. "That shall be all then, I'll be returning to the Empire's secondary capital, if you require anything of me just use the personal communication channel set up for you, it'll direct your call directly to me, even while not on Equis, thanks to those nifty little portalgates the Equestrians designed." She tapped a few times on the wrist mounted device she almost always wore, and with a flash of light and sound akin to thunder she was gone. Having used the Molecular Relay to teleport back to the secondary capital.

-------------------------------------Leva, Cultural Festival--------------------

Vodain wasn't exactly sure what her title was nowadays. She knew she still had some semblance of power over her former kingdom, and those of her rivals. But, not much compared to when she ruled her own Empire with her and her alone acting as the ruler. Even her palace was still hers, despite being modified with 'electric' lighting and other things, it was still hers, the staff all remained loyal to her, their training had done them well. But, Emperor Lorenzo couldn't be contested, she'd seen the kind of warfare the Crystal Empire waged first hand, she knew they stood zero chances in 'pan fried hell' as Lorenzo called it, of making any meaningful resistance. A few wanted to try, but she shut that down whenever she heard it, life was better now for themselves as a species than it ever was before, even if it sadly came with the removal of their autonomy, much to some Manuka's resentment.

In what was once the Imperial Palace courtyard a sort of festival was going on with music, and various foods, all of them native to the Crystal Empire. One stand was selling something called 'Chicken Pot Pie' which seemed to be popular at the moment if the line was any indication. It had been explained to her it was to get her people used to the Empire's style of life quicker than not, she'd also been mandated to get education from a personal teacher that looked like a ball with three metal eyestalks on it, creepy but it was polite enough when it spoke. Vodain listened as speakers on stage began to blare, an announcer tapping a microphone. "Up next, The Countess! Everyone give her a warm welcome!" Then the lights on the stage darkened and then a beat began to play through the speakers. "Time for the spectacle Time for the show The lights are bright And the colors glow, I'm not just anypony I think you know The time is now It's about to blow!" That's when the mare's voice took on an odd quality Vodain absolutely couldn't describe as natural sounding as the music continued.

--------------------Canterlot Royal Guard Training Grounds----------------

Princess Celestia stood in front of a group of forty or so soldiers dressed in Equestria's newest power armor, keeping to the theme she had before, they'd been painted a bright golden color. Their plasma rifles bearing a close resemblance to what Lorenzo said was a Zetan Energy Rifle. "I want all of you to look at the destruction our enemy has caused firsthoof, I have been to each city destroyed by those abominations of life." Her horn lit up and a set of holographic images blinked into existence. Fillydelphia, Baltimare, and Manehatten all shown in absolute ruin, not even ruins remained. It was all a black, glass like substance with bits of rock and melted concrete scattered about. For all intent and purposes it looked like an alien wasteland if not for the ponies seen in random images, all of which were royal guards.

Celestia observed the expressions on these guards, it varied from looks of horror to pity and disgust, to outright pure anger. "This is what the enemy we're facing can do, they did this with one shot. We offered them peace, friendship and harmony, and in retaliation they struck us like a wild animal. So, we shall treat them like they treated us, they were quite clear about rejecting our offer of friendship." Her horn lit as several energy cells floated to each royal guard. "These are your ammunition, those energy rifles your tools, we shall avenge those who where needlessly killed."

Another flash and semi transparent yellow Zetan images popped into existence, 3D and aiming weapons at them. Without much prompt the holo-aliens were blasted apart by automatic magical plasma bolts slamming into them. Celestia smiled watching each shot connect, training was going well, if the other groups where as good at hitting their targets as this one, she had no doubt the conflict wouldn't last too long. Not when she was going into the fight herself, she needed no plasma rifle, she had all the magic she needed to fight with.

--------------- Council of Five------------------

Soro looked at the display before him, looking at the others as well. "It has come to our attention that we wildly underestimated the level of technological progress that the inhabitants of System X-42 would have, expecting them to still be primitive and in ruin from the last catastrophic war they held, this was very obviously a mistake." The display switched to a loop of several starships firing large solid beams of plasma at the mothership. "The only weapon they had that could shatter our shields like they didn't even exist, was this." Images changed again to several starships with large beams of pure plasma coming from the end of the ships aimed at the motherships cameras.

A horrified gasp went around the room. Soro continued. "These new plasma beams seem to completely ignore shields, they bypassed them with one shot and struck at the ships superstructure itself in one blow, obviously not enough to take it out of course, but then something truly horrific happened, and the probe we launched prior to record this for the records also recorded this." The video changed to an Equine with wings and horn, aflame as if made of molten star magma, galloping through the space around the starship, before its horn began to glow a violent yellow and the starship was shown being crushed like cheap metal foil much to the audible terror of those present. Finally, after a dozen explosions the main reactors went off causing a violent shockwave that seemed to barely affect the equine, knocking the probe out of commission as it was blown up by debris.

The room went silent as everyone stared in muted terror at the video being displayed. One of the council members nearly voided themselves. Soro started again. "Combined with this and the attack we suffered here, it's very clear this enemy knows about where our homeworld is, and could at any time attack, due to this we The Council of Five shall be evacuating to a station within space that is very well hidden, this is to ensure if this world is lost, we are not and thus may continue giving orders and maintaining our civilization. As Head of the Council there will be no voting on this, it will be as I say."

No one argued, no one dared to do so. Soro seemed to be the only one on the Council at the moment to remain calm, or at least appear calm to them. In reality he was very, very worried about the future of their species. "We need to figure out what the weapon that tore our shields apart was, and try to replicate it, or at the very least, nullify it and ensure it's useless for the enemy."

------------------ Calculator, Former Holy Hegemony Solar System-----------------

Everything was going nicely here. The system had been purged of the Fedan species, and much to Calculators surprise, more than one slave species freed this time! There had been around four species enslaved on this specific planet, sure some Fedans still existed hiding in mineshaft's or basements, but the former slaves were taking care of them rapidly. It'd been two weeks since they'd been liberated. Much to his surprise, the slaves had all had military training of some sort or another, and had been rebelling the entire time the Holy Hegemony held the system, so giving them weapons to fight with wasn't much of an issue even if it was just outdated plasma rifles. They'd taken to them like a fish to water. The solar system itself held a K-Class orange dwarf star at the center, housing only 7 planets, three of which where barren, two gas giants, an ice world, and then the tropical oceanic world of which was inhabited. Calculator had had some issues regarding one of the species that looked, far too human for his liking. Almost like evolved humans, but so far had yet to encounter problems from the natives, and was rendering medical aid via android units.

-----------------------------UNKNOWN FLEET, SAME SYSTEM-------------------

As the fleet of starships primed for war exit large glowing vortexes, they came across an odd sight. Rather than the sleek, golden colored starships they had been expecting to witness, large bulky purple ones, with an odd white symbol on them swarm the system, each one massive, each one bristling to the brim with weapons on the hull.

"Lieutenant, what exactly am I looking at? They don't seem to be the fleet that was described." Fleet Admiral Johan Schmitt asked his aid as he stared out the viewing deck. The whole ship was set on red alert, the call for all to action station blaring along with the alarm. The entire deck was flooded with a deep sanguine light signifying the state the fleet was in.

Looking away from the scene before her, a Felinae Minus officer, with the twin sabers denoting her rank as lieutenant responded. "It appears to be a separate fleet stealing our kill." she replied coolly, before returning her attention to her data slate. "Shall I give the order to fire upon them Sir?"

"Negative Lieutenant. Give me an uplink with them. I'd Like to have a word. Perhaps they'll be willing to share and let us save our people." The "Human" Admiral ordered getting a small smile from his aide.

"Aye, Admiral. Glory to the Republic"

The uplink request signal was sent out, and within mere moments of doing so, it was accepted as the screen went from blank, to a blue line with a dark background. The voice on the other end of the line was harshly synthetic, but clearly male. "You are now in territory designated as a humanitarian crisis by the Crystal Empire, State your designation and intentions or you will be eradicated."

Surprise lit up in the admiral's features, but quickly schooled his visage to one of professionalism. An AI controlled fleet? How Peculiar. He thought before clearing his throat. "I Am Fleet Admiral Johan Schmitt of the Military Republic of Lunarum. You are in our territory. But seeing as you seem to have killed our enemy and hopefully not our people, we demand retribution upon the ones whom have so boldly invaded and enslaved our people. You will comply or we will not hesitate to attack you and your forces." He said, his eyes steely and his tone cold as ice.

The line began moving as the voice spoke. "Local Holy Hegemony is now extinct. Remnants being dealt with by your people." The vidscreen changed, flashing images, videos, robotic units gunning down HH soldiers, HH civilians, somehow avoiding (most of the time) shooting any of the various species seen in collars, units with a red cross symbol administering medical aid and removing collars was also shown.

The Fleet Admiral watched in silence, before coming to a decision. "This is Republic Space, while your aid to the citizens of the Republic is greatly appreciated, it is my duty to liberate them from these bastards you are killing. I request to join in the fight. These are my people. Grant me this privilege to strike back at this foe who was foolish enough to invade a world of veterans." He asked signaling the crew with a series of hand gestures behind his back to ready all weapons should things go south. "If you did not know, we have forces that have taken to guerrilla warfare to strike back and resist them. It would do well for both the populace and old guard if we joined in this fight."

The line is silent for a few moments. "I may not act without word of The Emperor." They could just hear the capital letters thudding into place. "Please hold." The line went silent for a whopping 15 seconds. "I have been authorized to allow entry into the atmosphere, attempted attacks on Empire forces will result in hostilities."

"Acknowledge. Any attempt at treachery will result in open war. When this is over, I would request a word with your superior." Johan said, a sense of relief flooding him and his staff as the fleet made their way towards the colony. Turning to his Aide, his face was once more one of resolve. "Ready all ground forces. Get the JST's ready for drop. they're goin in hot. Orders are to kill any not aiding our people, do not attack those wearing the sigil of a snowflake." He said evenly.

Tapping away at her data-slate, the Lieutenant replied. "Acknowledged Admiral. Orders are sent. The Troops are ready and eager sir."

"Very good Astrid." He said before turning back to the screen. "Our forces are prepared. Prepare for atmospheric landings." Things where about to get interesting, any of the fuckers left hiding would soon be very, very dead.

Author's Note

Hello all, a new civ is introduced! The fan who made this civilization has a message for y'all!

Hello readers, This is Nocte Flamma, the Creator of the new Alien Empire the Military Republic of Lunarum and all the species and tech associated with it. I have given permission to this awesome writer to use my work under the condition I retain all intellectual property of them. I hope you enjoy my creation and look forward to seeing what this guy does with them.

it's so damn good to see someone submit another species! I got tons planned but it does get a tad annoying lol! Anyone who wants to submit a civ, I have a specific document for it, just pm me and add me on discord if you wanna know more