The Beast King

"Why did it have to end this way?" - Celestia

Celestia felt her stomach churn as bile built in her throat. Unable to look away she watched as the griffin-like creature writhed in agony. She thought that she had put enough strength into her flames to kill the thing outright. She was no stranger to killing, she needed to protect her ponies from the endless monsters in the world after all. This was different though. The things she was used to fighting were mindless beasts whereas this one clearly had some form of intelligence.

She watched as the creature cried in pain for what felt like days as the sick feeling festered in her. It wasn't until Luna walked up and finished the thing before she truely regained her senses. "Sister we know that such things are unsightly but thou must must gain a stomach for such things. These creatures slew our ponies with no remorse, we must react in the same manner."

The cold words of her sister shook her. Celestia knew it was true, there was so much instability within the lands after Discord's defeat. The situation wouldn't fix itself. She and her sister would need to systematically pacify the continent and such sights would likely only ever grow more common.

"Of course sister dearest. We only felt uncomfortable do to the creatures intelligence, tis no meer beast. Yes, that is the reason we were unsettled." Dispite her confident voice she still felt sick at the thought. How could an intelligent creature do this to innocent ponies? She looked to Luna only to see the youngest stabbing any of the invaders which still drew breath.

Sighing she stood and went into the village proper to confirm the situation. I'd their were still survivor she needed to administer first aid to them and prepare them for travel to the nearest village.

Keeping her wits about her and with a spell prereadied she began to walk into the village. Celestia was disgusted by the sights. It was blatantly apparent that these creatures were thorough in their attack. Each pony she checked was struck in a vital area or had so many cut and stab wounds that a survival would be impossible. It was also clear that the bare, fleashier creatures came into the village after the fact. They were further away from the corpses and looked as if they were rushing into the town square. It filled her with a small comfort knowing that these creatures had intended to save her little ponies, however that comfort was lost as she saw what lied in the center of town.

A pile of corpses laid burning in the town center nopony was sparred of this atrocity, she could see the charred remains of a elderly stallion, looking as if it had tried to crawl away from the fire. Her mind forced the memory of the creature and implanted itself onto her ponies. She couldn't see anything other than their pain or hear anything other than that awful, agonizing scream. Kneeling to the ground she hurled.

After some moments of intense nausea she felt a palm on her back. Luna tried to comfort her sister but had no idea of what to say. Such cruelty was unimaginable to the two. As terrible as Discord was he would never resort to such cruel mindless violence.

The two sisters couldn't move, sat in the village center they cried until they could cry no longer. In the mist of their mourning a thundering of loud clopping could be heard. A loud cry could be heard as one of the furless creatures jumped of of a four legged pony-like thing. It unsettled Celestia to see something so similar yet so alien. Worse was the fact that the furless creatures were riding atop them.

"Preist Axle!" One of the smallest of the creatures cried in distress as it ran towards one of the corpses. The small one wore white robes with elegant golden trim, it's main was longer than the others though it only reached to its shoulders. As the robed one ran closer to them the other armored ones panicked, jumping off of the equines and rushing to the robed one. With the ten armor creatures approaching them Luna drew her blade and levied it at them as Celestia rose tried to appear disarming. If these creatures had tried to save her ponies then maybe she could handle this diplomatically.

"Wait, we don't want to fight. Our village was just attacked by a group of griffin-like beings. We have no quarrel with your kind." She pleaded as she looks towards the armoueed gaurds, their aggressive posture was placed in question one of their swords even lowering in response.

"Priestess Nina?" One of the armored ones asked. The one who had knelt over rose its head as it wiped tears from it's face. Standing the creature 'Preistess Nina' walked towards the two sisters sniffling.

"Greatings beastmen, it's a pleasure to meet some of the more civilized amongst your kind." The voice was soft, feminine and sounded caring dispite the insult. Luna verbally groweld at Nina refusing to lower her blade.

Jumping to action Celestia spoke in hopes of stopping a fight before it started, "Well, you see, were are known as ponies not beastmen. We aren't allied with the monsters which killed your friends." The demure female smiled at the words and took Celestia's hand. With one plam under hers and another tracing it's finger on her arm Celestia felt warmth pass through her body as the young female smiled softly.

"I apologize for my assumptions miss. Let me start over I'm Priestess Nina and we are humans." The priestess looked to Celestia with an endearing smile. Celestia knew that they had a new friend they could rely on.