“So who are all the key players going to be?” Ignis asks while eating an apple in the royal sisters tent.

“We have Dragon Lord Tormura from the Dragon Lands, King Silverwing from Griffonia, King Haakim and Princess Amira from Saddle Arabia, Chieftess Winara Steelheart and her husband Chief Faslen from Minos, Prime Minister Willow of Ciervana, and Queen Aurora of the Changelings.” Replies a white unicorn with a quill and ink on her butt.

“Alright the first two are obvious, but what race lives in Saddle Arabia? I assume minotaurs are Minos, but I’m not sure about Ciervana. Lastly, I have a feeling your changelings and my changelings are slightly different so if I could get a description on those that’d be great Miss….?”

“Inkwell, Raven Inkwell, Sir Ferrum. The ponies in Saddle Arabia are much like our earth ponies, but they’re moderately larger. Your assumption about Minos is correct, and Ciervana is an exceptionally large forest that is home to predominantly deer. Changelings are most accurately described as insect ponies. They have an exoskeleton that ranges for an assortment of colors mostly consisting of shades of gray, black, and white with wings and a horn, and their main feature is being able to take on the features of any pony. Anything else, sir?”

“That should be it. If anything else comes up I’m sure Princess Celestia wouldn’t mind answering me. Thank you, Raven.” Although he isn’t entirely sure, he’s fairly confident that an annoyed set of magenta eyes just bored a hole in the back of his head.

Raven nods her head before returning to the corner of the tent where Celestia and Luna are currently having a private discussion in a sound bubble. Must be a unidirectional sound bubble, good to note. Ignis thinks to himself as he stands up and walks out of the tent. “Good Morning my solar counterparts, are we ready to depart?”

There's a few seconds of silence and just as Ignis thinks he’s about to be ignored by Celestia’s guards again, one of them speaks up. “Just about………… Sir. We’ve got everything but the royal tent packed up. The other guards are formed up and mustering to make sure we didn’t lose anypony overnight. After that they’ll get a rundown on what to expect for today. Should be ready to head out in 15.”

Ignis decides that he likes this guard. “What’s your name?”

“Lieutenant Force.”

“Thanks for the information LT. I’ll go inform the Sisters.” Ignis turns and stops just before going back inside the tent. “Did you happen to submit a request to cross branch over to the Night Watch?”

“Me? No sir. I’d considered it, but after thinking about it I decided the schedule would make it hard for me to participate in social activities.”

“....that’s a shame.” Ignis doesn’t wait to see if the mare has a response before heading back inside the tent. Once he’s a few steps away from the Princesses the sound bubble drops and they turn to look at him. “Guards’ll be ready to roll in 15 minutes. Figured I’d come let both of you know so we can start packing up this tent, it’s the last one.”

“Oh? Thank you, but we usually wait until they are ready to go before leaving the tent.” Luna replies.

“Yes and I’m strongly suggesting we don’t do that from now on. If your guards are anything like my soldiers, they probably get annoyed constantly being rushed through tasks, showing up to something by a specific time, all just so they can stand there and wait on leadership to show up. It’d be a small but significant gesture if you were ready to depart earlier than or at the same time as the guards.”

Celestia chimes in before Luna can give a proper response, “Why haven’t any of my officers given me that feedback before if it’s an issue?”

“There could be any number of reasons for that. If a guard has ever told you “I can’t think of anything” or “I don’t know” when you asked for feedback it’s generally because it’s much harder to remember complaints or criticisms if asked randomly. Especially for small gestures like what I’m suggesting, it’ll cause a tiny amount of annoyance in the moment but it’s not worth remembering for later. All the tiny annoyances can pile up to general bitterness or resentfulness. The second most likely reason is because if they do have complaints about something it’s generally a much bigger problem than something like this. Which leads to this never getting brought up, but I guarantee if you went out there and asked that formation “Is it annoying when you form up at 0745 for an all-call with some officer at 0800, and said officer shows up at 0815 or 0830?” they’d respond with a resounding yes.”

Both sisters look at each other before giving the paladin a small smile as Celestia responds, “Very well. Let’s pack up.”

The sisters start magicking away their bedrolls, rugs, and other furniture before all four creatures exit the tent. Once they exit Celestia looks at the LT, “We’re ready to go.”

One of the two guards starts pulling up the pegs holding the tent down as the lieutenant looks up at Ignis. “I think I speak for a few of us when I say this. Thank you, sir.”

The elf waves his hand in a dismissive motion, “Bah it’s not a big deal. After two days of watching you guards murmur “Why didn’t they do that while we were mustering?” I figured I’d bring it up. Inefficiency and poor time management annoy me.”

A few hours later the convoy arrives at an absolutely enormous structure resembling a colosseum. It’s big enough that it could likely fit an entire city inside it. The carriages pass through an archway and reach the inner field of the structure. In the center of the field is a massive circular table with fist sized pink crystals spread out in precise increments along the edge of the table. Spread out through the rest of the inner area are different stylized tents and camps for the other nations present, each camp is separated with rope and markings on the ground. The Equestrians turn right and head towards the south east where there’s still a decently sized plot that has a sign in front of it that reads “Equestria”. Ignis initially thought they were the last country to arrive, but upon looking around he realizes there’s no dragons to be seen.

Once camp is setup the sisters, Ignis, and Shining Armor make their way towards the round table where most of the other races are already gathered. There are 2 large seating arrangements with a folded piece of paper in each seat that has Equestria written on them. The two Princesses take their place on their bench as Ignis stands to the right of Luna and Shining to the left of Celestia. If Shining were a humanoid they’d be standing shoulder to shoulder.

Positioned on the edge of the table the pink crystal lies perfectly in the middle of the two benches. Equidistant from the alicorns. Ignis looks at the crystal for a moment.

Arcana

15 + 11 = 26.

Ignis realizes there’s a resonance in the crystal that matches all the other crystals, presumably linking them together. Once he considers how they’re positioned in front of every seat he surmises that they are likely acting as a microphone/speaker. The table is definitely large enough to require something like that, it easily has a 40ft radius, maybe larger.

After a few minutes of the leaders talking amongst themselves and fanning themselves to alleviate some of the desert heat a huge burst of wind can be felt spreading over the entire field. Looking up they spot three massive dragons slowly descending through the open roof of the colosseum. One is white and the other two are red.

Once they land the bigger of the two red dragons approaches the table and lays down on the ground on his belly before resting his head just a few inches from the edge of the table. Guess that explains why the table needs to be so excessively large. Ignis thinks to himself.

The dull white pony shaped creature that is most likely Queen Aurora ignites her horn in a sickly green aura. Suddenly there’s a loud rumbling and the ground begins to shake lightly as Ignis stares up to the sky with wide eyes and a slack jaw. The edges of the massive open circular roof start to rotate and extend towards the center, the motion reminds him of a camera aperture closing when a picture is taken. Once closed bright white light is emitted from hundreds of crystals along the supporting pillars and the now closed roof of the structure, completely illuminating the inside.

The changeling queen then ignites her horn again and hundreds of mesh grated holes begin to appear in the ground. Almost immediately the temperature in the inner field drops 10 degrees to a much more tolerable level, the ground vents are somehow acting as a giant air conditioner.

The changeling queen then speaks, her voice is heard clearly coming from the pink crystal. “As the host of the Global Summit this time around, I am happy to welcome all of you to our little corner of the badlands! I’m sure no creature wants their time wasted so let’s get right into the agenda. Our first item for discussion is concerning the attempted global domination committed by Princess Luna Concordia of Equestria. It’s noted that in the past the same princess allegedly committed the same crime, and that she was never given a proper trial in international court. As such, the nations of Draconia, Griffonia, and Minos propose that Princess Luna be arrested and tried for two counts of attempted global domination. As the initial nation to submit the topic to the agenda, the representative for Draconia will be the first to speak on the topic.”

Ignis 1st Person POV

So we’re just getting right fucking to it, huh? I’m gripping the armrest of Luna's bench so tightly that it begins to crack. Celestia predicted this is how it would go, but I’m still pissed. Her proposed strategy is that we let all the nations that proposed the trial speak first without interruption. Depending on what they say she has several speeches prepared. I gave my word to her and Luna that I would not speak out of turn. They initially wanted me to agree not to speak at all as it’s not my place as someone that isn’t sitting at the table, but I talked them down.

I actually have my own plan if things take an absolute turn for the worst, but it’ll take a minor amount of deception.

A deep gravelly voice from the Dragon Lord projects itself over the entire inside of the colosseum, without the use of the pink crystal. “It is a simple matter. The lunar princess of Equestria caused thousands of crops across the globe to wither and die in a matter of days over 1,000 years ago. Indirectly she caused the deaths of hundreds of creatures throughout every nation. The first thing she does when she returns? Apologize? Pay restitutions to the nations involved? No. The first thing she does when she returns is to try again. It is an absolute spit in the face, a complete disrespect to all those affected. I propose we hold the trial two days from now with a jury comprised of every race present except ponies, equally.”

The changeling queen then spoke up, “Do the representatives from Griffonia or Minos have any remarks to add?”

No one else speaks for a few seconds, so the changeling continues, “Very Well. Do the representatives from Equestria have any counter arguments?”

Celestia, with venom in her tone, spoke. “Queen Aurora, as an unbiased 3rd party, do you know how many Griffons died during the 7 dark days from 1,000 years ago?”

“Zero.”

“And, how many minotaurs?”

“Zero.”

“Lastly, how many dragons?”

“Zero.”

“Of the reported number of deaths, what percentage of the total deaths were from Equestria?”

“Of the 726 deaths, 100% of those were Equestrians.” The changeling queen gave her final reply.

“Thank you. On the topic of restitutions, over 1.2 million bits and 1.8 tons of produce, to include medicinal herbs, has been paid and delivered to every nation that would accept payment. Since the incident 1,000 years ago no nation has requested another payment of restitutions. That tells me that every nation was quite satisfied with what they received. Not to mention that Princess Luna was tried and convicted for her crimes 1,000 years ago. On the 7th day of darkness Harmony herself found Luna guilty and sentenced her to 1,000 years exile, on the moon. Once she returned she extended the night for an extra 3 hours. A whole 3 hours. With no deaths, no consequences anywhere in the world. The only result was some creatures waking up later than they normally would have. With all these facts taken into consideration it is a complete and utter joke to have the audacity to suggest that any nation outside of Equestria has a right to demand or sentence my sister to anything.” Celestia finishes her rebuttal much angrier than she started it.

Queen Aurora steps up, “Would any representative from any nation present like to continue discussion on the topic?”

Four different creatures spoke up, “Aye.”

“Very well. In that case the floor is now open for free debate. Please keep things civil and peaceful.”

Instantly, at least five different people start talking over one another yelling incoherently.

It’s gunna be a long day.

Author's Note

This chapter is on the shorter side, but that's mainly because a decent chunk of my writing time today was spent coming up with names for people. I hate naming characters, actually despise it. I also wrote down all the minor and major things I wanna make sure get mentioned and I wrote down which countries have what kind of relationship with other countries.

I also spent about 3x as long reviewing the chapter for minor oopsies, so hopefully this chapter is squeaky clean.

If I made any oopsies or left something unanswered let me know and I'll get fixed up asap

Thanks for reading!