“Woo am I glad to see a familiar face!” Applejack calls out from an alleyway. She initially hid when she heard a large group approaching, but taking a peak around the corner she saw it was Fluttershy and her entourage. Stepping out from the alley she starts to run towards the pegasus.

“Applejack!” Fluttershy meets the earth pony half way and they quickly brush their necks together. Normally Fluttershy would use her wings for a hug but without them this will suffice. “Have you seen any of the other girls?”

“If I did I reckon they’d be here with me. I did watch the Princess get thrown through some buildings earlier, but that had to have been at least half an hour ago. They was pretty far away too, I only saw it cause I was climbed up as high as I could get to see if I could spot anypony.”

“Well, uhm, what do you think we should do? We were heading towards the castle, but do you think we should go find the others first?”

“Nah, they’re headed in the same direction. I don’t know how long it’ll take fore this here floating city to drops outta the sky, so we got no time to waste. The girls can all take care of themselves I’m sure we’ll see ‘em at the castle or maybe even right before the castle.”

Suddenly to the north there’s a blinding light way off in the distance accompanied by the echo of a high pitched screech. “Sounds like the Princess is fighting back…I hope everypony makes it out of this okay.”

Applejack notices the silence from the pegasus and looks over to find Fluttershy staring at the ground with a somber expression. “What is it ‘Shy?”

“It’s too late for that Applejack. We’ve already lost so many ponies. Th-they…they died protecting me.”

The farmer looks down and angles her stetson to block her eyes and snout. She’s upset to hear of the deaths, but even more than that she can feel her heart breaking as she tries to imagine everything Fluttershy has been through in this short amount of time.

“I’m so sorry, but we really need to keep moving.” A random voice calls out from the crowd and in response we hear a series of “shh’s” and a thud immediately followed by “Ouch!”

“What the heck? It’s true! This situation is unimaginably horrible, but we don’t have time to waste!” The stallion doubles down and this time there’s a somber but silent agreement among the crowd as they all start to slowly march forward again.

After walking for another 20 minutes or so the group is passing under a stone archway that connects two buildings when suddenly the archway collapses. There’s a series of screams and yells as dozens of ponies pop up from the surrounding rooftops and start throwing rocks and debris at the group. Mostly aiming for either Applejack or Fluttershy, who thankfully were not under the archway when it collapsed.

The collapsed archway does pose as a severe impediment for forward progress. This results in the entire group scattering into the nearby buildings and alleys while covering their heads with their forehooves.

“Follow me, this way!” Applejack calls out to Fluttershy and the two duck into what used to be a bakery.

Once they're inside they start to flip all of the tables over to create cover from the windows. Hooves can be heard thundering on the roof above them. Fluttershy hunkers down behind a table with a small stream of blood pouring from the top of her head. “Why is this happening to us?! What did we do wrong?!”

Applejack rubs her forehoof across the back of the traumatized pegasus. “It’s gunna be okay. We just gotta collect ourselves and come up with a plan to get back out there and make it to the castle. Take deep breaths, c’mon now.”

“We found a staircase leading up that could probably get us to the roof, but it’s been completely blocked off with furniture. From what we can see there’s no other exits either. The only windows are the ones at the storefront which is where we came from. I don’t know what we can do here.” One of the Day Guard gives an update from the back of the shop.

“We might just have to wait this one out…” Applejack quietly suggests, mostly just talking to herself.

Time remaining until Canterlot reaches Ponyville shelter camp: 95 minutes.

“Are you sure it’s a good idea for us to split up? I don’t really like the sound of it, Luna.” Ignis comments with a bit of a sour tone as he taps his foot on the ground with his arms crossed. Hair still burning with a bright fire.

“Yes. Celestia and I can go find the bearers and since Tia still has her magic she can teleport all of us to the castle. In the meantime you need to go to the castle on foot and make sure it’s cleared out. This is the most time efficient method we have. Since you two are the only ones capable of using magic right now it’s best if you split up. Divide and conquer.”

“Fine. I wish I could fly again, but I don’t think it’s a good idea to waste any spell slots just for that. It’s probably what, a 20 minute run from here? Celestia, why did you bring us all the way over here?”

Celestia looks over at the elf with a very tired face. “It had the least amount of ponies around. I was trying to minimize our collateral damage.”

Ignis realizes she’s still bleeding and extremely exhausted so he walks over and places a hand on her barrel and casts “Cure Wounds” at 5th level. Healing the alicorn for 57 hit points. The wound from the Eldritch Smite on her side stops bleeding and seems to slightly close up, but it’s still a gnarly looking wound. Any other injuries become much less noticeable and the alicorn seems to be a bit more energized.

“That’s much better.” Celestia turns her head to the right and cracks her neck. “Thank you, Ignis.”

It’s only when Ignis used the system and casted a spell that he realized there was a system message.

Beginning Integration……….21%

Huh, that’s neat, but what the hell is it integrating? Ignis thinks to himself as he apologizes to the solar alicorn one last time before turning and starting his run to the castle. The two sisters split off from the elf and start running to the south in search of the element bearers.

“I’m surprised he actually agreed to splitting up. I thought for sure he wouldn’t let you out of his sight while you don’t have wings or a horn.” After several minutes of silence Celestia decides to make idle conversation as they hop from rooftop to rooftop as they head south.

“I hadn’t even thought of that. No wonder he was so against it. It’s less that he actually agreed and more that he probably interpreted it as an order. That does still surprise me though, he’s disobeyed my orders before…I wonder what changed?” Luna hums in thought as they make one final jump and come to a stop.

“Sister look, there’s Rarity and Rainbow Dash.” The solar alicorn comments as she jumps off the roof and glides to a stop in front of their detail. Luna just rolls her eyes at the fact that Tia forgot her sister doesn’t have wings. With a sigh she jumps across a small gap to a building with a door on the roof and climbs downstairs.

Time remaining until Canterlot reaches Ponyville shelter camp: 75 minutes.

Ignis 1st Person POV (A/N: It's been too long since I wrote that line.)

Wow, I’m surprised there’s so few ponies here. I mean this is still a decent number, they have over 40 for sure, but I was expecting a much larger group to be waiting here at the castle to ambush Twilight and her friends. I quickly cast Invisibility on myself and sprint over to the training grounds. I don’t know where my Moonblade is, and I could use the original rapier I had on me when I arrived here. But, I don’t particularly want to kill any of these ponies.

Which is why the training grounds are my first stop. I can pick up two wooden swords. Glad to have my Dual Wielder feat from the Get Home quest rewards. I did notice something that was just a slight metaphorical kick to the nuts, though. I no longer have the Eldritch Adept feat with Devil Sight. The feat slot is just empty and the system is asking for a replacement feat.

“Select…Spell Sniper.” I’m a bit surprised by my own choice, but adding 60ft of range onto my spells seems pretty useful. I also get to ignore half cover and three-quarters cover, and I don’t have disadvantage if I cast a ranged spell within melee distance of someone else. Lastly it lets me add an additional point to Wisdom, bringing it up to 16.

My proficiency bonus went up by one when I leveled up as well, so combining that with the plus one in Wisdom brings my passive senses up to a bit of an absurd level. Passive Perception of 18, Passive Investigation of 20, and Passive Insight of 23. That Insight score being the absurd one. I basically never need to roll Insight ever again unless I’m talking to a changeling or an alicorn. Celestia in particular probably has a high DC whenever I roll Insight against her, Harmony too.

After grabbing two wooden training swords I run back around to the entrance of the castle and plan out where I should start. They’re all armed with either large stones or spears, but with Mage Armor plus Dual Wielder I’m at 19 AC right now. Next level up is 12th level of Wizard and that’ll let me get another feat, maybe I’ll take the Fighting Initiate and choose the fighting style that gives me another plus one to AC. Having a base AC of 20 would be…strong.

Bladesong and Shield combined would take me up to 30 AC which is insane. I guess right now those two things would bring me up to 29, so it’s only one less and still pretty strong. I doubt I’ll need Bladesong for this group of dickheads though. I’m not even going to use the system to be honest, I feel pretty confident in my abilities right now.

Just gotta pray these wooden swords don’t break on me, but in the worst case scenario I might actually be able to just throw hands with these ponies. Only a few of them are guards, and I assume the regular civilians only have like 10 Hit Points or something. Alright, enough delay, let’s run the fade.

Starting in the street in front of the castle I pop out of invis with a loud crack as I hit the first pony in the back of the head. They crumple and fall unconscious instantly, basically confirming my suspicion that regular civilians might as well be wet toilet paper.

Four or so nearby ponies get startled at the noise and snap turn towards me, yelling out something about the Lunar Knight. I don’t know, I'm not listening to them. Moving like a blur I aim for the next 5 closest ponies. Sprinting up to the first mare it’s light work just feint an attack straight on then move far too fast for her to track to the other side of her body and hit her in the head.

All of that is in one fluid motion, I don’t stop moving my feet for even a fraction of a second. Instantly pivoting to the left I channel a bit of mana into my legs and leap at the next stallion. He was wholly unprepared for this speed and both wooden swords hit him in the side of his neck. Unlike the others I follow through the swing and keep pushing forward, this launches the stallion into the mare that was right next to them.

They both topple to the ground a few feet away with the stallion unconscious and the mare under him flailing about trying to get him off of her. Turning again I scan for the few rogue guards and spot two of them around 60ft away standing at the main gate. Channeling the Illusionist Bracers, I throw out two Fire Bolts. One aimed at each guard. I only feel comfortable throwing these out at the guards since they can do up to 30 damage, 60 with a critical hit, it’s very likely I’d outright kill a civilian.

If I land a critical hit it’s going to outright kill a guard as well, but to be honest these ponies aren’t under any type of mental manipulation. They were just persuaded to join the dark side and lost their colors. Celestia would probably argue I only have this authority over the Night Guard but I think I have the authority to deal out the death penalty to any guard I find helping Discord. I’m not trying to kill them, but it’s for that reason that I won’t feel that guilty if I accidentally do kill one of them.

Both Fire Bolts land and one guard drops like a sack of potatoes, but the other one just winces and staggers a few steps. It’s at this point that the entire group of 20+ ponies is fully on alert and have registered what is happening. Now comes the hard part.

Several of them charge at me at once, and I watch well over 10 spears go hurtling through the air over the charging ponies. It feels like I’m on autopilot as I spin the wooden sword in my offhand at extreme speeds to deflect any spear heading for my upper body. The wood splinters a bit after deflecting a few spears but actually manages to hold up rather well.

This is definitely a result of the synchronization. I can see the exact path and actions I’m going to take to handle the ponies charging at me. They’re in a three pony wide formation with an extra straggler at the rear, totaling 10. Zipping forward to meet the charge I land my right foot squarely in the front and center ponies chest floof. They feel light, so they’re probably supposed to be a pegasus.

She lets out a yelp and goes airborne, flailing her hooves as her muscle memory tries to flex the wings she no longer has. The pony directly behind her is unable to react in time and she takes out his legs like a bowling ball as she lands and bounces into him. They’re both already staggering back up, I need to take out the other two ponies that were in the front row.

One is to my right and the other to my left, let’s start with the left. The pony thrusts a spear forward with a foreleg and I twist my torso out of the way and swing both swords at their head. I hear the sound of something moving through air at high speeds behind me so I step forward and jump onto the pony I just struck. Their eyes completely whited out after the hit but they were staggering on their feet trying to stay upright, but as soon as my feet landed on their back they started to crumble.

Within an instant of landing on the ponies back I jump and do a backflip over the spear that was being thrust at me from behind. I hear the attacker gasp in surprise and tilt my head to look down at them as I go upside down and start to finish the flip. Before they can thrust again I land on them and bring my sword down against the top of their head with all my downward force.

This one also instantly drops, two down. The pony I spartan kicked and the pony she knocked over are back on their hooves, but not for long. Now that I know the mare used to be a pegasus and she’s extremely light I can use that fact.

Twisting around the first spear and ducking the second one I drop the wooden sword in my offhand and grab the mare by her foreleg. She lets out a scream as I start to spin around rapidly and her body knocks back all three of the ponies in the second row. Those three fly backwards and the screaming stops, looking down at the mare I feel a bit guilty to see she’s foaming at the mouth. I can only see the whites of her eyes so I assume she went into a deep state of fear and then passed out.

I’m still spinning and let go of the mare, sending her flying with all of the momentum into one of the ponies in the third row.

One of the ponies I hit while spinning the mare manages to get back up, so that’s four ponies on their hooves and one pony is knocked down but still conscious, they’ll probably be standing soon. Let’s wrap this up and quit being fancy.

Picking up the wooden sword I dropped, I suddenly feel completely empty. There’s no thoughts, no emotions, and everything starts to move like a blur as I evade the next four spears and swing my two wooden swords around like flowing water, connecting with and knocking out all four of the ponies still standing. The one I threw the mare at is back on her feet and the 10th pony is still up.

Using the sword in my off hand I neck chop the mare that just finished standing and then throw the sword in my main hand at the straggler pony. It makes a comical thud noise as it bounces off of his head, and he makes a yelp sound as his head is knocked backwards, forcing him to look up.

By the time he looks back down I’m already on him, jumping into the air I grab the sword that bounced off of his head and do a flip over the pony. While performing the flip I use the momentum to slam the sword against his head one final time, and he finally drops.

That takes care of the first 10, but I still have two guards on their feet and seven civilians. Luckily all of them are unarmed since they decided to go all in on throwing their weapons apparently.

I just twist my head and crack my neck while staring at them, then I crack my knuckles and take a few slow steps forward. This seems to have the intended effect as five of the civilians yell and sprint away from the castle as fast as they can. That leaves two guards and two civilians.

Since they're unarmed all four go down faster than the group that charged at me. The guards took three hits each, but in real-time combat mode that’s nothing. Turning towards the main gate I walk over and crouch in front of the mare that dropped from my Fire Bolt. I put one hand in front of her muzzle to see if I can feel air moving, but there’s nothing. Placing that hand on her neck to check for a pulse I can only sigh as I don’t feel anything.

Now that I’m up close I recognize this mare. This is the one that gave me the stink eye when Celestia teleported me and Luna here right after we defeated Nightmare. She’s the one I surrendered my sword too and got mad when I refused to call Celestia by her title.

“I just don’t understand you seemed so loyal and devoted to Celly back then, so why did you turn against us? I can expect rash decisions from panicked civilians that are fearing for their lives, but you’re all guards. I just don’t get it.” Talking outloud to the corpse as if she hears me I sigh again before reaching out and closing her eyes. Should I revive her? It’s been less than a minute so I can still use Revivify.

Looking at her…All I can do is wonder if she had a family. She must’ve if she was tempted enough to turn against the element bearers for a chance to save herself and her family. Do they deserve a chance to say goodbye to her? Is it really my place to decide if she dies? Am I prepared to add another corpse to the pile of ghosts haunting my dreams?

I don’t know, but considering what the future holds after we defeat Discord…I’m going to be forced to kill a lot more than this. I’m sorry, but I can’t revive you. The resource is too valuable and limited, and your crime is too great. I’ll tell Celestia that you died defending the castle. At least that way your family will still get survivor benefits. “I’m sorry.”

With that done, and my mood much more somber, I walk through the main gate and enter the lobby of the castle. This is the room where Celestia was greeting all the ponies as they arrived for the Gala. Walking in there’s another group of around 20 ponies that all have the colors drained from them. All I can do is sigh.

“This will be a lot easier if you all just surrender or flee. Don’t think you stand a chance just because I’m outnumbered. The guys out there had me just as outnumbered and they’re all taking a nap against the gravel right now.”

They all look around at each other before yelling and charging at me. “Just once. Just one time I want them to take the easy route!” I mutter to myself before flourishing the two wooden swords and getting in my fighting stance.

Time remaining until Canterlot reaches Ponyville shelter camp: 50 minutes.

Author's Note

The chapters are starting to get a bit more chaotic, and all of the cogs are starting to turn as everything is slowly coming together.

I wonder what's being integrated into the system? Also should Ignis have revived the guard? Treason is a pretty serious crime...

Thanks for reading! <3