With bodies shivering from the cold, the mares and the dragon came out of the water, running to advance towards the castle, in order to find out what was going on.

The path did not make it easier, because although they were tall beings (all of them close to 2 meters tall, like amber who was the talles at 6 feet. Or even crown who was still a minor was 5 feet 8 at the time) to be forced to advance in a sea of snow of almost your height is at least difficult.

Fortunately, in addition to their own magic, skills and other means, they had with them a literal dragon. Wich as tired and tense as he was, if he desired he was a portable cauldron of thermal energy , this which helped make way for them, melting the snow and turning it into water around them, until eventually they reached the castle gates.

The first thing they noticed was that unlike the rest of Lancelot, the area surrounding the castle had the least amount of snow, only about 50 centimeters deep. They also noticed that some of the castle walls lay on the ground in the form of rubble, one of them actually fallen on the right side of the entrance, allowing the entrance to the castle in its entirety.

This massive wall falling down, was probably what Crown heard, something that tacitly knocked down the castle walls had to definitely make a big bang, but... What was exactly?

With a nod of his head, the dragon was the first to advance, followed by the brave mares as they walked through the castle, or well, what was left of it, noticing how blood stains covered some of the walls and floor of the place.

Ponies that they could only assume from memory were part of the castle staff before, were now lying around like rag dolls , simultaneusly series of footsteps in the snow inside the ruins unsettled them.

This scene was disturbing, but what disturbed the prince the most was that all these bodies were close to where they were at the time before they went to hoofington and he remembers hearing movement in the castle but... He could not remember what happened.

He was sure, he Heard movement in the castle but... No screams, or anything like that.

"I mean... All these footsteps, the blood, the destruction, the chaos, , everything!...but how, when?" the prince wondered to himself until another booming noice broke his Thoughts, to be specific as an explosion of vibrant magic in a blue color pierced the left wall in front of them that before all of this happened, used to give way to the training field where Crown and Fortress used to practice with a loud "BAM!

Immediatly after, something collided with the right wall infront of them wich, unlike the left one was intact at high speed creating a cloud of debris.

This immediately put everyone on alert and ready to fight or flee, however as soon as the dust was cleared a faint lavender shield could be glimpsed containing a Dawn inside with Bleeding teeth, bruises on her limbs and face covered in bruises, meanwhile the unicorn holded protectively a semi-conscious Whisper with her arm.

"Ugh, this game of cat and mous it's getting tedious." said a familiar voice, a voice that made the dragon's blood turn EVEN colder as he recognized it. That voice paralyzed him and his eyes widened like saucers, his mouth becoming as dry as the desert.

"For...tress?" the dragon dared to whispered with trembling voice conveying a mix of emotions.

"...oh?" sounds of footsteps colliding with snow made the presence known, as a figure stepped through the newly made hole in front of them.

Turning his body towards them, the figure of what was once his adopted brother, now with green pulsating eyes and black tainted softly pulsatin veins around his body, turned to look at him with a smile that grew progressively larger.

"Crown, my Man! I thought you weren't gonna make it to the party!"

"What the fuck are you talking about?! What the fuck is going on?!?" The dragon was completely confused, for once his stoic calm lost.

"...oh. So you're not here because you noticed?...that's kind of disappointing honestly" the now possessed fortress said mockingly.

In that moment of distraction Dawn used some of her remaining strength to carry herself behind her friends almost falling to the ground from the exhaustion to which she was clearly subjected in her combat Or rather defense against fortress during the time they were not here.

"Girls, take a.... Whis, we need to... Go and reorganize" the unicorn gasped.

With a grimace of disgust the male unicorn pointed his pearly white hairy finger at his sister and declared "Boooooring, whatever." the unicorn turned to the white mare and pointed at her with one of his fingers.

"Hey, abundance!"

"Don't speak my name!" The mare just spat to the side in disdain and defiance.

The male unicorn's smile became more mischievous "You act so dignified but you caused this, you know!" shocking everyone.

"I mean, I thought you all were here because you From all of them figured it out in time, by being "smart" or something but clearly that wasn't the case!" the unicorn said with a chuckle "What a stupid bitch!. I mean, to claim to be a tremendous Genius, you're so naive, you were giving out wrong information without realizing it!. After a moment of shocked silence, his laughter intensified.

Abundance, did not understand what was going on but as usual she held back her emotions and focused on trying to connect the dots in order to solve the puzzle, however a later statement from Fortress brought a thought to her head, which came to her attention.

"...OK, I'll give you a hint. Radio." said the unicorn with a deadpan.

"radio?...what do you have to-" abby paused briefly "....!?" her face showed shock.

Fortress's later statement brought a thought into her head, which, once it settled
solved the puzzle , in response high nervous tension covered throughout her body.

"Oh, you just figured that out now?" the unicorn scoffed. "That's right, your great idea of making an information network with all the soldiers was the perfect trollan horse and never better said!"

"Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!" the unicorn shouted in her mind, realizing what fortress was implying. The truth was that for all her skill in technology, her ability to make drones or any automaton to gather information or carry out tasks... at the end of the day she was still very limited at the moment, both in raw materials and in productive capacity, so making them in mass was simply not feasible.

What was viable however, was an alternative option, unlocked thanks to the saved scraps of investigation before the dragonic genocide. This new technology blueprints were turned into an information network that covered New Equestre or... well part of it; this blueprints were all based on sound waves, later baptized as Radio.

This led her to create the prototypes of portable radio to create an internal network of information connected between the different ponies and races in millitary service. But there was a risk point, if at any time, one or several key users were
were compromised by possession or just gave false intel, there was a significant risk of either intelligence leakage and corruption of information in favor of the threat OR just bad ciments for plans of action wich could add unnecesary risk to military operation. So she, with the help of her recently made AI, filtered, and based on algorithms a pathway to ruled out possible "compromised" information and nulify or at least minimize the risk.

Well that was the idea... clearly something went wrong.

"yes... I think your... What do you call it? AI? is still too stupid to decipher patterns, otherwise we wouldn't be in this situation. I mean all we had to do was fill your head with the idea head there was an attack going on in Hoffington, once that was done we would know that you two (he said pointing at crown and dawn) would choose to go help. Making all of you Leave Lancelot alone without you or the princesses. So by the time all of you left, we just had to have one of our own give the green light and start preparations."

"on that note...Are you (he said pointing at crown) seriously going to tell me that it didn't strike you as oddly convenient that part of the horde was chasing the remaining group of pony guards at a speed from which they could outrun in the first place ?"

abby thought at that instant that if those troops were the royal troops that meant they had to have radios... wich meant..., "oh, You've got to be fucking with me!"

"No thanks!" the male unicorn, joked , waving his blue mane as his head vibrated in a "no", as he conjured with his magic an electric beam directed at the white unicorn, who in response, thanks to losing her composture barely managed to put up The shield, which upon colliding with the thunder made a sound similar to that of a plate breaking, causing the sparks that managed to pass through the shield to burn one side of her head, mainly her hair and scalp turning that area of her hair into practically charcoal.

"Aaaah!" the unicorn screamed as she was pushed to the ground with the resulting shockwave from the destruction of the shield, and her now damaged face.

"Abby!" they all shouted, turning towars her.

"FIRST LESSON!" he then turned his body towards crown, DO NOT DISTRACT YOURSELF!" the unicorn surrounded hIS body in blue energy, specifically hIs musculature. As He used the oportunity and jumped in a leap reminiscent of the movement of a spring, while the accumulated force sent him flying towards the dragon at high speed, colliding the fist strengthened with magic and a metal gauntlet with the dragons jaw.

The dragon in that second of distraction, of course did not react on time as a metal gauntlet that the unicorn coated with voltage sending him flying towards the hole opened in the wall several meters behind.

"Crown!" The mares shouted before creating a defensive triangle formation, prioritizing the injured at the back and the "uninjured" as amber at the tip of it before advancing down the wall cavity.

"NO! Girls, wait!" Dawn tried to warn but to no avail, as the girls, as if a nervous response was activated, without thinking went running outside. However, before they could give chase, as they emerged from the hole in the castle, to the open, the ground around them was littered with the organic forms of what may have once been a pony, maybe jacks, griffins, whatever they were... did not matter now.

It was hard to say, since their figures were no longer recognizable at the species level.

This clump of creatures surrounding them outside the castle, however, allowed a clear path in a straight line along which the dragon had flown through, followed by his once master and once adopted brother, now turned puppet.

As soon as this happened, the creatures closed the circle again, leaving the mares separated from the dragon and vice versa. Each with respective enemies.

"Oh, come on. You've got to be kidding me!" Said amber, who quickly channeled her earth magic, making a series of protective rock walls to the north, south, east and west of their formation.

"Ok, this is NOT my idea of a party..." said Pillows.

"uuugghhhh!" abby was highly frustrated.

"We can't catch a break, can we now?" said Stella sarcastically.

"I told you, we need to--!" began Dawn before being interrupted by whis.

"Re-organize, right?..." whispered in a very soft voice a hurt Whisper, who was slowly getting up from dawn's embrace. while Respectively, electric sparks flew from her body. Internally her nervous system being manipulated to nullify most of the pain and get back on her feet and moving again, maintaining, albeit with some difficulty, her consciousness.

Whis wasted no time in touching his foster sister's thigh, causing an electric current to pass through her nervous system, neutralizing the pain in her leg, but also decreasing her sensitivity.

"..." dawn paused for a brief moment processing everything, considering the situation around her and her conditions.

"assume Formation, caged rabbit!" she shouted without hesitation, giving the new orders for one of the defensive/offensive position tactics practiced by the friends previously for hypothetical scenarios, taking advantage of the abilities of each one.

----music for the scene: Revengers,yuki hayashi- https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=uvElKS2GUDY&si=i4XIdj5pXxzrb3Gr

"YES!" they all said in response.

Immediately after, amber touched the ground, causing hundreds of 1 squeared meter squares of compacted earth to separate from the surrounding soil and fly into the air where dawn's magic would later hold them in place, floating.

Dawn's magic would keep them floating around the circle of enemies, in a sphere or dome arrangement, changing their physical properties to something similar to rubber, causing them to emanate a light violet color. Effectively mantaining 2 different types of area spells: floating and phisics alteration.

Abundance , pumping all the magic she could into the surronding soil of the dome. caused the entire floor inside the dome to take on a blue hue and have the same rubber properties.

Not a moment later, Stella used her elemental magic by concentrating on the circulating wind, making an earth storm appear partially blocking the vision of their enemies, who unlike them, did not possess visual tactical equipment.

Pillows, for her part, quickly seized the opportunity and put on her custom-made steel knuckles, while Whis made the same electric current that she used on herself, pass through pillows body. reducing to a minimum any possible pain that was about to occur...

With a conscious effort, Pillows eyes, as well as the rest of her body pumped blood non-stop to build up strength and oxygenation of her tissues and organs, meanwhile her glands secreted at maximum capacity adrenaline and other hormones. for combat and rapid action.

All courtesy of her genetics, which in another time was considered a curse, thanks to her arduous training and her miraculous encounter with the dragon and the mares was now her greatest weapon. Finally coating her body with a layer of muscle-strengthening magic thanks to her earth pony magics nature that was commonly specialized in physical strength and ground/ earth related stuff, like a stray bullet in the blink of an eye pillows body was shot towards one of the floating plates of the dome's top, as the defensive rock structure around the other mares closed like a sphere with no openings.

What happened next could only be described as a remote-controlled equestrian made living pinball, moving at an impressive speed and force impactig enemies in a remote-controlled manner.

The eyes of pillows, like an automatic machine were active, as her shoes touched the top rubber tile of the dome, at a eye sight speed that only she could obtain, scanned the area in search of those creatures that showed signs of being able to use extracorporeal magic (example: Unicorns) or just overall showed clear signs of being more problematic.

Like a spring, her legs impacted the tiles of the rubber roof, from which she bounced forcefully towards her targets, with the added strenght and speed compunding effect, like if it was a living mare slingshot- thanks to the rubber property of the dome and her physical prowess

Thus impacting the first target, hitting it with a fist at full speed destroying much of his body like a tomato would after being crushed by a fist. Without losing momentum, as soon as her shoes touched the ground thanks to her weight, strength and strategy, just as in the beginning she was propelled at great speed, but now to the roof of the dome, from which she was once again shot to a new target down below.Repeating this cycle over and over again, target after target at high speed, alternating occasionally between landing or hitting with her upper or lower limbs.

In just a few seconds she managed to finish off a large number of enemies. This of course not being for free, as he body was subjected to an immense self-caused physical pressure to achieve this feat obviously and if we add the centrifugal forces of movement and the multiple dozens of impacts that although mitigated by the rubber property, had the bounces on her limbs and body.

A few moments later, whis felt electric impulse in her magnetic field, thanks to her electrical ,magic control giving her an indication that pillows had reached her limit.

"NOW!" said whis, which caused the collective effort to stop, the rubber and levitation magic to stop and the rock sphere to open, letting through like a bullet a deaccelerating pillows whose body had the imagined damage you could expect, as she was braking with all her strength left using her legs still pumped full of blood before stopping inside the "trenches", while inhaling and exhaling at a disconcerting speed.

"Well, I'll leave the rest to you," she said before exhaling sharply and falling backwards to be caught by whis.

The troubled enemies, like possessed unicorns, much of the pegasus and other hazards lay on the ground like dye stains, while the rest of the now reduced but still teeming horde after overcoming the shock, were coming back in their direction.

"Don't worry, , leave the rest to us!" said the blue pegasus with a triumphant smile as her fists filled with voltage collided , making a sound similar to thunder rumbling on the battlefield. "I won't die a virgin!

Author's Note

so uhh, sorry if i took a while to update. Work and stuff is killing me.

on a side note, i have been filling the boru with the images so, while i update them on the respective chapters you can always look them up here:
View on Derpibooru (Original source unknown at time of posting)