To Chase The Shadows of Redemption

Four hours earlier

By the time Twilight's chariot had landed down in Ponyville, she hadn't even given the two stallions who gave her the rushed ride much acknowledgement besides a quick thanks as she sped off.

Ponies throughout Ponyville tried to greet her, but she was forced to ignore them. She had to get to her destination as quickly as possible.

The rumours Twilight had heard in Canterlot while she was there had burned in the back of her mind, and she did everything she could to ignore them for now. She would confirm things for herself later. That was the correct thing to do.

Already, she was approaching the Everfree forest on the outskirts of town. This was where she had been putting in so much work lately. There was no time to consider danger, and she head towards the heart of the forest towards the rendezvous point.

Twilight dodged and weaved through thickets, branches, and other colorful obstacles which the forest had to offer. She passed over the invisible signs of work she'd already completed.

All of this was risky, far too risky, and Twilight knew that if she failed she'd never be able to look Celestia in the face again. She also knew that there was no way she could ignore what she had seen in that room any longer at the same time. There was no time left, and by some stroke of fate the method for saving Luna had fallen unto her rather than Celestia. Who knew where she was and what she was doing, it was not with Luna and that was all that mattered right now. Twilight had actually waited in that room for a while hoping she'd show, but it didn't happen.

Twilight had done enough research, and she had the remarkable idea to speed up things by sacrificing not a normal forest, but the Everfree.

And what was Twilight supposed to do? Watch Luna perish while she cowardly thought about failing to save her? There was no way she could do that. It was watch her pass away, or try this and give her a chance at the minimum.

The Everfree was famous for its strange magical properties, as it was no normal forest. Twilight was absolutely sure that it represented far more life energy in total compared to spending the time to destroy many ordinary forests collecting energy. They didn't have the time for that. For the past month or so, she'd been slowly building the summoning circle around the entire Everfree. It was complete.

Her friends, who had caught on almost immediately because of how much time she had been spending on it, had helped clear her path and protect her many times. Her gratitude could never be expressed enough. Even if they didn't get it yet. She felt bad about restricting the majority of details so far from them.

The clearing where the centre of the forest lay came into view, and it came to Twilight's relief that she saw exactly what she'd been expecting.

Skidding to a stop near a panting and recumbent Rainbow Dash, who looked exhausted, she saw the large sack that concealed a precious and frail cargo.

"Did the flight go smoothly? Please tell me nothing crazy happened!"

"Relax Twilight... I came here as fast... as I could. You're so lucky I'm... in better shape than ever right now," said Rainbow Dash.

"As fast as you could?! Are you crazy?! I swear if she isn't okay..."

"You're just lucky you crossed paths with me at all in Canterlot, bucko, I still wish you would explain things more clearly," said Rainbow, who finally seemed to be breathing steadier.

"You're right, I'm sorry. This entire situation has me stressed beyond belief. This is a ponies life we're talking about! I can't afford to mess this up. No... it's more than that..."

"Listen Twi, you got this! I don't know how bad you think this mare has it, but we've all seen you diligently at work! You'll be fine!"

"Rainbow Dash, this is it! There's only one chance! I can't afford to mess this up! Sorry if I'm freaking out a little!"

Twilight fiddled with her saddlebag, and carefully opened it up to reveal the precious treasure stored inside. The Inner World Sanctuary she had found in Luna's room. There was no doubt in her mind who had most likely left it there, and it raised far too many questions, but she had decided to take it and do this herself after waiting long enough for Celestia to come back. It hadn't happened. So, she got Rainbow to fly out Luna in secret, which had been one of the most embarrassing things Twilight had ever done - distracting ponies in the castle while Rainbow awkwardly left while snaking her way out of the room and towards a door to take her outside so she could fly off.

She placed the amethyst exactly in the middle of summoning circle. Luckily, she'd had enough time to modify the summoning circle to only affect the vegetation itself. So while any creature may find itself without a home, that was something they would just have to live with as they found somewhere else. It was likely Ponyville would get something going again quickly. Hopefully a little less chaotic than what they had now.

Rainbow Dash was being surprisingly quiet, and she had a rare look of curiosity mixed with concern as she stood far off to the side. Or had she simply changed since the war? Oh, how it guilt trip Twilight to not even have a proper reunion with Rainbow Dash since she got back. Even though she had hugged her in tears on the first site of her, they hadn't much chance to really catch up. They had to later. Rainbow had come back alive, and now Twilight would succeed and save Luna as well.

So, she mustered up her courage and began preparing to start the ritual. The magical side of it was simple in Twilight's opinion, but it was the magnitude of it that scared her. This was an insane amount of energy to be controlling, period. The Sanctuary would carry the burden for her as she stored it, but the mass wouldn't move into it instantly, it'd take time to sift it in and collect it.

She pulsed out her magic, and it briefly reminded her of Krazor's spell as it spread to fill the entire circle with magic, to saturate the lines as the ritual began.

If you had the right view, you'd see portions of the Everfree beginning to light up as the lines woke up and illuminated the dark forest, which blocked most light to ground level even during the day.

Her magic having finally reached every point of the circle, Twilight gave herself one final mental slap.

Then, she began chanting while pulsing her magic to begin.

"Fluat vigor, reformatio vitae libera mihi."

Now, the Everfree was truly glowing with power. Every single point containing life energy within her circle that it could detect from the design it had been given became apparent in Twilight's mind. She could feel every single area and aspect of each living thing.

Then, the burden of fighting against these things to destroy their shape and claim their energy began. The strain was far harder than anything Twilight could've ever imagined. This was nothing like she had expected! Was the Everfree special in some regard? It struggled against her mind mightily and she grit her teeth against it.

Then, like a fish growing exhausted after a long fight against the rod and line of a fishing pole, things began to give.

Once they got going, the migration of energy towards the centre of the circle began. A kaleidoscope of color made of the freshly created aura swirled and swam its way through the air as more and more joined it as more life lost the battle.

Yes! Twilight could feel it getting easier and easier as more and more gave up, and she started collecting it in a large mass above the amethyst. While maintaing her strain on the ritual, she began funnelling a stream of life energy from the accumulated mass into the Sanctuary. It was working!

After several more minutes of focus, the trees around them began to disappear. Twilight couldn't see Rainbow Dash behind her, but she was sure her jaw must've been on the ground right now. It was almost frightening, how foreign and strange this new empty world was. She also felt a pang of guilt. Even though what she had destroyed held no minds, it still felt wrong.

While Twilight couldn't do it right now, she was sure if you squinted you could see the outline for the buildings of Ponyville from this far away. Ponies would be coming to check out what was going on soon enough.

The giant mass of energy nearly overwhelmed Twilight overhead. It was one giant ball, and she constantly had to apply some form of telekinesis to keep it from spreading out and escaping. It was a delicate balance of controlling the mass while continuing to pour into the amethyst, which glowed with power as it kept sucking in more and more. Just how much could it contain? It was crazy to think about. Which reminded her, she had felt some small portion already inside from the moment she first found it, but she wasn't sure what it had come from. All she knew, was that more was probably better to have more than less.

Now it was Twilight's turn to pant, and she fell flat after the flow ended and all evidence of the ritual seemingly disappeared into the comparatively small gem. Any average pony could've seen the flicker of light coming from it right now, and never realize how much that truly reflected. It glowed intensely now.

Without any foliage to surround her, a wind blew against her in the barren wasteland, unobstructed by anything anymore.

As Twilight had expected, there was no way this wasn't enough energy! It felt extremely dense in her opinion, and the amount of it was ridiculous. The Everfree truly was special, and it would live on forever in Luna if she had anything to say about it.

It became apparent to Twilight that she could see the castle of the two sisters, something she had come to know during her time exploring the Everfree while working, as well as it being something she had read about before hoof, and seeing it exposed like that was bizarre. It looked entirely out of place.

Now, she turned nervously towards the bag Rainbow had brought. Wait, where had Rainbow gone? There was no way she would leave her during such a critical time like this, so why?

She sighed. Who knew in the end. This was Rainbow Dash she was thinking about.

Besides, Twilight was feeling a little guilty about Luna being left inside the huge container. That was no place for her to be... but they hadn't been able to come up with anything else at the time. She mentally cringed at the image regardless.

She was glad for the guilt because it was quickly getting replaced by a deep seated nervousness. Step one had been completed... now the most crucial one remained. Once Luna's soul entered the process of change through Twilight's spell, there was no going back. It was do or die time. Literally.

No pressure at all Twilight...

No. Twilight had to believe. She had the energy, she was looking at it right now! She'd felt it! It wasn't being wasted out in the open, so there was no need to panic. Only that Luna's life held on by a thread every second.

She bit her lip.

She let her breath out harshly and brought two hooves to smoosh her face on both sides.

Remember your conviction. Remember why you've been doing all of this. You've prepared for this like everything else in your life, now was not the time to get cold hooves.

She opened the bag, and even seeing through the small gap that revealed itself made her cringe again. She'd never get used to seeing Luna like that, or any pony for that matter. It shouldn't have been possible.

She picked up the Sanctuary in her telekinesis and stared at it. Feeling the power flowing smoothly and lightly inside. To her surprise, it did not feel full entirely, but quite close to it. As far as she could tell anyway.

Well, now was better than ever.

She reversed the process from before, and began bringing some of the energy out under her guidance. It moved to surround Luna, and as more came out it fully immersed the entirety of the surface area of her body. Once this was acheived, Luna began to float gently into the air and out from the bag. She stopped a few meters up.

More and more Twilight poured, until she was sure that the current reserve around her was enough to start the Life Convergence spell. Messing it up by not having ample energy at the start wouldn't even be funny. Let alone halfway through.

Body floating and shining with so much aura around her, Luna was a strange sight. Eyes closed and balled up, skin revealed from all fur being gone and wrinkled beyond belief. Darkened hollows lay there. You could actually see a lot of the underneath anatomy now, including the blood vessels themselves sticking out like cords. It was disturbing. Her mane and tail had but a few strands left...

Twilight focused on shifting her perspective to that of a spiritual one. Soon she was feeling the outline of Luna's soul. Because lets face it, it wasn't exactly possible for her to resist that right now. Under any normal circumstance that would've broken so many natural instincts to the offending party and they would've lashed out. Now, it was easy and like playing with play dough.

Carefully, ever so carefully she felt the shape of it. It was already mostly collapsed, and the shape of souls were profoundly strange to the imagination. The way they shifted did not fall under the normal laws of physics, but she could still tell. It also didn't help how little of it there was left. If you had asked her if she was feeling the presence of a regular pony or an alicorn, she would've leaned towards a normal pony at this point.

Begin!

Luna's soul noticeably emulsified as the spell started, and Twilight nearly choked it with life energy from every direction. The aura vibrated wildly around her, and Twilight began drawing more out of the Sanctuary. First, Luna's soul would fill with energy in it's unstable state, and then it would begin rebuilding itself while in a position that would normally destroy itself if not for the external support.

Twilight nibbled at her lips while at work as she was anxiously awaiting to see what would happen.

It was working! As far as she could tell everything was going perfectly, and she was already getting used to rate of draw needed to keep this up.

Everything looked right, but after about ten more seconds Twilight began to feel a lump in her throat. Why was there no change happening? She couldn't detect anything at all. It should've started by now!

No... no, this wasn't happening. Why wasn't it working! Everything was perfect! Nothing made sense? Why!

Luna's soul, which while supported, was not in a position to last if it didn't start rebuilding itself. It'd start collapsing again soon!

Twilight cursed everything. Why was this happening?

"LUNA! FIGHT!" she yelled with everything she had. "DON'T LET THIS BE THE END! PLEASE! LUNA! YOUR SISTER NEEDS YOU!"

And then she saw it. Small pieces of Luna's ephemeral body began pealing off like ash leaving a chimney, gone with the breeze gently.

"Twilight! You can do it!"

"Believe in yourself, Twilight!"

"Keep it up, you're almost there!"

The sounds of all her friends surprised her, and Rainbow's had been the first she heard. Of course that was what she had been doing. Her blood went cold as she realized they had come to see her darkest moment.

Her body language must've betrayed much of her inner feelings, because they quickly settled down in apprehension or confusion. Probably both. They also had no idea what was even really going on. It must've looked like the strangest spectacle of all right now for them. Yet they supported her none-the-less.

Turning slowly to the side, she saw all of them with concerned faces. A lone tear slid down her face.

"Don't give up! Keep trying! I've seen hope at the end of the tunnel before and it'll come now! Don't you ever stop!"

Rainbow Dash somehow always seemed to have the right words at times like these. Perhaps it was recent experience speaking. Twilight gave a shaky nod and turned back towards Luna, who had a third of her body missing.

No matter what, she would support her until the end. She prayed that she woke up somehow, or something! Perhaps something about her was dormant now, and that was why it wasn't working?

It was almost impossible to miss, but Twilight saw it even against the blurry spell in front of her. Body turning to dust, a closed eye had the smallest of drops running out and down the husk of her face.

Twilight screamed something incomprehensible and closed her eyes tightly when she saw the rate of decay speed up. Within seconds there would be nothing left.

Just as Twilight began whimpering, a deafening impact hit. It almost threw Twilight to the ground, but she managed to stay upright.

A giant rainbow had appeared and ran through the sky, from the Castle of the Two Sisters, and poured into the mass that was surrounding Luna. Twilight felt untold power surge through herself and around the spell. This power felt like nothing she had ever experienced before, and her fundamental understanding of the universe felt different now as it spread. She also noticed that there was a weight on her head, of which she wasn't sure of.

And then it clicked. The Life convergence spell wasn't working, but time wasn't up yet. If she stopped casting, all would be over immediately. Or would it? She felt like she could do it. Really do it. Use the Divine Rebirth spell. It felt like there was unlimited energy to work with now, truly. There was no better opportunity. This would be no riskier than what was already going on. It was decided.

Twilight had no idea how she knew what to do, and she didn't. Voices whispered in the back of her mind that she would never understand, yet something clicked in her subconscious. Things just made more sense right now, as though the magic running through her veins had pushed out her potential to the max. It wasn't about knowing how it worked in its entirety, for that would be impossible, it was more like finding the key to open the door on an unstoppable flood and allowing it to go do its thing afterwards.

She stopped casting, but only for a moment to let the first spell die out. Then, she triggered the largest scale spell she'd ever attempted. The machinations of this spell were beyond understanding, and once it started it could not be stopped.

Four massive pillars of solid white light appeared around them, and soon a divine horn sound out from the heavens heralding the arrival of a new being. The air shimmered with ancient magic and crackled.

All of the accumulated energy warped and became sparks of golden light that formed a tapestry of cosmic vibrancy, and Luna disappeared entirely for a moment.

Then, the connecting strings of light grew like vines off of the sparks and coalesced into a singular spot, and soon something was growing there. Something perfect.

A body was forming anew, and the soul which had gone hadn't at all, it'd merely been in the soft hooves of the cradle of a divine bath. A vortex of spinning aura came down from the heavens, and they put the finishing touches on the body.

Just as Twilight began to see the brand new form of Luna, who appeared now looking like never before, her entire existence was whisked from reality.

An unknown amount of time had passed since Twilight Sparkle had disappeared. It felt like both an instant and years of time to her. She'd made a journey through a strange realm, one that was weightless where every color span as far as the eye could see, as she had swam through it to some unknown destination. Nothing made sense right now.

Where was she?

Slowly opening her eyes, what she found was the very concerned faces of her friends. They had made a circle around her.

"Darling, are you quite alright? This has been freakishly bizarre." said Rarity, who spoke for them all.

"Ugh..." groaned Twilight, who began getting up. "I feel so strange. What happened? I only remember this crazy power surge and switching the spell and..." her eyes grew wide. "Luna! Is she okay? Oh gods did I finish the spell?"

"She's fine Twilight, err, as far as we know. Maybe take a look at yourself for now hun," said Applejack.

They gave her space, and she got onto her hooves shakily. She did feel different. "Wha..." glancing to the side, new appendages could be seen that shouldn't be there. Her brain could not reconcile what she was seeing and what should've been.

"Wings?" there's no way those could be real... she managed to move them a bit, and bit her lip.

"Oh..." she shook her head. "Look! I'll... we'll figure it out later! Where is Luna?"

Twilight wanted to avoid thinking about it for now. It was too much.

Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie moved out of her line of sight, revealing a floating alicorn.

Luna looked significantly changed from when Twilight had first seen her after her return from the moon, and obviously anything that had come after that. She'd grown to be massive in stature, and Twilight quickly assessed she must've been slightly larger than Celestia at this point. Her coat was also darker, a liquid ink black that threatened to consume the world, and her mane and tail blew softly in the wind as an enormous starry paint splotch, flowing in waves. Her cyan eyes glowed.

Many things were different, and it wasn't lost on Twilight that many debris and rocks floated in the air with her even after the spell had finished. Was that anti-gravity magic? Luna was turned upside down and body stretched out while contorted in a weird way, and her eyes were going through a spasm. No, it was more accurate to say that they were twitching wildly to look in a different direction every second. It was a scary sight. Her mouth was slightly ajar, as though to say something, but couldn't. No, it was her entire body, it held some level of contraction and eventual relaxation. What was Luna going through right now?

Twilight wanted to be concerned, and she was, but it was finally starting to click that she had succeeded. The circumstances of what happened eluded her, but she'd succeeded all the same! The joy in her heart grew to unimaginable heights. Not only was Luna back, but her presence felt overwhelming even while she was seemingly dormant. Was Twilight's ability to sense magic inherently different now that she was also an alicorn? If a regular unicorn leaked magic like a small hose over time into the atmosphere, what she currently saw before her felt like a waterfall. Or perhaps an ocean?

The group had gone silent while staring at her, and eventually her eyes died down and became still. She grew still, all expression gone and a blank stare was all that was left. Then, subtly, only her face changed. A look of... pleasure? That was the best Twilight could come up with at the moment. Her eyes were wide and she had a look of wild excitement.

"She's... she's high?" guessed Rainbow Dash while breaking the reverie, and Twilight was meanwhile trying to figure out how she could tell such a thing.

"I don't know. This is too strange. She must've came back in perfect shape, so why is she acting like this? None of this makes any sense! Luna! Answer us! Are you okay?!"

Twilight, ever the observer, noticed another thing. "Why is her horn lighting up and pulsing every few seconds? She keeps doing it. Does everypony see that?"

"Umm... I've been watching her carefully this entire time, Twilight, she's been doing it for a while now. Doing what I don't know," Fluttershy seemed to be scared of not knowing, or perhaps it was just how insane this entire situation must have been from all of their perspectives.

"I guess I have some explaining to do. Thanks for watching her, Fluttershy."

Twilight began explaining everything, filling in details that they had never heard before about the situation and their eventual plan for it with Luna. Many shocked gasps and comments came from it. Nearing the end of her tale, Luna twist her neck and looked straight at their group with a conscious effort.

"Luna! Are you finally here with us? Say something! We've been scared something went wrong now for god knows how long! Thank goodness!"

"Who... who are you?"