Crusaders of Harmony: Tales of Pure Heart

Pure Heart and her nuns and priestesses traveled through Equestria towards a town in the east of Equestria, Amberleaf. The town had suffered a horrible storm that Cloudsdale couldn't control. The Wonderbolts could reach in time to save the town from more pain, but the damage was done. Hearing that, Pure Heart knew it was time to be charitable again, and with her followers went to help.

Upon arrival, after a few days in train, they saw the state of the town. Mud, water and destruction were around the place. The town folks were doing whatever they could to save their houses and despise the clouds having been taken out and the sun glowing over them; the sight was depressive. The wonderbolts seemed to have stayed and helped as much as they could, and so were ponies from nearby.

Pure Heart and her followers walked forward, pulling carriages. Once close, they caught the attention of the ponies and wonderbolts, and the leader of the squad flew down to acknowledge them. A certain rainbow haired pegasus. "Well, you are unexpected. Have you come to make more publicity of your religion while these ponies suffer?" Rainbow Dash asked, annoyed. She has had her encounters with Pure Heart and the Crusaders of Harmony, and due to her loyalty to Celestia she wasn't entirely great with them, but neither she was angry nor hated them.

"Hello to you too, apostle Rainbow Dash~," Pure Heart said slightly sarcasticly as she knew the Mane 6 hated being called that, despite that's how the crusaders see them as, apostles of Harmony. "We've come to help indeed, which makes publicity on its own. But we genuinely came to aid these poor ponies."

Rainbow Dash squinted her eyes in doubt, but she couldn't simply say no to help; what kind of image would that give? "Fine, but you better work hard; we are working day and night here!" She said serious.

Pure Heart nodded, and the nuns and priestesses started dividing into groups. Priestess Nurse Shine walked to the town folks with the carriages. "I know how hard it is what you suffered. We came just prepared." The nuns open the carriages to show a huge amount of food, blankets, medical kits and warm clothing.

The town folks saw this with bright and hopeful eyes; some even started crying in desperation. They started thanking them with all their hearts, especially those who had their hungry foals in hooves. It seemed the equestrian government was slow in aiding these ponies. The blankets were quickly given to all the families, and the food, like pies, hayburgers, daisies' sandwiches, and a lot of sugary pastries, was given, so they could regain energy and happiness. Meanwhile, Nurse Shine started using the med kits to heal or treat whoever needed it.

Rainbow Dash saw this with amazed and guilt eyes, because she couldn't help these ponies as much as the Crusaders did now. Maybe she was wrong in her thoughts after all.

Meanwhile, the rest of the nuns, led by Flash Spark and Priestess Canvas, used their powers and magic to help to take the debris out of the way, while Canvas did it in huge quantities and Flash Spark did it at huge speed. In a moment, Flash Spark stopped next to Rainbow with a mocking smile. "What is it, apostle Rainbow Dash? Too fast for you?~"

Rainbow quickly changed to an annoyed and angry face and turned to the Priestess. "Oh, it is on!" She said before whistle to the other wonderbolts and speed up their cleaning of the town. Flash Spark did the same with the nuns and continues the fast cleansing of the debris.

Pure Heart watches this from afar and chuckles while shaking her head. "Ah, Flash and her methods never stop surprising me." She stays looking until she senses a weird presence nearby. She perks up and looks around, until her eyes lock on the forest near the town. There her pure eyes felt a presence, of something watching her, that quickly hid again.

Pure Heart, surprised by this, quickly looked around, seeing everypony entertained and walked to the forest to see what that thing was.

Walking into the forest, Pure Heart looked around this natural and beautiful place. Endless trees of green leaves, strong oak and deep roots. This place was barely touched by the storm, showing it was more, something magical. The sun entered through the tops, bathing slightly the earth pony.

On her way around, some more appearances of this creature were made around her. She followed them without a fear; she was purely calm and confident nothing would happen. The slight chances she had of seeing this being were mere moments, where she saw a leg hiding behind a tree or a blur of the figure before hiding behind a bush.

She was amused, and this creature gave no bad vibe or energy. She continued until, in a moment, she saw the creature standing with her back to her. It was a pegasus mare, completely white from mane to fur and feathers. She seemed to watch nothing in particular.

"Hey!~ I can see your playfulness, and surely you want to play, but I am occupied, so, maybe leave this catch game for lat-"

Her voice and smile were cut when putting a hoof on the mare's shoulder, and she slowly turned. To Pure Heart's horror, this mare's face was many things but any good. Her eyes were two sunken and eyeless sockets, her nose dripped a black liquid, and her mouth hanged open. No teeth, no tongue, just blackness inside.

Pure Heart looked at her in shock and stepped back. But she had no time as the mare let out a horrible screech and jumped on Pure Heart, black tentacle tendrils coming out her mouth and wrapping around the priestess' head. Pure Heart pulled her back with her hooves. "Hey! What are you doing?! What happened to you?!"

The mare continues wrapping those tendrils around and now her mouth has widened impossibly open and started wrapping Pure Heart's head inside her mouth. Pure Heart groaned in pain, and her eyes glowed white as she charged power in her telekinesis and instantly exploded the mare's head, making her jump back and fall headless.

Pure Heart quickly gasped and looked at the body in shock. "What the? What in Harmony's name is this?" She said panting, but suddenly her mind spoke to her.

"Pure Heart, you have fallen into a trap. Run fast, dear chosen. The evil wants to take you with it.

At that moment, more sounds came around Pure Heart, and more ponies of that kind appeared. Dozens of them, of all races and ages, sharing the same pure white body and black features in their eyes, noses and mouths. Pure Heart saw this and tried to levitate, but she suddenly felt the sun being blocked and her powers going away too, as if somepony pressed the off button. "What?! Oh, come on!"

She sees the ponies charging with the same tentacles coming out of their mouths. Pure Heart simply turned and ran, jumping over some of them and into the thick forest. She looked around, making sure she wasn't ambushed, and good thing she did, because in her way, more or those pale ponies appeared jumping at her and trying to tackle them down. With her powers, she would defeat them all easily, but she was handicapped in that department.

Pure Heart kept running while the monster ponies made echoing moans, screeches and gurgling choking noises behind her. After minutes of running, she soon reached a deeper and more dark part of the forest, and in a moment, she was grabbed and pulled behind a tree. She yelled, but a hoof was put on her snout. "Shut." Said a whispering voice from a darkened figure.

The pale ponies ran past their hiding spot, making the sound of a hundred of them screaming and wailing loudly, until the noise was gone, and so were they. Pure Heart felt the hoof being pulled out of her snout. "Thanks. I may have been a goner."

The figure walked into the forest, ignoring Pure Heart. "Follow me. And make no noise." Said the other pony, a unicorn mare, by the figure of her body. Pure Heart did as said and walked behind her with soft steps. Passing through what seemed like a bubble of magic, Pure Heart felt her powers returning.

Once inside, the mare turned and pulled the hood off, showing it was Cross Heart, her rival from the Church of Celestia. Pure Heart looked at her in shock. "You?! What are you doing here?!" Pure Heart said confused.

Cross Heart huffed, the older mare looking annoyed. "I should be the one asking you that question. What the heck are you doing here?"

"Well, I felt something in the forest. I was helping around the town because of the storm, and then-"

Cross Heart scrunched her face. "You really thought that storm was natural?" She asked with a condescending tone. "You are naive."

Pure Heart looked at her in more confusion until she realized. "Oh no, a supernatural being? Oh heck, why can't I have a day without strange things hurting ponies?" She said she was tired and angry.

"You seem to be a magnet of these, or the other way around. In either way, this one is dangerous, and your help could come in handy."

"Huh? You? My help? Are you a changeling?" Pure Heart reached her hoof at her.

Cross Heart slapped her hoof aside. "Don't be an idiot. I need your help as much as I hate it. This creature doesn't benefit any of us. And you can make sure a being that takes out our powers is one very powerful."

Pure Heart rubbed her hoof with annoyance. "What is it?"

"No idea. It can either be a demon, a lich, a spirit of the forest. Who knows?" Cross Heart said with a neutral angry tone.

"So, what is the plan?"

"I tried all I could, from violence to rituals. Nothing worked. So it must have a link in the forest. We have to find it. Or, well, you have to."

"Me? Ugh, you are being a lazy horse again. Why me?" Pure Heart said annoyed and offended.

"Because you are the pure one who can detect any evil, even without your powers. You are a perfect radar."

"Or your perfect bait." Pure Heart said back with anger.

"I assure you, I'd LOVE to see you in pieces. But if I want to come out of here alive, I need you. Believe me, the moment I don't need you anymore, I will kick you out of my presence with all my will and might." Cross Heart said with controlled anger, but her eye twitched in annoyance.

Both mares looked at each other with cold and threatening eyes, showing no compassion, friendship, unity or respect. The idea that both killed each other right there was a probability. But after some seconds of silence, Pure Heart relaxed down and sighs. "Fine. I'll help, only this time. But once this is done, this never happened."

Cross Heart calmed down too and nods. "Agreed."

Pure Heart nodded and took this moment inside the magic bubble and used her power, and an armor, shining like the sun, appeared all around her like if it were being created at that moment. Her robes now hid inside this fully plated armor, and so she shook her hoof, and a sword appeared on her hoof, as if it were a trick of magic. "Ready."

Cross Heart looked at her with annoyance. "Showoff."

Minutes later, both high priestess walked through the forest, trying to avoid all the pale ponies rummaging the place. Their sounds and screeches helped them, hiding and staying silent. They had some encounters while Cross Heart guided her towards the source of this power.

Meanwhile, Pure Heart looked at her and the surroundings with confusion. "What happened to them?"

"Who?" Cross Heart said, confused and unworried.

"Those pale ponies. Looks like they are suffering." Pure Heart said worried.

"Those are lost souls. Their personalities and memories are gone. They are just husks, no life, no purpose, only serving like a puppet." Cross Heart said coldly and uncaringly for the ponies.

Pure Heart looked at her with anger and annoyance. "You really don't care, do you?"

"Different from you, I only care for those who live. These are gone, Pure Heart. There is no salvation for them. Death is the only way out for them now."

"But maybe we could-"

"Even if we destroyed the source of this power, their souls are completely gone. Their bodies will stand still until they starve. Better grow a pair and continue with your life." Cross Heart didn't have time for these things and continued without a glance back at Pure Heart.

Pure Heart by her part was feeling bad. Not capable of saving ponies was the worst feeling she had ever and still felt. She hated these horrible destinies that only a monster could male for innocent ponies. She gulped down and continued walking.

After what felt like an hour, they arrived at the center of the forest, finding a huge black tree, rooted to the ground and all trees around it completely dead and dry, as if the black tree was feeding off their life. They also found bodies of ponies; surely those uncapable of transforming only their bones were visible, a show of how they would end if they were ever trapped.

Pure Heart and Cross Heart looked at the tree with calculating eyes. "So, what is the plan?" Asked Pure Heart.

"I have none. We are going in blind." Cross Heart responded without even looking at her.

"Randomization, I like that plan." Pure Heart said, preparing her sword and walking out, but Cross Heart pulled her back into the bushes.

"Idiot running in without a pan is not a plan. We need to see how it works. Maybe find a weak point."

"Oh, come on, I can take on it. I have faced worse than a tree."

"You don't have your powers. Who knows what happens if that thing absorbs you?"

"I know, that is why I am going to cut it with my sword. I may not have my powers, but I am still tough."

"Ugh, you idi-" Cross Heart stopped herself when she heard a rustling. She crouched and saw one of those pale ponies walking to the tree erratically. Once close, the tree's branches grabbed it with vines, and the trunk opened with a wide vertical mouth and pushed the pale pony inside and closed shut.

Both priestesses looked at it in shock, knowing getting close was a bad idea now, but Pure Heart had an idea. "You have explosives?"

"No, I don't. But I heard tree resin is flammable, even explosive."

"I like when we think alike." Pure Heart, said with a smile.

Pure Heart and Cross Heart went away and started using their weapons to open the trees. Pure Heart with her sword and Cross Heart with her daggers. They tried to get as many as possible without alerting the pale ponies. After around an hour, they got a glob of resin. Cross Heart took out a jar and put it all inside.

"Good, it must be enough to ignite that tree." Cross Heart said with a serious tone.

"Cross. We have company." Pure Heart said, pointing her sword away.

Cross Heart turned and saw a horde of pale ponies going towards them, screeching and screaming. "The tree must have felt us."

"Then it is time to kick ass and pray. And I am all out of ass." Pure Heart, said with a serious face.

Cross Heart looked at her in confusion for that comment, but she wouldn't say anything. Both of them charge at the pale ponies with incredible dexterity.

Pure Heart goes the first and her sword spins on the base of her hoof, impossibly natural, and she runs to cut down the first pale ponies coming. Her sword cut through the neck of the first pony, and quickly sidestepped to cut the next's, and so the next came behind.

Cross Heart opened her black robes and exposed dozens of daggers and started throwing them to the ponies, into their tentacle mouths, and jumping over Pure Heart to make an epic trampoline jump, and throwing three daggers in one go.

"Hey! Those were mine!" Pure Heart said, slashing the next two pale ponies, while Cross Heart fought with a dagger in each hoof and stabbing the ponies.

"You got 7 so far, I got 13! You are a bit slow!" Cross Heart mocked her.

Pure Heart growled and quickly sped forward, spinning her sword at impossible speed and cutting several ponies in various pieces and beheading them in seconds. Cross Heart sees that and growls too and grabs many of the thrown daggers and re-throws them to the ponies, taking several of them all in one go. Between the two, the road towards the black tree was filling with bodies.

Between the two, high priestesses, even without powers, were a menace to these pale ponies. Stabbing, cutting and smashing ponies at huge super pony speed. Cross Heart was moving faster as she was taking more than Pure Heart. "46! You have 30!"

Pure Heart growled and reared her sword, and with a swing, she threw her sword spinning and perpendicular to the floor. Like that, her blade cut through several heads until nailing against a tree, and around 50 ponies fell dead in front of them all, stopping the horde of all them.

Pure Heart was panting, and Cross Heart looked in shock at the sheer brutality. Cross Heart slowly turned with a scoff. "Wow. You were supposed to be the pacifist one?"

"Shut up, or you could be next on my blade's way." Pure Heart walks to the sword and retrieves the sword back.

Pure Heart held onto the resin jar and started running forward with the other high priestess. Both mares continued running and running back to the black tree. In the way, more and more pale ponies came in the way. They easily cut them out of the way, even if they were being wounded by their hooves or tentacles. Pure Heart gritted her teeth as she was being bathed in the black blood, her white fur and green mane slowly turning dark.

Soon they reached back to the black tree, and saw it fully opened like a monster, roots and veins coming out from everywhere to attack it. Pure Heart and Cross Heart cut through them, but they were fast even for them, and quickly they were trapped on those tendrils, being puled up and by the limps pulled.

"AAGH! Pure Heart! You better do one of your miracles!" Cross Heart said, grunting in pain and biting on a vein trapping her hoof.

Pure Heart did the same and looked at the tree and slowly calmed down, taking a slow breath. "Give me the resin."

"What for?" Cross Heart said confused.

"I'll jump in its mouth and light it from inside, maybe burning myself too." Pure Heart said serious.

Cross Heart looks at her in shock, but quickly shakes her head. "Sure. All yours." She said without hesitation, giving her the jar of resin and an extra dagger.

Pure Heart takes it and looks at her with a neutral face. "I hate you too." Pure Heart said before putting the sword on her mouth and spinning to cut the tendrils holding her and starts running towards the black tree. Roots, veins and pale ponies charged at her, but she jumped through all of them, and without hesitation she jumped into the tree's mouth.

Once inside, she felt all the dark magic, the souls trapped inside that place. Pain, sadness, hopelessness and no destiny but oblivion. But she opened the jar and threw the glob of resin in the air, and with her sword and a dagger she took from Cross Heart, she slammed them together to make a spark, instantly filling her vision in red.

It had been maybe 30 minutes. Cross Heart stood in front of the burning black tree. The pale ponies fell to the ground without life. The black tree itself screamed unnatural gurgling sounds, but now only the sound of the crackling fire is heard around the air. Cross Heart looked at it with a calmed face, not worried or saddened by Pure Heart's sacrifice.

She had her powers back, her wounds quickly healing up, but she couldn't know the same for Pure Heart. "Well. Whatever destiny decides, Pure Heart." She turned and walked away.

*Hours later*

The tree and the forest were silent. The fire was gone hours ago. The rest of the crusaders found the hints and trails here. Priestesses Canvas, Flash Spark, Silent Whisper and Nurse Shine stood in front of the tree with shocked faces and worried eyes, except Silent Whisper due to the mask.

"She is there?" Nurse Shine asked in shock.

"Is not the first time Mother Pure Heart has done something stupid. I can still feel the dark magic around, and all the bodies. She is in there." Priestess Canvas said.

"Then, do we take her out?" Flash Spark asks confusedly, adjusting her sunglasses.

"No. You know the protocol. Let her come out on her own. She never wants help in these situations." Silent Whisper said softly behind her mask.

The priestesses waited for more minutes, until movement was heard from inside the charcoal tree. Then, a black hoof comes out, breaking some wood out of the way. Pained groans came out as the scorched black pony came out from the tree. The pony, who was totally unrecognizable, walked out with painful breaths and groans.

Her hair and fur were all gone, her skin black and red blood from the opened wounds. Her eyes disappeared, and some parts of her bones and skull are exposed. But quickly, her body started regenerating at a fast speed, the scorched skin slowly gained back the white color, and fur started growing back over it. In less than a minute, Pure Heart has healed completely again. She stood in front of the priestesses and looked side to side before smiling. "Hey girls! Want to have some drinks?~ I'm starving!" She said it with a happy tone, as if she was more than used to this.