"My name is Dante."

At the first moment, Ebony and Ivory did not react. However, give her a second or so, and Ivory said, "You're Dante?"

"Yep."

Ebony turned his head away from Dante's fixed stare. "We've been looking for you since we got here."

"I bet," Dante nodded. "I've been looking for you over in my realm as well. Kinda pisses me off that that damn clown would drop you down the abyss like Vergil did me."

"You were dropped down an abyss?"

"Yep. And apparently, this is where it leads. Hmph. Some 'abyss.'"

Dante backed away for a short moment. With his back turned, Ebony and Ivory exchange questionable looks. The demon presence was emanating from the two ponies, Dante finally pieced together, which means they have souls, as do other demons.

Dante pondered upon this topic for a moment. He looked back on his adventure thus far. Earlier, Ceberus, the guard dog, gave up his soul so that Dante may use it to continue his quest. And Agni and Rudra, two twin blades of fire and wind, he had to 'tame' before he could use them. Determining with this minimal information, he feared, in order for Ebony and Ivory to transform back into guns, he would have to kill them.

But if they were always demons, and Dante always contained their souls as handguns, then maybe they were always ponies, too. He cringed from the thought.

Ivory saw him jump. "What's wrong?"

Brought out of his train of thought, Dante turned, "Wha? Oh, it's, uhh... It's nothing. Just a little noise in the back." He pointed to the table that contained the majority of the food, which didn't contain as much food as it did a pink pony.

"Oh," Ivory rolled her eyes. "Yeah, she's pretty random."

Dante broke a small sweat. "So," he said, "do either of you have any plans for the rest of the day?"

Ebony and Ivory looked at each other once more, then back to Dante. Ebony said, "I don't think so. Why? What's up?"

"Oh, it's no big deal. It's just I don't have a house or anything. I was hopin' maybe I could temporarily sleep over or somethin'."

"Oh, that's no problem. If you don't mind sleeping in a cave..."

"Trust me," Dante fluffed the front of his hair, "I've had worse."

On the way home, Ebony and Ivory caught up with Dante. They told him about everything they remember from being in Ponyville, and how they got here. During this conversation, Dante learned a little more about this realm.

Apparently, this forest they were venturing into, and where all three souls were summoned into this world, was known as the 'Everfree.' He figured this was a good start; at least he knew where to return back to his realm. It still stumped him, however, whether this place was part of Temen-Ni-Gru or not. At one point, he even considered calling it 'Hell,' since he fell to get here.

"How much farther?" Dante said in a tone between a call and a shout, to the two ponies that had kept moving while he slowed down in his train of thought.

"Actually," Ebony turned his head to see Dante, "we're here!"

The young Devil Hunter raised an eyebrow as he took a glance to observe his surroundings, with his right hand in its pocket, his left on the hilt of the holstered Rebellion. Everything looked exactly the same; nothing but trees in pretty much every direction, a few with odd faces etched into them, most likely to unwit some passer-by with nerves of puddy. The only thing that really stood out, besides the cave, was the patch of dirt almost directly in the center of the clearing. Now, this wouldn't normally spike any attention from the man; actually, it was the color of it - crusty orange around the edges, yet a darker shade of beige that appeared to splatter around the skinny slit that went straight through the middle of it.

He didn't even need to unholster Rebellion to know that that's exactly how the stab in the Earth was formed.

"Sweet!" Dante took his hand off of his blade and walked up to observe the lip of the cave.

Ivory raised a hoof. "Well, I guess make yourself at home."

Dante chuckled and shrugged off the invitation. He then proceeded to enter the cave...

When something grabbed his attention.

As faint as the devil presence was that resided within his two pony handguns, he noticed something about the essence spike. In a matter a milliseconds, he had whirled around, his sights protruding down the edges of Rebellion. And, as he expected, the disgusted souls had followed him into this realm.

"Thank God," Dante whipped his head back, as to launch the bangs out of his eyes. "You realize you guys actually saved me, right?"

The evil excuses for lives merely stared at him as he exited the cave. Once Dante was in the open, he observed the whereabouts of his two equine friends, both of whom had their flanks pressed against either side of the entrance, forehooves poised and ready to assault. Dante smirked as he turned his attention yet again to the ugly demons and said, "Yeah, you saved me from a world of absolute boredom!"

At that, Dante ducked down and dashed forward. With a mighty kick off the ground, Rebellion ripped through its first victim as both it and Dante propelled through the air. His prey released a quick gurgle before it exploded into a mess of chunky demon blood at its base.

As Dante was rocketing forward, his right foot found the face of another demon. The young Devil Hunter, agile as he was, thrusted his body weight forward, slamming the brains - or what would be the brains - of this foe deep into the dirt. Behind him, he could hear his fellow weapons going to work on the evil entities. Under his breath, he sighed out of relief they were still useful, and threw the hand containing Rebellion behind him, driving the blade steadfast into the tough grounds.

Then, Dante pushed off the ground once more, flipping over his signature blade and landing on the opposite side. He then completely let go of Rebellion and kicked it into his audience of evil, impaling at least three souls in the process. Dante smirked again as the twin blades seemingly materialized from the inside of his duster.

Ripping each blade out with opposite limbs, Dante shot his wrists out, releasing a quick discharge of flame and gust toward his prey. Then, with several flicks of his wrists, Dante continued to slash imaginary blades of fire and wind toward the uglies. It was slightly boring, sitting there and picking them off, but it was better than them never being there at all. Plus, he kinda wanted to let Ebony and Ivory snag a few kills, so he was trying his best to be a gentleman about it, regardless of whether you could actually have manners when it comes to killing or not.

After a very short minute of slaying the dark monsters, Dante, Ebony, and Ivory had the last one cornered against a tree. If devils could cry, this one would have a soggy second-grave awaiting him. Dante stepped back, nodding to both Ebony and Ivory, offering them the 'victory' kill. At once, both their horns began to radiate their pale yellow auras. Then, not two seconds later, one single thunderous noise echoed through the Everfree Forest, slowly followed by the painful gurgle of a soul dying in its afterlife.

Author's Note

Very sorry to keep you all waiting on this chapter. But, thankfully, I am finally out of my writer's block, and I have a relatively good idea as to where I'll take this story. Thank you for your patience, and please continue enjoying Of Demonic Firepower!