The Over-Powered Adventures of Gray and Silver

“Well fillies and gentlecolts, I welcome you to the finals of the fourth annual Equestrian Ultimate Combat Tournament!”

“Yes, and might I say what an exciting tournament it has been Mike!”

“You’re sure right about that, Mega. These two finalists have certainly blown the other competition-”

“-and a good section of the stadium-” Mega interrupted quickly

“away with their power. Our first finalist, going by the name Gray Matter may seem at first glance to be a weak little unicorn, but in these battles he has certainly proven himself a formidable foe. On only the first day of the tournament, he was put up against the mighty Iron Smith!”

“Quite right, Mike! I still remember when those two stepped onto the field, Gray wielding his trademark elemental crossbow and Iron Smith sporting his trusty battle axe. Whilst Iron’s muscular frame may have unnerved some ponies, Gray showed indifference towards his opponent’s obvious power as he dodged Iron’s blows with agility and speed rivalling that of his opponent’s strength.”

“Using this Speed and agility, Gray easily put some distance between him and Iron. After that, the fight was pretty much over. With a few well placed crossbow bolts to Iron’s forelegs, Gray rendered them completely useless, making it impossible for Iron to even lift his hefty battle axe. Thus, Gray won the match with next to no bloodshed, and secured himself a place in the semi finals.”

“That’s right Mike, and the very next day Gray faced his second opponent, the nimble Steve Stillblade. In quite a contrast to the previous fight, Steve’s agile and quick movements kept Gray from getting the vital distance he needed to end the fight quickly. He was forced to leave his crossbow in favour of his trusty knife. Steve met him in a close quarters battle, knife against knife.”

“For a while they seemed evenly matched as they fought, but suddenly Gray’s knife cut through Steve’s, allowing Gray to land a winning blow on his opponent.”

“Quite the lucky break if you ask me, Mike. Good thing he has luck, because he’ll need it against our second finalist, Silver Slasher. He’s a rugged looking pegasi who dual wields katanas in his battles. He’s certainly proven himself just as competent as his opponent, Gray, in this competition, and a whole lot more destructive to boot.”

“You got that right, Mega. In his first match we saw him go up against a fellow sword user by the name of Killer Cutter. His name certainly was intimidating, but in his battle with Silver his sword skills paled in comparison.”

“Amazingly, Silver fought Killer Cutter with an expression of what looked like boredom. After a short clash of swords between the two in the center of the stadium, Silver simply pushed his opponent back with his own two blades and unleashed what appeared to be two energy waves from his sword at his opponent, who suffered serious injury from the waves. Not to mention the damage it caused to our stadium.”

“I hear you there Mega. I shudder to think where Silver got that amount of destructive power from, and judging by the state of our stadium, he isn’t afraid to use it.”

“You’re definitely right there Mike, as was shown in his semi final match the next day when he fought Aurora Blaze, a unicorn proficient in the arts of magical combat.”

“Even then though, Mega, that magical skill didn’t help him against the relentless attacks of Silver.”

“You’re not wrong there Mike, the terrifying spectacle of power we witnessed yesterday was quite something. Aurora Blaze stood there confident in her abilities. She stood her ground, firing her spells at Silver, which he dodged with the grace of an accomplished dancer, ducking and weaving between each spell as he moved ever closer to her.”

“And just as he reached her and swung his swords at her it appeared she had erected a magical barrier between them. Silver didn’t seem to care about that though as he thrashed against the barrier repeatedly with his blades until he realised it was no use.”

“Yes, if it were any other pony they would have taken a step back and thought of a way to get around that barrier, but Silver instead opted to take a step back and attack the barrier with his energy waves.”

“We thought we had seen his destructive power in the first match hadn’t we Mega?”

“Yes indeed, now imagine our surprise when out of nowhere he starts firing these waves relentlessly upon this poor filly, all she could do was sit inside her magical barrier and hope for it to blow over.”

“Sadly, by the time Silver had finished his attack we had another pony that needed treating in the hospital and a severely battered stadium.

“Yes, quite a sight was it not? His reflexes in that fight show that Gray here may have some trouble hitting him with that crossbow.”

“Right you are, his speed and maneuverability rival that of Gray’s. And his destructiveness seems to be on a whole other level to anything we’ve seen before.”

“Well, without further ado Mike, let’s get the final stage of this tournament underway.”

“On one side of the ring, all the way from Manehattan, we have the crossbow wielding dead shot. Artemis’ Gift himself, Gray Matter!”

“And on the other side, all the way from Baltimare, the Reaper’s Right Hand himself, Silver Slicer!”

Upon the end of the announcers’ statements, two figures stepped onto the field of battle.

On the right, Gray Matter. His dark grey mane swayed in a breeze that rolled through the stadium upon his entrance. He stood on his hind legs and clutched his crossbow readily between his hooves, loaded and ready to go.

On the left, Silver Slasher. His light grey coat occasionally flashed in the light and gave off the same silver color as his mane. Unlike his opponent, he grasped his dual weapons in an almost disinterested manner, and didn’t even bother to eye his opponent.

“Three... Two... One... Fight!” The announcers shouted in unison.

The instant the announcers called the beginning of the match, Gray sprang from his readied stance and started running clockwise around the arena while firing a few bolts off at Silver.

Silver, as if he knew they were coming, simply stepped out of the way of the bolts with unnatural ease.

With a grimace, Gray continued his run around the arena, keeping up the pressure by firing bolts at Silver whilst keeping his distance from the pony that had barely moved from his starting position. Amongst the bolts Gray was firing was a special vine bolt which had seemingly missed and hit the ground near Silver.

Silver, not caring or seeing the bolt, continued lazily dodging the oncoming projectiles.

Gray watched as Silver disregarded his bolt and then focused his normal bolts onto one side of Silver, attempting to push him towards the waiting trap near his hooves.

Silver walked right into the waiting trap. Vines shot out of the ground and quickly entangled the unsuspecting stallion.

Gray smiled as he noticed his trap had worked, and set about firing several bolts imbued with fire magic towards the trapped stallion.

“Heh... heh heh heh.” Silver laughed eerily right before the flame bolts struck him. In the instant of impact, he suddenly moved. With a twirl of his blades and a few flaps of his wings, he destroyed the vines and dodged the bolts. “Nice try, foe!” He shouted almost laughingly.

As this happened, Gray had come to a halt as he stared in amazement. “You’re joking right?” he said in disbelief. “Those vines should be more than enough to trap you!” he stated.

“Energy Wave!” Silver replied. He swung one of his katanas, and a crescent wave of energy flew off of his blade towards Gray.

The energy wave rushing towards Gray snapped him out of his stupor. He rolled to the side to dodge the incoming attack, but even though he rolled away from the oncoming blow, his side was still grazed by the wave.

“C’mon, you can do better than that!” Silver shouted aggressively. Gray’s ears flicked up as the sound of wingbeats approached him.

Gray turned his head to direction of the sound and fired more crossbow bolts at the flying form of Silver.

Silver faltered in mid-air and had to roll awkwardly away from the bolts. However, one struck him square in his right wing, sending him plummeting into the ground.

“Ha! Where’re your cocky words now? Good luck trying to fly with that wing now.” Gray barked with aggressiveness easily rivaling his opponent’s previous taunts.

*snap* Silver removed the bloodied bolt from his wing. “You kidding? I’ve taken harder hits from slingshots!” Silver dashed towards Gray with a sadistic smile after finishing his statement.

Gray grimaced once again at his foe, but had no time to think about Silver’s resilience, or skill. Instead Gray took out his knife and held it in his right hoof alongside his crossbow, which sat in his left. Using both his crossbow and knife he took up a defensive stance against Silver.

Silver closed in with no sign of intending to show Gray any mercy. His obvious mastery of his blades presented itself as he mercilessly beat against Gray’s defence, throwing his opponent off in mere seconds. Instead of continuing his vicious slashing streak, he lifted his blades above his head.

“Over Compensation!” he shouted. His katanas glowed eerily, then swelled to massive proportions. “I’m compensating, for you!” he brought down both of the massive blades onto Gray, sending him flying clear to the opposite end of the stadium.

Gray slowly and unsteadily brought himself to his hooves after crashing into the ground. Even when he was up though, the damage he had sustained was apparent. Gradually he brought his crossbow up to draw at Silver, and fired a single blue bolt at his target, who hadn’t noticed Gray’s quick recovery due to the dust his attack had thrown up.

Silver, still trying to recover from the energy drain of using his attack, didn’t have a chance to dodge the oncoming attack.

After noticing that his attack had been successful, Gray took full advantage of the effects of his “ice bolt” and fired relentlessly attack the immobile figure of Silver, and to his satisfaction, was rewarded by the sound of numerous bolts hitting their target.

“That should be the end of it.” Gray said, his exhaustion apparent in his voice.

“.... GrrrrrrrrRAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!” the frozen figure of Silver suddenly burst outward, sending ice fragments everywhere. “Energy Wave!” he swung his right sword and sent another energy wave at his opponent.

Gray quickly snapped to attention after hearing the outburst from Silver, and realised that there was no way he could dodge the oncoming wave of energy, and instead brought up his crossbow. “Then how about this? Energy bolt!” he shouted as he fired a large bolt from his crossbow to counter Silver’s own attack.

”Energy Wave!” Silver retorted cleverly while sending another wave at Gray.

“Energy bolt!” Gray countered wittily.

”Energy Wave!” Silver offered as an insightful rebuttal.

“Energy bolt!” Gray raised, the stakes were high in this game and one had to keep ahead of his opponent.

”Energy Wave!” Silver went all in, a worthwhile investment from his point of view.

“Energy bolt!” Gray also went all in, a gutsy move from a smart pony like himself, but he wasn’t about to let his foe outbid him yet.

Silver raised his sword for another wave, but both of his weapons fell from his hooves. He stared at his opponent angrily, gasping for breath and unable to move any further.

Gray looked as worn out as Silver, and tried to raise his crossbow to get a shot off at him, but just like Silver he too find himself unable to hold onto his weapon, and his crossbow fell to the ground, where he found himself a moment later.

Silver hit the ground at the same time as his opponent, causing the entire crowd to go silent.

“Ladies and gentlecolts... for the first time in Equestrian Ultimate Fighting history, we have a tie!” Mike screamed to the crowd. The crowd remained entirely silent, for the most part.

”Wooooooooo! That was great!”