Chapter 72
Chapter 72 - Wedding Vows
After her first attack failed to be effective, Sunset decided against continuing a possibly futile offence. Instead, she decided to take advantage of the time Chrysalis was spending in her self-healing to prepare herself for the upcoming battle.
Sunset started doing that by closing her eyes and turning her focus inward, into her own being. It could be said that such was the basis for all magic, for the root of magic was the soul, and only through awareness of one's soul was it possible to harness this power.
However, Sunset was taking the action of focusing on the self to the most extreme level. Instead of simply recognizing her soul, Sunset was focusing on the very core of it, she was piercing through her own identity created through countless experiences and interactions in order to find the true origin of her being.
Such implacable introspection wasn't something that came naturally, and Sunset had only managed to achieve that impossible degree of inward focus through her training with Princess Celestia and her own determination. The alicorn had told her that very few existences had ever managed to do that during the course of known history.
Mostly, it was her own determination that allowed her to carry through with the equivalent of stripping herself of her very identity, reducing her being into something that was only barely not nothing. The trainings with Celestia, where she fought the alicorn and lost more times than she cared to count, only served to get her into the right frame of mind in that she could even attempt that feat.
And the reason for all of that was the fight they had with Flames of Annihilation. Sunset had seen the result of a pursuit of power that had taken everything away from a pony, down to their very identity. She rejected such an ending for herself, so she decided to do the exact opposite. Instead of pursuing power, she sought after identity.
While looking inside herself, Sunset realized why one would throw away their own self. Seeking identity did not inherently lead to power, as one's identity at their very core was just as one being one many, without any special traits or qualities. But by accepting that, Sunset reached an even deeper truth.
While she was just one of many, her decisions made her unique. She could choose to grab her own importance instead of having a role decided for her. She could decide to make countless connections, creating a chain that would continue affecting the world even long after her death, and even if she was forgotten.
Sunset took upon this understanding and will, making it the root of her new magic. Everything she was boiled down to what she wanted to be, and there was one desire that she held closer and dearer than any other. And perhaps it was fate that Princess Celestia was the one to help her unlock that power.
For Sunset's desire, what she had held in her heart from even before she could remember, was to become closer to Celestia. Her cutie mark was proof of it, her job was proof of it, and even during the hardest times what kept Sunset going was the thought of being Celestia's Knight.
And so, it was no surprise that her power took the form that it did.
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Meanwhile, in another part of Equestria, Celestia and Luna were hard at work against the Congregation of Chaos. Such a powerful mass of chaotic energy was too powerful even for them to deal with without extreme effort. The two sisters were an amazing sight to behold, with Luna dashing all over the place with the speed of shadows, attacking with lunar blades that were able to hit things in their very essence.
Meanwhile Celestia was constantly teleporting while maintaining dozens of illusions of herself to throw off the enemy while she repeatedly charged and unleashed attacks powerful enough to destroy cities. Those two were truly showing the power and experience of such ancient alicorns, but that only served to show how powerful the Congregation of Chaos was.
Because all they were trying to do was prevent that chaotic event from reaching any closer to habitated cities. Simply beating it would not be enough, as the very nature of such chaos made it extremely resilient to any efforts geared towards eliminating the mayhem it would cause. Most likely, even if it was defeated, some parts of it would escape and split off to cause chaotic incidents in several other places.
They couldn't afford to allow that, as they'd need to split the Knights to deal with those incidents, which was far too dangerous to do when Tirek was so close to breaking free.
So instead they were trying to exhaust most of the Congregation's chaotic potential while keeping it in one piece. That would serve to slow it down to give the Knights more time to prepare as well as allowing all of them to fight it together to prevent possible issues.
Celestia and Luna had connected their minds in order to coordinate better, and so Luna realized immediately when her sister suddenly became a lot happier for some reason.
'What happened?' She asked, sparing only a small portion of her attention in order to communicate.
'My little pony has finally grown up.' Was the answer, which Luna did not quite understand and decided to ask for elaboration later.
Due to her profound connection with the sun, it was no surprise that Celestia could feel several aspects related to it, and so she was able to tell when a pony she knew very well started channeling its power.
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At that moment, Sunset started drawing in the energy of the sun. That wasn't the kind of power that could be channeled lightly, even though she was only using a small portion of it. But Sunset could do it, that was her decision, that was where her origin had taken her, that was what her experiences allowed her.
The power coursed through her body without harming it, just like how Celestia could use it freely. Sunset wasn't an alicorn but she could mimic the way Celestia's body handled the magic to a certain extent, which was more than enough when combined with her armor's feature of reducing the burden of magic on her body.
That power was mixed with Sunset's own magic in a form similar to Trance Mode, thus giving birth to a result greater than simply Sunset's magic plus sun power. That energy infused every part of her body and harmonized perfectly with her mind, allowing her to use it just as well as her own power, to the point Sunset could instinctively adjust her spells to her new capabilities without the slightest issue.
In a mix between the body enhancement magic Sunset used, and the essence armor magic from the Black Knight, which Sunset had studied but never really mastered, her power fused her body and armor as one. And the Awakening Armor proved itself to be exactly as Rarity had designed, accepting Sunset's new spell without the slightest dissonance, transforming as a result.
The sun sigils on it changed from being mostly like Celestia's cutie mark to variations of Sunset's own cutie mark, and they were no longer static, instead shifting like the actual sun, while their colors moved around in a battle of dominance, sometimes mostly red, and sometimes mostly yellow.
The rest of the armor seemed to have become alive, "breathing" along with Sunset. And from the sides of it sprouted wings made of the same material as the rest of the armor, conjured from magic. Together with it, Sunset spread her awareness throughout the whole battlefield, expanding her domain. But instead of the usual spell for it, she instead used the very light of the sun crossing the space to serve as a medium.
With this, she could cast spells from anywhere on the battlefield, regardless of distance. And the first spell she cast was a variation on Rarity's fire wings, to give herself mobility far beyond anything she had been capable of before. Finally, Sunset was ready for the fight of her life. That was everything she had.
"This is... The Essence of my Heart." She spoke in a trance, declaring her technique without even realizing.
All of that takes a while to describe, but in fact Sunset's transformation took almost no time at all, to the point where Chrysalis recovered only just fast enough to hear the unicorn's words.
Still, that was just the bare minimum necessary for Sunset to even be able to fight Chrysalis in the first place. The real test started just after that, when Chrysalis shot in Sunset's direction at Rainbow Dash-like speeds, intending on finishing her off as fast as possible, for she could feel that the unicorn was now powerful enough to possibly pose a threat to her.
'Essence Drive' were the words Sunset spoke in response, not with her mouth, but with her very soul.
And Chrysalis had to suddenly turn upside down and change half her body back into the black mist, for that was the only possible defense when Sunset teleported right above her, already casting a spell capable of annihilating mountains.
Sunset couldn't move that fast, but with her domain covering the whole battlefield, she could teleport anywhere within it utterly instantly. And she didn't need to cast a spell either, for the Essence Drive was enough to cover all that she did within that moment.
Instead of a spell, it could be said that Essence Drive was more like a point of view, a shift in her soul to allow her will to apply itself to the world without a medium. If one were to try and translate what that point of view meant, the closest they could get would be the word 'overwhelm'. And as such, all actions dedicated solely to overwhelming the enemy could be performed freely.
Chrysalis parried the blast with her mist, forcing herself sideways and out of the area of effect. And on that same instant, the blast disappeared without any traces, the spell simply ceasing to exist when Sunset willed it instead of having to be specifically canceled.
And she had already teleported just behind Chrysalis' movement, tackling her with a body enveloped in flame and power.
Chrysalis shifted her mist, switching the halves' states and thus placing her mist in direct opposition with Sunset's attack, molding it into a drill to destroy her opponent along with their attack. But in the next moment a new spell appeared on the opposite side of her, released from thin air thanks to Sunset's domain, an arrow of diamond and solidified light.
Despite her surprise, Chrysalis reacted swiftly. She unmade her drill and remade it into a wing, whose powerful flap made her evade upwards. At the same time, her mist started shivering as if there was something inside it that was trying to escape. Sunset immediately recognized it as a problem, and so she took action.
'Essence Hold' Came another declaration from her soul.
It was just in time, for Chrysalis followed her dodge with shifting her mist into mouths and releasing a powerful wail. And as soon as it was released, balls of flame appeared all over the battlefield, up and down, left and right and everywhere else. Sunset's amazing feat instantly heated all the air on the battlefield, disturbing the magical soundwave into harmless dispersion.
And that wasn't the only thing, for once again a powerful attack appeared from Chrysalis' blind spot, that time a bolt of lightning formed into a spear. Chrysalis shoved her mist into it like a giant swatting a javelin away, following it up by spitting a drop of blood into the sky, which grew into a gigantic black shadow.
Chrysalis understood that the light was key to Sunset's domain, so she would get rid of it.
Of course, Sunset would not allow that. Before the shadow could cover everything, it was enveloped by an even bigger tridimensional spell formation conjured out of thin air. Said spell formation 'blinked' before its components were connected by lines of light that restrained the growth of the shadow before closing on it like a vice.
That word, 'restrain', was the meaning of the new point of view Sunset had added. It represented spells designed to restrain the enemy and their actions. But the best part about the way those points of view worked was the fact that it wasn't an either/or thing. Instead of switching between points of view, new ones were added, expanding her capabilities. The biggest problem with that was the fact that Sunset couldn't simply invoke all of them at the start of the battle, having to add them slowly as the fight progressed. But of course, slow was relative.
Just as the shadow was restrained, Sunset once again appeared out of an instant teleport right next to Chrysalis, but under her that time. And her attack was a dozen arrows of fire coming from the unicorn's position, along with a circular band of energy above Chrysalis, ready to restrain her if she tried to run.
The changeling queen did not run, as she would not fall for such an obvious trap. Her mist turned into a huge sharp wing, which flapped powerfully, the air pressure preventing the arrows from moving closer. And at the same time, the flap brought the sharp tip of the wing right on top of Sunset.
The Knight's aura resisted the attack, an impressive feat considering that the non-defense focused Knights had been immediately defeated by similar attacks. But Chrysalis did not waste any time being surprised, immediately putting more power into the wing and shattering Sunset's aura barrier.
Thus falling into her more subtle trap.
As soon as Sunset's aura shield broke, she teleported away, completely escaping injury. And the shattered pieces of her aura turned into chains that held onto Chrysalis' shapeshifted wing and prevented her from moving or changing it for crucial moments.
In these hard-earned moments, Sunset reappeared next to her restraining band of energy, punching into it and turning it into a gauntlet. At that same time, the fire arrows seemed to explode with renewed energy and pierced towards Chrysalis with increased speed. Sunset also punched with her gauntlet, generating an explosion just to increase her speed and timing the attack to hit at the same time as the arrows.
The changeling queen simply had no time to break through the restraints in her wing before the strike hit, so she was forced to simply use whatever portion of the mist she could still control in order to put up a hasty defence.
Sunset's attack broke through that mist and struck right at the still physical half of her body.
"GRAAAGH!!" Chrysalis screamed, breaking through the restriction and swiping her mist at Sunset in a space piercing attack, forcing her into a hasty teleport to dodge it.
The Knight did the mental equivalent of a frown, it seemed like normal attacks were just not enough to sufficiently harm Chrysalis, even with Sunset's greatly enhanced version of 'normal'. So it was time to go even further.
'Essence Charge' She added a third point of view.
At that moment, Chrysalis counter-attacked, swiping with her mist in such a way that it broke apart and distorted space, attacking the whole area of the battlefield all at once. Sunset teleported to one of the areas attacked by the least amount of fragments, conjuring a ring of fire that twisted like a helix and absorbed the shards of mist that were coming in their direction.
However, Chrysalis appeared to have decided to mimic Sunset, and launched another attack almost at the same time, dashing at a speed that was almost like the Knight's teleportation, spreading her mist into a sphere around both herself and Sunset. The mist hummed with magic power, and the unicorn realized that it was blocking her teleportation.
However, the effort needed to enclose herself with her opponent meant that Chrysalis' next attack was slightly delayed, giving Sunset the opportunity to retaliate. She flapped her fire wings to shoot herself straight at the changeling queen, she pulled back one hoof to unleash a punch enveloped by a corona of power that resembled a comet.
Chrysalis decided to defend that one with her own body, using the rest of the black mist that wasn't otherwise occupied, she raised her left foreleg (now her only foreleg).
The impact was massive, and Chrysalis was forced back... a whole pony's length. And once again Sunset's previous thought was proven correct, as even with minimal defenses, that attack was only enough to give the changeling queen superficial wounds. Then things got even worse as the broken off pieces of black mist from her earlier omni-area attack finally came back to Chrysalis.
But once again, the changeling declined to launch an immediate attack, instead taking the time to shape her mist into a wickedly sharp and corrupted looking scythe. Chrysalis had also understood the level of Sunset's defence, and so had prepared a form of attack specifically to deal with it.
The knight used that last bit of time the best way she could, releasing a rain of explosive spells right on top of Chrysalis, which concealed another magical restraint. Then she flapped her wings to evade Chrysalis' exceedingly fast slash. But she hadn't moved away, instead flying to Chrysalis' other side, stopping while at touch range of the changeling queen.
The restraint she had created earlier reached Chrysalis, holding the black mist from reaching a certain circular spot on her back. Sunset once again punched, this time aiming at that exact spot, and managed to break Chrysalis' shell at that point. That was enough to significantly harm Chrysalis', and the slash of her scythe that was coming to reap Sunset slowed down just a tad, giving the knight enough time to avoid the slash by a hairsbreadth.
Then the scythe came again, having spun around Chrysalis' body like a clock hand, forcing Sunset to flap her fire wings once again in order to dodge. And in the following moment, Sunset's blood ran cold as the black mist sphere around them morphed violently, hundreds of spikes sprouting from the parts both above and below them, almost like they were teeth in a mouth.
Or rather, exactly like that, as the sphere compressed itself like a mouth closing, clearly trying to ravage Sunset in between those rows of teeth. It was apparent that the scythe was mostly a distraction and Chrysalis' true killing move was this.
But Sunset's previous attacks had also been a distraction, specifically to prevent Chrysalis from realizing that the previous helix of magic that had absorbed some of her attacks did not in fact disappear afterwards, but quietly grew in power.
That was the result of Sunset's Essence Charge, which had the meaning of Enhance, just like her old technique of magic enhance, except much less rigid and dependent on magic formulas. Just before the mouth could close, Sunset activated that helix, which shot a small cross shaped blast.
A small blast that contained a monumental amount of power. It was absorbed by Sunset, who then released a cataclysmic level of energy in an explosion centered around herself. The mist mouth was broken through and dispersed, and even Chrysalis herself received noticeable heavy injuries and was shot into the distance like a missile.
The result wasn't born solely out of simple power, but also due to the nature of that energy. When the helix absorbed the shards of mist, it used them as a baseline, directing its evolution in the way that would bring the most harm to the type of existence the mist was.
Another cross blast came into her, exhausting the power of the helix. Sunset teleported right above Chrysalis before she could recover and condensed that power into a pyramid of flaming diamond and smashed it into the changeling queen.
Said opponent did not simply stood there to take the attack, of course. She spit out more blood and condensed it into a barrier of black mist that was small but incredibly dense. And the moment before the attack connected with it, Sunset thought she had finally gotten an advantage over Chrysalis, but despite the special nature of her power, the black mist did not break but flowed around the attack, forcing its trajectory away from the changeling.
The Knight realized what had happened almost instantly: Chrysalis had used her shapeshifting abilities to change the nature of her mist on the fly, to the point where her special energy no longer worked as its weak point. That meant Chrysalis had gotten her thoughts in order insanely fast after being hit by that first attack.
By that point, Chrysalis was about to recover most of the mist that had been dispersed during said attack, so Sunset followed her example and changed tactics just as fast. The pyramid of power split into five different spells that teleported back towards Sunset and started spinning around her like satellites. Chrysalis recovered her mist and swept it into Sunset while turning it into some sort of spiked mace.
The Knight dodged towards Chrysalis with a flap of wings and was completely unsurprised to see that her straightforward attack had simply been a cover for something else, in that case hidden mist emerging from the air around Sunset to try and envelop her.
One of the spells around the Knight which resembled a small pawprint activated with a flash and accelerated Sunset into supersonic speed very briefly, just long enough to crash into Chrysalis like a runaway cart wearing a heavy suit of armor. The impact, while violent, only caused superficial injuries on Chrysalis, but it did surprise her enough to give Sunset time to bring another of her spells to bear, that one shaped like a hammerhead.
Chrysalis reacted just before being hit by the conjured plane of force, but instead of defending, she attacked, ignoring the heavy wounds what remained of her body suffered in favor of shooting all her spare mist at Sunset in a zero range wave of death, which easily broke through the Knight's aura... only to be stopped by her armor.
Sunset's previous "desperate" dodges were simply to give the impression that her aura was her biggest defence, while in fact her armor was tougher by a whole level after the melding with her skin from her powered up State.
Sunset then brought to bear the last two spells she had floating around her, shaped like a half sphere and a spear respectively, and combined the two into a sort of technological lance, with the half-sphere acting as both hand guard and power focuser, and it drew power from the environment at a rate that could be seen by unaided eyes, power that was melded with the straight part of the spear, causing it to hum powerfully like a contained storm.
Finally, Sunset stabbed with her overwhelmingly powerful spell construct, and that's when the true point of her attack became clear. Because while it seemed exceedingly strong, it was simply not enough for a frontal confrontation with Chrysalis, who had already recovered enough mist to create a defense capable of blunting that attack, if not completely blocking it.
In fact, that was what she tried to do, but suddenly her control of the mist slipped for a single moment, courtesy of a restraining spell. A restraining spell that acted from inside her own body.
Earlier, Sunset had split the pyramid into five spells. One was used to tackle Chrysalis, another was used to trick Chrysalis into a bad exhange of blows, and two had been fused into that final attack. That was only four.
The fifth spell was the subtlest of them all. It was shaped like mist, and when Sunset hit Chrysalis and cracked her outer shell, the mist stealthily infiltrated her body, all for the purpose of preventing her from defending at a crucial moment.
Sunset had indeed learned a few things from growing up with Trixie.
The spear pierced through Chrysalis' shell easily, then unleashed the full might of its focused power into her. An attack definitely powerful enough to take down even one as powerful and resilient as the changeling queen.
And yet, the fight did not end there, as in the last moment, the remaining half of Chrysalis' body also turned into black mist, with a sound that was like a screech coming from thousands of mouths at once. The unleashed power of the spell pierced into the mist, causing a series of ear-rending explosions and forcing it a long distance away from Sunset.
For a moment, the Knight thought Chrysalis had fully turned into mist, but she managed to catch a glimpse of an insect-sized version of her being protected by the thickest layers of blackness. It seemed that, even for a shapeshifter on the level of Chrysalis, achieving full formlessness without losing oneself was too difficult.
Once again Sunset's blood ran cold, as she realized two things: One, it was clear that her spell had been effective, and she had caused a grave injury on her opponent. Two, it was just as clear that, even though the power she had shown before was amazing, their battle had pushed Chrysalis' strength even higher. This was it. She was about to face an evolved Changeling Queen.
So, there was only one thing Sunset could do. She had to use everything.
'Essence Shift.' Her heart spoke, adding the fourth and final point of view.
That point of view represented "change", the power of difference. But that was overshadowed by the effect it had as being the last remaining step of Sunset's State changing spell.
When it was uttered, the Knight changed visibly, and yet in a way that was nearly impossible to describe. Sunset appeared to have been completed, despite the fact that she had not been missing anything beforehand. It wasn't a difference in size or shape, but more in terms of feel. Sunset simply appeared to have truly made that foreign power her own.
It was the completion state of her Essence Heart.
"Unleash Essence: Reverse Eclipse!" She declared a spell for the first time since changing her State.
It wasn't out of choice that she hadn't done it before, but simply because she couldn't. Another of Essence Heart's weaknesses was being unable to declare spells while it was in a half-completed state. Once again, Sunset believed that weakness to be worth it.
Her spell declared, Sunset Moved in a way that was part teleportation, part extreme movement and part drawing herself towards the light, once again appearing right above Chrysalis. And then came the attack, which far overshadowed anything that had been used in the battle thus far.
An eclipse was when the light of the sun was blocked, but that was the opposite, granting the light an intensity that was like the Knight had brought the sun into the battlefield. The air in between Sunset and Chrysalis was irradiated by enough heat to briefly turn into plasma, before Sunset's spell forced all the accumulated energy to discharge downwards in a blast of astonishing destructive power.
Chrysalis' response to that was not lacking in any way, as she truly showed the might of her new power. Her mist changed, but instead of the simple shifting of before, what happened was a true transmutation that affected every single characteristic of it.
The mist became a monstrous serpent head, which opened its mouth to show endless rows of razor-sharp teeth, and from the dark depths of said maw came a torrent of red fire that shot towards Sunset's spell like a geyser. The fire clashed with the light, and seemed to absorb it, quickly brightening into a majestic golden color before crystalizing itself into a line of solid energy that punched through Sunset's spell and forced her to teleport away at the last moment.
Only part of her spell had been absorbed, though, so Chrysalis still had to deal with a great mass of focused radiation bearing down on her.
She changed again, and this time it was even more astonishing, as there didn't appear to have been an in between state, simply Chrysalis being something one moment, and a completely different thing the next. Her new form was a terrifying beetle, with legs numbering in the thousands and a shell that was not only white, but the whitest thing that Sunset could ever conceive. The shell was so unspeakably white that a good part of the light energy of the Knight's spell was bounced away.
"Core Essence: Infinite Spells!" Sunset hastily declared as soon as she realized that her spell wasn't working.
In response, tens of thousands of spells were formed all throughout the battlefield. All of them were offensive, intended to attack Chrysalis, but each of them was different and unique, as Sunset poured all of her memory and experiences into her creation spell, to serve as a "map" to help them form.
Those spells were formed quickly, and they were fired just as quickly in a massive wave of magic.
Their target, Chrysalis, responded to that in a very specific way.
"Outsider Form." She declared a spell of her own.
There was another change, and the beetle turned into something much stranger: It was an arm, huge and black and scaled, with clawed fingers. That arm appeared to be coming out from a rift in space which was apparently also part of the transformation.
The arm swiped through the air once, and it somehow hit the entire battlefield, despite being far from big enough to accomplish said feat.
All of Sunset's spells were broken by that swipe, and she herself was sent flying through the air, feeling like she had been hit with a building. However, Sunset recovered with astonishing speed, her current durability being such that even a strong hit like that wasn't enough to seriously hinder her.
Still, Chrysalis's current capabilities were a problem, specially given that her battle rhythm seemed to have completely changed. There was only one way she could see to have any chance of winning. So, Sunset took it.
"Essence Domain!" She declared, and endless waves of power exploded from her body.
That power, conjured from the most pure essence of Sunset, quickly spread through the entire battlefield, filling it to the point where it seemed like Sunset was everywhere at once. She then launched herself forward with a powerful firey tackle, while still releasing her energy nonstop.
That same energy allowed Sunset to move at unbelievable speeds, like she was being pulled forward by the traces of her own self in the air. It was to the point where it took less time than the blink of an eye for Sunset to reach her enemy.
Chrysalis' next transformation was even faster, however. She was suddenly become an eagle-like creature with two pairs of wings and three pairs of legs, and flapped those wings to unleash the equivalent of a tornado straight on top of the approaching Knight.
Sunset did not dodge, and in fact she didn't need to. The wind seemed to avoid her of its own accord, and the Knight managed to ram into Chrysalis with full power, releasing a big explosion that caused the first noticeable harm her enemy had received ever since her power up.
That was the effect of the Essence Domain. Sunset's power was creating an area of control that gave her an unparalleled advantage in any fight. But there was one problem with that technique: Given that she had to keep constantly emitting power over the entire battlefield to keep it going, it was exceedingly draining.
Three times as draining as anything else Sunset had done in her life, in fact. She could only use the technique for a total of five seconds, as anything more would damage her own body and impair her for the rest of the fight. But that was okay, because she didn't plan on using it for more than that.
She didn't need to.
Chrysalis retaliated by shifting into something like an ursa with praying mantis blades, one of which she swung while giving the edge a red tint. The changeling had realized very quickly that projectile attacks would be innefective.
The slash was extremely fast, but Sunset dodged it as if she had known it was coming ahead of time, once more moving through her own energy like a combination of swimming and teleportation, avoiding even the invisible extension of the blade by a hair's breath, once again thanks to her Domain.
Sunset attacked with a punch that turned her hoof into a golden comet, piercing through the "skin" of Chrysalis' current form to unleash its power inside. With that, Essence Domain had been active for two seconds.
The changeling queen managed to shift fast enough to avoid most of the damage from that attack by turning into a monstrous worm with scales and legs like a centipede. She bent downwards to bring her fangs towards Sunset, while also releasing countless razor sharp scales to attack at the same time.
The Knight teleported on top of the enermy's head, allowing some of the scales that had less energy to hit her, since her defense could handle it.
"Essence Blast!" Sunset declared, releasing a sphere of power that travelled through the entire body of the worm, ravaging it with explosions and forcing Chrysalis into a hasty shift into a butterfly that was five times bigger than normal ones.
With that, Essence Domain had been active for four seconds.
Sunset used the final second on creating a dozen arrows of fire and teleporting them to a seemingly random place a bit above and in front of her. Which was the exact place where Chrysalis teleported to at the same moment, ready for a point blank attack.
The arrows pierced all over her body, but Chrysalis did not abort the attack, releasing a green ring of solidified vibration magic, which bulled through Sunset's Domain with overwhelming power, hitting her and managing to get through both aura and armor defences, damaging her internal organs.
Sunset spit out blood, but the wound wasn't truly serious, and she had things to do. As the last second finished, she cancelled her Domain, while also shooting a small spell that stuck to Chrysalis and after a cry of "Draw!" from Sunset, it attracted all the loose energy on the battlefield, resulting in a series of violent explosions as the energy reacted with the arrows.
Partway through that, Chrysalis shifted into a strange cylindrical shelled being, which seemed like an organism from the deep sea. The last few explosions were mostly resisted by its thick shell.
Those five seconds had been immensely high-intensity, to the point where Sunset had to take a breath and recover a bit. That fact wasn't missed by Chrysalis, who exploded into another shift, this time into some kind of combination of bird and arrow.
She cut through space almost instantly, aiming for Sunset's heart.
The Knight flapped her fire wings and managed to dodge anyway, predicting her attack despite no longer having access to a domain.
Sunset had not wasted her five seconds of power. Her goal had never been to actually defeat Chrysalis in that period, but simply to adapt to her opponent's new rhythm. A big part of high level battles was being able to sense the flow of magic of the enemy to get a rough prediction of their attacks, but Chrysalis sudden change had thrown off the Knight's ability to do that. She could adapt in time, but she simply didn't have enough time, as she wouldn't be able to last long being at a disadvantage against an opponent that was already so strong.
So, Sunset used her domain. She collected information from every bit of magic that touched Chrysalis, helped by the injuries she was able to inflict on her opponent. That served the double function of allowing her to change the flow of battle as well as quickly adapt her senses to the Changeling Queen's new fighting style.
It was at that point when the battle entered its final stage.
"Essence Crash: Light Fantastic!" Sunset declared.
Dozens of magical prisms manifested themselves all around the two fighters. The light was refracted by them, creating dozens of rainbows, but only briefly. Almost before their colors could be seen, those rainbows were filtered by Sunset's magic, removing all of their colors. What was left behind was a mysterious existence that was at the same time both a color and not. The phantasmal eighth color.
The beams of that hidden color mixed together and created a ray of magical power directed at Chrysalis.
"Nine Lives Blade Shift." Chrysalis responded.
In the middle of her words, the Changeling Queen teleported nine times at once, splitting herself into nine bodies similar to her original one, so the second half of her spell was spoken from nine mouths at once. The nine slashed with blades grown from their legs, and they had appeared to completely surround Sunset, blocking both space and magic to prevent any possible escape.
"Knight Essence!" Sunset declared grimly.
All of her remaining power was focused on every defense the Knight could muster. She knew it wouldn't be possible to evade without giving up on her attack, so that was the best she could do.
The nine blades hit all at once. They annihilated Sunset's aura defense, cut through her enhanced armor and even managed to dig into her body and release a few strands of power that were burned away by her target's magic before they could deal too much internal damage.
Sunset grit her teeth in pain, but reached out with her aura to hold the nine bodies of Chrysalis in place for just long enough for the powerful ray to wash over them. The Knight was completely unaffected by the strange light, but every one of the changeling's bodies started melting at a visible pace, as if that light was both exceedingly hot and radioactive to her.
Chrysalis unleashed another powerful shriek to try and escape, but the magical ray prevented her from putting enough power into the sound. Her wail became even louder as she forcefully fused her nine bodies back together, thus managing to escape from Sunset's hold.
"Essence Rush!" Sunset refused to give her any time to rest. That spell drew in the remaining light of the ray into her body, coloring Sunset herself with the strange appearance of that light. She then dashed through the air at full speed and rammed into Chrysalis.
The attack broke through the enemy's shell, but wasn't quite enough to harm the 'true body' inside. Chrysalis did not allow a second chance:
"State Shift!" She declared, and her body flowed into liquid form, splashing over Sunset. And it wasn't any ordinary liquid, but some kind of magical acid that ate through the armor, burned the flesh and blinded her left eye.
Sunset screamed in unimaginable pain, but still managed to declare another spell:
"Essence Sun!" And an artificial sun manifested itself on top of her position. Once again she wasn't harmed by her magic, but the sun was so unbelievably hot that Chrysalis' liquid form was instantly sublimated into gas and then plasma, exploding all over the battlefield at near-relativistic speeds.
That was obviously very painful as well, and Chrysalis would have screamed had she a mouth at the time. Instead, the only indication of damage she gave was the delay before her next attack, which allowed Sunset to raise her sun above herself.
It was just barely enough, though. And Chrysalis' next spell came before she could do anything else.
"World Shift..." She chanted, and took advantage of her form being spread around the battlefield, shifting into and englobing everything around it, thus managing to cut Sunset off from the power of the sun.
The Knight still had the power gathered until the previous moment, however, and she poured every bit of it into her created sun for the only spell with a chance to save her.
"Twin Sun!" She managed to declare, despite Chrysalis' space getting into her mouth and trying to choke her out and cut her throat at the same time.
The artificial sun shone, imitating the real thing to the best of Sunset's abilities. And through its similarity, she managed to create a connection to the true sun. It was just a brief connection, but It gave the Knight another burst of power, allowing her to shoot a powerful beam of solar energy upwards as if trying to reach its celestial counterpart.
That beam burned away at the space created by Chrysalis, destroying a good portion of it and forcing her to withdraw.
Sunset shot a thousand beams of energy from her sun into Chrysalis' new position, and made to follow up with a teleport into her, but the spell fizzled out mid-cast. With barely a trace of hesitation, she redid the magic, this time spending slightly longer to make sure it formed properly.
"Kheires Shift!" Chrysalis shouted before the attacks arrived, turning into a round monster with dozens of arms that batted aside the energy beams. But that delayed her enough for Sunset to arrive and declare another spell:
"Essence Blade!" She shouted, and the remaining energy of her manifested star gathered into a luminous blade of magic that floated above her horn.
Sunset slashed with it repeatedly, slowly cutting through the arms of Chrysalis' new form. But the changeling started simply conjuring new arms, and even adding a second blade to her attacks wasn't enough to break through her defenses.
It was at that point that Sunset was forced to face an unfortunate fact: She was probably unable to win the fight. There was still a chance, if she went all or nothing and bet on some really risky plan, but even then the chance was low. The reason she thought that was her previous failure at forming her teleport spell.
That failure was simply the most visible symptom of the real problem: Sunset was rapidly approaching her limits. That was the first time she managed to achieve the Essence Heart state, and the exhaustion and mental burden of both using powerful spells and keeping up said state together with the mental pressure of fighting such a deadly opponent plus the injuries she had received...
Simply put, all that together caused that one mistake, and as the situation worsened, the mistakes would pile up and become worse until Chrysalis managed to take advantage of one of them and decide the fight.
It was truly unfortunate to lose the first actual fight she had while in Essence Heart form, but it would be even more unfortunate to fail her mission. And losing to Chrysalis didn't necessary mean failing the mission.
"Celestial Seed Form!"
Chrysalis changed into a huge seed that expanded even further while also growing spikes, finally managing to break through Sunset's relentless double-bladed assault. And that was the moment when Sunset put her new plan into action. Instead of resisting the force, she went along with it, being shoved backwards at high speed. Sunset also quickly dropped her altitude until she had landed on top of the dome shield.
The Knight then took a look at Chrysalis, smiled and dropped every single one of her external defenses, with even the armor disappearing. All that power was condensed inside her body, hiding completely.
That sight actually caused Chrysalis to hesitate for a split second, as she couldn't fathom Sunset's true aim. However, the changeling queen soon charged forward with all her strength, knowing that regardless of the possibility of a trap, she simply couldn't afford to allow Sunset time to prepare something big.
Turning into a strange elongated bird with a cry of "Quetz Form!", Chrysalis flapped her two enormous wings once, accelerating to supersonic speeds even in the very small (comparatively) distance between her and Sunset. The beak of the beard was a broad and sharp spear, and it pierced straight through Sunset's body, coming out the other side, leaving an injury bigger than the pony's own head.
Yet, were Chrysalis' current form capable of showing expressions, one would have seen her face darkening at that moment, while Sunset smiled (though it was wan, because of the pain). The immense energy inside the Knight's body had managed to force Chrysalis' attack away from any critical areas (Well, critical for a Knight. Most ponies would consider losing a head sized portion of their torso to be pretty critical).
The changeling queen immediately flapped her wings again moving backwards to try and escape whatever Sunset was trying to do. However, it turned out to be pointless. The Knight's trap wasn't getting Chrysalis to get close, but to get Chrysalis to wound her... All to get a sufficient Grudge.
And with her eyes shining with aggression Sunset finally called her spell:
"Grand Curse: Chained Heart!"
All the power Sunset had gathered instantly shifted into a foul energy. Half of it started swirling within her body, while the other half instantly appeared all around Chrysalis, who shifted again and again, teleporting all over to try and evade it, but to no avail.
The true nature of Curse Magic was actually Bonds (So the Crusaders would probably be pretty good at it, once their studies reached that point). Except, it was based on negative bonds instead of positive ones, and that particular magic took all the grudge of Sunset to form an unescapable bond with the one who had injured her so. That was something only the three original Knights could possibly do. They had spent their entire lives apprenticed to Celestia, and had learned the theory of various powerful magics that had been used by past Knights.
They could not use them as well as they could their own specialties, but they could still be quite effective. Meanwhile, the newer Knights had no time to focus on anything other than their specializations, making them less versatile, though not necessarily weaker.
Regardless, the energy invaded Chrysalis' body at the same time as it condensed in Sunset's, forcing the Changeling back into her regular form. And it didn't stop there, as the opening on Sunset's torso allowed one to see as the energy took on physical form, shaping itself into spiked chains that wrapped themselves around her heart. The Knight could not help but scream, and it was echoed by Chrysalis, as the curse mirrored its effects on her.
The changeling crashed to the "ground" (still the top of the shield) unable to even move anymore. That was the basic nature of curses, harming oneself in order to harm one's opponent. In truth, there was no actual harm done to either of them, as even Sunset's current grudge wasn't enough to achieve such effects against such a powerful opponent. The only thing it caused was Pain.
It was actually preferable, as the Knight was already too injured, and it was all she could do to keep the curse active. Any more than that and she wouldn't be able to bear it. Even then, the pain was horrendous, as proven by the fact that even the half-crazed Chrysalis was unable to bear it... at first.
After a few seconds, the changeling managed to force herself upright, and started crawling towards Sunset with an unbending will. She knew that the curse would be cancelled if she managed to land even a single blow. The Knight, by contrast, was far from capable of moving, and could only watch as Chrysalis reached closer and closer.
Soon, Sunset could see the color of Chrysalis' eyes, then the twitch of her lips as she bore the pain, and then they were almost close enough to touch-
Someone landed in between the two, leading to a moment of confusion. Then they noticed it was a pegasus. Then they noticed that she was Venus.
Upon seeing her target so close, the Changeling Queen lost all control. She managed to force her uncooperative body to leap forward, already opening her mouth to bite... And fell back to the ground, one of her back legs having been caught by something... A piece of shield. And it was at that moment when Chrysalis realized that Venus was whispering something.
+0+
Earlier
"Looks like we win." Shining Armor said with a sigh. He had been using remote viewing through his shield to keep an eye on the battle, and he had just seen Chrysalis reaction to Sunset's curse "The enemy's guard could not be any more down."
"Yeah." Spike agreed "But since they're connected, attacking Chrysalis will definitely break the spell, so we need to put everything into one attack."
"I'll do it." Venus declared "Rarity said she wanted to give me my gift after the wedding if it was possible, but using it is our best bet to finish things off smoothly." She smiled "I'll just have to act surprised when she gives it to me."
Nearby, Rarity's unconscious body twitched.
Shining Armor's smiled at his fiancee's words, but then his expression dropped "She's getting up!" He exclaimed.
Spike did not waste any time. He immediately sent a message to one of the guards who was close to where the gifts had been put, and it was a unicorn guard that was good at teleportation.
Still, it took three whole seconds for the guard to arrive with the packaged gift, which Venus immediately snatched out of his telekinectic grip and annihilated with a lightning bolt, leaving only the gift inside.
It was a leg ring, one very elaborate ring colored light grey that seemed to highlight Venus' beauty by contrast (of course, since it was Rarity who designed it), the ring was covered in dense magical designs, but they formed an artistic whole instead of looking like something functional. All in all, it was an acessory that did not draw too much attention to itself, but seemed very elegant when it was noticed.
None of that was noticed by the pegasus in the moment. She shoved her left foreleg through it and her mind was immediately provided with a series of instructions on how to use that artefact (Rarity called that an "additional service"). Turning around, she saw that her groom had already opened a hole in the shield, and Spike was breathing an orange fire into it.
Venus launched herself into the air, diving through Spike's fire and being accelerated by it as intended. She was already fast normally, but that spell made her move with enough speed to cause Rainbow Dash to nod her head in approval.
Due to the way Shining Armor had shaped the hole, Venus came out of it facing directly towards the two combatants. She flew towards them, already concentrating her mind for the spell she was going to cast. She landed in between the two, hoping she would have enough time. Venus whispered a few words into the artefact ring very tenderly, then looked up to see that Chrysalis had been stopped by Shining's Shield.
So she realized that there was time to speak. She glared straight at Chrysalis, making sure to look right into her eyes, and spoke "I am Venus, Warrior of Love." She pulled her left foreleg back, as if preparing to punch "And I don't like you." The leg moved forward, and as it moved an overwhelming amount of energy manifested around it.
"Love Sign: Master Spark!" Venus shouted, and unleashed her annihilation of love.
The manifested energy condensed into a cone of pure destructive power that crashed into Chrysalis with overwhelming momentum and carried her into the air.
(With a gasp, Sunset finally let the spell lapse, being unable to endure any longer. She also fell unconscious.)
Chrysalis was suddenly released from the pain, and she immediately tried to shapeshift away, but failed. The same happened when she tried to teleport. The Master Spark was a destructive spell, but it was more than just mindless violence. One of its effects was that the destructive power was capable of disrupting the flow of energy in its vicinity, thus making it far harder to escape.
Carried along by the beam of energy, Chrysalis crashed into the dome forcefield that had been cast over the city. And the spell was still going, a seemingly endless fount of power gushing from Venus's body. Caught between the unstopable force and the immovable object, Chrysalis' body was slowly being ground away.
"GAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!" The changeling queen shouted in primal anger.
She leaned her head backwards, and proceeded to headbutt the spell. And the headbutt contained such force, that for a single moment it overwhelmed the opposing energy.
In that comment, Chrysalis' body shifted. It condensed into the size and shape of a needle, becoming denser than any known natural material. The needle forced itself into the barrier, piercing through and creating a minuscule opening. Then it passed through.
Venus stopped her attack, knowing that there was no point anymore. The needle turned back into Chrysalis outside the barrier, but she looked diminished, as if she had spent part of herself to achieve that stunt. Without even looking back, the Changeling Queen teleported away.
The battle was over. Shining Armor soon retracted his shield and Sunset was taken to receive medical attention and the guards looked around to make sure everything was indeed over. While that was happening, Venus was resting from the exertion and talking with her groom.
"Looks like we couldn't defeat Chrysalis completely." She said.
"That was always a long shot." He replied, shaking his head "But we managed to suceed on the main mission." He smiled "King Thorax is here."
It was true. The neophyte changeling ruler had just arrived right outside the barrier that englobed the city. He had been in standby the whole time, together with a squad of elite changelings, and one of the contingency plans that had been prepared was a teleportation circle to take all of them to the battlefield after the barrier was lowered.
Thankfully enough, that plan didn't prove to be necessary, so instead Thorax came by himself after the battle was over. He still had a role to play, one that had nothing to do with combat.
After reaching so close to the magic barrier he could touch it, King Thorax brought forth the magic of his soul. Both his body and mind resonated with it, as the changeling ruler touched upon the most primal and sacred magic of his race: The hive mind itself.
He wasn't connecting with his own subjects, however, for that wouldn't take as much effort as he was spending (or any effort at all, really), instead Thorax reached out to the many changelings who were still trapped inside the barrier, too weak to even try to escape or hide, specially after being drained by their queen.
Chrysalis herself did not notice anything, the drain of the fight combined with the wear her blood sacrifice magic caused on the connection with her subjects weakened it to the point where she could barely even feel their existence. So she was not able to interfere.
As soon as the changelings realized who was contacting them, they rejected his attempt at a conversation, their loyalty to Chrysalis still unabated despite her recent actions. However, the communication of the hive mind was far deeper and more involved than a simple sharing of thoughts. As such, even as they rejected him, the changelings understood a bit about him.
And that left them surprised, as it was the realization that he had something in common with them: He also loved Chrysalis.
That was something he had realized about himself after becoming a King. Despite her flaws, he still had been a loyal servant to her, and his decision to break away from her control wasn't done without some regret. Thorax had struggled with his contradictory emotions for a while, until he cast his mind far into the past, dozens of generations before his birth, accessing the shared memories of the hive.
He understood that Chrysalis hadn't always been as selfish and obsessed as she currently was. In fact, she had loved the hive with all her soul, and had that love returned. But centuries of strife, persecution and pain had warped her into what she eventually became. Those old days were the root of the loyalty of her changelings, as the shared memory of love from the entire hive had touched all the later generations of her servants, including Thorax himself.
From that realization, a wish was born in the heart of the Changeling King. He wished to be able to heal the heart of Chrysalis, so that the changelings could truly leave behind their history of strife and move on to a bright future, but also because he didn't want her to keep suffering.
Despite being rejected, Thorax did not give up. He patiently reached out to Chrysalis' changelings again and again, and little by little the contact allowed them to understand his feelings and his wish. Slowly their rejections became less vehement as they found that their own feelings closely matched with what the king felt.
Eventually, they were unable to reject Thorax anymore, as that would be like rejecting their own selves. But even still they were not prepared to truly listen to him, their hearts still refusing any idea of betraying Chrysalis.
Thorax did not consider that to be a problem, as a long dialogue was thus started within the hive mind. Each and every one of the changelings had their own thoughts and ideas about Chrysalis' situation, and he met with them in turn, while the communication was also shared between all of them.
Some of them doubted the feasibility of the peaceful coexistence that Thorax was pushing, but he shared with them many of the memories of his own subjects, and how they were being treated by the other races of Equestria.
Others feared that their queen would be harshly punished for her actions against the ponies and Equestria itself, but he shared what he had learned about their practices, how Chrysalis had never done anything that was beyond their forgiveness, how Chrysalis would be able to help them with their crises in exchange for lessening her punishment, and how he promised to share with her whatever that punishment ended up being.
Others still did not think that changing Chrysalis' mind was a possibility, given how long her "new" behavior had already lasted, and how much she had invested in all her schemes and attempts to obtain power. To answer those, Thorax turned the question back on them: Did they think it was possible, or were they just resigned to endure the "new" Chrysalis for the sake of their love for the "old" Chrysalis?
Finally, there were very few changelings remaining unconvinced. Their argument was nothing like any of the others, as they actually agreed with everything Thorax had said, but refused to leave Chrysalis, as they were unwilling to subject Chrysalis to the loneliness of being completely cut off from all other changelings.
However, Thorax had one last surprise in store from them:
"I never intended for you all to join my swarm. All that I ask is that you allow us to connect with you, and thus with Chrysalis. I want her to hear me, but most importantly, I want her to hear the voices of those who refused to follow the her she became." Those were the words that would be written in the history books, but the communication of the network allowed for an entire world of additional meaning that could not be conveyed through a single statement.
Regardless, after that was conveyed, the network of Chrysalis' followers fell into an uncharacteristic silence. Thorax had already said everything he'd meant to, and each of the changelings stopped to think about what decision to take. The time that deliberation lasted was unclear, varying from one account to another, but eventually they began to respond.
At first it was one by one, but soon enough more and more of them joined in voicing their assent for the proposal. Soon enough, all of them had accepted it. And when they realized it, the changelings did the telepathic equivalent of looking around at each other, before they acted as one and opened the connection between Thorax's hive and Chrysalis, serving as intermediaries.
The consequences of that action would only become clear in the future.
+0+
Back on the wedding battlefield, the work of fixing and cleaning everything for the ceremony was proceeding apace. Not that they were particularly hurried, as it had already been decided that the actual wedding would only occur two days later, since even the most injured of the Knights would have recovered enough to take active part in the festivities, which they clearly deserved.
All of them had already gone through the first round of medical care, and were currently resting inside their own private rooms (except for the crusaders, as separating them so soon after their use of bond magic was ill-advised). As such, Sunset immediately realized something was strange when a white-coated earth pony mare entered her room.
"Who are you?" She asked.
"I have just come to congratulate you on your achievement, my student." The mare spoke in a very familiar voice.
"Teacher?" Sunset asked, surprised, but she already knew the answer was yes.
"I'm going to be in disguise until the wedding, since I want to take part in the festivities without causing an uproar, just so you know." Celestia said, before stepping close to Sunset's bed.
"I see... Are you going to talk to everyone?" Sunset asked.
"Maybe later." Celestia said with a playful smile "For now, I came just for you."
Sunset was about to ask what she meant by that, but stopped upon seeing Celestia's expression turn solemn.
"Power without Heart only leads to destruction, both of those around you, and yourself." She spoke in a tone of recitation.
"On the other hand, a Heart without Power, as righteous as it may be is incapable of defending its values." She continued, and Sunset's expression changed as she thought of a possible reason for what Celestia was doing.
"As one who understood that, I ask of you this: Are you willing to proceed forth in your harsh path without giving up, using your power for the sake of Equestria?" She asked.
"Yes!" Sunset said hurriedly, barely daring to believe that was really happening.
"I see." Celestia replied "Then I proclaim you, Knight Sunset Shimmer, the Heart of Power."
And with that, the current generation of Knights had reached a new stage.
Wedding Arc End
Next: Cloud of Chaos Arc
Titled Knights Saga - True Start
After her first attack failed to be effective, Sunset decided against continuing a possibly futile offence. Instead, she decided to take advantage of the time Chrysalis was spending in her self-healing to prepare herself for the upcoming battle.
Sunset started doing that by closing her eyes and turning her focus inward, into her own being. It could be said that such was the basis for all magic, for the root of magic was the soul, and only through awareness of one's soul was it possible to harness this power.
However, Sunset was taking the action of focusing on the self to the most extreme level. Instead of simply recognizing her soul, Sunset was focusing on the very core of it, she was piercing through her own identity created through countless experiences and interactions in order to find the true origin of her being.
Such implacable introspection wasn't something that came naturally, and Sunset had only managed to achieve that impossible degree of inward focus through her training with Princess Celestia and her own determination. The alicorn had told her that very few existences had ever managed to do that during the course of known history.
Mostly, it was her own determination that allowed her to carry through with the equivalent of stripping herself of her very identity, reducing her being into something that was only barely not nothing. The trainings with Celestia, where she fought the alicorn and lost more times than she cared to count, only served to get her into the right frame of mind in that she could even attempt that feat.
And the reason for all of that was the fight they had with Flames of Annihilation. Sunset had seen the result of a pursuit of power that had taken everything away from a pony, down to their very identity. She rejected such an ending for herself, so she decided to do the exact opposite. Instead of pursuing power, she sought after identity.
While looking inside herself, Sunset realized why one would throw away their own self. Seeking identity did not inherently lead to power, as one's identity at their very core was just as one being one many, without any special traits or qualities. But by accepting that, Sunset reached an even deeper truth.
While she was just one of many, her decisions made her unique. She could choose to grab her own importance instead of having a role decided for her. She could decide to make countless connections, creating a chain that would continue affecting the world even long after her death, and even if she was forgotten.
Sunset took upon this understanding and will, making it the root of her new magic. Everything she was boiled down to what she wanted to be, and there was one desire that she held closer and dearer than any other. And perhaps it was fate that Princess Celestia was the one to help her unlock that power.
For Sunset's desire, what she had held in her heart from even before she could remember, was to become closer to Celestia. Her cutie mark was proof of it, her job was proof of it, and even during the hardest times what kept Sunset going was the thought of being Celestia's Knight.
And so, it was no surprise that her power took the form that it did.
+0+
Meanwhile, in another part of Equestria, Celestia and Luna were hard at work against the Congregation of Chaos. Such a powerful mass of chaotic energy was too powerful even for them to deal with without extreme effort. The two sisters were an amazing sight to behold, with Luna dashing all over the place with the speed of shadows, attacking with lunar blades that were able to hit things in their very essence.
Meanwhile Celestia was constantly teleporting while maintaining dozens of illusions of herself to throw off the enemy while she repeatedly charged and unleashed attacks powerful enough to destroy cities. Those two were truly showing the power and experience of such ancient alicorns, but that only served to show how powerful the Congregation of Chaos was.
Because all they were trying to do was prevent that chaotic event from reaching any closer to habitated cities. Simply beating it would not be enough, as the very nature of such chaos made it extremely resilient to any efforts geared towards eliminating the mayhem it would cause. Most likely, even if it was defeated, some parts of it would escape and split off to cause chaotic incidents in several other places.
They couldn't afford to allow that, as they'd need to split the Knights to deal with those incidents, which was far too dangerous to do when Tirek was so close to breaking free.
So instead they were trying to exhaust most of the Congregation's chaotic potential while keeping it in one piece. That would serve to slow it down to give the Knights more time to prepare as well as allowing all of them to fight it together to prevent possible issues.
Celestia and Luna had connected their minds in order to coordinate better, and so Luna realized immediately when her sister suddenly became a lot happier for some reason.
'What happened?' She asked, sparing only a small portion of her attention in order to communicate.
'My little pony has finally grown up.' Was the answer, which Luna did not quite understand and decided to ask for elaboration later.
Due to her profound connection with the sun, it was no surprise that Celestia could feel several aspects related to it, and so she was able to tell when a pony she knew very well started channeling its power.
+0+
At that moment, Sunset started drawing in the energy of the sun. That wasn't the kind of power that could be channeled lightly, even though she was only using a small portion of it. But Sunset could do it, that was her decision, that was where her origin had taken her, that was what her experiences allowed her.
The power coursed through her body without harming it, just like how Celestia could use it freely. Sunset wasn't an alicorn but she could mimic the way Celestia's body handled the magic to a certain extent, which was more than enough when combined with her armor's feature of reducing the burden of magic on her body.
That power was mixed with Sunset's own magic in a form similar to Trance Mode, thus giving birth to a result greater than simply Sunset's magic plus sun power. That energy infused every part of her body and harmonized perfectly with her mind, allowing her to use it just as well as her own power, to the point Sunset could instinctively adjust her spells to her new capabilities without the slightest issue.
In a mix between the body enhancement magic Sunset used, and the essence armor magic from the Black Knight, which Sunset had studied but never really mastered, her power fused her body and armor as one. And the Awakening Armor proved itself to be exactly as Rarity had designed, accepting Sunset's new spell without the slightest dissonance, transforming as a result.
The sun sigils on it changed from being mostly like Celestia's cutie mark to variations of Sunset's own cutie mark, and they were no longer static, instead shifting like the actual sun, while their colors moved around in a battle of dominance, sometimes mostly red, and sometimes mostly yellow.
The rest of the armor seemed to have become alive, "breathing" along with Sunset. And from the sides of it sprouted wings made of the same material as the rest of the armor, conjured from magic. Together with it, Sunset spread her awareness throughout the whole battlefield, expanding her domain. But instead of the usual spell for it, she instead used the very light of the sun crossing the space to serve as a medium.
With this, she could cast spells from anywhere on the battlefield, regardless of distance. And the first spell she cast was a variation on Rarity's fire wings, to give herself mobility far beyond anything she had been capable of before. Finally, Sunset was ready for the fight of her life. That was everything she had.
"This is... The Essence of my Heart." She spoke in a trance, declaring her technique without even realizing.
All of that takes a while to describe, but in fact Sunset's transformation took almost no time at all, to the point where Chrysalis recovered only just fast enough to hear the unicorn's words.
Still, that was just the bare minimum necessary for Sunset to even be able to fight Chrysalis in the first place. The real test started just after that, when Chrysalis shot in Sunset's direction at Rainbow Dash-like speeds, intending on finishing her off as fast as possible, for she could feel that the unicorn was now powerful enough to possibly pose a threat to her.
'Essence Drive' were the words Sunset spoke in response, not with her mouth, but with her very soul.
And Chrysalis had to suddenly turn upside down and change half her body back into the black mist, for that was the only possible defense when Sunset teleported right above her, already casting a spell capable of annihilating mountains.
Sunset couldn't move that fast, but with her domain covering the whole battlefield, she could teleport anywhere within it utterly instantly. And she didn't need to cast a spell either, for the Essence Drive was enough to cover all that she did within that moment.
Instead of a spell, it could be said that Essence Drive was more like a point of view, a shift in her soul to allow her will to apply itself to the world without a medium. If one were to try and translate what that point of view meant, the closest they could get would be the word 'overwhelm'. And as such, all actions dedicated solely to overwhelming the enemy could be performed freely.
Chrysalis parried the blast with her mist, forcing herself sideways and out of the area of effect. And on that same instant, the blast disappeared without any traces, the spell simply ceasing to exist when Sunset willed it instead of having to be specifically canceled.
And she had already teleported just behind Chrysalis' movement, tackling her with a body enveloped in flame and power.
Chrysalis shifted her mist, switching the halves' states and thus placing her mist in direct opposition with Sunset's attack, molding it into a drill to destroy her opponent along with their attack. But in the next moment a new spell appeared on the opposite side of her, released from thin air thanks to Sunset's domain, an arrow of diamond and solidified light.
Despite her surprise, Chrysalis reacted swiftly. She unmade her drill and remade it into a wing, whose powerful flap made her evade upwards. At the same time, her mist started shivering as if there was something inside it that was trying to escape. Sunset immediately recognized it as a problem, and so she took action.
'Essence Hold' Came another declaration from her soul.
It was just in time, for Chrysalis followed her dodge with shifting her mist into mouths and releasing a powerful wail. And as soon as it was released, balls of flame appeared all over the battlefield, up and down, left and right and everywhere else. Sunset's amazing feat instantly heated all the air on the battlefield, disturbing the magical soundwave into harmless dispersion.
And that wasn't the only thing, for once again a powerful attack appeared from Chrysalis' blind spot, that time a bolt of lightning formed into a spear. Chrysalis shoved her mist into it like a giant swatting a javelin away, following it up by spitting a drop of blood into the sky, which grew into a gigantic black shadow.
Chrysalis understood that the light was key to Sunset's domain, so she would get rid of it.
Of course, Sunset would not allow that. Before the shadow could cover everything, it was enveloped by an even bigger tridimensional spell formation conjured out of thin air. Said spell formation 'blinked' before its components were connected by lines of light that restrained the growth of the shadow before closing on it like a vice.
That word, 'restrain', was the meaning of the new point of view Sunset had added. It represented spells designed to restrain the enemy and their actions. But the best part about the way those points of view worked was the fact that it wasn't an either/or thing. Instead of switching between points of view, new ones were added, expanding her capabilities. The biggest problem with that was the fact that Sunset couldn't simply invoke all of them at the start of the battle, having to add them slowly as the fight progressed. But of course, slow was relative.
Just as the shadow was restrained, Sunset once again appeared out of an instant teleport right next to Chrysalis, but under her that time. And her attack was a dozen arrows of fire coming from the unicorn's position, along with a circular band of energy above Chrysalis, ready to restrain her if she tried to run.
The changeling queen did not run, as she would not fall for such an obvious trap. Her mist turned into a huge sharp wing, which flapped powerfully, the air pressure preventing the arrows from moving closer. And at the same time, the flap brought the sharp tip of the wing right on top of Sunset.
The Knight's aura resisted the attack, an impressive feat considering that the non-defense focused Knights had been immediately defeated by similar attacks. But Chrysalis did not waste any time being surprised, immediately putting more power into the wing and shattering Sunset's aura barrier.
Thus falling into her more subtle trap.
As soon as Sunset's aura shield broke, she teleported away, completely escaping injury. And the shattered pieces of her aura turned into chains that held onto Chrysalis' shapeshifted wing and prevented her from moving or changing it for crucial moments.
In these hard-earned moments, Sunset reappeared next to her restraining band of energy, punching into it and turning it into a gauntlet. At that same time, the fire arrows seemed to explode with renewed energy and pierced towards Chrysalis with increased speed. Sunset also punched with her gauntlet, generating an explosion just to increase her speed and timing the attack to hit at the same time as the arrows.
The changeling queen simply had no time to break through the restraints in her wing before the strike hit, so she was forced to simply use whatever portion of the mist she could still control in order to put up a hasty defence.
Sunset's attack broke through that mist and struck right at the still physical half of her body.
"GRAAAGH!!" Chrysalis screamed, breaking through the restriction and swiping her mist at Sunset in a space piercing attack, forcing her into a hasty teleport to dodge it.
The Knight did the mental equivalent of a frown, it seemed like normal attacks were just not enough to sufficiently harm Chrysalis, even with Sunset's greatly enhanced version of 'normal'. So it was time to go even further.
'Essence Charge' She added a third point of view.
At that moment, Chrysalis counter-attacked, swiping with her mist in such a way that it broke apart and distorted space, attacking the whole area of the battlefield all at once. Sunset teleported to one of the areas attacked by the least amount of fragments, conjuring a ring of fire that twisted like a helix and absorbed the shards of mist that were coming in their direction.
However, Chrysalis appeared to have decided to mimic Sunset, and launched another attack almost at the same time, dashing at a speed that was almost like the Knight's teleportation, spreading her mist into a sphere around both herself and Sunset. The mist hummed with magic power, and the unicorn realized that it was blocking her teleportation.
However, the effort needed to enclose herself with her opponent meant that Chrysalis' next attack was slightly delayed, giving Sunset the opportunity to retaliate. She flapped her fire wings to shoot herself straight at the changeling queen, she pulled back one hoof to unleash a punch enveloped by a corona of power that resembled a comet.
Chrysalis decided to defend that one with her own body, using the rest of the black mist that wasn't otherwise occupied, she raised her left foreleg (now her only foreleg).
The impact was massive, and Chrysalis was forced back... a whole pony's length. And once again Sunset's previous thought was proven correct, as even with minimal defenses, that attack was only enough to give the changeling queen superficial wounds. Then things got even worse as the broken off pieces of black mist from her earlier omni-area attack finally came back to Chrysalis.
But once again, the changeling declined to launch an immediate attack, instead taking the time to shape her mist into a wickedly sharp and corrupted looking scythe. Chrysalis had also understood the level of Sunset's defence, and so had prepared a form of attack specifically to deal with it.
The knight used that last bit of time the best way she could, releasing a rain of explosive spells right on top of Chrysalis, which concealed another magical restraint. Then she flapped her wings to evade Chrysalis' exceedingly fast slash. But she hadn't moved away, instead flying to Chrysalis' other side, stopping while at touch range of the changeling queen.
The restraint she had created earlier reached Chrysalis, holding the black mist from reaching a certain circular spot on her back. Sunset once again punched, this time aiming at that exact spot, and managed to break Chrysalis' shell at that point. That was enough to significantly harm Chrysalis', and the slash of her scythe that was coming to reap Sunset slowed down just a tad, giving the knight enough time to avoid the slash by a hairsbreadth.
Then the scythe came again, having spun around Chrysalis' body like a clock hand, forcing Sunset to flap her fire wings once again in order to dodge. And in the following moment, Sunset's blood ran cold as the black mist sphere around them morphed violently, hundreds of spikes sprouting from the parts both above and below them, almost like they were teeth in a mouth.
Or rather, exactly like that, as the sphere compressed itself like a mouth closing, clearly trying to ravage Sunset in between those rows of teeth. It was apparent that the scythe was mostly a distraction and Chrysalis' true killing move was this.
But Sunset's previous attacks had also been a distraction, specifically to prevent Chrysalis from realizing that the previous helix of magic that had absorbed some of her attacks did not in fact disappear afterwards, but quietly grew in power.
That was the result of Sunset's Essence Charge, which had the meaning of Enhance, just like her old technique of magic enhance, except much less rigid and dependent on magic formulas. Just before the mouth could close, Sunset activated that helix, which shot a small cross shaped blast.
A small blast that contained a monumental amount of power. It was absorbed by Sunset, who then released a cataclysmic level of energy in an explosion centered around herself. The mist mouth was broken through and dispersed, and even Chrysalis herself received noticeable heavy injuries and was shot into the distance like a missile.
The result wasn't born solely out of simple power, but also due to the nature of that energy. When the helix absorbed the shards of mist, it used them as a baseline, directing its evolution in the way that would bring the most harm to the type of existence the mist was.
Another cross blast came into her, exhausting the power of the helix. Sunset teleported right above Chrysalis before she could recover and condensed that power into a pyramid of flaming diamond and smashed it into the changeling queen.
Said opponent did not simply stood there to take the attack, of course. She spit out more blood and condensed it into a barrier of black mist that was small but incredibly dense. And the moment before the attack connected with it, Sunset thought she had finally gotten an advantage over Chrysalis, but despite the special nature of her power, the black mist did not break but flowed around the attack, forcing its trajectory away from the changeling.
The Knight realized what had happened almost instantly: Chrysalis had used her shapeshifting abilities to change the nature of her mist on the fly, to the point where her special energy no longer worked as its weak point. That meant Chrysalis had gotten her thoughts in order insanely fast after being hit by that first attack.
By that point, Chrysalis was about to recover most of the mist that had been dispersed during said attack, so Sunset followed her example and changed tactics just as fast. The pyramid of power split into five different spells that teleported back towards Sunset and started spinning around her like satellites. Chrysalis recovered her mist and swept it into Sunset while turning it into some sort of spiked mace.
The Knight dodged towards Chrysalis with a flap of wings and was completely unsurprised to see that her straightforward attack had simply been a cover for something else, in that case hidden mist emerging from the air around Sunset to try and envelop her.
One of the spells around the Knight which resembled a small pawprint activated with a flash and accelerated Sunset into supersonic speed very briefly, just long enough to crash into Chrysalis like a runaway cart wearing a heavy suit of armor. The impact, while violent, only caused superficial injuries on Chrysalis, but it did surprise her enough to give Sunset time to bring another of her spells to bear, that one shaped like a hammerhead.
Chrysalis reacted just before being hit by the conjured plane of force, but instead of defending, she attacked, ignoring the heavy wounds what remained of her body suffered in favor of shooting all her spare mist at Sunset in a zero range wave of death, which easily broke through the Knight's aura... only to be stopped by her armor.
Sunset's previous "desperate" dodges were simply to give the impression that her aura was her biggest defence, while in fact her armor was tougher by a whole level after the melding with her skin from her powered up State.
Sunset then brought to bear the last two spells she had floating around her, shaped like a half sphere and a spear respectively, and combined the two into a sort of technological lance, with the half-sphere acting as both hand guard and power focuser, and it drew power from the environment at a rate that could be seen by unaided eyes, power that was melded with the straight part of the spear, causing it to hum powerfully like a contained storm.
Finally, Sunset stabbed with her overwhelmingly powerful spell construct, and that's when the true point of her attack became clear. Because while it seemed exceedingly strong, it was simply not enough for a frontal confrontation with Chrysalis, who had already recovered enough mist to create a defense capable of blunting that attack, if not completely blocking it.
In fact, that was what she tried to do, but suddenly her control of the mist slipped for a single moment, courtesy of a restraining spell. A restraining spell that acted from inside her own body.
Earlier, Sunset had split the pyramid into five spells. One was used to tackle Chrysalis, another was used to trick Chrysalis into a bad exhange of blows, and two had been fused into that final attack. That was only four.
The fifth spell was the subtlest of them all. It was shaped like mist, and when Sunset hit Chrysalis and cracked her outer shell, the mist stealthily infiltrated her body, all for the purpose of preventing her from defending at a crucial moment.
Sunset had indeed learned a few things from growing up with Trixie.
The spear pierced through Chrysalis' shell easily, then unleashed the full might of its focused power into her. An attack definitely powerful enough to take down even one as powerful and resilient as the changeling queen.
And yet, the fight did not end there, as in the last moment, the remaining half of Chrysalis' body also turned into black mist, with a sound that was like a screech coming from thousands of mouths at once. The unleashed power of the spell pierced into the mist, causing a series of ear-rending explosions and forcing it a long distance away from Sunset.
For a moment, the Knight thought Chrysalis had fully turned into mist, but she managed to catch a glimpse of an insect-sized version of her being protected by the thickest layers of blackness. It seemed that, even for a shapeshifter on the level of Chrysalis, achieving full formlessness without losing oneself was too difficult.
Once again Sunset's blood ran cold, as she realized two things: One, it was clear that her spell had been effective, and she had caused a grave injury on her opponent. Two, it was just as clear that, even though the power she had shown before was amazing, their battle had pushed Chrysalis' strength even higher. This was it. She was about to face an evolved Changeling Queen.
So, there was only one thing Sunset could do. She had to use everything.
'Essence Shift.' Her heart spoke, adding the fourth and final point of view.
That point of view represented "change", the power of difference. But that was overshadowed by the effect it had as being the last remaining step of Sunset's State changing spell.
When it was uttered, the Knight changed visibly, and yet in a way that was nearly impossible to describe. Sunset appeared to have been completed, despite the fact that she had not been missing anything beforehand. It wasn't a difference in size or shape, but more in terms of feel. Sunset simply appeared to have truly made that foreign power her own.
It was the completion state of her Essence Heart.
"Unleash Essence: Reverse Eclipse!" She declared a spell for the first time since changing her State.
It wasn't out of choice that she hadn't done it before, but simply because she couldn't. Another of Essence Heart's weaknesses was being unable to declare spells while it was in a half-completed state. Once again, Sunset believed that weakness to be worth it.
Her spell declared, Sunset Moved in a way that was part teleportation, part extreme movement and part drawing herself towards the light, once again appearing right above Chrysalis. And then came the attack, which far overshadowed anything that had been used in the battle thus far.
An eclipse was when the light of the sun was blocked, but that was the opposite, granting the light an intensity that was like the Knight had brought the sun into the battlefield. The air in between Sunset and Chrysalis was irradiated by enough heat to briefly turn into plasma, before Sunset's spell forced all the accumulated energy to discharge downwards in a blast of astonishing destructive power.
Chrysalis' response to that was not lacking in any way, as she truly showed the might of her new power. Her mist changed, but instead of the simple shifting of before, what happened was a true transmutation that affected every single characteristic of it.
The mist became a monstrous serpent head, which opened its mouth to show endless rows of razor-sharp teeth, and from the dark depths of said maw came a torrent of red fire that shot towards Sunset's spell like a geyser. The fire clashed with the light, and seemed to absorb it, quickly brightening into a majestic golden color before crystalizing itself into a line of solid energy that punched through Sunset's spell and forced her to teleport away at the last moment.
Only part of her spell had been absorbed, though, so Chrysalis still had to deal with a great mass of focused radiation bearing down on her.
She changed again, and this time it was even more astonishing, as there didn't appear to have been an in between state, simply Chrysalis being something one moment, and a completely different thing the next. Her new form was a terrifying beetle, with legs numbering in the thousands and a shell that was not only white, but the whitest thing that Sunset could ever conceive. The shell was so unspeakably white that a good part of the light energy of the Knight's spell was bounced away.
"Core Essence: Infinite Spells!" Sunset hastily declared as soon as she realized that her spell wasn't working.
In response, tens of thousands of spells were formed all throughout the battlefield. All of them were offensive, intended to attack Chrysalis, but each of them was different and unique, as Sunset poured all of her memory and experiences into her creation spell, to serve as a "map" to help them form.
Those spells were formed quickly, and they were fired just as quickly in a massive wave of magic.
Their target, Chrysalis, responded to that in a very specific way.
"Outsider Form." She declared a spell of her own.
There was another change, and the beetle turned into something much stranger: It was an arm, huge and black and scaled, with clawed fingers. That arm appeared to be coming out from a rift in space which was apparently also part of the transformation.
The arm swiped through the air once, and it somehow hit the entire battlefield, despite being far from big enough to accomplish said feat.
All of Sunset's spells were broken by that swipe, and she herself was sent flying through the air, feeling like she had been hit with a building. However, Sunset recovered with astonishing speed, her current durability being such that even a strong hit like that wasn't enough to seriously hinder her.
Still, Chrysalis's current capabilities were a problem, specially given that her battle rhythm seemed to have completely changed. There was only one way she could see to have any chance of winning. So, Sunset took it.
"Essence Domain!" She declared, and endless waves of power exploded from her body.
That power, conjured from the most pure essence of Sunset, quickly spread through the entire battlefield, filling it to the point where it seemed like Sunset was everywhere at once. She then launched herself forward with a powerful firey tackle, while still releasing her energy nonstop.
That same energy allowed Sunset to move at unbelievable speeds, like she was being pulled forward by the traces of her own self in the air. It was to the point where it took less time than the blink of an eye for Sunset to reach her enemy.
Chrysalis' next transformation was even faster, however. She was suddenly become an eagle-like creature with two pairs of wings and three pairs of legs, and flapped those wings to unleash the equivalent of a tornado straight on top of the approaching Knight.
Sunset did not dodge, and in fact she didn't need to. The wind seemed to avoid her of its own accord, and the Knight managed to ram into Chrysalis with full power, releasing a big explosion that caused the first noticeable harm her enemy had received ever since her power up.
That was the effect of the Essence Domain. Sunset's power was creating an area of control that gave her an unparalleled advantage in any fight. But there was one problem with that technique: Given that she had to keep constantly emitting power over the entire battlefield to keep it going, it was exceedingly draining.
Three times as draining as anything else Sunset had done in her life, in fact. She could only use the technique for a total of five seconds, as anything more would damage her own body and impair her for the rest of the fight. But that was okay, because she didn't plan on using it for more than that.
She didn't need to.
Chrysalis retaliated by shifting into something like an ursa with praying mantis blades, one of which she swung while giving the edge a red tint. The changeling had realized very quickly that projectile attacks would be innefective.
The slash was extremely fast, but Sunset dodged it as if she had known it was coming ahead of time, once more moving through her own energy like a combination of swimming and teleportation, avoiding even the invisible extension of the blade by a hair's breath, once again thanks to her Domain.
Sunset attacked with a punch that turned her hoof into a golden comet, piercing through the "skin" of Chrysalis' current form to unleash its power inside. With that, Essence Domain had been active for two seconds.
The changeling queen managed to shift fast enough to avoid most of the damage from that attack by turning into a monstrous worm with scales and legs like a centipede. She bent downwards to bring her fangs towards Sunset, while also releasing countless razor sharp scales to attack at the same time.
The Knight teleported on top of the enermy's head, allowing some of the scales that had less energy to hit her, since her defense could handle it.
"Essence Blast!" Sunset declared, releasing a sphere of power that travelled through the entire body of the worm, ravaging it with explosions and forcing Chrysalis into a hasty shift into a butterfly that was five times bigger than normal ones.
With that, Essence Domain had been active for four seconds.
Sunset used the final second on creating a dozen arrows of fire and teleporting them to a seemingly random place a bit above and in front of her. Which was the exact place where Chrysalis teleported to at the same moment, ready for a point blank attack.
The arrows pierced all over her body, but Chrysalis did not abort the attack, releasing a green ring of solidified vibration magic, which bulled through Sunset's Domain with overwhelming power, hitting her and managing to get through both aura and armor defences, damaging her internal organs.
Sunset spit out blood, but the wound wasn't truly serious, and she had things to do. As the last second finished, she cancelled her Domain, while also shooting a small spell that stuck to Chrysalis and after a cry of "Draw!" from Sunset, it attracted all the loose energy on the battlefield, resulting in a series of violent explosions as the energy reacted with the arrows.
Partway through that, Chrysalis shifted into a strange cylindrical shelled being, which seemed like an organism from the deep sea. The last few explosions were mostly resisted by its thick shell.
Those five seconds had been immensely high-intensity, to the point where Sunset had to take a breath and recover a bit. That fact wasn't missed by Chrysalis, who exploded into another shift, this time into some kind of combination of bird and arrow.
She cut through space almost instantly, aiming for Sunset's heart.
The Knight flapped her fire wings and managed to dodge anyway, predicting her attack despite no longer having access to a domain.
Sunset had not wasted her five seconds of power. Her goal had never been to actually defeat Chrysalis in that period, but simply to adapt to her opponent's new rhythm. A big part of high level battles was being able to sense the flow of magic of the enemy to get a rough prediction of their attacks, but Chrysalis sudden change had thrown off the Knight's ability to do that. She could adapt in time, but she simply didn't have enough time, as she wouldn't be able to last long being at a disadvantage against an opponent that was already so strong.
So, Sunset used her domain. She collected information from every bit of magic that touched Chrysalis, helped by the injuries she was able to inflict on her opponent. That served the double function of allowing her to change the flow of battle as well as quickly adapt her senses to the Changeling Queen's new fighting style.
It was at that point when the battle entered its final stage.
"Essence Crash: Light Fantastic!" Sunset declared.
Dozens of magical prisms manifested themselves all around the two fighters. The light was refracted by them, creating dozens of rainbows, but only briefly. Almost before their colors could be seen, those rainbows were filtered by Sunset's magic, removing all of their colors. What was left behind was a mysterious existence that was at the same time both a color and not. The phantasmal eighth color.
The beams of that hidden color mixed together and created a ray of magical power directed at Chrysalis.
"Nine Lives Blade Shift." Chrysalis responded.
In the middle of her words, the Changeling Queen teleported nine times at once, splitting herself into nine bodies similar to her original one, so the second half of her spell was spoken from nine mouths at once. The nine slashed with blades grown from their legs, and they had appeared to completely surround Sunset, blocking both space and magic to prevent any possible escape.
"Knight Essence!" Sunset declared grimly.
All of her remaining power was focused on every defense the Knight could muster. She knew it wouldn't be possible to evade without giving up on her attack, so that was the best she could do.
The nine blades hit all at once. They annihilated Sunset's aura defense, cut through her enhanced armor and even managed to dig into her body and release a few strands of power that were burned away by her target's magic before they could deal too much internal damage.
Sunset grit her teeth in pain, but reached out with her aura to hold the nine bodies of Chrysalis in place for just long enough for the powerful ray to wash over them. The Knight was completely unaffected by the strange light, but every one of the changeling's bodies started melting at a visible pace, as if that light was both exceedingly hot and radioactive to her.
Chrysalis unleashed another powerful shriek to try and escape, but the magical ray prevented her from putting enough power into the sound. Her wail became even louder as she forcefully fused her nine bodies back together, thus managing to escape from Sunset's hold.
"Essence Rush!" Sunset refused to give her any time to rest. That spell drew in the remaining light of the ray into her body, coloring Sunset herself with the strange appearance of that light. She then dashed through the air at full speed and rammed into Chrysalis.
The attack broke through the enemy's shell, but wasn't quite enough to harm the 'true body' inside. Chrysalis did not allow a second chance:
"State Shift!" She declared, and her body flowed into liquid form, splashing over Sunset. And it wasn't any ordinary liquid, but some kind of magical acid that ate through the armor, burned the flesh and blinded her left eye.
Sunset screamed in unimaginable pain, but still managed to declare another spell:
"Essence Sun!" And an artificial sun manifested itself on top of her position. Once again she wasn't harmed by her magic, but the sun was so unbelievably hot that Chrysalis' liquid form was instantly sublimated into gas and then plasma, exploding all over the battlefield at near-relativistic speeds.
That was obviously very painful as well, and Chrysalis would have screamed had she a mouth at the time. Instead, the only indication of damage she gave was the delay before her next attack, which allowed Sunset to raise her sun above herself.
It was just barely enough, though. And Chrysalis' next spell came before she could do anything else.
"World Shift..." She chanted, and took advantage of her form being spread around the battlefield, shifting into and englobing everything around it, thus managing to cut Sunset off from the power of the sun.
The Knight still had the power gathered until the previous moment, however, and she poured every bit of it into her created sun for the only spell with a chance to save her.
"Twin Sun!" She managed to declare, despite Chrysalis' space getting into her mouth and trying to choke her out and cut her throat at the same time.
The artificial sun shone, imitating the real thing to the best of Sunset's abilities. And through its similarity, she managed to create a connection to the true sun. It was just a brief connection, but It gave the Knight another burst of power, allowing her to shoot a powerful beam of solar energy upwards as if trying to reach its celestial counterpart.
That beam burned away at the space created by Chrysalis, destroying a good portion of it and forcing her to withdraw.
Sunset shot a thousand beams of energy from her sun into Chrysalis' new position, and made to follow up with a teleport into her, but the spell fizzled out mid-cast. With barely a trace of hesitation, she redid the magic, this time spending slightly longer to make sure it formed properly.
"Kheires Shift!" Chrysalis shouted before the attacks arrived, turning into a round monster with dozens of arms that batted aside the energy beams. But that delayed her enough for Sunset to arrive and declare another spell:
"Essence Blade!" She shouted, and the remaining energy of her manifested star gathered into a luminous blade of magic that floated above her horn.
Sunset slashed with it repeatedly, slowly cutting through the arms of Chrysalis' new form. But the changeling started simply conjuring new arms, and even adding a second blade to her attacks wasn't enough to break through her defenses.
It was at that point that Sunset was forced to face an unfortunate fact: She was probably unable to win the fight. There was still a chance, if she went all or nothing and bet on some really risky plan, but even then the chance was low. The reason she thought that was her previous failure at forming her teleport spell.
That failure was simply the most visible symptom of the real problem: Sunset was rapidly approaching her limits. That was the first time she managed to achieve the Essence Heart state, and the exhaustion and mental burden of both using powerful spells and keeping up said state together with the mental pressure of fighting such a deadly opponent plus the injuries she had received...
Simply put, all that together caused that one mistake, and as the situation worsened, the mistakes would pile up and become worse until Chrysalis managed to take advantage of one of them and decide the fight.
It was truly unfortunate to lose the first actual fight she had while in Essence Heart form, but it would be even more unfortunate to fail her mission. And losing to Chrysalis didn't necessary mean failing the mission.
"Celestial Seed Form!"
Chrysalis changed into a huge seed that expanded even further while also growing spikes, finally managing to break through Sunset's relentless double-bladed assault. And that was the moment when Sunset put her new plan into action. Instead of resisting the force, she went along with it, being shoved backwards at high speed. Sunset also quickly dropped her altitude until she had landed on top of the dome shield.
The Knight then took a look at Chrysalis, smiled and dropped every single one of her external defenses, with even the armor disappearing. All that power was condensed inside her body, hiding completely.
That sight actually caused Chrysalis to hesitate for a split second, as she couldn't fathom Sunset's true aim. However, the changeling queen soon charged forward with all her strength, knowing that regardless of the possibility of a trap, she simply couldn't afford to allow Sunset time to prepare something big.
Turning into a strange elongated bird with a cry of "Quetz Form!", Chrysalis flapped her two enormous wings once, accelerating to supersonic speeds even in the very small (comparatively) distance between her and Sunset. The beak of the beard was a broad and sharp spear, and it pierced straight through Sunset's body, coming out the other side, leaving an injury bigger than the pony's own head.
Yet, were Chrysalis' current form capable of showing expressions, one would have seen her face darkening at that moment, while Sunset smiled (though it was wan, because of the pain). The immense energy inside the Knight's body had managed to force Chrysalis' attack away from any critical areas (Well, critical for a Knight. Most ponies would consider losing a head sized portion of their torso to be pretty critical).
The changeling queen immediately flapped her wings again moving backwards to try and escape whatever Sunset was trying to do. However, it turned out to be pointless. The Knight's trap wasn't getting Chrysalis to get close, but to get Chrysalis to wound her... All to get a sufficient Grudge.
And with her eyes shining with aggression Sunset finally called her spell:
"Grand Curse: Chained Heart!"
All the power Sunset had gathered instantly shifted into a foul energy. Half of it started swirling within her body, while the other half instantly appeared all around Chrysalis, who shifted again and again, teleporting all over to try and evade it, but to no avail.
The true nature of Curse Magic was actually Bonds (So the Crusaders would probably be pretty good at it, once their studies reached that point). Except, it was based on negative bonds instead of positive ones, and that particular magic took all the grudge of Sunset to form an unescapable bond with the one who had injured her so. That was something only the three original Knights could possibly do. They had spent their entire lives apprenticed to Celestia, and had learned the theory of various powerful magics that had been used by past Knights.
They could not use them as well as they could their own specialties, but they could still be quite effective. Meanwhile, the newer Knights had no time to focus on anything other than their specializations, making them less versatile, though not necessarily weaker.
Regardless, the energy invaded Chrysalis' body at the same time as it condensed in Sunset's, forcing the Changeling back into her regular form. And it didn't stop there, as the opening on Sunset's torso allowed one to see as the energy took on physical form, shaping itself into spiked chains that wrapped themselves around her heart. The Knight could not help but scream, and it was echoed by Chrysalis, as the curse mirrored its effects on her.
The changeling crashed to the "ground" (still the top of the shield) unable to even move anymore. That was the basic nature of curses, harming oneself in order to harm one's opponent. In truth, there was no actual harm done to either of them, as even Sunset's current grudge wasn't enough to achieve such effects against such a powerful opponent. The only thing it caused was Pain.
It was actually preferable, as the Knight was already too injured, and it was all she could do to keep the curse active. Any more than that and she wouldn't be able to bear it. Even then, the pain was horrendous, as proven by the fact that even the half-crazed Chrysalis was unable to bear it... at first.
After a few seconds, the changeling managed to force herself upright, and started crawling towards Sunset with an unbending will. She knew that the curse would be cancelled if she managed to land even a single blow. The Knight, by contrast, was far from capable of moving, and could only watch as Chrysalis reached closer and closer.
Soon, Sunset could see the color of Chrysalis' eyes, then the twitch of her lips as she bore the pain, and then they were almost close enough to touch-
Someone landed in between the two, leading to a moment of confusion. Then they noticed it was a pegasus. Then they noticed that she was Venus.
Upon seeing her target so close, the Changeling Queen lost all control. She managed to force her uncooperative body to leap forward, already opening her mouth to bite... And fell back to the ground, one of her back legs having been caught by something... A piece of shield. And it was at that moment when Chrysalis realized that Venus was whispering something.
+0+
Earlier
"Looks like we win." Shining Armor said with a sigh. He had been using remote viewing through his shield to keep an eye on the battle, and he had just seen Chrysalis reaction to Sunset's curse "The enemy's guard could not be any more down."
"Yeah." Spike agreed "But since they're connected, attacking Chrysalis will definitely break the spell, so we need to put everything into one attack."
"I'll do it." Venus declared "Rarity said she wanted to give me my gift after the wedding if it was possible, but using it is our best bet to finish things off smoothly." She smiled "I'll just have to act surprised when she gives it to me."
Nearby, Rarity's unconscious body twitched.
Shining Armor's smiled at his fiancee's words, but then his expression dropped "She's getting up!" He exclaimed.
Spike did not waste any time. He immediately sent a message to one of the guards who was close to where the gifts had been put, and it was a unicorn guard that was good at teleportation.
Still, it took three whole seconds for the guard to arrive with the packaged gift, which Venus immediately snatched out of his telekinectic grip and annihilated with a lightning bolt, leaving only the gift inside.
It was a leg ring, one very elaborate ring colored light grey that seemed to highlight Venus' beauty by contrast (of course, since it was Rarity who designed it), the ring was covered in dense magical designs, but they formed an artistic whole instead of looking like something functional. All in all, it was an acessory that did not draw too much attention to itself, but seemed very elegant when it was noticed.
None of that was noticed by the pegasus in the moment. She shoved her left foreleg through it and her mind was immediately provided with a series of instructions on how to use that artefact (Rarity called that an "additional service"). Turning around, she saw that her groom had already opened a hole in the shield, and Spike was breathing an orange fire into it.
Venus launched herself into the air, diving through Spike's fire and being accelerated by it as intended. She was already fast normally, but that spell made her move with enough speed to cause Rainbow Dash to nod her head in approval.
Due to the way Shining Armor had shaped the hole, Venus came out of it facing directly towards the two combatants. She flew towards them, already concentrating her mind for the spell she was going to cast. She landed in between the two, hoping she would have enough time. Venus whispered a few words into the artefact ring very tenderly, then looked up to see that Chrysalis had been stopped by Shining's Shield.
So she realized that there was time to speak. She glared straight at Chrysalis, making sure to look right into her eyes, and spoke "I am Venus, Warrior of Love." She pulled her left foreleg back, as if preparing to punch "And I don't like you." The leg moved forward, and as it moved an overwhelming amount of energy manifested around it.
"Love Sign: Master Spark!" Venus shouted, and unleashed her annihilation of love.
The manifested energy condensed into a cone of pure destructive power that crashed into Chrysalis with overwhelming momentum and carried her into the air.
(With a gasp, Sunset finally let the spell lapse, being unable to endure any longer. She also fell unconscious.)
Chrysalis was suddenly released from the pain, and she immediately tried to shapeshift away, but failed. The same happened when she tried to teleport. The Master Spark was a destructive spell, but it was more than just mindless violence. One of its effects was that the destructive power was capable of disrupting the flow of energy in its vicinity, thus making it far harder to escape.
Carried along by the beam of energy, Chrysalis crashed into the dome forcefield that had been cast over the city. And the spell was still going, a seemingly endless fount of power gushing from Venus's body. Caught between the unstopable force and the immovable object, Chrysalis' body was slowly being ground away.
"GAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!" The changeling queen shouted in primal anger.
She leaned her head backwards, and proceeded to headbutt the spell. And the headbutt contained such force, that for a single moment it overwhelmed the opposing energy.
In that comment, Chrysalis' body shifted. It condensed into the size and shape of a needle, becoming denser than any known natural material. The needle forced itself into the barrier, piercing through and creating a minuscule opening. Then it passed through.
Venus stopped her attack, knowing that there was no point anymore. The needle turned back into Chrysalis outside the barrier, but she looked diminished, as if she had spent part of herself to achieve that stunt. Without even looking back, the Changeling Queen teleported away.
The battle was over. Shining Armor soon retracted his shield and Sunset was taken to receive medical attention and the guards looked around to make sure everything was indeed over. While that was happening, Venus was resting from the exertion and talking with her groom.
"Looks like we couldn't defeat Chrysalis completely." She said.
"That was always a long shot." He replied, shaking his head "But we managed to suceed on the main mission." He smiled "King Thorax is here."
It was true. The neophyte changeling ruler had just arrived right outside the barrier that englobed the city. He had been in standby the whole time, together with a squad of elite changelings, and one of the contingency plans that had been prepared was a teleportation circle to take all of them to the battlefield after the barrier was lowered.
Thankfully enough, that plan didn't prove to be necessary, so instead Thorax came by himself after the battle was over. He still had a role to play, one that had nothing to do with combat.
After reaching so close to the magic barrier he could touch it, King Thorax brought forth the magic of his soul. Both his body and mind resonated with it, as the changeling ruler touched upon the most primal and sacred magic of his race: The hive mind itself.
He wasn't connecting with his own subjects, however, for that wouldn't take as much effort as he was spending (or any effort at all, really), instead Thorax reached out to the many changelings who were still trapped inside the barrier, too weak to even try to escape or hide, specially after being drained by their queen.
Chrysalis herself did not notice anything, the drain of the fight combined with the wear her blood sacrifice magic caused on the connection with her subjects weakened it to the point where she could barely even feel their existence. So she was not able to interfere.
As soon as the changelings realized who was contacting them, they rejected his attempt at a conversation, their loyalty to Chrysalis still unabated despite her recent actions. However, the communication of the hive mind was far deeper and more involved than a simple sharing of thoughts. As such, even as they rejected him, the changelings understood a bit about him.
And that left them surprised, as it was the realization that he had something in common with them: He also loved Chrysalis.
That was something he had realized about himself after becoming a King. Despite her flaws, he still had been a loyal servant to her, and his decision to break away from her control wasn't done without some regret. Thorax had struggled with his contradictory emotions for a while, until he cast his mind far into the past, dozens of generations before his birth, accessing the shared memories of the hive.
He understood that Chrysalis hadn't always been as selfish and obsessed as she currently was. In fact, she had loved the hive with all her soul, and had that love returned. But centuries of strife, persecution and pain had warped her into what she eventually became. Those old days were the root of the loyalty of her changelings, as the shared memory of love from the entire hive had touched all the later generations of her servants, including Thorax himself.
From that realization, a wish was born in the heart of the Changeling King. He wished to be able to heal the heart of Chrysalis, so that the changelings could truly leave behind their history of strife and move on to a bright future, but also because he didn't want her to keep suffering.
Despite being rejected, Thorax did not give up. He patiently reached out to Chrysalis' changelings again and again, and little by little the contact allowed them to understand his feelings and his wish. Slowly their rejections became less vehement as they found that their own feelings closely matched with what the king felt.
Eventually, they were unable to reject Thorax anymore, as that would be like rejecting their own selves. But even still they were not prepared to truly listen to him, their hearts still refusing any idea of betraying Chrysalis.
Thorax did not consider that to be a problem, as a long dialogue was thus started within the hive mind. Each and every one of the changelings had their own thoughts and ideas about Chrysalis' situation, and he met with them in turn, while the communication was also shared between all of them.
Some of them doubted the feasibility of the peaceful coexistence that Thorax was pushing, but he shared with them many of the memories of his own subjects, and how they were being treated by the other races of Equestria.
Others feared that their queen would be harshly punished for her actions against the ponies and Equestria itself, but he shared what he had learned about their practices, how Chrysalis had never done anything that was beyond their forgiveness, how Chrysalis would be able to help them with their crises in exchange for lessening her punishment, and how he promised to share with her whatever that punishment ended up being.
Others still did not think that changing Chrysalis' mind was a possibility, given how long her "new" behavior had already lasted, and how much she had invested in all her schemes and attempts to obtain power. To answer those, Thorax turned the question back on them: Did they think it was possible, or were they just resigned to endure the "new" Chrysalis for the sake of their love for the "old" Chrysalis?
Finally, there were very few changelings remaining unconvinced. Their argument was nothing like any of the others, as they actually agreed with everything Thorax had said, but refused to leave Chrysalis, as they were unwilling to subject Chrysalis to the loneliness of being completely cut off from all other changelings.
However, Thorax had one last surprise in store from them:
"I never intended for you all to join my swarm. All that I ask is that you allow us to connect with you, and thus with Chrysalis. I want her to hear me, but most importantly, I want her to hear the voices of those who refused to follow the her she became." Those were the words that would be written in the history books, but the communication of the network allowed for an entire world of additional meaning that could not be conveyed through a single statement.
Regardless, after that was conveyed, the network of Chrysalis' followers fell into an uncharacteristic silence. Thorax had already said everything he'd meant to, and each of the changelings stopped to think about what decision to take. The time that deliberation lasted was unclear, varying from one account to another, but eventually they began to respond.
At first it was one by one, but soon enough more and more of them joined in voicing their assent for the proposal. Soon enough, all of them had accepted it. And when they realized it, the changelings did the telepathic equivalent of looking around at each other, before they acted as one and opened the connection between Thorax's hive and Chrysalis, serving as intermediaries.
The consequences of that action would only become clear in the future.
+0+
Back on the wedding battlefield, the work of fixing and cleaning everything for the ceremony was proceeding apace. Not that they were particularly hurried, as it had already been decided that the actual wedding would only occur two days later, since even the most injured of the Knights would have recovered enough to take active part in the festivities, which they clearly deserved.
All of them had already gone through the first round of medical care, and were currently resting inside their own private rooms (except for the crusaders, as separating them so soon after their use of bond magic was ill-advised). As such, Sunset immediately realized something was strange when a white-coated earth pony mare entered her room.
"Who are you?" She asked.
"I have just come to congratulate you on your achievement, my student." The mare spoke in a very familiar voice.
"Teacher?" Sunset asked, surprised, but she already knew the answer was yes.
"I'm going to be in disguise until the wedding, since I want to take part in the festivities without causing an uproar, just so you know." Celestia said, before stepping close to Sunset's bed.
"I see... Are you going to talk to everyone?" Sunset asked.
"Maybe later." Celestia said with a playful smile "For now, I came just for you."
Sunset was about to ask what she meant by that, but stopped upon seeing Celestia's expression turn solemn.
"Power without Heart only leads to destruction, both of those around you, and yourself." She spoke in a tone of recitation.
"On the other hand, a Heart without Power, as righteous as it may be is incapable of defending its values." She continued, and Sunset's expression changed as she thought of a possible reason for what Celestia was doing.
"As one who understood that, I ask of you this: Are you willing to proceed forth in your harsh path without giving up, using your power for the sake of Equestria?" She asked.
"Yes!" Sunset said hurriedly, barely daring to believe that was really happening.
"I see." Celestia replied "Then I proclaim you, Knight Sunset Shimmer, the Heart of Power."
And with that, the current generation of Knights had reached a new stage.
Wedding Arc End
Next: Cloud of Chaos Arc
Titled Knights Saga - True Start
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