Chapter 10
Dragon Overdrive
Maximus, also known as the century dragon, is a shadow dragon created by Alexei that can clone himself 100 times. In terms of rank, Maximus is the lowest ranking general in Alexei's army. He is also the youngest. Maximus is hot-headed, cocky, stubborn, impulsive, fearless, and a loose cannon. He doesn't listen the other dragon generals, especially Discord. The only one he has respect for is Alexei, mostly because Maximus fears Alexei due to his overwhelming vicious presence. Even though he's just a kid, Maximus was more than a challenge for the Elemental Warriors. Flareon was soon about to find out how powerful Maximus was for himself. It all began one afternoon in Death Valley, Alexei was sitting in his throne eating a slab of meat off a large bone, when suddenly, he began to smile.
"Discord...do you remember our dear general Maximus?" Alexei said as he threw the bone to the pile of bones resting in the corner to the cavern. Discord, who was resting in the air reading a book, looked at Alexei seriously and sighed.
"Ah yes...him," Discord replied, "I remember Maximus very clearly. That kid never listened to word I said. Why do you ask?" Alexei slowly got up from his throne and walked to the middle of the room.
"More of my power has returned to me, enough that I'm now able to resurrect Maximus," Alexei said as he stretched out his right claw and began to gather power into it. Unfortunately, Discord didn't seem happy at what Alexei had just said.
"Lord Alexei...are you sure you want to bring him back?" Discord replied, "No offense, but...shouldn't you wait till your able to resurrect the others instead? Can we even trust Maximus?" Alexei simply chuckled at Discord's words.
"Oh come now Discord...that's no way to treat your fellow dragon. You don't need to worry, Maximus will carry out this mission I have for him, I guarantee it," Alexei said as he looked at the big black ball of dark energy in his right claw. Soon after, he fired the energy at the ground before him, and a few seconds later, it dispersed and a small winged dragon was seen standing before them. The dragon looked around the room and spotted Alexei.
"Oh...Alexei, you here," Maximus said. He turned his head and saw Discord. "Why is that dork here?" Discord simply stuck out his tongue at Maximus. "Wait...where are the others at? What's going on? The last thing I remembered was fighting a group of ponies at Fort Hope and then everything went black."
"When I was sealed by Nova and the Elemental Warriors, my entire army disappeared, including you and the other generals. It has been 10,000 years since we last lived in Equestria, everything is very different now, but our goal remains the same. In about five years, once all my power returns to me, I will finally take over Equestria! This time...the Elemental Warriors won't be able to stop me!" Alexei proclaimed.
"Alright dude...cool, but what should I do? Now that those elemental losers are dead, whose butt do I get to kick now? I mean...seriously, I don't want to spend five years hanging around with dofus over there!" Maximus replied.
"You see Maximus...there is this chosen one that is supposedly destined to defeat me. His name is Flareon and he has the same power as Nova, though Flareon is clearly inferior to him. Still...I would like you to kill Flareon for me. He lives in a town called Ponyville. Think you can handle that...Maximus?" Alexei said. At that moment, Maximus burst out laughing.
"You're kidding right? All I have to do is kill one pony? That's it? This is going to be easy!" Maximus proclaimed as he flew into the air, "I'll be back in no time at all!" As Maximus flew past Discord, he looked at him and said, "Smell ya later grandpa!" After Maximus left, Discord walked over to Alexei.
"My lord...how do you think Flareon will fare against Maximus?" Discord asked.
"I can't say for sure, but it would be a shame if he would lose to Maximus. Like I said before...I would like to be the one who kills Flareon. Hopefully, he can at least help Flareon get stronger. It doesn't matter to me if Maximus ends up dying, because I still have the others," Alexei replied as he and Discord began to laugh malevolently. Meanwhile, in Golden Oak Library, Flareon, Twilight, and Spike were playing with Solana, when suddenly, the door opened and Rainbow Dash came inside.
"Flareon...a dragon appeared in Ponyville. He's calling your name!" she exclaimed, "I think he was sent by Alexei!"
As Flareon got up, he turned to a worried Twilight and said, "Don't worry Twilight...I got this."
"Just be careful...ok?" she replied. Soon after, Flareon quickly left the house with Rainbow Dash and headed into town. While they were flying, he told Rainbow Dash to help the Ponyville residents escape to safety. Meanwhile, Maximus was walking through Ponyville and laughing at all the scared ponies who were running away.
"Come out Flareon! Don't make me destroy this pathetic little town just to make you coming out of hiding! Show yourself already you coward!" Maximus yelled. Suddenly, he spotted Flareon land before him. "It's about time you showed up loser!" At that moment, Rainbow Dash was trying to help the Ponyville residents escape to safety.
"Come on everyone...follow me!" Rainbow Dash said as ponies quickly followed her out of town. Flareon then looked closer at the dragon and began to laugh. Maximus was a small, young dragon that was probably no older than Apple Bloom. Was this the best Alexei could do?
"Is this a joke?" Flareon said as he tried to stop laughing, "Alexei sent some little kid after me? Is her even taking me serious anymore?" Right away, Maximus started to lose his temper.
"Quit calling me a kid you stupid horse!" Maximus yelled, "Alexei sent me here to kill you and that's what I'm going to do!" Sadly for him, Flareon was still laughing at him.
"Yeah ok kid...you and what army?" Flareon replied. Instead of getting more angry, Maximus started to smile mischievously. Flareon started to get worried as something seemed off. What was Maximus planning?
"Allow me to show you...my true power!" Maximus proclaimed, "Once I kill you, Alexei is definitely going to move me up in rank! I'm so going to shove this victory right in that old geezer Discord's face!" At that moment, Maximus's body split in half, and soon after, two Maximuses appeared before him. Unfortunately, it didn't stop there. It wasn't long before two became four, four become eight, eight became sixteen, and so on until, Flareon was surrounded by 100 Maximuses. Flareon couldn't even tell which one was the real Maximus. "How do you like my special ability? Come on guys," Maximus said as he signaled to his clones," Attack the chosen one now!" Flareon had no choice, he was going to battle 100 dragons by himself. He then quickly flew towards the clones and the battle between Flareon and Maximus began. A couple of minutes later, Flareon was beginning to learn Maximus's battle strategy, mainly that he didn't have one. All the Maximus clones simply did was constantly charged at him recklessly and aimed fireballs at him without thinking. Even though Maximus didn't have a strategy, that actually didn't seem to matter in the big picture. The problem was that no matter how many clones Flareon defeated, Maximus simply cloned himself again to make up for the numbers he lost. If Flareon defeated ten clones, Maximus would create another ten. If Flareon killed twenty clones, Maximus would make twenty again. It didn't take long before it struck Flareon. This was turning out to be a never ending battle. Suddenly, the clones stopped attacking. As Maximus looked at Flareon, who was panting heavily, he began to laugh. "This is the best you got dude?" Maximus said as he pointed to him and laughed, "You're so pathetic! Alexei was right! You're not even close to as strong as Nova was! Seriously...you aren't even a challenge! I've wasted enough time playing around with such a weakling! I'm going to end this right now!" At that moment, a Maximus clone suddenly grabbed Flareon's legs, and then a clone grabbed the clones' legs, and one after another, it continued until all the Maximus clones had formed a giant snake. Suddenly, the clone snake turned hard right and Flareon was flung into the side of a building. It continued going right as Flareon was sent crashing through building after building. The clone snake then turned left and Flareon crashed through the building on the left side. The clone snake went upwards and Flareon was forced high into the air. As the clone snake reared back and began to fling Flareon into the ground, the Maximus clone that was holding onto Flareon's legs yelled, "Maximus...Super Whiplash!" Soon after, Flareon was sent crashing into the ground. The force of the impact was so strong that a huge shockwave was seen flying from the area. As the dust dispersed, Flareon was seen lying on the ground in a crater. A Maximus clone began to laugh at him. "How did you like my ultimate technique? It's almost as awesome I am! I might as well finish you off now!" Things were looking very bad for Flareon. He was beginning to think to himself, was he going to die? Suddenly, Twilight and Solana appeared in his mind which started to give Flareon hope. He couldn't die here, especially since he had a family depending on him. As the Maximus clones began to charge at him, Flareon used his fire magic to make a smoke screen appear around him as all 100 clones charged through the smoke screen and crashed into the ground. A few seconds later, after the smoke dispersed, the Maximus clones were surprised to find out Flareon was nowhere to be seen. A clone quickly looked around and yelled, "Quit hiding you coward!" He then signaled to the other clones. "What are you waiting for you morons?! Go find him!" Soon after, the Maximus clones began to search around the area. Meanwhile, Flareon was hiding behind a building and peaked his head around the corner to see the clones searching for him.
"I have to find a way to end this," Flareon muttered, "No matter how may clones I defeat, Maximus just keeps cloning himself to make up for the lost numbers. If I'm going to beat Maximus, I have to defeat all 100 Maximus clones at the same time, but how?" At that moment, Flareon remembered something Rainbow Dash had showed him once. She could create a tornado by flying low to the ground and going upwards in a circle at high-speed. Rainbow Dash could also send the tornado in a direction by kicking it. Flareon was then stuck by an idea. "I think...this should be powerful enough to defeat all 100 Maximus clones in one blow. Here goes nothing!" As Flareon flew into the open, the clones quickly spotted him.
"Well, well...the coward finally showed himself!" a Maximus clone yelled, "Come on guys...let's kill this loser already!" As the clones began to charge at him, Flareon used his fire magic to cloak himself in fire, flew low to the ground, and went upwards in a circle at fast as he could. A few seconds later, Flareon had successfully managed to create a tornado made purely out of fire.
"Take this...Fire Tornado!" Flareon yelled as he kicked it towards the rapidly approaching clones. Since the Maximus clones were grouped tightly together, they weren't able to avoid the Fire Tornado's powerful suction. As all 100 clones got sucked into the tornado, they soon screamed in pain as one by one, the Maximus clones vanished in the blazing inferno. A few seconds later, the Fire Tornado finally disappeared. Flareon slowly landed on the ground to rest. It was over at last, he had defeated Maximus. Suddenly, he heard sound of approaching hooves and turned around to see Twilight and his friends coming towards him. Flareon's friends smiled happily as they began to congratulate him on his victory. As Twilight furiously hugged and kiss Flareon with tears in her eyes, he flinched in pain. It wasn't until now that Flareon realized how badly he was injured. Right away, she noticed that Flareon was hurt.
"Come on Flareon...let me help you to the hospital," Twilight said. When she saw his face, Twilight replied, "Don't give me that tough guy act, you're going to rest at the hospital, don't even think about arguing with me. I was worried sick about you!" After the hard, tough battle Flareon had just experienced with Maximus, he knew that arguing with Twilight if he needed to go to the hospital or not was a whole different battle on its own and one that Flareon wasn't going to win. He then let Twilight grab his right hoof and put in around her back as they slowly began to walk towards the Ponyville Hospital. Not only did Flareon defeat Maximus, he also obtained a new technique, the Fire Tornado.