Pharynx entered the vermin camp, disguised as Gelltor.
"There you are," Ascrod said. "When you didn't show up last night, we thought you'd turned traitor like Mokkan."
Pharynx laughed nervously. "No, I was captured and tied up by the ponies yesterday," he lied. "I only managed to escape just now."
"Typical Gelltor," Vannan said. "Gets himself caught by the enemy with nothing to show for it."
Meanwhile, Grogar had observed this conversation, then he turned to face Predak. "And you were saying you had an idea…?" he asked.
"Yes, my lord," answered Predak. "What finer way to capture those ponies than by using something strong and sturdy, something immovable… strong as a rock maybe."
Grogar gave her an impatient glare. "Get to the point!"
Predak continued to explain. "I'm going to use your dust to create a giant rock monster. Against such a hard and heavy object, the ponies won't know what hit them."
"Predak… you may proceed," said Grogar. "And do not fail me like your brother did."
As Predak prepared for her mission, she suffered the ridicule of her siblings. "Even I know this plan of yours won't work, Predak," mocked Ascrod.
"Huh! Just you wait…" snapped Predak. "I'll be delivering pony pancakes to the front door by the end of the day."
"Oh, sure you will…" Vannan said with sarcasm as she gazed at herself in her mirror from many angles. Luckily, she had a backup mirror after the first one broke.
Predak to no further notice and went on her way.
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Celestia was passing through the park, when she noticed Fluttershy talking to a bird. Celestia couldn't understand what they were saying- she didn't speak bird language- but she could tell Fluttershy was getting upset.
The bird flew away and Fluttershy turned to Celestia. "That thrush just came from the Everfree Forest," she said. "She told me the Marlfoxes have killed and eaten all the rest of her flock. How could anybeast bear to take the life of another creature for food? Ooh, it makes me so mad!" She stamped her hoof.
"Hey, don't knock it till you've tried it," said a voice. Fluttershy and Celestia looked up and saw Predak sitting in a tree.
"What do you want?" Celestia snapped.
Predak leapt down from the tree and sniggered at them. She reached behind her and held out a single ordinary rock she had found, and before the two ponies could react, she reached into a pouch she was carrying, and dusted the rock once with yellow dust and again with blue. "That dust…!" yelped Fluttershy.
The rock began to glow magically as it grew in size and sprouted legs and arms, and an ugly face. Predak laughed maliciously as the monster became complete.
Fluttershy and Celestia blinked their eyes once each. "I think we're in trouble…" Fluttershy peeped.
Predak snickered again. "Strong Stone, seize them!"
The monster pounded its huge feet which actually caused tremors which nearly knocked Celestia and Fluttershy down. Celestia got down on all fours and charged forward… but Strong Stone lived up to his name by simply raising his huge stone fist to block Celestia from going any further and simply nudging her…
"WHAAA…!" Just that simple nudge sent her far.
"CELESTIA…!" cried Fluttershy.
Celestia could see stars and birds before her dizzy eyes.
Starlight Glimmer and Rarity were passing by just then and saw Celestia in trouble. They jumped in to defend their princess. They shot spells at Strong Stone. Sadly, all that bombardment didn't even tickle the monster. "It's like hitting a solid rock," said Starlight.
"Uh, Starlight…?" said Rarity. "It is a rock, and it's heading this way!"
The monster was stomping toward them, and the two unicorns began to run as the monster gave chase. Predak laughed hard and wickedly. "I'm enjoying this…! Heh, heh, ah, ah, ah…!"
Celestia finally got upright again. "Are you afraid to fight us yourself?" she snarled at the vixen.
"Bring it on!" snapped Predak. She drew her ax and swung it at Celestia.
Despite still being winded, Celestia managed to dodge all Predak's attacks. "Being strong isn't everything, you know."
Predak growled and continued to swing the ax at Celestia. "Tell that to Lord Grogar when I bring you to him all tuckered out!"
As their fight continued, Starlight, Rarity, and Fluttershy were still on the run from Strong Stone. He wasn't very fast, being so heavy, but he sure was able to keep the girls in his sights, so Fluttershy decided to fly up high.
But she wasn't any safer up there. Strong Stone looked way up, and opened his huge mouth firing blazing meteor stones straight up at Fluttershy, which she barely dodged. "Celestia…! We could use some help…!" shouted Fluttershy.
Down below, Celestia was engaged in a battle lock, her horn against Predak's ax. "I'm a little busy right now…" she shouted back to Fluttershy. "Try to find the monster's weakness!"
"He doesn't have one!" growled Predak.
Strong Stone continued to fire his meteors at the girls. The girls just continued to swerve and evade the shots, but they couldn't keep it up. Somehow, they just had to find out the monster's weakness.
Then suddenly, as Fluttershy gazed into Strong Stone's huge mouth, "I have an idea…!" she said as she flew downward.
"Fluttershy, no! What are you doing?" cried Rarity.
Fluttershy had flown closer towards the monster and began teasing him to chasing her. Flying one way, then another- up and down, every way around…
She was pretty fast, and her small size made her hard to see and follow. Strong Stone was getting dizzy.
Rarity was beginning to see, but she already knew the monster wasn't fast. Where was its weakness?
Suddenly Fluttershy flew way, way up until she was directly above the monster. The monster opened his mouth and fired another meteor. It went up, and up, and up… and soon came down again in a perfect straight line, smashing into the monster's face. Pieces of rubble landed in his open mouth. The monster groaned and roared as it didn't seem to like being hit there.
"What…?" snarled Predak. "It can't be!"
Celestia pushed her away with a blast of magic from her horn, and flew up to join Fluttershy. "My turn now…!" she said. From her horn, she shot a beam of energy straight into Strong Stone's mouth, weakening him even more.
The magic flew straight down Strong Stone's throat, crushing him into ordinary rocks, and dissolving the evil magic within.
WHAAAOM!
WHAAAOM!
Celestia, Fluttershy, Rarity, and Starlight cheered for joy, whooping and high-fiving each other. And then Celestia turned back to face Predak, but the Marlfox was gone. Unlike her brother Gelltor, Predak knew when she was licked.
Celestia growled in frustration that Predak had escaped, but the important thing was that everything was okay now. No serious damage had been done to the park.
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Predak came back and told Grogar what had happened.
"An extraordinary performance, Predak," sneered Grogar. "The second the rock monster died you pretty much threw a tantrum and gave up. You're allowed to keep going, you know."
Predak hung her head.
"However," Grogar continued, "It wasn't a total loss. Celestia and the others sent out so much magical energy in the efforts to fight Strong Stone that the residue leaked out into the air. I can feel myself absorbing it now, and it's making me stronger. Already I will be able to bring my most loyal servant over from the dimension of darkness."
He shook his head to and fro, making the bell around his neck ring.
Suddenly, a goofy looking donkey appeared in the middle of the campsite. "Hello, Bray," said Grogar. "How are things in Tambelon?"
"Everything is in readiness, master," said the donkey. "The Troggles merely await your word."
Grogar chuckled. "Pretty soon, but not just yet. I must continue to gather power until I am strong enough to move the entire kingdom over. The ponies have won the battle today, but the war is not over yet!"
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After failing to catch the boat thieves, Jeff and his voles returned to their cave. They were cooking lunch when two ponies appeared in the cave entrance. They were Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash.
Jeff was instantly suspicious of them. He stood up. "My name's Jeff. Who are you and what are you doing here?"
Twilight didn't like the way he spoke, but she couldn't see that he had any reason to wish her and Rainbow harm, so she said, "I'm Princess Twilight Sparkle and this is Rainbow Dash. We're from Equestria. We're looking for some friends of ours: a squirrel named Song, a changeling named Ocellus, and three ponies named Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo."
As soon as she said those names, Jeff turned to the others and cried, "I knew it! They're friends of the ponies that stole our boat! Tear them to pieces!" He jumped on Twilight and bit her ear.
"What the hay!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed. Next instant the rest of the voles set on them. They were fighting the whole lot of them at once. The two ponies were taken so much by surprise that they couldn't do a great deal at first. But the funny thing was that although the voles were yelling for their blood, they couldn't fight at all; they obviously didn't know the first thing about fighting. All the same, there were twelve of them and only two ponies; Rainbow and Twilight were outnumbered.
All of a sudden, there was a flash of light and the voles went flying in all directions. Twilight looked at the entrance to the cave and saw a hare standing there. He wore a blue and white robe and held a wand in his paw. If you've read my other stories, you can guess who this was.
"Joshy!" Twilight yelled. Yes, it was indeed Joshy Stag Hare, the wizard of Mossflower.
"No time to talk!" said Joshy. "Quick, run before they get back up!"
Joshy, Twilight, and Rainbow Dash dashed out of the cave and into the woods. The voles tried to chase after them, but they managed to escape.
"I say, what did you do to those vole chaps to get 'em all hatin' on you like that?" Joshy asked when they were safe.
"We didn't do anything!" Rainbow Dash said. "They just attacked us for no reason like a bunch of psychos!"
"It's good to see your face again, Joshy," said Twilight. "Feels like it's been a couple of years since we last met."
"So, what brings you back to Mossflower?" Joshy asked.
"We're searching for our friends," Twilight explained. "The Cutie Mark Crusaders, Ocellus, and a squirrel named Song."
"And they're on the trail of a crook named Mokkan Marlfox, who stole the Alicorn Amulet from Twilight's castle," said Rainbow Dash.
"Indeed!" said Joshy. "I've heard of those Marlchaps. They're a bad lot, but Mokkan might be the worst of the bunch. Just recently, I met a squirrel, I can't remember his name. I think it was Ganja, or maybe Gojo. Anyway, he told me he'd been a slave for the Marlfoxes on their island, but he managed to escape. The brutes cut off his tail, if you can imagine. Even Badrang or, or Malkariss didn't do that to their slaves!"
"With the Alicorn Amulet, Mokkan can do magic, just like a unicorn," said Twilight. "We had a lot of trouble when Trixie had it. I imagine it'll be even worse in the Marlfox's paws. So, we're tracking our friends, who are tracking the fox."
"Well, sounds like you've got a difficult task ahead of you," said Joshy. "I think you might need the help of a hare magician, wot wot."
Twilight clasped his paw. "Thank you so much."