Entropy Arc: It never did strike twice.

"...It can't be..." - As a wave of magic hit his body, paralyzing most of his muscles, the creature felt his own stomach sinking in, heavily. - "No..."

The unholy sensation of his magic stopping abruptly inside his body made his flesh burn, forcing the Draconequus to writhe and screech in agony; His very veins and arteries were bursting open, flooding every single inch of his flesh with his own panicking magic... Fighting against stasis itself was an uphill battle, which even the most powerful chaos magic could not stand up against.

The new heirs to the elements of harmony rose up to the skies like deities, as their eyes got possessed by a bright scorching light; a magic that would rival and defeat even that of Alicorns... A rainbow arch suddenly shot from the group, piercing the corrupted chaotic skies, and as it came crashing down upon their mighty, deceitful foe; the group of friends cherished and laughed as they slowly came back down to earth, their hooves finally connecting to it again. The reminiscences of the rainbow blast spread all around in an ever expanding dome-like shape, erasing all traces of chaos that once poured upon the land.

"We did it! We did it!" - Pinkie couldn't help but beam and jump around all excited for a short while until a sudden realization hit her as she came to a halt. - "Oh, on second thought I'm gonna miss the cotton candy clouds, chocolate rain, popcorn cornfields... But that's the price you gotta pay for being a hero. I tell you what, had he not been a meanie; Discord could have been a great candy maker!"

"Oh no, dear, this is simply horrid! To just IMAGINE that unnerving vermin making any type of recipe for anypony to consume is just plain revolting!"- Waving a hoof to the air and placing it upon her forehead, Rarity could not be more disgusted with such an idea, and of course, she spoke her mind with a small touch of drama that only she could deliver.

"Well, time to take that old goat faced snake back to its garden. I hope that his statue crumbles this time around!"

"Rainbow! We all might be a little... Scarred from this battle, but that might be still a bit too much. The elements of Harmony wouldn't do such a thing."

"Besides... I think that it would be a hay of a mess to glue all the pieces togetha later on, other than what Twilight has said already."

As the orangeish earth pony joined in the casual chit-chatting, the others couldn't help but also enroll their turns, in the casual feeling of safety that embraced them after the elements had brought the landscape back to normal.

"I still say he would make a great candy maker! Maybe a chocolatier even, if he was not, well, evil!" - Saying with quite the determination, Pinkie gave a strike to the ground with one of her front hooves.

"Girls..." - A timid voice tried to rise amongst the debate that had been reignited.

"Oh Pinkie, even if you somehow see an ounce of talent in that monster, how could you possibly say that?! Such creature deserves no sympathy. Besides, too much chocolate can also be a menace to a pony’s health."

"...Girls..."

"Like we never seen ya drowning ya sadness in a big, deep pot of ice cream, huh?" - Applejack asked teasingly, with a small smirk directed at the white unicorn mare; that could only frown and feign indignance after hearing such an accusation.

"Well, it's not my fault I can find some comfort within the contents of-"

"GIRLS!" - This time the timid, soft voice was emitted much louder, almost turned into a scream... Once Fluttershy got everypony's attention, she blushed ever so slightly and looked down, letting her long bang cover half of her face. -"I-I... Don't..."- her voice was fading back again, even weaker than before.

Immediately worrying about her friend, the bulky earth mare approached Fluttershy and put a hoof under her chin, making she look into her eyes as she gazed back into those beautiful turquoise irises.

"What is the matter, Sugarcube?"

But much for everyponie's surprise, Fluttershy suddenly snapped, unfolding her wings and squaring herself up as she said out loud. -" I DON'T SEE IT ANYWHERE!"- After that, she quickly dashed behind Applejack's rear, as she could only feel safer within her group of friends surrounding her.

"WHAT!?"- The rest all questioned in unison.

Unfortunately, it was true... They looked around frantically; however, there was not a single statue or trace of shattered rocks to be seen. As the panic started to get on their nerves, they scanned high and low for any signs, anything they could have overlooked... But the beast was just gone.

"Twilight... Do you think the elements-"

"It can't be, Fluttershy! It's not in their nature to... Kill something! They sent Nightmare Moon to the moon, turned Discord into stone, and brought Princess Luna back from her corruption... They wouldn't disintegrate him, they shouldn't!"

"Why do we even care anyways?! Equestria would be better off with that THING dead and gone!"- Always loyal to the princesses, Rainbow couldn't help but lash out a bit after she came back from her short speed flight... Even taking very high altitudes and scanning a great area, still, she could not track a single clue.

"Look, I'm upset about this too but, wishing that upon Discord would be around as good as wishing it upon Princess Luna."- With a tired and frustrated sigh, Twilight frowned at her friend before her horn lit up; scanning for any traces left of magic... But she couldn't deny it was extremely hard to track down chaos magic itself.

"Hey, ya'll! Quick, I found somethin'."- Stomping the grass, AJ looked down as everyone ran up to her as quickly as they could... Even if Fluttershy and Rarity were the most reluctant in the group to deepen this matter even further. But as they came closer, both the mares could feel their stomachs turn, especially Rarity.

"Ugh, no! I refuse to gaze upon this!"

"Oh my..."

In the exact same place Discord once stood airborne with his gravity defying throne, was laying a pool of splattered blood across the burnt grass blades... A trail of the liquid led directly into the Everfree forest, but it was also mixed with large blood clots, burnt dark brown fur, and blue feathers.

Nonetheless, it had a terrible stench coming out of it.

"That freaking coward! Trying to run away huh..." - Feeling the rush of both adrenaline and anger pumping through her body, Rainbow was totally ready to punch the Draconequus into tomorrow the time she would lay her gaze upon him. -"Let's see how well he can handle getting a sonic rainboom to that ugly mug of his-"

"I can't believe it... The elements didn't petrify him? No, it can't be! He must have done something! This is just not possible... URGH!"

Clenching her teeth, the purple mare struck the ground with both her front hooves, making some ashes and small particles of blood spread in the air as she stared dead on to the edges of the Everfree...

"There is no time to lose then."

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The maze of tall dark trees made his body sting every time he accidentally stumbled on their sturdy and spiky trunks. Tumbling and staggering, the Draconequus would just leave a long trail of damaged feathers and burnt fur mixed disgustingly with large quantities of blood that were uncontrollably puked by him; the elements had really failed to contain him this time, but it didn’t meant that there was no effects left from that initial blast. Getting his chaos magic even more putrefied, he could feel that with each heartbeat a sharp quantity of harmony magic would be pumped through his veins and tear them apart… His magic tried remaining together, but it was almost impossible. The pain was just so extreme and unbearable; As much as Discord fancied a full fledge dimension spinning in all directions, getting such effect through blood loss and an extra side of lightheadedness was very uncalled for at such a crucial moment.

Every sense within his body was so disconnected… The bleeding just won’t stop. Reaching the edge of a river, the creature shakily dragged itself closer to the edge and finally fell to the ground, shoving much more than just half of its muzzle inside the water, taking large gulps of the fresh and cold liquid as quickly as he could. Closing his eyelids tightly, there was just the feeling of quick splashing wetting his fur… All sounds rang wildly inside his sensitive ears, all distinguished smells blurred together and his bifurcated tongue was not of much use when it was always covered in blood, saliva and stomach acid. The vague sound of trotting in the distance reached his dysfunctional ears briefly, but it was cut short as growls and howls started to be emitted much closer to his current position.

“Great..!”

He barked in a low and harsh tone as he raised his muzzle out of the water… A thick thread of bloody saliva hung from his mouth, as it resisted against the stream of water that had washed his face. After all, the area was well known for being infested by timber wolves; but this didn’t faze him in the least… As the woody canines showed up, enclosing the beast in a circle, there was something in Discord’s head that just snapped.

“Come on girls, we’re closing in now!”

Unable to fly, due to the risk of hitting one of the tall trees, all of the mares trotted as fast as they could follow the messy trail left behind by the draconequus… Twilight leading the group, as her horn illuminated their dim lit path.

“Ugh, another meeting with that ruffian! And this soggy environment will NOT, leave my poor mane undamaged. “

Clearly distressed, Rarity couldn’t help but complain as she ran alongside Fluttershy, in the tail of the group…

“Ya’ all, don’tcha think it’s fishy that no timber wolves even tried to mess with us all the way here?”

Just as Applejack finished her question, loud howling and whining could be heard coming from certain directions all around the girls. The forest was dense and naturally slightly dark, but fiery silhouettes came running and tumbling, as they whined loudly and tried to put off the blue fire that was set upon their bodies.

“ … What in tarnation happened to those woody critters?!”

As they kept running and tried to avoid the panicking fiery timber wolves, the forest started to lose density and a weak sunlight shone through the treetops; the sound of a running river up ahead filled their ears, as well as the sound of an intense battle between an angry pack of timber wolves and a creature whose grotesque roar sounded like all sorts of deadly things screaming in unison:  A lion, an eagle and a dragon.

Reaching the battle, their eyes caught sight of a rather disturbing vision… Discord stood tall amongst the few enemies he had left trying to attack him. One that jumped straight for his neck was immediately blasted with a potent stream of blue and white fire, not even having a single chance to reach the ground and try to run to the river to extinguish the flames; His body hit the ground and exploded immediately, sending fiery pieces of wood flying in all directions and spilling a purple acid liquid that started to burn and scorch both the earth and plants it fell upon. A pair of them tried to flank him, one of them successfully sank their sharp wooden fangs deep into his “goat” leg, trying to tear apart the muscle with all of it its strength… But the second one was not so lucky as the hardy scales on the dragon-like leg deflected the bite; Discord was quick to react and literally kick his head off, which came rolling close to Rainbow Dash’s hooves as it was oozing that purple goo from all possible holes it had in it right now, and possessed a broken jaw.

 Roaring loudly, Discord quickly sank his teeth with all of his strength on the remaining timber wolf’s skull… It didn’t crush immediately, but the pressure was so great that eventually the wood cracked deeper and deeper and his jaws sank through, completely destroying the wolf’s head as its body fell limp on the river’s edge, also spilling that toxic acid on the clear water and disassembling its body right after it.

When the struggle was over, Discord gone back to standing on all four legs as he huffed and growled lightly… Every scratch and wound on his body sparked with peculiar white electricity as they were healing back by themselves. The howls had gone quiet and the sound that reigned was of the water stream, his agitated huffs and the treetops being shaken by the wind… Until it was soonly disrupted again.

A large impact could be heard as the blue Pegasus kicked the decapitated wolf’s head right into Discord’s nape, startling the beast that crocked its neck weirdly to stare at her immediately.

“Come on you coward, we’re gonna shove you back into stone even if I have to kick you back into a statue!”

Not sparing a second the female Pegasus took right off and launched herself in the beast’s direction… The rest of the group stared in shock, but reflexively Twilight charged up her horn.

However, in the very moment Discord saw her flapping her wings, he launched himself in her direction with his jaws fully open… Two dangerous rows of sharp teeth ready to lock down onto her skull just as he did with the timber wolf earlier. Taken aback by this surprise attack, the Pegasus tried to maneuver but it was far too late to change direction now; as soon as she extended her hooves and tried to tuck her head back, a stream of pinkish purple light came buzzing overhead and exploded right in the draconequus mouth, throwing his face off course by the sheer strength of the impact and creating a smoke cloud in the process.

Their bodies collided and in this very moment some strange red sparks were emitted out of the point her chest connected to his shoulder, but this didn’t matter now, as Rainbow had to be quick enough to use the ground to regain her balance and leap out of his range, getting airborne right after and flying away to regroup; Once she landed right beside the girls, she looked quite shocked, had her wings fully extended and her feathers all prickled up around her neck.

“What in the whole Tartarus was that?! The guy is a coward! He should have teleported or something!”

“Are ya crazy?!”

“I’m not! I just didn’t expect him to-“

“Girls! Stand back!”

Twilight commanded, calling their attention as the group followed her order… Something was very off with Discord.

Coughing and shaking his head from side to side violently, the draconequus raised his muzzle and stared Twilight directly into her eyes… His ruby like irises had expanded and his pupils turned into the shape of needles. A low threatening growling was emitted from the creature’s throat; but suddenly it looked down to its own shoulder, that mysteriously had now a new burned area, almost in the shape of a small symbolic lightning.

Twilight’s face scrunched in confusion, but before she could voice up her thoughts or act any further, the gapping jaws of the lord of chaos opened up to their full might again, and from his throat were spilled a jet extremely hot flames. Both the unicorns in the team created a magical shield to deflect the flames, but everything around then was set ablaze and quickly started to be consumed… The air was rising in temperature quickly, and getting difficult to breath, since the quantity remaining inside the shield was very scarce for 6 ponies.

Amongst the tall, blue flames stood the silhouette of the devious creature… With two dark red eyes that shone as bright as the flames around them, acquiring a light purple glow from the blue light reflected on his eyes. The mares expected for the worse possible outcome as they were trapped, and so they prepared themselves…

But much for their surprise, the draconequus extended his damaged wings, simply turned around and ran at full speed before taking off after jumping over the river. All of the mares were left speechless and stared in confusion, as their magical shield expanded and extinguished the flames that were threatening them the most… Once the fire was tamed and the shields broke off, a dangerous growling could be heard within themselves.

“…No, YOU WON’T!”

“Rainbows, don’tcha dare-“

As fast as AJ tried to bite down onto her tail hair, the mare was gone as she flew off to pursue Discord, gaining speed quickly. His ears twitched to the sound of the incoming angry Pegasus… And even if he so was much bigger, he knew quite well that those pesky equines had longer canines and sharper hooves than other races most of the time, and getting injured or captured was out of question. Surprisingly the draconequus had an amazing thrust for a creature with mismatched wings, but this didn’t matter… Nothing did.

“You made me betray my own friends, and you’re gonna pay for that Discord!” 

Diving like a hawk, she pulled her hooves back to strike his bat wing, but unfortunately… She underestimated his capacities; Discord quickly rotated his flexible body as if he was a cat, and maneuvered his wings to purposefully catch all of the drag possible… And as he came to a sudden break, he stared dead on into her eyes with a vicious gaze and quickly swiped his paw at the direction of one of her wings.

Rainbow tried to dodge or even retract her wings, but it was too late as she witnessed his black claws sink deep into the connective tendon between her bones and muscles… A sharp pain hit her immediately and spread through her entire wing to her back, as she suddenly fell from the sky like a bird that had their wings torn apart; that demon was just there, staring at her from above as he rotated back into position and thrust himself forward towards his freedom.

Flapping her wings was no use.

Screaming was no use.

As her body plummeted from the skies, her blood droplets got carried by the wind, falling with her but floating above the Pegasus. The pain was just unbelievable but she was far too shocked to react or scream; until two slim hooves of a soft yellowish fur suddenly broke off her fall with a strong jerk. As the velocity was diminishing, she could hear the loud and fast flapping of a pair of wings behind her.

“F-…Fluttershy?!”

“Hng… Just… Stay… Quiet… It’s gonna be okay!”

The mare tried to reassure her with a firm tone in her voice, yet a sweet sound to it… Like always. In a few seconds they landed, and the yellow Pegasus was gasping for air after releasing her friend, after all going so high and breaking the fall of somepony else put quite a strain on her body.

Seeing her in such a state broke Rainbow Dash out of her trance.

“Fluttershy! Are you okay? I’m sorry, I- ARGH!”

 Screaming in agony as she moved her wings to fold them, the realization hit her like a full speed cart. Her muscles were badly injured, and a stream of blood was trickling down her feathers quickly. Clenching her teeth, she held some tears back… It was not only her wing that hurt, but it was also her pride and her feelings.

As her friends finally caught up to her, each of them was panicking and distressed by what they had just witnessed, but once the blue mare sat down, looking defeated and gazing at the horizon, they all remained quiet as they lacked the right words to be spoken.

“I… I can’t believe it.”

Tears of pure anger and revolt rolled down her cheeks, wetting her fur and making it darker. A strong hoof was placed on her shoulder, as she was pulled in the embrace of Applejack.

“We can’t either Sugarcube… But first, let’s patch this up, and fall back… For now.”

 As bitter as those words were for her, Applejack was right… They couldn’t do anything right now. They were defeated; even using the elements of Harmony had failed, even if their friendship was tested… The draconequus still escaped, as the sun stood high in the sky and the scenery that was once beautiful and wild had been covered in blood, flames and tears that day.