Luna's Little Adventure (In Progress)

 

Little Luna holds aloft her oar, the only means of propulsion for her mighty vessel, a barrel she managed to drag into the stream not far from the castle.

She uses the oar to push her "vessel" into the stream.

Luna's vessel goes a ways down the stream, with her paddling a bit to help it along. In short order, it gets stuck on a berm of sand just beneath the surface.

Luna looks around suspiciously.

Luna jumps out of the barrel, wooden toy sword clenched in her teeth, and wades to shore.

Luna dives behind a row of bushes and creeps up on the guard ponies at the castle entrance. They watch her in amusement but pretend not to see her. When she is close enough, she jumps out at them.

The guard ponies smile at each other, and draw the toy wooden swords Luna gave them earlier with explantation that they were to be the bad guys. Then one replied.

Epic "battle" ensues. Eventually, the guards let Luna get the upper hoof. She pokes one in the belly.

He falls to the ground. Luna wheels around and with a fierce gaze of justice, kabonks her sword on the flank of the other guard.

The guard begins to lift the trumpet to his lips, slow enough to let Luna take the decisive blow.

She pokes him in the belly.

Luna momentarily surveys her work.

Luna charges into the castle.

 

Chapter 2:

 

Luna charged into the courtyard swinging her little wooden sword wildly, much to the surprise of the townsfolk who had come to the castle market to do business. Luna saw their confused expressions and realized she had been successful in taking by surprise the demons and monsters that had taken up residence in here.

Confused at first, the townsponies soon realized it was the feisty little moon filly up to her usual shenanigans. They began to play along.

Luna jumped back with a shocked face, but soon her intense knight training took over and she regained her composure. She swung her sword confidently.

Luna swung her sword at the dark mage while he retreated in fear. Meanwhile, a hat salespony tied a scarf around his face and put on a very wide-brimmed hat.

But, the cunning knight of the moon and stars caught him out of the corner of her eye and executed an evasive roll to get out of the way.

The monster made an agonizing cry and flopped down on the ground.

More townsponies jumped into the game, becoming monsters, demons, witches, undead, and other fiends. Luna's eyes widened and she took her fighting stance.

The gaggle of townspony fiends closed in, but Luna held aloft her magical wooden sword.

The townsponies looked at each other, not quite knowing what this all meant. Yet, they all felt that this must be the end for them since Luna now wore a cunning grin.

The townsponies played their roles and fell one by one, lamenting their terrible fate with cries of pain as they did so. When the last fiend fell, the bystander ponies clapped their hooves and thanked Luna for saving them. Luna smiled and curtsied. She addressed them presently, upon this important victory.

The townsponies responded with "Huzzahs!" of their own and showered acclaim upon the mighty, but small, knight. Luna sheathed her sword triumphantly. Then she approached the hat and cloth merchants, who were getting up after having been cut down by magical moon beams.

The hat merchant looked at the cloth merchant and the cloth merchant looked at the hat merchant. In a moment they smiled and shrugged.

In a flash, the merchants had whipped up a cleaver disguise for her. The cloth merchant provided a purple "cloak" with swirly patterns and tassels in golden and silver thread. The hat merchant contributed a fancy hat to match, the sort of hat that the courtiers that Luna often saw milling about the castle might wear.

The merchants clapped their hooves and the hat merchant responded, mimicking Luna's high ponish

Luna smiled, quite satisfied with the arrangement. Now she sat back on her haunches and flipped the cloak in front of her face, swinging her eyes from side to side the way Count Dracula would.

She came back to all fours and bowed to the merchants.

They bowed in return and in reverence to this little savior of Equestria.

With that Luna adopted a dignified posture and walked, most nobly, up the steps and through the entrance to the castle keep. Commensurate with her new role as a demon courtier she adopted a sort of smug, twisted grin so that the other demon nobles would suspect nothing

 

Chapter 3:

 

At the top of the stairs, our little demon princess passed the entryway guards. Here, thought Luna, is the first test of her disguise. She took a breath and readied herself for a great performance.

Even though, the two guardsmares had been participants in Luna's games before, they nearly burst into laughter. Nevertheless, they were able to keep it together and the one answered with a dignified bow.

The other added.

Luna bowed in return. Then she raised her cloak to cover her face as she had practiced shortly before.

The second guardsman nodded to the other indicating she knew how to respond.

Luna gasped in horror at the depravity of it.

The guards watched her go, barely able to contain their giggles. But, the first could not fully contain it and her laugh caught the ear of Luna, who stopped and turned.

The guardsmares were quick to stand straight and look serious.

Luna looked satisfied with the deference these demons gave her, so she decided to forgive them and not send them back to Tartarus.

The guards waited until Luna was out of earshot and burst out laughing.

 

Chapter 4:

 

Carefully mimicking what her royal instructors had taught her about walking with poise, Luna strode down the main corridor, each step full of panache. Guards proudly standing their post along the corridor, eyed her with amusement as this little mischief-maker went past.

Near the end of the corridor, where a cross-wise passageway let left and right. Luna observed as Lucky Petals, the kingdom's chancellor and second only to the sovereign, rounded the corner and came toward her.

The chancellor, at this and looking Luna up and down in her unusual hat and cloak, was taken aback.

Luna's looked around nervously, surprised that her disguise had been seen through. No other demon noticed. So, if she quickly and quietly dispatched this demon her mission could be preserved.

The good Chancellor now understood the game.

Luna lowered her voice to a whisper and drew a hoof to the side of her mouth.

The Chancellor nodded in reverence to this noble declaration, and observed what was clearly a new and wild thought forming in the mind of the little filly. In short order, Luna let loose with her new modification to the game.

The Chancellor chuckled to herself as she bowed in gratitude at this honor.

Luna, rather pleased with herself and the fortuitous turn of events - for even she could not have foretold that she would gain such a powerful and useful ally within the bowels of this occupied castle - bowed in turn, but not so low for it is well known that spies occupy a rung below knights in the order of chivalry.

Luna did not gallop far, but as she saw it she had passed through an enchanted corridor that gave the illusion of having no end whatsoever. In the course of the gallop, Luna called upon the power of the moon, which promptly dispelled the enchantment and allowed her to enter the later half of the corridor.

But Luna's boast was short lived, for the quiet passageway now revealed to her well-trained eye that it was perilous indeed. Far from merely being a corridor full of decorative furniture, paintings, tapestries, statures, and stained glass windows, it was clear to Luna that it was filled with traps.

Now Luna stepped carefully across the tiled floor, watching everything for signs that she might have set of a trap by stepping on a switch, or something. Luckily, there were no other ponies in the corridor, or Luna might have waited for those demons to depart before attempted to cross the perilous passage. Luna did notice the eyes of the statues and ponies in the paintings were following her.

Several steps into the passageway, Luna felt her front hoof give a little more that it should have when she placed it down on a tile.

Immediately Luna noticed the statues turn toward her. They let loose volleys of arrows at her. She drew her sword and improvised shield. With deft skill, Luna began dodging arrows, blocking them with her shield, or swatting them away with her sword.

Such was her skill that she continued to move down the passageway, defending herself as she went. Soon she found herself backing away from the statues, when she felt her back hoof activate another tile switch. Luna felt a puff of air beneath her and jumped back just before a line of spears rapidly emerged from the floor.

Now spears came out of the walls and ceiling as well, but they sought their target in vain. For Luna, knight of the moon and stars, displayed fantastic skill in dodging them all. Luna dodged the last set of spears by doing a dive roll over them on to a carpet in the center of the passageway.

But in the next moment, Luna heard the distant sounds of some foreboding wooden clockwork.

She looked about, trying to trace from whence it came, ready for anything. Then, she felt a rumbling beneath her hooves.

The tiled floor on the side now constituted a ledge above the now revealed gapping shaft of air above a pit of spikes. Luna gazed down, observing a few pebbles as fell from the ledge into the pit of spikes.

Luna inched her way along the edge and clear of the pit. Again she stepped carefully along the floor, supposing the the next trap would be the worst.

Luna now heard more mechanical clockwork sounds emanating from all around her. She glanced about and saw that the ceiling was now descending upon her. Razor sharp pikes began to emerged from holes in the floor and ceiling. On top of that, scythes now swung like pendulums all about. And afar off, at the other end of the corridor a slab of stone was descending, gradually closing off the only exit. Luna rolled her eyes, pursed her lips, and blew a strand of mane out of her eyes.

At the right moment she took off at full tilt, dodging spikes, rolling or jumping over scythes, and trying to make the exit before the slab closed it off, entombing her in this chamber of horrors.

She took a diving leap over the last scything and slid across the floor, through the door just before the gap became too small for her to fit through. In actuality, her dive landed her on an ornamental rug that then slid for about 3 meters down the hall.

Luna turned just in time to levitate her hat through the gap and back to her head just before the slab slammed shut and sealed the chamber...forevermore.