A new Threat

Preparation

"I'm sorry master but I don't understand, why make sure you don't hurt the ponies? Why not crush them like the bugs they are?" Ivory walked towards Crimson, not understanding his tactic.

"I will do things my way, don't question my Strategy." Crimson said, disappearing into a cloud of shadows. and his voice rang through the castle walls."I have to prepare..."

------- In Ponyville-------

 "Beloved ponies, a new villain has arose, and he is coming this way. Please stay inside your homes while we battle him, so you remain unharmed..." 

Celestia continued giving instructions to the ponies while Twilight put a protection spell over each house. They didn't want anypony being turned into a Dark horse. 

"Everypony is inside their homes and they all have protection spells. They also all have anything they would need if something would happen." Twilight reported

"Good work, my faithful student. Now we must prepare ourselves for this fight of the Century." she said, walking towards the meadow where they would fight and they prepared. Celestia watched them train and told them what might work better for more effect, while Twilight told Celestia what Crimson's moves were. Hours later they were tired since they had been training non-stop.

"We should rest. Then we will have energy for the battle tomorrow." Twilight pointed out. 

"Ya, i'm plumb tuckered out." AJ yawned and then flopped down onto the grass "Ima just gonna hit the hay right here."

"It is not a bad idea to rest. Sleep well." Celestia then flew off to the castle to get some rest. 

All through the night Luna did her job. she gave them all a restless night full of nightmares. Every time they closed their eyes to rest they had nightmares of Crimson defeating them... or worse.

 ---.. somewhere in Equestria---

"Ah, this will do nicely."Crimson smiled and then destroyed everything in that area using just a single blast from his horn. When he was done the area he was in had once housed mountains higher than the eye can track; now it's flat field of stone. 

"Ahhh that was a nice exercise. Now let's see what my minions up to..." he said as he used his shadow magic to teleport to the castle.

---------------------

When Crimson appeared in the castle, no one was there, they were all doing just as asked. Luna was giving his opponents nightmares, The guards were with Ivory, learning every move they could in a short time. Crimson sighed, everything was going according to plan, but nothing was going the way he wanted.

 "Stupid stone..." He mumbled as he went to the bed to sleep for tomorrow's battle.