Awesome / The Assassination of Twilight Sparkle

The Assassination of Twilight Sparkle

• Celestia ordering the execution of Blueblood and his nine co-conspirators by burning at the stake, showing that invoking the wrath of a Physical Goddess and a mother who lost her child at the same time is just about the single most idiotic thing you could possibly do. Do Not Taunt Cthulhu, indeed.
  • The build-up to this during the trial shows precisely why she suffered from The Worf Effect in canon and just how terrifyingly angry she was. The mere sight of the conspirators is enough to make her turn up to heat in the courtroom until the air became dry like a desert. When Blueblood was brought in at last, the heat became so high that film in the cameras that the photographers were shooting with started to melt. Some, like Rarity and Fluttershy, fainted momentarily from heatstroke while others slowly made pools of sweat beneath them. Only Luna was unaffected by the insane amount of power, but even she managed to break a sweat. Only until all ten conspirators were properly lined up then she turned down the heat.
• Blueblood, for mustering up the courage to respond to Celestia's angry speech with one of his own. Say what you will about what he did, but it takes some serious guts to stand up to an angry Celestia. Stupid guts, but still.
  Blueblood: Shut up! I deserved to be an alicorn! I carry your blood in my veins, the noblest blood in all of Equestria! Becoming an alicorn was a privilege only somepony of my family was worthy of having! Not some low noble unicorn that was good for nothing except cleaning up your mistakes! Everypony knows that’s all she was good for!

Aftermath of a Fallen Star

• Stag get pointers for, not only manipulating Ivory Shell and Lord Cosmo psychologically, but managed to infiltrate Equestrian's First HQ, an anti-Twilight terrorist group, with the help of an unwitting scout. Here is the result in all its glory:
  “Bingo! Give the pony a prize! He finally figured out that he, in one single night, gave the most vital information to a friend who happens to have been hired by Princess Luna,” said Black Lightning as he clapped his hooves. “That information lead to the utter destruction of the Equestrian’s First group, where I think maybe eighty or ninety percent of them are dead. With the rest awaiting trial for treason, terrorism, murder, theft, assault, and whatever other laws that will surely send them to the gas chambers or life imprisonment. Not to mention the added bonus of finding out that your now dead leader here was in contact with other terrorist groups, and we have more information to help take them out too.”
• In Luna's chapter, she confronts Amadeus in his dreams as he flees to Unicornia, reveals that she knows all about his plans to dethrone herself and Celestia and establish Majesty as Queen and that, if she wanted to, she could kill the baby alicorn in her sleep, and then tops it off with implanting the Tantabus into his mind to ensure that he will suffer from never-ending and progressively worse nightmares for the rest of his life as punishment for his sins!
• Cheerilee's scathing letter to the headmaster of Manehattan P.S. 134, reaming him out for refusing to help Regal, a student bullied to the point of suicide for the crime of being Blueblood's nephew. She closes her speech with, "Thank you for the experience, sir. May you rot in Tartarus."
• After the funeral, Rainbow Dash begins drinking heavily out of grief and guilt over the last thing she said to Twilight before her death. She eventually gets alcohol poisoning and has a dream about all of Ponyville mourning her death, then meets her subconscious self who offers her the option to die so she won't have to feel any more guilt or pain. Her loyalty to her friends and family wins out and she chooses to live.
• Fancy Pants laying down a blistering verbal smackdown on Lord Hex, a unicorn noble who opposed Twilight's reforms even after her death. And immediately after, making a promise that any Canterlot noble who tries to stop the modernization of Equestria is going to fall, and fall hard.
  Fancy Pants: Hex, I know you never approved of Twilight’s reformations, even if you never went public about them. You still were part of the side that favored tradition and wanted nothing to change. And now you look around you and see change happening, regardless of what you and those brave enough to still hold on to their argument can see. You’re not just upset you’re losing money or that Equestria is moving on, you’re upset because your side lost when Twilight died. All of Equestria is looking to reform itself and you have no choice but to follow, kicking and screaming like a foal having a temper tantrum because he didn’t get his way.
• The first part of Apple Bloom's chapter reveals that Rarity has stopped taking in orders from Canterlot. When a Canterlot mare comes in asking for a dress to wear at a party (only two weeks after Twilight's death) Rarity refuses. When told by the mare that she will make sure nopony will ever shop at the boutique again, Rarity simply tells her to kiss her plothole. (Yes, that is a direct quote.)
  • In that same chapter, Silver Spoon has been running her mouth about how Twilight deserved to die for trying to change Equestria. She mentions this to Diamond Tiara, thinking she'll take her side, only to be smacked across the face by Diamond Tiara and promptly told that she is dead to her.
• Spike's epiphany back at Rupert's inn after losing to Aquilina in Misery Poker. Instead of convincing him that everything is a lost cause and just accept reality, he decides that Silly Rabbit, Cynicism Is for Losers! and decides to change Erebus Isles for the better so that tragedies like Aquilina's wouldn't happen again. Even when he lost his innocence, he still intends to bring the magic of friendship to Erebus, one person at a time. As stated upon him joining of the Red Lightnings:
  Spike: I promise you, Mom. I’m gonna get stronger... and I’m going to fix this island and even Equestria one day. I promise.

Path Of The Dragon

• The Establishing Series Moment in the first chapter shows the sheer difference between Spike on his first day in Erebus and his post Time Skip self.
• The heroes' first job requires them to save a captured girl who was going to be sold to slavery. Except that she is held in a very heavily guarded compound so they can't just break in. The initial plan to just buy her failed because an even more important customer reserved her in advance. Then it is revealed that The Legion has sent one of their intelligence agents undercover to liberate their own captured men. After finding out about Spike, Rexius the agent told him that his flames are powerful enough to melt a steel door that previously needed to be opened with a heavily guarded key that he could not obtain by himself. After dispatching the guards, destroying the cloaking crystal which made the island visible without raising any alarms, this allowed a fleet of submarines loaded with soldiers to surface and take island defences by surprise.