Adult Spike is trying to work out exactly how dragon magic works, and after he expresses frustration at not being able to use the only text ever written on the subject, King Thorax, his boyfriend decides to find it for him.
The journey takes him to the Crystal Empire, where the author once lived, but finding secrets from before Sombra's Reign is not easy, as memory and trauma obscure everything.
Written for the 2022 M/M Shipping Contest, it ended up a bit less shippy than I'd hoped, but hey, I wrote something!
Yeah! SpikexThorax let's go!
What a nice story! I liked the parallels between Spike and Thorax's relationship and Leafglitter and Lantern's, felt like a nice through-line.
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I'm glad you liked it. That's what I was going for, so I'm happy it worked!
hehe always love these ponifications. Four Ear is very in keeping with the canon Haycartes
aww, Spike is a researcher!
hehe love the forthrightness of age
aww the effects of a ponycentric Society…
ooh love this use of Changeling abilities, and the illustration of the tradeoff
hehe that is indeed what looking at Cadance would give you
always love it when the princesses use the phrase “my little pony” it is always so great
aww, mystery-solving boyfriends!
and oof! since Lantern had passed the thousand years in real time this is definitely the conclusion he would have come to
very useful tool to kill only Changelings though uh, idk how Thorax might feel about that haha
augh love that connection! and the whole story leading up to this was an illustration of one of the things that makes this ship great, which is that Spike and Thorax are both non-pony outsiders that ponies knew little about and feared before the canon series. the parallel with the Leafglitter and Lantern ship is really great.
love the way that this takes the idea of dragon greed and recontextualizes it as a positive thing
and oof. thank you for this glimpse into more of their story, which could be told for dozens of more chapters!
What a great story! It was a fun adventure that covered a lot of ground, and I like the direction you took with Spike and Thorax. The ending felt a bit rushed - it would have been great to see more emotional payoff for the two of them - but it wrapped up the main story nicely. Great work!
Great little story.