//------------------------------//
// Chapter 4: Royal Flush 
// Story: The Glow 
// by WhoHoo 
//------------------------------//

Both Twilight and Celestia stared at Spike for a few moments, mouths agape. 

“Spike!” Twilight scolded her assistant. “That is an ancient magical artifact, not a piece of excrement! Plus, Celestia created this from the sun itself. According to Long Wind’s book, this might be the very object that caused the first ponies to—”

“He is right, though, Twilight,” Celestia interjected in a quiet voice, her face flushing red with embarrassment.

“WHAT?” Twilight and Spike replied as one.

“Before I drafted my response to your inquiry about the Glow, I checked Long Wind’s book out of the Royal Library and read the passage that prompted your interest,” Celestia explained. “It turns out that the scholar did not have a proper understanding of the Glow’s creation.”

“S-so what really happened, Princess?” Twilight nervously asked. The purple unicorn was not sure that she really wanted to hear anymore, but her internal academic curiosity propelled her further into the bowels of forbidden knowledge. 

“Twilight, Spike, do you remember the huge meteor two months ago?” Celestia began to explain. Her two companions nodded. “Well, earlier that day, Luna ate three Manican burritos, and her stomach was bothering her. For as long as my sister and I can remember, every time alicorns get indigestion, magical phenomena occur outside of our control. In the case of the Glow, I had eaten some cashews without roasting them. Normally, that would be enough to kill or seriously poison a regular creature, but it only gave me a very bad tummyache. In the process of the resulting … scatological event … I passed the Glow. Within a year, the first ponies began appearing throughout Equestria.”

Everything finally clicked together in the unicorn and dragon’s minds.

“So … so, you shit out the first ponies?” Spike wondered aloud. Meanwhile, Twilight was just standing there, twitching. Her response was understandable since her whole worldview had just been upended.

“In a manner of speaking, yes, that is correct, Spike.” Celestia responded.

“Does that mean that every time that ponies use the bathroom, they’re technically creating your grandchildren?” Spike asked, deep in thought. This observation caused Spike and the Princess to begin deliberating for several hours about Equestria’s current citizenship and birth legislation.

“What a crappy day!” Twilight finally moaned aloud, as Celestia and Spike’s conversation drew to a close.

Fin.