The Royal Palace was quiet that eve. Come to think of it, it was quiet pretty much all the time, and as far as anypony knew, this spell had not yet reached that level of power that it was capable of inflicting its personality warping tricks upon buildings themselves. That would be quite the feat, for buildings do not possess any sort of personality to change about in the first place. Still, with everything else this mysterious miasma was getting its nonexistent talons into, it did not seem an entirely unlikelihood that it would be capable of extending its long reach to the very matter of Equestria that was not burdened by such organic and mental compulsions.
The point was, the Royal Palace of Canterlot was noticeably quieter than usual on this night of all nights. Perhaps it had something to do with the current state of its Princess, who had locked herself away in her chambers with only the wide web of thoughts to occupy her. This was not something she had ever imagined would get to her in such a way before, always whenever Equestria was under attack from some foreign intruder with malicious intent, it did not take too long for her prize student and her cadre of exceptional friends to deal with it in due haste, end the threat before it had any chance of really starting.
But this: this was something not so easily transparent. Princess Celestia was not one to usually lose her composition so easily, but this spell that seemed to be anywhere and nowhere was causing her just a small sliver of discomfort. And if it was causing the mighty ruler with god like potential of Equestria discomfort, then it just had to be a force to be reckoned with, right?
Celestia looked up from her balcony to the moon above. The one who had raised it would soon be returning to the Royal Palace after a night well down. How to break the news to her, Celestia wondered...
"How to break the news to her, indeed." A voice went.
Celestia agreed. That is, until she realized that at no point did she remember any other pony in the room with her, and thus promptly jumped in alarm, turning around to the empty room.
"Who said that?" She asked to the chamber, devoid of any life other than her own.
"Ha! Like all great mares, you hear, but you do not listen..." The voice went again.
"Show yourself!" Celestia demanded to the still empty room.
"Or what?" The unseen dared to ask.
"Or I will..." The Princess remarked, showing the full might of her regal tone.
"You go ahead and do that." The voice went again, sounding somewhat lazy.
Celestia wasted no time in showing who the real authority around here was. Lighting up her horn in a very rare instance of royal magic, she cast out several beams of light that swung out far and wide all around the chamber. It was with some anger then, that the Princess did not find what she was looking for, the room remaining empty as empty could be.
"Quite the display that..." The voice went again. "Such a shame I am not bound by such petty organic restraints."
Celestia was starting to grow thick with fury. Whomever this voice belonged to, they better have some trick up their sleeve else they face the full wrath of an anger alicorn.
"If you know what's good for you, you will show yourself!" She demanded, keeping back the barely contained fury in her trembling voice.
"Far enough, you win. I'll come peacefully." The voice replied. "Only excuse me here. I've never actually tried to manifest into something physical before."
A short series of magical crackles and snaps followed that statement. Celestia watched with bated breath as a cloud of thick fog appeared in the middle of the chamber. Dark orbs of magic emerged from the sight, all eventually joining together to create some kind of shape. This shape soon grew into the figure of a pony, shrouded in fog, until it reared its head from the clouds, stepping forwards. Celestia looked on, and then gasped... as Twilight Sparkle manifested before her very eyes.
"Twilight?" She uttered in disbelief. "But how..."
"How indeed?" "Twilight" asked back, shocking the Princess again, for the voice that left her lips was not the voice of her student.
"Who are you?" Celestia asked, her anger subsiding to fear.
"Who?" "Twilight" asked back. "Who implies a persona, and that is something I appear to be lacking, would you not agree."
"Umm." The Princess uttered.
"Perhaps a more accurate question would be: what are you?" The mare in front of her retorted. "But on such a bewitched night, such as tonight, would you, in lieu of simply demanding my identity, permit me to assign a persona, or perhaps more accurately a character, to this lacking body you see before you?"
Celestia simply stared down her student with a look of immense confusion.
"I'll take that as a yes." The unicorn remarked. "But first, let's get to eye level here."
"Twilight" scrunched up her eyes in concentration, and to Celestia's shock yet again, she found the mare growing in size, only stopping when she was eye level with the Princess.
"Now then." The unicorn began. "In surveillance, a simple mare of sincere stock, seen by some as both saint and sinner, a sight supported by a subtle shift in the sequence of their secluded selfdom. This specimen, no simple semblance of superciliousness, is in fact a servant of the supernatural powers that saunter amongst the shrouded spaces of this world. Contrary, this sampling of spellbound significance stands splendorous! And now strives to safeguard the satisfactory strengths of its servitude against the scornful and sinful sovereign supervisor who would scheme to stop the survival of this specific singleton and seek to subdue and subjugate those stricken by this subliminal scourge to its suborned sway of supremacy…”
The unicorn raised a mighty hoof and cast out a blast of fire from its horn. Celestia ducked but there was no need to, as the bolt shot into at one of the curtains and burned a brightly colored S into the fabric.
“…The only solution is silence.” “Twilight” continued. “Strike at the soul of this solidarity and see all become subjacent.”
The unicorn brought its eyes to look in the eyes of Celestia. For a moment there was a brief moment of silence, before it let out a childish chuckle.
“Surely, this salmagundi of speech seems sufficiently sonorous.” It remarked. “So why don’t I say simple that it is an honor to make your acquaintance and you may…”
“You’re the spell.” Celestia cried out. “Aren’t you?”
“Oh.” It went. “Was that straightforward enough for you?”