Sorry, Twilight
Beside Twilight was the very book which consumed her daylight hours for the past three days of her studies. It was titled 'How to Train Your Human.' Now Twilight was putting it into practice. “Hi,” Twilight said with a wave of her hoof.
The human cleared his throat. “Hie.” His brow was furrowed, his posture was leaning forward, sitting down one hand on his knee supporting himself, the other arm was laid across his thigh as he sat with his legs crisscrossed. Pronouncing the Equis language with its equine phonetics was proving to be a bit of a challenge for him. Then again, even griffin had trouble learning it.
“Very good!” Twilight beamed as she clopped her hooves.
The human shivered for a moment as he rubbed his hands together, clothed in only a loincloth. It was something that didn't go unnoticed by his owner. Twilight made sure his clothing stayed clean, and him well fed. She tried to look out for him. “Are you cold?” Twilight asked.
The human looked away mumbling to himself, trying to remember what those words meant. Then recollection hit him. “Yes, I am cold.”
A wide smile stretched across Twilight's face. “Good job!” One of his eyebrows rose as his eyes squinted. Looking at her, scrutinizing her response. “Oh wait.” She lifted a hoof to her lips. “Technically that's bad that your cold, but it's good that you...” She never got over how pony-like his expressions could get.
Twilight got up and walked over to her closet in her spacious bedroom. The human waited, appearing to admire the beauty of the room. It was a lovely place, fit for a princess. She never got over how soft her bed was.
Twilight came back with a red silk blanket with gold trimmings, and with her magical levitation she wrapped it around her slave. He watched her with an expression she couldn't read as she went back to her spot on the warm rug they were both sitting on. With her magic a few pages flipped. “Uh huh,” She mumbled.
Twilight looked back up at the human, he wrapped the blanket around himself tighter. 'It's so strange how he can't handle this cold, I wonder how the humans in the far north manage?' Her mind drifted to another book she read. 'With clothes,' she answered herself, 'or hides taken from the local population of their environment.'
“Theiu-” The human cleared his throat and tried again. “Thank you.”
Twilight's jaw dropped, she never taught him those words. Two of his fingers came out of the blanket and tugged on it, to emphasize what he was thanking her for.
“W-what!? How- Uhhh... G-g-good job?” Beyond surprised she took a moment to think.
'When did he learn that?! No other pony is training him! I-is he listening to Spike and I talk from his cage? Did he pick up the meaning of that all by himself?'
Ignoring the slave, Twilight quickly began scanning her book. Even the advanced sections explained nothing about this. Humans should not be able to pick up words on their own like that. A relevant fact from the book popped into her head: Tentacles, the apt name of a human that existed forty years ago held the record for most known words. The creature could speak twenty seven Equis words counting four phrases, the human lived a long life for his species and died at the age of forty two. While the human before her knew ten words already, and today was the first day she was teaching him. Eight words, being: Yes, no, hungry, thirsty, cold, hot, I, am, and a new little phrase of his, thank you.
'Impressive, to say the least. I'm glad I purchased this guy.' When Twilight finished that line of thought, somepony knocked on the door and walked inside.
Twilight looked up, the human meanwhile didn't move, he seemed content in relishing the warmth of the blanket, uninterested in the pony behind his back.
“Hey Twily, studying huh?” He said with her brother's usual upbeat pitch.
“As always, Shining,” Twilight giggled at her predictable self.
He smiled at her in return. Shining stopped right next to the human. “Well I just figured out that we have a Royal Garden... So I'm making my wife and Spike come along as we wonder around it, and I was hoping you would join us. Please?” Shining gave her a wide, pleading grin.
“Oh hmm...” Twilight furrowed her brow. “Actually I'm really busy Shining, I need to study and train my human, sorry.” Her ears were folded, she wanted to go, but she would never get done with her brother always stealing her away from her work.
He tilted his head. “What do you mean-” Just then Shining turned around to look at the big propped up blanket to see the human's face turn to him at the same time. “OH GEEZ!” After taking a discontorted leap back Shining held his chest as he leaned onto the wall. “Oh geez. I didn't see him there. That's like something out of some horrible horror story where the suit of armor actually has somepony in it... or the statue is actually a living pony.” After his heart rate dropped back down he turned to his sister. “You know what I'm talking about, Twilight, right? It was in that book you recommended to me.”
Twilight snickered. “I recommend lots of books to you Shining.”
“Ahh... forget it.” The stallion let out a big sigh.
“Sahw-” The human cleared his throat. “Sorry, Shining.”
The stallion's eye twitched. “Honestly, I'd take the ghost of a sadistic axe murderer over this guy and his blanket any day.... How did you teach him that anyway?”
“I didn't tea-” Twilight cut herself off, not wanting to worry Shining. “I mean yeah, he's easy to teach.”
Now having a better understanding of what Twilight was doing in her room Shining nodded his head. “Alright, I see, I was only born blind to the world but now I can see the truth. You're obviously more interested in your human than your own flesh and blood brother.” He stuck his bottom lip out and gave his sister his best puppy dog eyes.
“Shining...”
“Just kidding Twi.” He turned around and began walking towards the door, but then stopped. “Oh yeah,” -He tossed her a scroll- “I told Spike I'd give you that, I think it's from your friends.” He smiled. “Take care Twily.”
The sunlight gave her eyes plenty of help with the neat little words.
Dearest Princess Twilight Sparkle,
'Rarity,' Twilight realized, both from the diction and the neat writing.
We received the letter you sent regarding when we might arrange a get together for a reunion.
Twilight scrunched up her brow upon reading the phrasing of the letter. It's only been like two months since I've last seen them,' Twilight mused. 'if that. But that is a long time... just doesn't require a 'reunion'. Makes it sound like we haven't seen each other in ages. Twilight read on.
It feels like forever since we've been able to enjoy the company of one another and after talking with all of us we've agreed that we will be visiting you this coming Wednesday. We'll all be there. Looking forward to you telling us all about your time in Canterlot.
—Regards, Your friends.
'Wait, Wednesday?! As in this coming wednesday?' Twilight trotted over to her calendar. It was a Celestia tribute calendar, for this month it was a picture of Celestia raising the sun, next month was Celestia wearing her royal regalia, next month was... It really didn't matter.
Today was Monday and... two days... hmm... She could work with that. Move some things around in her schedule. She'll have to find Spike later to make a new schedule though, but it was easily manageable.
Twilight turned back to her human. 'Yeah, two days. My slave will be presentable and ready for socialization with other ponies in two days. I still have time... maybe.' Twilight watched the guy for a moment, even when he began watching her back. 'Make him presentable,' a voice in her mind told her. It was an appropriate measure, she realized as she trotted into her wardrobe, knowing that something in the place would fit him.
At the Crystal Garden Spike was already growing bored, most ponies would be in awe, but Spike had grown up in Canterlot. It took a truly marvelous architectural feat to get a reaction out of him..
The three were enjoying the weather, the Crystal Garden proved a great place to kill time. Spike stretched, trying to determine if he was taller than Shining, he wasn't. “It's too bad Twilight didn't come.”
Shining sighed. “She spends all day with that mongrel thing.”
Cadence pressed onto her husband, leaning her head onto his neck. A few birds came and landed onto a statue's head. “Shining, don't be mad. Your sister has work to do, and besides, you're just being antsy because you suddenly have too much free time on your hooves now that you're no longer Celestia's Captain of the Guard. When we start forming a standing army you'll have something to take your mind off of. Your sister can't spend every minute of her every day with you honey.”
He reeled his head back from her. “That's not what I want!” His wife gave him a look, showing Shining that she knew better. He huffed, looking away. The birds fluttered away and left the two to bicker to their heart's content. Spike wished he could do the same. “She didn't even laugh at my joke honey,” Shining told Cadence with his bottom lip puffed out. “My sister didn't even laugh when I told her that I didn't know our castle had a garden.”
Cadence kissed her husband's cheek. “That's because it wasn't funny dear.”
“...That's not true,” Shining mumbled to himself.
“Oh thank Celestia,” they heard Spike mumble. “Hey Twilight! Over here!”
They both turned. Shining's eyes brightened upon seeing his favorite sibling, it wasn't a highly contended position but he knew she earned it all the same, then his eyes narrowed upon seeming her pet project and his new outfit. “Oh... she would bring that thing along.” He was nudged, roughly, by his wife in the ribs.
Twilight picked up her pace upon hearing her assistant. “Hey guys, I changed my mind about the garden thing. I thought it might be a good idea to socialize my human.”
They all turned to the human, who, unlike usual, was paying more attention to them than last time. Finally he waved at the Princess of the Crystal Empire. “Hie Cadence,” he greeted her in broken Equis.
The mare's eyes lit up. “Oh Twilight! You taught him my name! What else did you teach him?”
Twilight was about to tell her the truth, that the human was learning all this all on his own when the human greeted Spike.
“Hi Spike,” the creature said with better pronunciation.
The dragon chuckled. “Awesome!” The dragon lifted up a fist, waiting for the human to hit it back. The human had no idea what the reptile wanted from him. “Awww.”
Finally the human turned to the prince, opened his mouth, then froze. He ran through the memories in his mind. All that time he spent around them. The luncheon thing, or whatever the pony equivalent of it was, all the visits he made to Twilight. He knew the purple pony, that he suspected owned him, called this stallion by name less than an hour ago. They were all looking at him. His mind blanked.
Reverting back to the standard human language, Modern Latin, he began talking to himself. One hand pressed against his face. “God's Teeth! What the hell was his name?” He sighed. The stallion was getting a bit mad now, talking in his pony language to the others. “By the Emperor! What the hell was his name!?”
Then before any of the ponies could remind him, it popped into the legionnaire's head. 'Ah. Right. That was it.' It sounded a bit plain to the human, but never the less, he said it. The word of greeting and then the stallion's name. The mares clopped their hooves together absolutely enthralled by the parrot-like performance. The stallion just seemed annoyed.
'Understandable,' thought the legionnaire. 'I'd be annoyed too if I had to keep a stick up my ass the whole time... flank... whatever. Arsehole.' Unknown to the ponies, when the legionnaire made the mistake to force a magical collar off of himself, he didn't pass out. He was just momentarily paralyzed. And clearly remembered that stallion roughly throwing him in a cage. He still had a bruise from that.
The others like always continued talking, casting a look at him every minute or so. At least the little dragon guy tries to hid his stares. They were talking about him, it was beyond obvious.
Feeling a cold breeze wash over the place he brought his cloak tighter around himself. The temperature change went unnoticed by the naked ponies. 'Fur,' he realized.
They went on a little walk, and he followed them. The place was interesting with its unique abundance of CRYSTALS LITERALLY EVERYWHERE! But in all truth, in a completely objective way, Constantinople was more impressive, that place trumped this one without a doubt. It even had strange working devices from the before time, something called 'teevees', one of the citizens told him. Allowed him to see what the Emperor looked like for himself for the first time in his life, all in color, like a moving canvas.
When the horses were done speaking about him(when they stopped looking his way every time they took a breath) he decided to take a little detour. 'No harm no foul.'
Five minutes later the legionnaire realized the place was much larger than he had thought. Covered in various tributes to old rulers and great warriors. Statues for the great, and plaques for the slightly less great.
He finally came to a clearing, it looked like a wall and doorway all made out of cut bushes. Guarding the way was a single crystal pony guard. They were all stoic, all the time, moving only when ordered to, or on schedule, yet always vigilant. It reminded the soldier of home.
The guard turned his head upon seeing the unchained human and took a more battle ready stance. The human approached, attempting to seem nonthreatening as possible. Now was not a good time to try an escape attempt. It would come one day, just not today, not that it was a good idea. He had no idea where he was. Somewhere northwest from where he was captured perhaps?
The guard pointed his spear towards the human and backed up, not wanting to kill Twilight's favorite pet.
The human, not knowing this, thought he might have to earn the guard's trust a bit. It was just too much for him. Heck, even the armor looked a bit similar. All his training had drilled so much to him. The legionnaire saluted. “HAIL CAESAR!”
The guard slowly cracked a smile and chuckled a bit, wondering who would have the sense of humor required in teaching a human how to salute. He went back to his post.
Now that the pony was at ease he slipped to the other side of the courtyard.
It was much easier to find on this side. A full view of the city below. It was larger than he remembered from walking through it, but still not that huge. Probably less than twenty thousand lived here, while Constantinople had well over two million, maybe even three million, a proper capital if there ever was one.
Out over the horizon was nothing. Even from up here there were no helpful landmarks, just an endless sea of green.
No way home. No more glory, being a slave wasn't the most glamorous life to live. No greater purpose. Nothing left to do but rot and die. But their was one thing he could do, one way to take the power back.
The legionnaire stepped onto the crystal rails of the balcony and looked down. Yeah, that was a long way down alright. The soldier in him remembered one rule they always drilled into the Perfectus humans.
NEVER SURRENDER TO THE ENEMY
Even after the unicorns back at that place messed with his mind, he could never completely forget his training. He didn't truly surrender to the little horses, but that didn't seem to matter at this point. His other foot found the railing.
This wasn't why he left the group, this was spontaneous, this was him taking the power back. Defiant to the end, that's how his friends always described him. Well that and 'stupidly headstrong'. Good times...
He heard the purple unicorn call out behind him, and after some thought he looked behind himself. She seemed mad, like a mother who found their child in the act of taking a cookie from the cookie jar. The others were behind her, including the guard he met earlier. They all looked concerned.
He felt his face change into something ugly, he inched toward the edge. The unicorn's face turned to worry then to... something like betrayal. He could see the question on her face, they didn't need an interpreter then. 'Why do you want to die? Weren't you happy with me?'
The legionnaire closed his eyes and remembered his Emperor's face. That glorious city with its charming fake lights. Those strange coal powered things of iron that moved with such speed. The legion, his life, his right into manhood, into citizenry.
He took the power back.
The wind wrapped around him. Not even the machines could make him move this fast, he thought stupidly.
Oh well, to hell with pity. I served the Emperor for a long time. Almost survived my entire time in service. Just a couple of more months and... Damn. What a shame. Just had to get caught. Oh well, I survived to the age of twenty-three, some don't even make it that far. Thanks Emperor, humanity will triumph in the end. I believe in you. The legionnaire knew the ground was approaching quickly.
“Ave Imperator,” the slave whispered.
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Loving it man, like when I first set eyes on this story.
Moving pieces of iron? Tevee?
Oh god, not what I halfway expected...
Welp, the 'Roman legionnaire' theory was right all along! But… you could have dragged it out a little more about who they really were… That would have been a bit more fun… But I really don't care! This is AWESOME!
… Now how much should I bet that he's gonna get saved?
So I'm guessing the humans have a form of empire somewhere. Wonder when the ponies will find it.
MORE!!!
have you heard of rise of legends? are the humans that kind of advanced or same as classical rome but a little more advanced?
1-media-cdn.foolz.us/ffuuka/board/tg/image/1332/96/1332966710988.jpg
like this?
Looking good, mate
4205622
I never played that game, but based on the picture, they are less advanced than that I would say.
Though more so than classical Rome.
Ave Imperator, you glorious bastard. Let He Upon His Throne watch over you, even in death...
>muffled whispering
Eh?
>frantic whispering
Wrong emperor, you say?
>steady whispering
Well then, er... Down with the false emperor! Stop whatever it is he's doing, Twilight!
4205905
least the slave can choice his own fate now. freedom or the cage?
4205865 Gladius, scutums and lorica segmentas and such?
Imperator protegit, filium meum.
Love this story man.
4205905 ... Wot'z dat?
4206030
...Maybe
Hmm, the switch to the Humans POV was nice, if a bit abrupt. so this my non-existent (yet!) seal of approval.
P.s. GODDAMN YOU AND YOUR BEAUTIFUL CLIFFHANGERS
4206199 that sounds like you didn't understand it
A MAN CHOOSES. A SLAVE OBEYS
I AM NO SLAVE!
AVE IMPERATOR
Let me guess, The Legion took over New Vegas?
It's more of a balconyhanger than a cliffhanger..
The Holy Roman Empire... those griffons are fucked
img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120329090509/warhammer40k/images/2/29/Aquila.jpg
A spiritu dominatus
Domine, libera nos
From the lightning, and the tempest
Our Emperor, deliver us.
From plague, temptation and war
Our Emperor, deliver us.
From the scourge of the Kraken
Our Emperor, deliver us
From the blasphemy of the Fallen,
Our Emperor, deliver us,
From the begetting of daemons,
Our Emperor, deliver us,
From the curse of the mutant,
Our Emperor, deliver us,
A morte perpetua,
Domine, libera nos.
4206497
4206461
It's not based off of Fallout
Love that game though
4206343
They may use the weapons common in the times of antiquity... or they may not.
And the magic and the human is disappointed that he failed at trying to kill himself.
Or just "Splat!"...
We are defiantly dealing with a post nuclear accident society. Which puts them at our tech or better before the boom. Conformation of trains, tv's, transmission towers and organized society hell bent on restoring the human race to its former glory..
The ponies are doomed.
If I was to guess its probably a post nuclear senerio with most humans descending to near animal levels. Of course the same forces that make us increase in intelligence today and in the past would correct this over time.
Culling the weak doesn't hurt though.
4205399
What I'm wondering is how they managed to hide it for this long? A city of millions is not an easy thing to hide, you need a massive infrastructure to support it. Aquaducts to move enough water into it, farmlands to produce enough food for all these people (and unless they're reasonably far along with industrialization, a huge population to work said farmland), roads and transportation to move all of it... we're talking an entire country that the rest of the world apparently missed for centuries.
4206738
The Holy Roman Empire was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire. And honestly, not that impressive. No, this is the real deal. To quote Doctor Who:
4212901 Like america? (Vikings excluded) There could just be some big body of water or other natural obstacle in the way but my guess would be that there just is some harsh land between this empire and the ponies. Maybe there are lots of land where human tribes lives, effectivly keeping the other races away. This empire seems to at least fight somthing and my guess would be the tribes, just like the real romans.
4213054
The thing about the Empire being really isolated by inhospitable land though is that, well, ponies can fly. So can gryphons, dragons, and possibly other races as well. That would make exploration a much easier proposition. You'd think at least something would have filtered through.
Good point about the tribes, it hadn't occured to me that there could be a lot of human polities. I figured the tribes were basically a front; the fact that they normally only sell the severely mutated and brain-damaged humans off as slaves to me seemed to point to a deliberate form of disinformation.
Otherwise surely in those centuries at least a few normal humans would have been sold off. Instead the best a human slave has managed to learn in all those years is a handful of words. To the point where they're so used to thinking of humans as barely sapient animals that they still haven't realized Maximus (I'll just call him that, at least until we learn his real name) is at least as smart as a pony.
4213242 Hmm, your right about that flying part. Even tho i belive that no race would have close to the stamina needed to tavel anywhere of importace wuthout brakes and sleep, but as im typing that i just realised that they can land on clouds... That would mean that they only need to go groundside to gather suplies, which i belive could be done in a safe maner.
So a group of pegasi explorers should be able to go over hostile tribes without to much truble. You could make the argument that they don't think they have anything to gain from beyond, therfore not going there. But i don't think that would hold since at least someone would just do it for the explorings sake. As i can see it that only leaves out an added airborne theat as a reason an empire could stay hidden.
To sum it up i think it is possible for an empire to stay hidden based on the low tech. But thay are alson not humans and therefore limited to the ground as you pointed out which makes it a lot less likley than what i first antisipated.
4216645
I didn't even think about the landing on clouds bit; I figured they'd just sleep in a tree or somewhere isolated. Tribal lands are very sparsely populated, it shouldn't be hard to find a place with no one around for miles, especially if you can look down from above to see if anyone's nearby.
It could be that ponies are simply less exploration-minded than we are; after all, we're the nutjobs who climb huge mountains just because they're there, not every species might have that kind of inclination. They do seem to be rather conservative. Just look at how they reacted to Zecora, somepony with a weird coat and maindo walks into town and the whole place goes on lockdown! Maybe they're just less inclined to push boundaries.
Still, you'd think there'd be at least one.
4212901 Genghis' Mongols were far more efficient. And effective.
4246424
Those mayflies? Their conquering days were mostly over after half a century, and their empire fell to pieces after one century. And their biggest contribution to history was butchering a metric fuckton of people.
Come back when you've had half a millennium of steady expansion and consolidation and leave a legacy that's lasted for fifteen centuries and counting, ya whippersnappers.
4248759 Twice the land as the biggest those orgy-happy Romans ever got in a tenth of the time. And had the only successful winter attack ever (on Moscow no less)! By a general who never lost a battle.
4258540
And lost it just as quickly. Doesn't matter how much you grab when you can't keep it.
4262570 It took over a century for the Mongols to collapse. And they were more progressive than some modern states.
4262976
That's really not saying much, given the sort of medieval hellholes some countries still are these days. I will admit they were better in some respects given the standards of the time (the position of women under Mongol rule in China for example) but their habit of depopulating entire countries kind of compensates for that imo.
Depends on what you count as "the" Mongols. Their empire was in four pieces before the 13th century was out. After another couple of decades, most of the pieces were on their way out or being assimilated into the local culture. Either way, that's a long way from lasting half a millennium, not being surpassed for another thousand years, and remaining influential all the way to the present day.
4267871 Still better than Alexander or Attila, who have had no real impact. Besides, the Mongol's glory came from a few individuals with vision, not compounding generations.
4267941
Fair enough. Although Alexander did have some impact, but most of it was by way of the influence his spreading of Greek culture had. In other words, it was the ones that came after that did the work.
4268888 Genghis' biggest impact is his genetics. They are everywhere.
4420453
Yes
Why?
4271204
Heck, I'm pretty sure I've got Genghis in me somewhere. A tenth of a kidney or some such.
4210947
4210968
Perfect. This is perfection.
-Powers
Cliff Hanger=VERY, VERY, BAD!!!!
anyways, KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK MAN!
I no like cliffhangers once my fav. author did one and now I want to punch him (not really) for 'apologizing' in the next book. 5 MONTHS LATER.