CANCELLED FOR FORSEEABLE FUTURE: Explanation likely to be provided in the comment section at some point. Unless I start a rewrite, this will not be updated. Frankly, this story is terrible, and it particularly starts terrible. Don't read it.
After being exiled from all of Equestria for a crime of conscience, and with all memory of her erased, Twilight attempts to force herself back into the public eye, and expose the truth about Celestia's noble goals...
With only her name, and the research in her head, she must get back to Equestria, restore balance, or die trying. Oh, and she has Discord, I guess.
Will likely undergo rewrites of the first three chapters at some point in the future.
Originally an entry into the Exiled Contest, but due to a lack of time, I had not been able to meet deadlines.
This looks promising.
This competition is the best
luv all the new good stories
Are you going to continue this?
4194691 Probably, just unable to find time to work on it at the moment, due to other stuff.
have you abandoned this story? it's really good
Mooooooooooooooooooooore!!!!!! Pleeaase!!!!!
HAHAHAHA
IT'S ALIIIIVE!!!
well, it's good to see this story continuing. hope it stays that way.
Ah, crap…Discord.
6322646 Now now, he may be involved in the story, but you don't know in what way
Great story please don't take a year to update again
Please
Is it discord or just twilight's subconscious? Discord confirmed? Or mental unstable twilight confirmed?
Am I right or am I left?
6324205 At this point, I was just trying to introduce the fact that Discord becomes involved somehow. That is just Twilight being reminded of what was said by Discord in the Season 2 opener, so she's not yet unstable at this point, and Discord himself isn't involved quite yet.
Her reaction to the different texts just simply relates to her tendency to trust books, but seeing two completely contradict each other, and the realization that it won't be as easy as she thought it would be, is what was happening there.
6324229
OK thanks for that.
HL3 confirmed
AWWWW I wanted more. Do you still write this story? I sure hope so its so AWESOME
YES finally a new chapter MAN you have no idea how happy I am to see a new chapter and it was perfect. I absolutely loved it, I can't wait for more
will celestia ever see that she made a mistake like in some of the otheres exlie stories
So Celestia somehow erased her from the memory of the common pony?
Will the other elements still remember her?
Very nice chapter, good work.
so sun bitch erased everyones memories. man, i hope this comes back to bite her in the ass so hard! like, another one of her 'ancient villains in a can' that shows up every once and a while comes out to play. maybe something out of Tartarus. then the elements are needed, but five aren't powerful enough to beat whatever it is that showed up.
6501368 You and me both.
I hope twilight can still become a alicorn to rub it in there face without there help!
Heh, desperation can turn even the purest of hearts to do despicable things. I'm interested to see what Twilight will do next.
YOU'RE ALIVE!!! Anyways glad you updated and wow Celestia erasing everyone's memory didn't see that one coming
Okay , so Celestia wanted Twilight to study chaos magic and something went wrong. Tia, you need to take blame as well for YOU ordered her to study it.
6501368 More then likely I think Twilight is going to be one of those "'ancient [and forgotten] villains in a can' that shows up"
I think if Twilight finds a way to get into Equestria then Celestia will try and use the Element Bearers against her to add salt to the wound.
Hmmm, curiouser and curiouser...
6511328 Great.. Now I see Twilight as Alice and Discord as the Mad Hatter. Thanks.
But all in all an excellent addition. I cannot wait to see how it goes.
I love this chapter. Just one question is the whole story going to be a journal entry?
I can't wait for the next chapter
i will admit that this story didn't draw me in with the beginning but now its really starting to pick up so i am glad that i tracked this
good, no GREAT job with it
6511533 No, it's not all going to be journal entries. The journal entries and flashbacks will become less frequent as less backstory and exposition is needed. I should probably go back and find a way to easily distinguish the flashbacks and journal entries from each other, since the last chapter was entirely italics
.
But yeah, the main reason you're seeing a lot of them here at the beginning, is that walking through the desert with nothing happening is both hard to write, and incredibly boring. The journals allow for thoughts to be inserted without worrying about how it fits in context, or making their actions seem to take an eternity. When things start piling up, and there's more actually happening, with Twilight, it will probably switch more to the non-italics, real time sections that can't decide if they're in simple past tense, or past progressive tense, that you and I both love so dearly.
6512276 That is why I'm considering rewriting the first chapter. Wrote that ages ago, and only in the past couple months did I decide to actually add on to it. So right now, the beginning could really benefit from a proper look over.
6508810
Yeah that was just what I was thinking. "So Celestia ordered Twilight to study chaos magic, which is almost totally unknown and by definition completely unpredictable...and then when things went wrong you got mad at her?"
6513876 bingo, he weak part of this story.
6513876
6513898
I always hate to be the guy who either A: Ruins a story just to clarify a point, or B: Butts in on people's criticisms to tell them how they're wrong. I also hate to be the guy who says "Read more, it gets better!" or "Just wait and see, it will all make sense!". Clearly I have done something wrong in terms of telegraphing information to you as my readers.
That being said, I feel the need to make just one statement in response to your issues with the way Celestia dealt with the events.
Who said something went wrong?
Hopefully you'll both keep on reading, despite the issues you seem to have. Although that's probably more than I could reasonably ask for, considering the kind of quality (or lack thereof) I'm presenting to people with this anyway.
I was thinking maybe Twi accidentally 'Discord'ed Celestia, but she was being somewhat questionable in giving the assignment in the first place. Hmmm.
This story is amazing! I'm looking forward to reading more!
6514031 was still reading but another major issue comes up with chapter 4.
First off I'm going to say that I'm a logical guy so when I see illogic it frustrates me to no end. If a change happens there has to be a logical reason behind it.
Since Celestia manage to erase Twilight from Equestrian memory i can buy that. However the fact that Discord is a statue again really raises some red flags.
Without Twilight the Elements can't work and she is still technically the Bearer of Magic. So They couldn't re stone him and if the memory erasure somehow messed with time it's even worse. For Discord and Nightmare Moon would still happen and without Twilight they are screwed and i can't she Celestia having that much influence on the Elements to eliminate one. I strongly recommend changing what you did this chapter. i like the concept of the story but these issues are major flaws in it from my perspective.
6515370 I feel part of the issue you're having, relates to the way I'm presenting the story, how I'm revealing bits of information (Such as, Discord is now once again a statue), and then only later explaining what happened (Probably will be Chapter 6 or 7). These are things I have considered, and I do have reasons behind them, and for why they happen. Can't really give you a solid explanation without giving away the mystery I've tried to keep up, until this point.
That being said, while I can't blame you for doing so, as I didn't give any indication as to otherwise, I feel your issues lie with the assumptions you're making based on the information I've yet to present. Such as assuming that the reason Twilight was punished is cause something went wrong, or in this case, that the elements are the only thing capable of turning Discord to stone.
Assuming something went wrong brings up the issue of Celestia's blame, and where that all lies. Assuming the elements are the only thing that can turn Discord into stone brings up the issue of there being all six elements (which could still be explained as "Celestia wielded the elements in the past, and made up the sixth element in Twilight's place", but that's not what I went with).
Not saying you're wrong for assuming things, or blaming you for working off of incomplete information, but I feel I needed to clarify, without giving away too many details.
Very good chapter, nice work.
Long chapters aren't a bad thing, but 3000 is hardly long lol.
6774470 I meant compared to what I had otherwise been putting out. Because chapters to this story have been written on a "Am I somehow not busy with other projects right now? Do I feel like writing words in to a box?" basis, the other 4 chapters are between 1500-2000 words. While I have an outline, none of the actual writing parts are planned (hence the ludicrously slow release times, and unpredictable nature of those times).
So, considering those, 3500 words is long, because it means I've managed to write that much on a whim, and because it's comparatively longer than anything else in this story. That being said, if my outline is any indication, it looks like the trend is heading towards longer chapters, so this probably won't be considered long, for... long.
6774470 That being said, I've read most of the longest stories on this site, so I know what an actually long chapter is like, but I was making that comment in respect to this story in isolation, not as a chapter compared to the rest of the site.
Excellent chapter!
Now things are starting to really pick up. I can't wait for the next chapter!
... no seriously, I can't wait. Give me the documents and Mr. Fuzzybottums won't get hurt.
Aw god damn it, it was just getting seriously interesting!!!
6774523 Well, the notes I keep describe Chapter 5 with six, 2-3 word bullet points, and Chapter 6 has eight. My "documents" really would leave a lot to be desired ;P
Don't take this the wrong way, but I find it hard to believe this was written for a contest.
I say that purely because I just don't know where these contests are held. I see stories saying they are written for contests, but...where are these contests? Where do they exist? And why are they not made more obvious to people who might want to enter them?
6774557 Contests usually take place on the forums of the many groups on the site. Some of the smaller but more active groups, will host a contest every so often, with a prompt or guidelines for a story. The description should have the contest the first chapter of this story was written for, linked. I didn't actually produce something that warranted an entry, but that was what got this story started.
6774562 You know I wasn't being rude right? Just double checking here.
Also, I think contests should be made more obvious. Maybe have a contest page where contests can be listed per week or whatever.
Then again, I have little confidence in my abilities so I doubt I'd enter a contest anyway. I mean what is the prize for these contests anyway?
6774568 Contests are done by moderators or owners of groups, not as a site thing, so making dedicated contest pages seems like a bunch of extra work, for very little return. If a group is active, you should be able to find any contests being held, pinned to the top of their forums, if they're an official contest for a group.
Also, often time these contests are simply done as fun little "here's an idea, roll with it" stories, with no prize beyond a feature. For instance, the Exiled Contest was a contest that was done by the "Badass Twilight" group. It's "prize" was simply a feature on the group.