After almost two decades working under Princess Celestia, Chronicle has... acclimated to his position as her seneschal. The process was rarely easy and never comfortable, but he did it. He's learned the ins and outs of making sure the palace runs smoothly, keeping De Cuisine happy, Fitted Sheet from destroying his paperwork, the nobility occupied, and even managed to pickup some politics along the way.
Every year, H.R.H. Princess Celestia chooses a different city to host the Summer Sun Celebration. Unfortunately, her absence from Canterlot doesn't stop the palace from hosting one of the largest parties in the Equestrian Diarchy. If everything goes according to plan, Chronicle will be able to spend the evening in the privacy of his solar, waking up just in time to see the sun rise on the thousandth consecutive Summer Sun Celebration.
(A prequel of sorts to Tundara's epic story Myths and Birthrights.)
I can't get enough of the interaction between Sol and Celestia.
I just love that big, dense, huggable ball. 
It looks like you're jumping in the action much faster than last time and I can't wait to see what you have in store for us. I do have one small correction, at the end of the chapter you have the word mark in all lowers case.I'm assuming it's just left over from editing, so you might wanna remove that.
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Thanks, I must remember to check for those.
And yeah, that's what happens when you have a real plan. XD
I quite enjoy the world of M&B, it's one of my favorite settings in the fandom, so I'm really excited to see more of Ioka especially from such a different point of view, especially since I've always liked fics involving pony politics for some reason.
Your characterization is very neat and clear, I can definitely tell your experience as an editor reflects positively on your writing.
Eagerly awaiting the next chapter.
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Be warned, Tundara has much greater faith in my abilities than is warranted. Still, I'm glad you like it so far and I will endeavour to live up to expectations.
Did he enter the Parliament? Guess I have to find out next chapter.
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I have total faith in your abilities because it is totally justified!
Best sun ever.
Yep... no matter how many times I read it, I love the interactions you have between Celestia and Cadence.
The prefix does not seem to match the title used in the story, "Her Divine Highness".
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H.D.H. is a religious title where H.R.H. is a political/legal title.
[Edit: You'll find that the princesses have far too many titles for their own good.]
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It mostly stands out as "Her Divine Highness" has shown up more so a far in the non-abbreviated form. "Her Royal Highness" only shows up at the start of chapter one.
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Fair point. I'll have to look into that a bit closer.
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I think it makes sense in that in this setting the princesses are goddesses before they are rulers to the ponies in general so they would prefer to use H.R.H. only when dealing with strictly legal matters and then default to H.D.H. on any other situation.
Given the spiritual and superstitious nature of ponies in this world a potential blasphemy would probably seem like a greater offense to most of them than a missplaced legal title.
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After some consideration, I realized that, in the context, H.D.H. doesn't fit. It'll come up later with more religious ponies, though.
What a great (and fun) portrayal of Celestia and Cadance’s relationship.
Great chapter, sets up the what life in the castle was before the events of the next day quite nicely. I really enjoyed all the interactions between the different characters and it's nice to see the attention to details from the M&B stories is also present here. Can't wait to see what follows the next day.
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Thanks, there will be one more chapter for the first act followed by a short interlude before everything starts to go to Tartarus.
As for the MaB stuff, Tundara and I have been working closely to develop all the 'structures': religious, political, social. It's really fun just talking about how things work in a society that is so differently-similar to our own.
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And it's always the little things that cause snags... Like, "How does Bloodrock trade with Equestria if they have no port?"
The story is quite good so far, and I look forward to reading what comes next. I think that palace/courtly life in Equestria is an interesting aspect to explore and the M&B-verse has enormous potential for that. That said, I saw a few things that could be addressed:
Near the middle second paragraph in the scene after Cadence and Revered Speaker leave Chronicle:
Near the end:
The word "either" should be "neither" since the rest of the paragraph indicates that neither of them has control of the situation.
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Just because Bloodrock is landlocked, does not mean they are unable to trade with anyone other than neighbor. They may have trade deals with neighbors to allow access to ports for trading with Equestria and others. Heck, trade deals like that would be used for political intrigue in trade negotiations.
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Thanks
Sunrise, eh? Looks like it's time we got this show on the road! Cue panicking nobles in 3... 2...1...
It took me a moment to realize Celestia already knew the outcome of Nightmare Moon's return from the M&B prequel. Great interaction between them, too bad we know it's not going to last.
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Yeah, I probably could have made that more clear, but I figured that any one who didn't know would just assume Celestia was being super confident in her plots.
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I don't think that's an issue, anyone who's following this continuity enough to read this far can probably figure it out. I know I enjoyed remembering those events without having them explicitly pointed out.
I must now find a way to showcase or otherwise describe Penumbra in all her glory...
I wonder what degree of "ballistic" Cadence and Shining will achieve when they discover that Celly played Stones with the Nightmare to distract her while Twilight and the others were in the Everfree gathering the Elements, and that Twilight faced down Nightmare Moon all by herself.
(Yes,I am assuming that what we saw in S1E1-2 still happens in this universe, more or less)
Did you and Tundara conspire to publish new chapters of your respective stories a the same time?
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Yes, but 'more or less' is a rather ambiguous measure by any... measure.
Twilight and co. stomp through the Everfree Forest, they find the castle, find the elements, confront NMM, discover the elements, and come out smelling like cake... because Pinkie Pie. Beyond that... well, reality is never very clean cut and... well how long do you think they spent in those woods?
This story keeps getting better and better.
So was this your birthday gift to Tundara?
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Yes. Yes. That is definitely what this is. Totally not a coincidence. Those things don't even exist.
>.>
<.<
Did they buy it? I think they bought it.
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Ambiguity was intentional I assure you. In the show Twilight & company spent at at most a few hours in the Everfree. I very much doubt that timeline can be shoehorned into thee M&B universe so I assumed that you and Tundara would take liberties with it here.
I will say that I am glad that it seems you two stuck to the general gist of the pilot, at least.
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Conspired to publish at the same time? NOooooo.... Maybe...? Yes.
I hold that the Pilot is mostly the same, maybe a little more drawn out and less cuddly, but nothing too different, with the differences compounding after that point.
Man, we really need some art of Cadance in armor with Penumbra. I'm tempted to commission some, the world needs more badass Cadance.
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The world of M&B seems to be roughly equivalent to our own in scale (exept for it being flat, of course).
In the map of Ioka it shows Canterlot and Ponyville to be roughly the distance between New York City and Philadelphia, Canterlot remaining visible in the distance because its on a mountain and because the world is flat.
The Everfree is south of Ponyville and according to the official map the Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters is near the south east border of the forest, going back to the map of Ioka that would place the ruins about as far away from Ponyville as Canterlot is.
At least in the show they didn't have a map, at the most they went with a passage mentioning the ruin being at the south east of the forest and then just took off in that direction.
While it is true that in the show it seems like it didn't take all that long, the whole thing had to be sumarized into 10 minutes so its not like they could have made it seem longer.
You have to take into acount that they had to walk through the forest in continuous night with vague directiona for what could have been 100 miles. Maybe they were being drawn to the elements and where not totally going at it blindly even if they didn't realize it, but i would say it had to have taken them a few days at least. Enough time that they truly bonded and became friends through their time together rather than just because of a few feats, as important as those where too.
Anyway, that's my take on it but I'm dying to see yours.
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Agreed. I'm planing on commissioning:
-Cadence in her armour. Done something like this...
-AJ and Soarin
-River
-Zubu teaching Gilda
When and who I will commission, however...
4563411 Awesome!
And when you gaze into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.
Loved that ending.
Blessed Harmony is pretty awesome every time she shows up, regardless of story.
Hah!
Another enjoyable chapter. It was nice to read how Cadence senses/interacts with love and explore the different types/effects of it. I did notice an error.
The adventure should be adventurer.
All that rushing hither must be tiring, ITYM "hither and yon."
Yawn = Something you do when sleepy.
Yon = That place over there.
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Thanks!
Oh my
...I can see why Cadence doesn't get along with Luna in Myths now. I've wondered about that for a while.
Well done!
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Yes, separating Luna from Nightmare Moon is not something that will come easily for Cadence. Especially since a great many of their personality traits and philosophies are the same... just one takes them to an extreme that the other never would nor could.
It amuses me that the Nightmare isn't quite as crazy as she is coming across as, she's just having two conversations at the same time in two different locations.
Hmn, random thought, I'm suddenly wondering if the season one episode two trek through the Everfree was so astonishingly unfatal because of the Binding spell on Twilight.
Gee, nice job with that fight, Cadance. Except, you know, the exact opposite.
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To be fair to Cadence, it's been a few hundred years since her last fight, and it also doesn't help that Luna was/is the best swords-mare on Ioka, good enough, in fact, to take Amon's arm where he nearly killed Celestia. (Hence her realization that picking a fight might not have been the best idea ever.)
*whistles innocently*
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-From A Dream of Pride and Envy, Celestia discussing Luna.
Yeah, Luna is a mare that you don't want to take up arms against.
Cadence erred thinking that, after hundreds of years not picking up a sword, she would prove a threat to NMM in a duel. 
I love the description of the fight. Made me go back and redo portions I've written for the next chapter of Myths.
We already new that Cadance was young when Luna fully turned but those first two paragraphs make it sound like she never knew her as anything other than NMM, or at least she was too young to remember her as she was before. Seems like even the name Luna is not something she associates with her mother.
I can see how she kept having a hard time accepting Luna after she got "harmonized", it's hard to know what to make of of one who went from wicked to a complete stranger.
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She didn't. Luna's transformation happened shortly after Celestia fostered Cadence against Luna's wishes. It wasn't the last straw, and Luna had already been on the path for a long time (see A Dream of Pride and Envy), but it certainly didn't help matters.
I've tried to show that, even at her worst, NMM still loves both Cadence and Celestia, she's just not very good at it, mostly because they stubbornly refuse to see things her way.
Please write more?
Incredible story, please tell me that it wasn't abandoned at its climax...