Clara Terram, The Meeting Room Of The Nine Knights Of Chroma...
Orange, The Knight Of The Golden Fortunes: So, still no sign of her?
Green, The Knight Of The Green Fields: Nopony has come forward yet, at least nopony credible. There's been a few fakers, of course, but that's to be expected: Some ponies just don't understand how The Cycle works. They think we just look for ponies with strong potential or a strong likeness to the original to fill the role, rather than wait for a current member's incarnation to step forward. You can't fake being one of the Chroma, especially in the presence of one of the other Chroma. We've known each other too well for too long.
Blue, The Knight Of The Flowing Waters: A shame that there are ponies who understand so little, but what can you expect? Only about 5% of the population have sufficient magical ability to 'close the gap' between birth and death, if that, and until you've done it, you can never understand what it entails. Probably for the best: I've... seen what is waiting on the other side. If I didn't have responsibilities here, I wouldn't bother coming back.
Red, The Knight Of Iron And Blood: And nopony would hold it against you. But that raises a question: Could Royal Purple have decided to just pass on? She's the first and the oldest, so if anypony has earned it, she has.
Yellow, The Knight Of Dazzling Lights: And she knows how bad things could get if she leaves. Her sense of responsibility is the strongest of all of us. No, something must have happened. Maybe she's stuck someplace remote, where contact isn't possible?
Indigo, The Knight Of Vast Skies: A possibility. And in spite of our efforts, nopony has managed to successfully make contact with the old pasturelands. I know most assume it to be a myth, us having migrated from a far off land on the other side of the ocean, but even if it is just a story, there's still the possibility of there being ponies outside of Clara Terram. If she was reborn amongst one of them, and they didn't have our level of magitek...
White, The Knight Of Unbreakable Diamonds: A possibility indeed. And at five years old, how could she manage to construct a communication device without the proper materials, or manage even a basic communication spell with that kind of range? We'll need to widen our nets a bit. But we'll also need to be discrete: If Madigrin learns that Chroma Violet is missing, he'll do one of two things. He'll either try to make a move on Clara Terram, thinking that without our leader, he might be able to break through and take the throne...
Black, The Knight Of Limitless Voids: Heh. He can try, see how far he gets, compared to last time.
White, The Knight Of Unbreakable Diamonds: Or he'll try to capture Violet, and... well, if he were to burn out her mana channels, and then slay her at the moment she has no magic in her body...
Indigo, The Knight Of Vast Skies: ...There's no coming back.
Black, The Knight Of Empty Voids: This is my department, then. Madigrin and his cronies can't scry me outside of this room, unlike the rest of you. I know a few ways Violet might try to make contact if she were in a situation where normal methods were impossible. But the bigger question is, once we find her, how do we retrieve her, given that she may be on the other side of the world?
White, The Knight Of Unbreakable Diamonds: We'll cross that ocean when we get to it.
7884525
Indeed. The prologue is indeed something I placed on my blog as a preview. A proof of concept, as it were.
7884542
Or out the window... of a skyscraper. Perilous. Thing is, a unicorn never thinks about that, at least not so far in this setting. The spell works perfectly every time: Why would you need to test and see what happens when it fails if it never does? An earth pony or pegasus would test the f*ck out of that to see what may happen if magic ever failed to work properly. But unicorns? The majority of the unicorns in MLP:FIM we've seen, barring Twilight Sparkle, Fancy Pants, and a few other notable exceptions, are more concerned with style and appearance, rather than substance.
The best example I can think of to compare this to is in the Foundation Series, where a galactic empire is in a slow decline. Eventually, people forget, largely, how the advanced technology of the empire works, so when things like nuclear reactors finally break down to the point they can't be fixed, they have no means of replacing them. However, when one person asks what they'd do if the machinery broke down to the point that basic repairs would no longer work, he's looked at like an idiot, given said machinery has worked for centuries without a hiccup.
It appears no one on the Clara side has had a sense of exploration.
7884591
Exactly. All aerial transport in Equestria is pegasus based, asides from hot air balloons and pedal powered bikes like Pinkie Pie's: Even "airplanes" are pulled by pegasai. This means that the distance of a flight is limited by how far a team of pegasus can haul an aircraft behind them. Two, three hours, maybe? Meanwhile, the sea features its own dangers: Sea monsters and uncontrolled weather make sailing hazardous. The ponies of Clara Terram enchanted an unmanned vessal to sail to the other side of the world, and it was in fairly bad shape even without monsters trying to climb in to eat the crew.
However, that doesn't mean that the ponies of Clara Terram have never met their distant cousins...
7884596
Or just more pressing problems.
7884618
Just seems strange no one would try to figure out a way to extend the range of flight. Like, even transportable clouds would allow for rest stops. Or interchanging teams, though this depends on a pegasus' carrying capacity.
7884857
The problem is, most of that doesn't work once you're out over the ocean: Any sailor can tell you that weather over open water can be a lot wilder than weather over land, so I imagine that pegasai will have problems trying to control weather on the ocean. And you have to consider a sort of 'diminishing returns' aspect: The more ponies you take to make the trip, the more supplies you need to sustain them. The more supplies you need, the more weight for your cargo. The more weight for your cargo, the more ponies you need to haul it. And we're talking about a trip with no certain destination, no idea what sort of situation may be waiting for them when they arrive. Imagine how much difficulty Christopher Columbus had in convincing anyone to fund a journey to find a 'westerly route to India', which ended up being a trip far longer than he ever imagined. If anyone had known the actual distance from Europe to India going west, they'd have been a lot less likely to have been willing to go on that trip. Ponies, thanks to magic, know where various continents may be, but the distance involved, plus the various sea creatures that roam the waters farther offshore, such an expedition would be extremely difficult both in practice and in logistics. And there's no guarantee that there are not monsters capable of flight that might be roaming the skies, flying beasts that might prey on giant sea monsters the way a seagull preys on fish. When ponies write 'Here Be Monsters' on a map, it isn't because no one has been there. It's because there are freakin' monsters that eat anyone who goes past that point!
7884891 So, I guess airships just never got developed as an idea at all, then? No means of mechanical propulsion? (engines, motors, etc) No heavy AA weapons either?
: P
(Hmmm, here be monsters? I wonder if I can incorporate that idea somehow.)
I love the interesting premises. I cannot wait to see what comes next.
On a side note:
I believe the Unicorns probably used to speak Arab, given they used a base ten numeral system.
I also believe the Pegasi probably used to speak Latin, given they used a twenty-six letter alphabet.
All of the above is made on the assumption that the Ponies of Equestria use the same alphabet and the same numbers as us.
A great and very promising beginning, along with a nice little twist right after the prologue.
Well, yeah, it's about time Equestria does some proper technological growth. In the show it self it doesn't seem like they have advanced much in the thousand years. This is going to be a lot of fun!
7884584 Which is what I'm afraid in the future when more automation and computer systems allow them to be self-sufficient that many humans wouldn't bother to learn how they work. Especially for the more common people who would gladly just learn what they can and deem personally or socially useful, and the people needed to work on the computers and machines became rarer. Of course it wouldn't go down to "Idiocracy" movie as everyone would be educated beyond read, write and count, especially considering the entertainment and gaming industry crunching up some good and immersive games.
Magitek best magic. Get ready for linux