Ch 84 Reflections

Okay so wow, chapter 84! Long chapter, big events, and a lot to go over. I definitely hoped that you enjoyed reading it but I can understand how there could be points that might be confusing. So this is to try and clear some of those up.

Alright so to start with... Let's talk about changelings and ponies. So imagine this... A married couple like Mr and Mrs Cake per say are out doing chores in town separate from each other. Mr Cake returns home to find his wife there in an amorous mood and they have fun having sex together. Meanwhile, Mrs Cake was really Chrysalis feeding on the love that was shared. Later that night the real Mrs Cake comes home and Mr Cake laughs asking if she had a good day today. Seeing her husband smiling in such a good mood makes her smile as she says she did. Then the two go to bed for the night being none the wiser. All the while, Chrysalis is back at the hive and uses the love (and genetic material) from Mr Cake to fertilize and feed a new batch of changelings. And this has been going on for a long, long time. Now, is this a perfect theory? No. Is this Canon? Probably not, whose to say? Does it really change anything? Not really. But do I find it interesting? Yes. As such, I think it makes for a small comment that adds a lot of flavor to the scene. Plus it was fun to freak out Dash and Applejack for a bit. Do I plan to use this detail for anything greater in the story? Hmm probably not, I haven't decided yet. But it leaves the door open for me now that the concept has been introduced.

Now speaking of that timeframe... I do indeed believe that Chrysalis outdates Celestia. Not by a lot but still that she was wrecking havoc before Celestia was born. However, this is a concept I don't plan to explain at this time. I have an origin story planned for Chrysalis for a much later chapter and I would hate to ruin what I have planned for it.

Okay so about the map table... Who remembers what the map was doing back when Rayne first arrived in Equestria? It was calling ponies to Tartarus, the Crystal Empire, Griffonstone, and the Changeling Kingdom. With Rayne present in Equestria this presented the possibility to reform Tirek, save the possibility for Sombra to rekindle friendship with Radiant Hope and be reformed, choose whether the Idol of Boreas should be returned to the Griffon's or not, and give Thorax a chance to face having difficulty standing up for himself. Now at chapter 84 all four of these arcs have been resolved. I'm sure back when these plot arcs were introduced no one thought they would be answered this far ahead in the future but this was my scripted plan all along back when I first started the story. It feels good to finally have them wrapped up.

As a side note, no Rayne is still not finished with gathering everything he seeks to achieve. There's still about half a dozen or so targets that he has left. But he is getting close. Very close. But once he's done will it result in the outcome he expects or will a darker fate be in store for him?

Okay so this chapter caused something unexpected to happen for me as the writer. The changelings students were only really supposed to exist for this arc. But I think they've grown enough to be used again in the distant future. Also, this was completely on accident but I found myself loving getting to write about Anansi. She is the fiery, wild, brazzen type and I was thrilled to write out her excitement. There was definitely a lot more about her until I started cutting things back for chapter length. Please tell me if you liked reading about her character or not because I would love to include her more in my writings in the future.

Alright so Thorax is a character with a strong heart and he does have the skills to be a great leader... even if he needs a nudge every now and then. There was already the episode in the show where Ember had to help teach him to be more assertive with the other changelings. However characters in this world tend to be slow at learning lessions. Just look at how many times the mane six had to learn the same lessions over and over. So I figured it wouldn't be a stretch to say Thorax learned how to be assertive with the hive but not himself. Facing down the panther would be an excellent opportunity to put that to the test. And frankly I'm proud of how Thorax stood his ground against Rayne in charge 84. I can only hope that you are too. And I know Pinkie and Fluttershy were happy to uninowingly her prepare Thorax for that.

Here is the big question though... What did Rayne want? So yes Rayne now has the changeling shapeshifting ability. That will be a big help to him but frankly that is on the bottom of the list of powers that are important to him. What Rayne really wanted was the magical immunity from Chrysalis' throne. However, aquiring that was no easy feat and it took quite a complicated formula for that to be possible. So let's go over it to make things clear...

The objective was to gain the ability of magical immunity. Now the first problem is to gain abilities he needed Tirek's magic. One check down. But Tirek could only take the essence of living things and the throne would negate his magic anyway. The first solution for this was getting the powers of a dragon. Now take the ability to eat rocks etc and combine that with Tirek and Starlight's powers. Now Rayne can eat a magic Stone and gain the stone's abilities. But the next problem is the throne still canceling out Tirek's magic. Now I admit I fudged this one a bit but let me explain. I took that a single piece of the throne might be weaker than the whole thing together. So if that's true then Rayne just had to have enough power to overcome that piece for just a single second to merge eating the stone with Tirek's ability to absorb it. Once Rayne finally managed to inherit the throne's power for himself that would only lead him to the next problem. His magical immunity would become as effective as his power level. This means it wouldn't matter if he only absorbed a small throne shard. Rayne would basically as antimagic as the entire throne was from how powerful he had become (offset by the original Rayne only giving his separated panther copy so much power to begin with). And if Rayne is a walking field of antimagic then what does that mean? Every other power he's ever attained no longer works. But there's an answer to this too. His original self who did not eat the throne shards still had the bulk of his magic. He just needed that version of himself to aquire changeling magic first. Once the real Rayne had changeling magic it was safe for him to to give it to the antimagic panther. Even though Tirek's magic would be resisted, the changeling energy would not. As for the end result, the panther's magic now IS changeling magic which the throne is perfectly fine with. Using Starlight's ability to merge it all together... now every spell Rayne knows is considered changeling magic giving him the ability to nullify other spells around him while his magic still works. And it's a simple matter for the panther and the stallion to merge back together sometime that night while no one was watching. And once together I leave it assumed that Rayne can control the intensity and range of his anitmagic ability by flexing it or not. TA DA! What do you think?

Alright so that's finally it! Please feel free to leave any comments, questions, or concerns that you have in the comments section for chapter 84! And I hope this blog helped to answer anything that wasn't clear in the chapter. Thank you for reading!