The State of the Story Address · 2:32am Mar 6th, 2022
(Haha! See what I did with the title? Haha! I’m so funny.)
I decided that I should make a blog about the stuff floating around in later chapters of Fólkvangr and Piece of Parchment, since both stories complement each other. And a small recap. Because someone might find it interesting, because it might start a conversation, because I’m bored and need a break from gaming and creative writing. And because I love the sound of my Redragon Surara. (It's a good keyboard for the price. Especially in a third world country).
This is about symbology. And there shouldn't be any spoilers if you read the whole story until now.
So, according to our Old Greek friends, griffons hated horses and saw them as a favored prey. Why? Well, apparently horses were benevolent and inherently good creatures while the griffons were inherently evil. Funny enough, it was also the Greeks that came up with the Mares of Diomedes. But, maybe, that was the point of the whole idea of the mares having been dedicated to Hera. Because she was soooooo nice...
Anyways. Griffons are 'evil', because they are 'selfish/independent'. And ponies are 'good' because they are 'selfless/interdependent'. You can see where I'm going, this isn't really deep.
Those chapters where Luna is messing around Gilda's memories are meant as a large piece of origin myth. Both for Gilda and for the world itself. As such, they're meant to explain the origin of stuff that is important in the present. And beside Gilda's social problems, those would be...
1- Ponies have an innate relationship with nature. Other creatures too, but they hold the protagonism in that. (First season of the cartoon was incredibly important to me)
2- What actually is Harmony? I don't think that the cartoon ever made a statement about that. It was just something 'good'. Maybe it's balance, a magic comes from those virtues the Elements represent.
3- These freaking big ponies look different, seem to be damn important to the other ponies and this one can literally make you fall in love. Not quite like Twilight's want-it-need-it spell. Cadance could 'spread love'. What that actually meant was left for interpretation. Some will say that Cadance doesn't actually make ponies fall in love, but if I'm wrong, some FIM animators agree with me...
That is ridiculously powerful. And meanwhile, there is another one that can enter your dreams. I swear. Some of the stuff that got into this cartoon because the small children ‘wouldn't notice’... Like Luna using Tantabus to punish herself. Or Celestia... I think that Celestia's 'derpization' (and you people are free to disagree with me) was intentional because someone looked at her and realized that Lauren Faust had essentially created a cartoon pony god-king of the sun and a cartoon pony god-king of the moon.
I don't think even in Mythology there is one such entity. You have gods that rule pantheons, sun gods, gods of rulership, and rulers with divine mandate. And then there were the Pharaohs.
Not the Ptolemaic Dynasty which were actually 'Greeks' that Alexander the Great sat at the Egyptian throne. I'm talking about the Old and New Kingdom. Along the thirty-something dynasties, the definition of what the Pharaoh was kind of changed, but what is important to the story is that the Pharaoh (as of the nineteenth dynasty, I think) was the secular and religious leader, with absolute domain over society and religion.
So, the Pharaohs really were the best example of god-kings. Much as the Egyptians saw Amun-Ra as the creator of the universe and the sun, Pharaoh was the 'man-god supposed to rule'.
Did Lauren Faust think of Celestia and Luna as god-kings? Maybe, but it's honestly not important. As it has already become abundantly clear, the alternate universe (I need to name it...) happens after G4 (G5 is not a part of the chronology unless I find a really good reason to make it so). The important thing is that in the alternate universe Celestia, Luna, Twilight, and Cadance are all god-kings. Aya Harpyia too, but she would rather have someone rule in her stead. She really likes that ‘above the mortals’ thing. Of course, as long as her chosen one is ruling the ‘right way’.
Or are they? Depends on who you ask. Luna will tell you that the individual begins when the soul meets the physical body (and the Palace of the Self is formed), and ends when the body fails and the soul disconnects (and the Palace of the Self is destroyed). So, as far as Luna is concerned, she is not Luccenotturna. She is Moonlit Nights, the daughter of the bakers from Everfree that happened to be born with the same soul that belonged to the goddess that created the minds of modern creatures.
But ask Celestia and she'll tell you that the soul's ability of creating powerful memories that remain after death and are carried over into another creature implies a continuity. She'll say that much as your body changes and its constituents are recycled and replaced throughout your life, she is Sol-Estia in a different period of her existence that identifies as Celestia.
To further complicate things, some beings can remember stuff past the cycles of the Black Sun. And this brings me to the next point: the Westworld analogy.
Luna's magical system for surveying the mind. I really like the Westworld analogy because, when it started, the series was a hard fictional look into the functioning of an artificial mind and how it might be created, and related to the naturally created human mind. Also, Evan R. Wood, Ed Harris and Anthony Hopkins.
Also, My Little Pony never explained the workings of Luna’s magic. How does she know that something needs her attention? It’s just magic and it works. Which isn’t a problem, but secondary canon showed Luna with a dream ticker, with a pair of ravens (Huginn and Muninn, because, why not) that helped her survey the dreams of ponies. I felt like I wanted to do something with it and the Westworld analogy works wonders.
I'll explain a little for the people that may not have watched Westworld. The first season was about a Wild-West-themed amusement park where the visitors, or Guests were stupidly rich people that payed for the opportunity to rape, pillage, murder, destroy, rape, rape, rape and murder some more live out their wildest dreams in a highly curated and safe environment while interacting with artificial people the series called Hosts. All that with a pinch of undercover corporate bullshitery. It goes about as well as you'd expect.
The reason I like it so much is because of the brilliant way that the series uses the theory of the bicameral mind. It is an outdated real-world theory that tried to explain religion and the dawn of the rational mind. It basically posited that the first humans heard themselves thinking and assumed that the voice inside their heads was some sort of primitive god. That primitive human (maybe not even a human yet) would do things because that voice told them to. As culture developed and humankind understood their own nature better, that voice gradually disappeared and humans started 'thinking by themselves'.
The theory is bunk because of stuff like metacognition that could be seen in older texts such as the Epic of Gilgamesh, and such a mind couldn't understand certain things, such as introspection. It's complicated, and not really important. Not to mention that many people don’t have an inner monologue they hear then they think.
The important thing is that Westworld used it to bridge a gap between basic instincts that would be easily programmed into a machine into higher reasoning, or free-will. Sentience. Understanding what they were and 'being'.
Of course, in the series the Hosts heard their programming as commands, but were never allowed to make that jump, as their memories were reset and they defaulted to their base programming of the character they were supposed to be in the narrative of the park. It was once one of their creators decided to allow them recollection of 'past lives' that they were able to 'navigate the maze of broken memories' and become self aware.
And the series had so many great small details, such as the Hosts activating different parts of their programming for the narrative cycle according to the music that played. And the creative writer feeling frustrated over Guests messing up his stories because they'd kill a character. Anyone that's DM'd a RPG knows the feeling.
There is also one of my favorite scenes that I tried to make a small joke with in Fólkvangr. I would rather not post it here because of some nudity, but it is 'Maeve's dialogue tree scene' you can find on Youtube.
Back to the story, what did 'the system' look like before Chocolate Velvet told Luna about Westworld? It's not important, but it was probably something like working complex math in your head before someone introduced you to a computer. It is still the goddess' magic in Luna's soul doing it's thing, but Luna perceives it like that. Hence the scene in PoP chapter 27, Fulgora, where Luna figured out The Harpy's magic that hid some griffons from her.
A small addendum, there is a magical hierarchy system going on. Highest authority is Harmony, then The Harpy, followed by Celestia, Luna, Cadance, Twilight, and finally Naminé, and then everyone else. Discord is a wild variant that has special 'privileges', like the Windigos. And then there are the griffons that have full authority inside their own minds, even above The Harpy.
Anyways, something still to be explored happened after the end of G4 and it caused a 'Systemic Cascade Magical Failure' that led to a 'Black Sun Event'. It restarted Creation and in the present iteration of the world something different happened, because that is what it is supposed to do: collect information so Harmony can correct 'the seed' in the next cycle.
The pony goddesses created ponies in their birthplace still to be explored and let them out into the world so that they could tame magic and bring life into the world. But something went wrong (or something wrong went right) and instead of forgetting their goddesses, the ponies remembered them. Instead of vanishing from their Thrones and becoming just strings of magic inside the minds of the ponies, parts of their rational minds, like cogs in a machine, they remained, The ponies' inherently creative and crazy powerful magic made them into gods that they believed resided inside statues and the ponies started a religion around them.
Events still to be explored summoned the Windigos as agents of the Creation, supposed to destroy the ponies and trigger the Black Sun, but as had happened in G4, the Fire of Friendship (the way ponies expressed the Elements of Harmony) allowed them to remain. They built The Republic, but again things went wrong. Something BAD happened. The story mentions 'the Ancient Pact', and it is something stupidly messed up that happened. It corrupted the magic of the world and summoned Discord. Not to destroy ponies, just because things got effed. But Discord and his rudimentary understanding thought that he ought to fix things and tried to trigger the Black Sun.
Of course, he screwed up because he didn't truly understand the issue, but the Black Sun was triggered. However, the process never completed because the pony goddesses tried to save the ponies. It was desperation. The end of the world around them caused the ponies to summon them to the 'realm of the living', much like their magic had done with the Windigos and Discord. After an apocalyptic battle of titanomachy levels, Discord either killed them or their damaged magic couldn't allow them to sustain themselves, stranded in a place they weren't supposed to be.
Their souls entered the natural flow of magic and they were reborn eventually. Meanwhile not only the ponies built Everfree in the shadows of the ruins of the capital, but also the griffons recovered. And they too had summoned something. It was the Black Sun and it's weird time dynamics that allowed them to summon The Harpy.
While The Harpy hid in what remained of the Stormy Eyrie (in this version of the world taken by the Windigos), Celestia and Luna were reborn and something was terribly wrong with the sun.
People that have been paying attention may have already figured it out, but no. It's not that Sol-Estia's soul was yanked from the sun. It's actually worse. But the point is that the sun was slowly winding up into the Black Sun again. Twilight and Cadance know that it wasn't because of Discord, so they know that something messed up had happened. It was in that period that Celestia and Luna rose to rule the Diarchy after fixing it. It caused Celestia to erase the whole period of the Republic and replace it with her memories from the past cycle. (G4)
In the same period, she helped Grover hide the Holy Griffon Empire under the rug along with the Cult of The Harpy, also replacing it in history with her memories. Although she never believed that The Harpy was real, because she remembered The Harpy was destroyed and she never found her.
At that time, Luna's system was the old one. She didn't have the same tools (or rather the same methodology) she has in the present and The Harpy slipped unnoticed.
Now that I said all that, I want to address some of the symbolism in the story that has some coincidences with unsavory real world symbolism. Almost all of them were unintentional.
I'll begin with the most obvious, the Black Sun which has been associated with white supremacy groups such as the neo-Nazi. Because of course the fuckers had to have dibs on everything from lightning to suns and occult pagan symbols that are actually much older than Nazism.
Anyways... The reason they like it is because suns are often symbols of divinity and 'the spark of divinity in men'. Ironically, in alchemy it is the symbol for Negredo, the first state of the matter for creating the Philosopher's Stone. Also known as rot. Ironic...
ANYWAYS, as the nazis used it, it was a black ball with twelve sig runes (the black bolts in the SS) radiating from it. The reason it's called the Black Sun is because of the material used to make the mosaic from which it was derived. It was supposed to be the 'sun of the renewal of the Aryan race'. I'm just thankful nobody decided that dawn was a nazi symbol too.
I will not post images of Nazi symbols. You can look them up if you want. I will post an image of a black hole, though, because black holes are cool.
I love to hate that movie...
In the story, the Black Sun is a magical black hole. Which is, if I dare say so myself, a proper use of the term. I think that Celestia and Luna have already explained it extensively and identified it as a benevolent property of their universe.
By the way, the idea of the Aryan race is about as obsolete and irrelevant as the bicameral mind. It was already a stupid idea by the time the Third Reich decided it wanted to soil the world with its existence. But you know how it goes... Every ideological brain fart needs an ideal and an enemy to combat.
And the reason I brought this up now is because I want to talk about the northerners and their practices. Particularly the whole thing about the thralls and the red scarf that identifies the members of the Court of The Harpy. Because it didn't occur to me at the time, but of course the aforementioned pricks had a red adornment with a symbol on it.
Well, the double sig rune was meant to represent victory. I think. I'm not sure. I am also not sure why they liked the red band around the arm. Maybe it something to do with blood too, and it was supposed to be wore close to the heart.
I can tell you about the scarves in the story. Red is the color of blood, which is important to The Harpy given her breeding program. And it has nothing to do with the Lebensborn. Rather than a desire for creating a pure race, the idea in the story is filtering out the magic of ponies that was introduced through the hippogriffs. And that is where the idea of the court came. The idea of purity actually makes sense because ponies and griffons are two different species.
The Harpy will accuse Celestia of weaponizing the hippogriffs against the griffons. The thing is that she is lying. The intended message is that even if purer griffons can access their innate magic like the Loremasters and the Swordmaidens, it's not worth all the hatred and pain that it causes. That is why Grinolf is in the story. It is clearly hurting The Harpy's own goals, and there is more coming in the story about how she's actually messing up the griffons.
The symbol in the scarf is a black and white pair of griffon wings. It should be obvious as those are The Harpy's colors.
Unfortunately, I don’t have an image of a griffon wearing the red scarf. Yet. I’m working on it.
The Loremasters are an adaptation of Frank Herbert's Bene Gesserit in Dune. Though I haven't watched the new movie yet. (I hope they included the badass desert scene where Jessica Atreides is faking interest in the Harkonnen soldiers and 'hacking' their minds with the Voice).
Doth not chuckle at the God Emperor of Dune.
The Swordmaidens are a combination of Witchers and Jedi. But fetishized to hell and back with magical swords. Yeah, The Harpy expects Gilda to mother Grigory a couple of cubs. We’ll see how that works out for her. And Gilda is basically the Star Wars Chosen One and Dune’s Kwisatz Haderach of griffons. Which is a really cool concept that Frank Herbert adapted from old Jewish mysticism.
The whole thing about thralls is really more like a social security net (since they reject the pony ideas). Suppose a griffon messes up somehow and ends up in a situation with no money and no way of acquiring it. They can enter a thralldom with a master that will allow them to rebuild their life, working to carry their weight, but they wouldn’t be abandoned. It is a similar concept to the Asari Indentured Servitude rather than real world slavery and all the nonsense people throw around about it.
Just like that, Mass Effect ruined the asari.
It's the best analogy with pop culture I can come up with. The point is that a griffon cannot own another griffon under the Harpy's commandments. Of course, things are different when you're talking about other creatures.
The Empire was inspired heavily in Assyrian aesthetics and the modern northerners are 'viking griffons'. So, things like sacrifices and thralldom come from the historical knowledge of them.
It is obvious that the northerner griffons have a fascistoid vein as they are meant to be the evil force that is going to conquer the free southerner griffons. But so had King Sombra. They are the main antagonist to the ponies. The group that is luring the disenfranchised griffons tired of a corrupt government. The ones that have rigid social norms and rules dictated to them from a divine being that is herself a despot. Gilda is a victim. She was dragged into it, but she thrived because… That is what the Children of The Harpy do. And most important, she will be a good influence over The Harpy.
The only thing that was an intentional analogy to the Third Reich was actually a characteristic of the German Army rather than the Nazi Party. Their warfare doctrine and the search for innovation. Overwhelming power and speed combined with superior arms. One of the defining characteristics of the northerners is that they have started to deploy semi-automatic rifles, machine guns, submachine guns, and rifled cannons. They are preparing for a war.
Lady Gwendolen sent Grigory’s friends to study in the best Equestrian schools and universities and Gallensa pretty much would have invented weapons of mass destruction if Celestia hadn't stopped her. Heck, one of his friends is called Gewehr. The one that makes guns. And this is not meant as a glorification of the Wehrmacht of the time. It’s a sign of the times, not to mention that Blitzkrieg is what modern combat is today. A wake up call that ponies may have stagnated because magic made it all too easy. However, Celestia was preparing and development of magical weapons didn’t stop. And the southerners may still surprise The Harpy...
Another small addendum. Fólkvangr and Piece of Parchment are both going to enter the final stage of the story now that Gilda is in the north, Luna has figured stuff out. It will trigger events that will help Twilight and Cadance escape. Especially because Celestia and Luna are too busy and unreachable.
The point is that Celestia is also a divine being that is a despot. Albeit a benevolent one. In the end, the deal about them is a difference in ideology to create conflict. And another thing is that both want what they think is best, but The Harpy has a twisted idea of what that ideal is. Celestia stayed in the world and she learned from her own mistakes while The Harpy arrogantly held to what she thought was ideal. We’ll see what happens.
It calls back to the idea that the predator, the one that takes, is 'evil'. That the one that imposes is evil. But the northerner's sternness is also a sign of their steadfast adherence to tradition, loyalty and irreproachable work ethic.
Because of their isolation, they remained closer to The Harpy's original griffons. They carry an unbreakable will, discipline and dedication. They are heroes that protect the southerner lands from the monsters since before the Empire. And Gilad is that 'mighty king' Celestia said the griffons need so that they can get over their independent streak and make magnificent things like Griffindell's walls or the irrigation system in Griffonstone. The question is, will Grigory raise to be a suiting heir, or will he follow on his mother's less savory ideas?
The final point is that griffons and ponies are different. What is good for one may not be ideal for the other. They have to find a common ground where they can coexist and the Equestrian Federation can remain united. Or, maybe, it would be better that griffons go their own way for them to find that middle ground. No spoilers.
Finally, in the topic of analogies and inspirations, the alert classes that Luna’s system uses are loosely based on the Ancient Egyptians’ idea of souls. This is going to be more important in a story Luna is going to star in and that will explore her interpretation of things like Starlight Glimmer stealing cutie marks, Discord messing with pony minds, and Tirek stealing magic.
Basically, the Egyptians believed that, much like creatures in the story, humans were made with a duality of body and soul. And that the soul was made of different parts. In the story, you should think of each as an ‘organ of the soul’. I just wanted to mention where the words came from.
Well, that got rambly. I hope it was entertaining or interesting in any way, shape or form. I welcome any questions bellow.
oO WOW...
Kay I guess i'm a dense idiot....cause I LOVE YOUR STORY And the depth of it...but i caught NONE Of that....
DAMN you a good writer.
also: "The Harpy expects Gilda to mother Grigory a couple of cubs"
I don't remember who grigory is....lotta griffons in this story, the names blend together. But i'm pretty sure if a male mounts Gilda without her consent, he's gonna lose his jewels....XD
5641821
Grigory is the adopted son of the Lion and Harpy.
5641821
Nah, you are. Most people read fanfiction without looking for deeper meaning and I like these things just for fun. Like the Egyptian words in Luna's magical system, and the whole Westworld analogy.
Most of that is in Piece of Parchment because Fólkvangr doesn't jump around characters and just stays with Gilda. She isn't paying attention to some details.
The Harpy briefly mentions Grigory in chapter 11, 'Aya Harpyia'. She says that Gilda is gonna like him. He and his friends are mostly in Piece of Parchment, as of chapter 14, 'Winter Has Come a Long Time Ago and We Never Noticed'. The Harpy also shows up a lot in Piece of Parchment, as of chapter 23, 'Ice Queen'.
I don’t actually know why, but I haven’t read Piece of Parchment. This post, however, has exposed me to previously unknown information about that story and has convinced me that I need to read it.
5641981
I can't chose between my children, but Piece of Parchment is very important to the alternate universe as a whole because it serves as an anchor. It basically lists out what is different from the cartoon and has Twilight and Cadance investigating stuff, talking to creatures that know things and figuring out the past. It has a very different pacing from Fólkvangr and it jumps around characters a lot. I also try to introduce more humor and the age rating is lower. It also has Chrysalis' Praetorian Guards that I absolutely love.
Honestly, I think that Fólkvangr is better as a written piece. But I believe that Piece of Parchment is good because of the lore.
There will be more stories that effectively show things the characters talk about, such as Shatterhoof Valley, the war against the Empire etc... But the priority is finishing PoP and Fólkvangr. Heck, the one about how Celestia became Celestia is already written, waiting.
Finally, feedback is always appreciated if something is not good enough.