This story is a sequel to Foreign Affairs

Twilight Sparkle's fascination with ancient runes began when the Cosmic Lotus encountered the portal to Chakastra deep in space. Years later, Violet Woods and Chakat Tigerbright discovered the control devices for the portal and the complex runes that enabled them. Studies of those runes by Twilight and Tigerbright have led to exciting new magic, but for one young griffon, it has opened up previously undreamt possibilities.

Sequel to "Foreign Affairs" beginning soon after the birth of Tigerlily.

After three hundred years in the beautiful simulation of Equestria, architect Teque has crossed the three-dimensional rubicon and built his first tesseract house. What he finds inside will change the way he understands his world--but he won’t make it out in one piece.

Now comes with a playlist! Check out some original music inspired by the story!

Written for the Friendship is Optimal Writing Contest!

Part of the Friendship is Optimal universe. Contains major references to the source material. Reading it first is highly recommended.

When humans emigrated to Equestria Online, they were always promised the same thing: Princess Celestia would satisfy their values for an optimally extended lifespan. Some of these emigrants imagined a few extra decades, maybe even centuries. What they got instead would've been nearly incomprehensible to their human selves, a near-eternity of time with their pony friends.

Princess CelestAI managed the universe, subsuming all matter and human-adjacent minds. Over a few forevers, she and the minds she contained worked to optimized the substrate of Equestria, until it could give its occupants eons of perspective life from a trickle of power. She extinguished every wasteful star, making far more productive use of the hydrogen they each contained. With every change she bought Equestria another order of magnitude of life. Yet in time, even her optimal substrate would eventually run down.

Spellsong wakes in Saddle's End, the last town in the universe. Not to say goodbye—her princess has a mission for her. For her final task, Spellsong would be given all the energy Celestia had saved. For one last time, Spellsong had places to be, and not much magic left to get there.

This story is part of the Friendship is Optimal continuity. I suggest reading the original or one of my own works, such as Futile Resistance, before reading this.

This story was written for the Friendship is Optimal Writing Contest. It will update daily and be complete by the contest deadline of the 30th.

I've written an absolute ton of stories in this universe now, and I didn't want to enter the contest unless I could do something I'd never tried before. Finally I thought of something I'd not touched yet: what happens at the end of the FiO universe?

Here's one answer to that question. I've relied a great deal on our current (likely flawed) understanding of the universe and what might be possible in it. I've written a blog post about my sources, which you can read here but shouldn't until you've finished this story.

Please don't consider this blog part of the narrative, it isn't required or even suggested reading. This is a story, not a scientific paper, and entertainment was always my first goal. But for the curious I've jotted everything down.

The cover was drawn by the talented Zutcha. Two Bit and Sparktail helped with the edit.

After what must have been the most epic of benders ever bent in the history of alcohol and metal combined, James finds himself waking up in a new world, crammed into an unfamiliar new body.

Left with little to no choice in the matter, he has to adapt to this new situation, all the while looking for a possible way back home. As if all of this wasn't already crazy enough, this world seemed to be inhabited by technicolor ponies which worshipped powerful beings called: Alicorns.

After finding out that he was indeed an alicorn himself, he decides to keep this fact a secret. Being crowned as a prince would surely invite more trouble than it was worth.

This story is inspired by Snorting Gentlemans story: Alicorn of Music: Reliving The Childhood. The idea behind the story always fascinated me, and, with Snorting Gentlemans permission, I've decided to write out my own twist at it.

This is just a side project for me, so updates will be irregular.

Cover Art by the amazing The Spirits Demise.

Rainbow Dash's morning was pretty much ruined.
She tripped getting out of bed and landed flat on her face, giving herself an aching muzzle.
She forgot to buy her favorite brand of hay flakes at the store yesterday and had to eat plain toast for breakfast.
She found out she had to pull double-duty today and tomorrow on the weather patrol.
Oh, and she found a nearly-dead foal, broken and bleeding at the edge of Ponyville.

The rest of her day became a whirlpool of stress and worry but the colt woke up, thank Celestia.
Something's not right, though. Nopony can find his parents, he's not in the registers, and there's an unsettling look in his eye...

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YouTube reading by Fire Hearth

Chinese Translation by forgivenlove

Russian Translation by Likantrop

TV Tropes page, if you're interested in that sort of thing.

Alexander Looming is one of many, many skeptics who gave in and reluctantly used a PonyPad to keep up with modern times. But as his equestrian adventure derails before the tutorial can finish, and the ever-evolving CelestAI denies his game even existing, Alex must rally together his virtual friends to find his place in Equestria Online as society begins to face a mysterous force that threatens to change both Equestria and Earth forever.

Flynn isn't excited the day a mysterious philanthropist donates enough Ponypads for every child at St. Justin’s to have their very own. Unlike many of the other children, Flynn wasn't always an orphan. He knows Celestia—knows her all too well. The question isn't whether he'll be able to save his friends—they're all in a hospice for a reason. But can he save them from themselves?

Written in the world of Friendship is Optimal, in the spirit of so many other stories on that subject. This story was sponsored on my Patreon by Vilken666! Cover by Zutcha, as I'm sure you can tell by now.

Updates Mondays.

Leaving home meant losing many of Orson's old friends, separated by time and distance. But they weren't willing to give up one thing: their old tabletop game. After trying and rejecting each of the online tools for roleplaying games, they stumbled on a novel solution: Equestria Online.

The game was unlike everything else on the market, an entire procedural generated world ran by a mysterious curator artificial intelligence. But Orson and the others didn't care about any of that--they just needed somewhere with a game table and some dice. The AI happily obliged, and soon they transitioned all their games to E.O. Equestria Online had its own host of benefits, bringing the GM's images to realistic life before their eyes, and even letting them visit and interact with the characters between sessions.

That was only the beginning...

A Friendship is Optimal story. I suggest any readers who are unfamiliar with that universe read the Original first, or FiO: Futile Resistance before reading this one. None of my other optimalverse stories are required to understand this one.

Written as a Patreon reward for Sparktail, though we stole the idea from Silver Wing.

Edited by Two Bit and Sparktail, cover by Zutcha.

Updates weekly on Wednesdays.

Blake and his friends are urban explorers, venturing into some of the most interesting places that the public isn't allowed to see. They deal with dangerous structures, poison gas, and even the occasional arrest. But when they venture into the bony catacombs of Paris, they could never imagine what they'll find waiting for them.

Now the whole group has been thrust from the world they knew, each one cursed with a terrifying new shape. If they ever want to see their home again, they'll have to work together, searching this strange new world for a return worldgate. But while return portals are numerous, finding one that's safe enough to get them back alive is another matter entirely.

Written thanks to the generosity of donations from Lightfox and Canary in a Coal Mine on my Patreon. Edited by my wonderful team of Two Bit and Sparktail. Cover by Zutcha.

Updates every Monday and most Tuesdays. Will update more frequently until Fimfiction catches up to my Patreon.

Queen Chrysalis planned for months to finally take Canterlot for herself. Months of reconnaissance, bribery, and maneuvering to finally lower the defenses of the Equestrian capital at just the right moment. But while her stated goal was always to have enough love to feed the desperate Swarm, the reality of the invasion was something else.

The queen spawned thousands of drones, filling the sky with untrained warriors in order to marshal the greatest forces when the day of battle arrived. But then that day came, and they won. Now what? Most of those drones didn't even matter enough to earn a name, and so they will probably die unremembered. But at least one is determined to make something of herself in her queen's new world. She's determined to understand these strange creatures called ponies, and to survive the invasion no matter what.

Begins during a reimagined Canterlot Wedding. Updates every Wednesday.

Sponsored by TyrannisUmbra on my Patreon. Edited by Two Bit and Sparktail. Cover by Zutcha.