Twilight Sparkle just can't find enough time in the day. She has to study friendship for the Princess, hang out with her five friends, and juggle her own hobbies and interests besides. But when a novel solution presents itself in the form of an experimental new spell, will it solve her time crunch, or will she be distracted even further?

This story is a sequel to The Irony of Applejack

Warning: this story is a sequel. Therefore, it is highly recommended that you read the prequel first before continuing!

Over half a year has passed since the changeling attack on Ponyville, and Applejack would like to think things have finally settled down. Much has changed for the young changeling, and all of Equestria in kind. The new district in Ponyville proves that, along with the town's many new residents.
But there is much the young queen does not yet know about being a changeling. Some things, she will learn, can be chosen, while others will be chosen for her. With new allies and enemies emerging all around her, Applejack must discover what it truly means to rule before the choice is taken from her forever, and the history of the changelings repeats itself, once again...

Image provided by Heilos.

Echo is a high ranking changeling officer. The Canterlot invasion was going perfectly, and her battalion had personally defeated the Elements of Harmony. Suddenly, she finds herself far flung from Canterlot, crashing into the Everfree forest. Now she is faced with a difficult reality - her hive, the only family she's ever known, no longer exists, and she must adapt to life as a pony. What she finds out about herself, though, will surprise her.

Rated Teen for occasional suggestiveness and language, tagged gore for brief violence, particularly in later chapters.

Dark because later chapters get pretty ... well, dark.

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Addendum 5/29/2018

This story is now, as of this addendum, five years old. It is getting more attention as I put out new chapters on the sequel.

I recognize that this story has problems, and that some of them by their nature carry over to the sequel; please remember that when I started writing this, I was not yet even old enough to legally drink in the US. A lot has happened and a lot has changed, and there are many things about this story I regret including, but which it is now too late to change. Some of those things I have simply done my best to ignore and make irrelevant, but some of them are errors from a 19 year old me that will haunt me until the sequel is finished.

In short, please be gentle.

How would things be different if Twilight had never made it to Ponyville? Twilight Sparkle finds out just how different things could be when she is forced to travel to her own past while chasing down a mystery; a plot to erase Princess Twilight Sparkle from history.

Landing in a time just weeks after the one thousandth Summer Sun Celebration, she finds a world shrouded in an eternal night, where the Elements of Harmony were never recovered. Can she fix the things that should have, but didn't happen? Or is this Equestria destined to head down a different path?

Chinese Translation by Hell Organist

Hi there, my name's Abel, I'm the new changeling on the block.
Been living in Ponyville for three years. Been here a year before Twilight and managed to make a name for myself as a darn good accountant that goes by the name of Balanced Books.
Even got along with each of the Bearers pretty well. Well enough that Twilight decided to invite me along for her brother's wedding.
Getting past that shield the first time wasn't fun. Figuring out the plot behind the wedding, also not fun.
Did I happen to mention that any and all changelings who are NOT a part of Chrysalis' Hive Mind have a VERY good reason to hate her? Me moreso than most?
Yeah, that was torture.
Now all I have to do is explain to the bucking princessess about my true nature and pray to, well, them, that I'll be allowed to return to my life as Books.
Wish me luck, my interrogator is here.
Cover art provided by jjamess10

In the aftermath of her battle against Tirek, Twilight Sparkle is unwell. She wants more. She needs more. And she is afraid of what others might think of her.

But even in the midst of her growing despair that she has betrayed everything she stood for, she learns something about friendship and what it means to be an alicorn.

Transformation magic is a powerful, dangerous tool, a lesson Princess Celestia has taught time and time again. But when a miscalculation of her own warps her body into a new and terrible form, an avian form her oldest enemies held millennia ago, Celestia learns these dangers from an entirely new perspective. Now she must find a way to reclaim her old body and manage the killer instincts of her new one. Of course, in order to do that, she'll have to climb off her dusty old throne and make some friends with the knowledge to help her, with some prompting from the more-than-friend who sent her the spell to begin with.

Edited and proofread by the marvelous JKinsley

Covert art by the lovely Fuzzyfurvert

Sequel to The Return of Princess Nightmare Moon! After having made a full medical recovery Princess Nightmare Moon tries her hoof at wooing one of her subjects, Nurse Bandaid. Meanwhile, Chrysalis returns to feed on Celestia, still vying for the position of godhood. (Coverart by Mewaponny!)

I am not Twilight Sparkle.

I have her body, I have her memories, I have her power. I am not her, and I have done such terrible things. This is my story.

Twilight has discovered a new spell to use in tandem with the Elements of Harmony. Its intent is to reveal more of the mysteries behind the artifacts. Yet once the spell is cast will the mane six be able to deal with the consequences? What will they learn when they come face to face with the very virtues they claim to embody? The Mane six will have to face their greatest challenge yet. The Elements of Harmony themselves.

(Cover art done by CSIMadmax)

(Featured on 1/6/2014)

(Also big thanks to Coppercore for help editing my ramblings!)