Twilight Sparkle has too much magic, and it will take her decades to learn to control it. Her spectacular loss of control during her entrance exam only proves that fact. She is a danger to herself and others.

After Sunset Shimmer’s disappearance, Princess Celestia needs a new student to bear The Element of Magic to defeat Nightmare Moon. With all of Equestria at stake, Twilight Sparkle…is not the pony she needs.

Princess Celestia seals Twilight Sparkle’s magic with the distant promise of one day teaching her.

But there are two diarchs of Equestria. Amidst a lucid dream, an offer is made.

“Hello, Twilight. Would you like to be my student?”

Cover art provided by Lafiir.

In the far reaches of Canterlot Castle, high above in the towers lived the archmage. Everypony knew her, yet few had met her.

Twilight Sparkle sighed, having teleported away another noble seeking favors before reaching the top of the stairs for the second time today. They never learned. As the archmage, she already dealt with political squabbles far too often without inviting them into her home. Aside from personal favors for Celestia, she did what was required of her position and then returned to seclusion and research.

The nobility grumbled that no archmage should be a commoner, and Twilight’s disrespect toward them proved it. Each and every time they were forced to bow to her, they hated what they saw: the position, the status, the deference.

Was she not powerful? Was she not great?

Twilight, now reading through dusty scrolls and long forgotten tales, wrote in her notes — notes gathering dust of their own. A brief thought flashed through her mind.

Am I not powerful? Am I not great?

And then Twilight picked up The Tale of the Royal Pony Sisters.

Defunct side stories told in Across the Boundary. They can still provide a little context, but when in doubt, the main story here is canon.

Cover art provided by Lafiir

A different take on alicorn ascension. Sixteen years after arriving in Ponyville, Twilight Sparkle is excited to have invented a brand-new kind of spell, but it will come with consequences she cannot possibly anticipate. Meanwhile, threats in shadows around the world conspire to overthrow the Solar Throne. With her world turned upside down, she will have to come to terms with the role that fate has dealt her while straining to keep Celestia in power.

Now with a TVTropes page! Please show it some love! Also check out the official side stories, Designing Intrigue, and Love and Barriers! (With even more in my stories page!)

(Please Note: This story was started before any season three information was available. All episodes in season three and later are non-canon for this story, which also means there's no Crystal Empire in this one. In addition, the promotional map released close to the beginning of season three was also not available and is not compatible with this story. While the OC tag is active because there are OCs in the story, they're really just supporting characters. The focus is on Twilight.)

Also be sure to check out the Rites of Ascension Expanded Universe Group! We're working to develop the resources needed for other authors to try their hand at writing stories set in the Rites Universe!

The Book Two cover art was created by the amazing Silfoe! The original cover art can still be found at Violet Squiggle's deviantArt page.

Author's Notes, including proofreader's credits, can be found here!

"This is 100% Approved by Twilight's Library!"

Sometimes, fiction matters.

Now with a Spanish translation by Spaniard Kiwi!

[Please read the author's notes after the expansion before reading. Thank you]

Welcome to the new Equestria, Twilight Sparkle. See your friends at each other's throats? You have to choose between them now, to stop the heartache of war with decisive victory. For the nation lies bleeding, its harmony shattered into a million pieces. Black and white and right and wrong have blurred together.

You must choose wisely, or all shall die.

~Image by JohnJoseco~ If anyone can find a fitting, unique image for this story, please do not hesitate to link in the comments.

[Author's Note]

The following stories should be read in order to get a good grasp on references to previous works.

- Sunset (Mandatory)*
- My Little Muffin (Optional)
- Clash of the Heavenly Titans (Optional)*
- Blood is Thicker / The Reluctant Reunion of the Redoubtable Rabble-Rouser (Strongly Recommended)

All can be found on my Deviant Art account: http://ciroton.deviantart.com/
Those with * can be found here on FIMFiction.

Sunbeam Sparkle is not a good pony. She might not be pure evil, but she is ruthless, ambitious, and so power-hungry that she would even aspire to usurp Celestia's throne. Worse, she succeeds in manipulating Celestia into not only surrendering rule over Equestria, but her immortality as well.

It is often said that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. In most cases that’s true. Many good ponies have begun with good intentions, but slowly lost their way. However, this is not always the case. A rare few virtuous ponies have the character and strength of will to resist temptation, and are never corrupted by their authority.

Even rarer, there comes a time when gaining power makes a pony better than they were before. This is one such story.

Twilight Sparkle has been living a lie. Everypony told her what a beautiful and accomplished mare she was. Everypony thought she was a responsible adult. They were wrong. She was still just a filly trying to stumble her way through life.

It has been more than one hundred years since Celestia banished Nightmare Moon. While Equestria has enjoyed a century of relative peace and prosperity, there are still lingering tensions between the three pony tribes.

Shadow Kicker, a proud warrior of Pegasopolis, must navigate the treacherous noble court of Canterlot and address the concerns and wounded pride of her own tribe in a desperate effort to prevent matters from coming to open warfare.

There are 100 billion stars in the Milky Way, and humanity is determined to explore every one. We send probes, probes with the blueprints to reproduce human explorers upon arrival. Uninhabited worlds the galaxy over can be colonized and populated, until after many years they too can join the vast throng of interstellar civilization. But if a probe is very, very lucky, it will land on a populated world instead. Equestria is one such world.

Even so, it's far from perfect for colonization, not with an environment lethal to human life. But each probe is resourceful and armed with the greatest machine intelligence mankind has devised. If placing a human mind into a newly manufactured human body won't work, it will just have to get a little more creative.

This book has a Hardcover! If you want to pick it up, you can grab it here: https://starscribe.net/

This story was written at the behest of Canary In The Coal Mine, who is sponsoring it on my Patreon. As usual, cover by Zutcha. Editing by Two Bit and Sparktail.

Fantastic prereading help from: Chyre, Danger Noodle, Doctor Disco, and Doggyshakespeare (who also did the Esperanto translation). Thank you all for helping to make this story more readable and more consistent for everyone.