//------------------------------//
// 3- An Untapped Base 
// Story: Friendship is Chaotic 
// by Flutters Is Shy 
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Chaotic.

One little word, and it rang all kinds of warning bells in Twilights head. Discords modus operandi, and it turned out that the humans had based a huge part of their way of life around it.

All right, so that knee-jerk reaction wasn't wholly warranted. As Tomt- Tom explained, humans went about a majority of their lives in a generally... normal method. It was only through what Tom described as a game that their mundane lives were filled with wonder. Again, the trigger word, Chaotic. Most humans apparently couldn't even use magic.

Not that he described the world of 'Perrim' or 'Chaotic' as magical. Somehow Discord had deluded them into believing that there was a perfectly barebones nonmagical explanation for everything they had seen in Chaotic.

Making the chaotic appear as nothing more than balanced harmony, stars above he was infuriating!

Tom was adamant in his belief that Discord was a new element, however. He had never been heard of on his world (Twilight had to stifle an unbecoming squee of glee, the sight of her excitably bouncing about her library might have been visibly entertaining but it was so darned embarrassing when she didn't catch herself in time) and instead had apparently just 'popped out of nowhere'. It was certainly possible, after all. She couldn't just outright dismiss the possibility. 

The far more likely scenario however was that wherever their world was in relation to Equestria, Discord had arrived there years, if not centuries ago. The disconnect with Equestria caused a time dilation effect, giving the twisted multibreed all the time to plot and plan in the world. This allowed him to set up the boar as he had seen fit, garnering this disjointed, disarrayed grouping of individuals that had no idea that they were dancing to his whims.

Twilight had researched the 'Prince of Chaos' (Other less reputable sources also marked him as 'Crown Clown of Chaos', which just seemed like an unneeded extension as far as Twilight was concerned.) to the greatest thing extent she could with the limited amount of text she could get her hooves on. To be honest there wasn't a lot of information in circulation, she had gotten most of what she had from the lips of the princesses.

Seems like most ponies didn't want to remember the oppressive days gone by where harmony was upset and pointless inanity reigned supreme.

Twilight didn't blame them.

Beyond that, Tom talked of how the 'game' they played allowed him and other humans that participated in it to temporarily take on the appearance and abilities. Regardless of how similar this sounded to the oft despised changelings, Tom assured her that the ability to mimic another creature was restricted to the game itself.

The fact that the 'game' itself was little more than a glorified gladiatorial style arena conflict chafed Twilight, but she couldn't really voice her protests once learning that damage never really persisted past the end of a 'match'. It was violence for violences' sake, but at least such violent tendencies were being expressed in such a way that wouldn't end in lasting or permanent bodily injury.

Twilight wasn't against sports persay, but the high contact sports that were touted and praised in her youth were nothing she was ever truly interested in. Interested in watching once she had achieved her first estrus cycle... But never participating in. Such things always struck her as slightly barbaric and backwards in the way they were carried out.

From what Tom described, taking on the role of whatever creature a player chose would give them a slight understanding of certain things that the original 'creature' knew of or had experienced. This explained how the human Peyton had known where Pinkie had hidden a cake within the library. It also came with a highly alarming note as Twilight reviewed that bit of information.

They could not only see the memories of those they turned into, but they could copy the muscle memory of their hosts.

Peyton had been 'scanning' ponies left and right. They didn't even realize, they had no idea! And it wasn't like Twilight could make a big deal about this like she wanted to, she knew pony mentality. The instant they saw her freaking out about this they would all swarm, screaming and stampeding in their panic. They already panicked over the silliest things, there was no reason to incite them over something they wouldn't truly understand.

That being said, she couldn't really accuse Tom or Peyton of doing something underhanded. They viewed their actions as just that of a foal collecting hoofball cards. It was a game to them, they saw nothing wrong with it.

Twilight sighed over this new influx of information, filing the relevant topics away for later conversation.