//------------------------------// // Ch. 5 Perfect Pitch... for MAGIC! // Story: A Strange Trip // by TheWhiteFreak //------------------------------// Ch. 5 Perfect Pitch… for MAGIC! ** During the fight between Taros and Elitros Venomspitter, almost every pony in the small town of Ponyville had heard the battle, some came running, others went running but they all knew what was going on. Rarity was the closest to the conflict, still getting her outfit ready for the day when she heard the first roar; she dropped the outfit and raced out the door, then ran back in and grabbed a stylish scarf, put it on, then raced out the door again. Pinkie Pie the next to hear the sound of battle. She was happily singing her baking song in the kitchen when she started blowing raspberries. “PPTHHPTHPFFTHPPPT… PPPTTTHHPPTFFFHHH?” ‘Uh oh, numb tongue, Taros is fighting an icky sticky dragon. I should go help… with CUPCAKES!’ She pulled out a pan of cupcakes from nowhere and began hoping out the door humming her ‘Smile, Smile, Smile’ song, the pan balanced perfectly on her head as she bounced. Fluttershy was feeding some of her animal friends when the roar echoed across her home, sending her and her animals all running for cover. Hiding under her chicken coop she heard a second roar, much sharper than the first and full of malice. Even at such distance Fluttershy knew that the dragon that saved her life was in trouble and she had to help. She shakily dragged herself from under the coop, looked over to Angel Bunny who was hiding in his hovel. “Angel, take care of the other animals while I’m gone.” Angel was going to stop her but her pre-‘Stare’ look silenced any opposition as she raced off to Ponyville. Applejack was the last to hear, mostly because Sweet Apple Acres was so far away from town. She had already been up for a few hours, preparing the apple family cider for the market when the roar drew her attention. She dropped the barrel of cider she had on her back and rushed out the barn, shouting to Big Macintosh as she passed him. “That new dragon is in trouble! Big Mac, take care of things!” Big Mac didn’t say anything when he saw the determination in his sister’s eyes; he only nodded and hurried to the barn she had come from. ** Spike, the CMC and Rainbow Dash were slowly carrying Twilight back into the library, Rainbow doing so with a little more care than the others, I couldn’t follow them since not even my head would fit through the door. Rainbow made sure to leave the door open so that I could see what was going on, they gently put her down on the couch and Spike went and got a wet cloth and placed it on her forehead. I knew that there wasn’t anything I could do until she woke up. ‘What did she say? Magus Perceptum or something? I think it’s Latin, Magus means magic or mage or something, but what does Perceptum mean? Perceive? Perception? Magic perception? What the hell does that have to do with anything? I decided to stop thinking about what Twilight said, I would just ask her when she woke up and chose to think about what just happened with Elitros. ‘Now how did he turn into that dragon-pony thing? I thought that dragon magic was only in the fire-breathing? I thought back to when I saw him as a pony; I closed my eyes as I re-analyzed the memory in my head but I failed to notice the growing tugging sensation in the back of my mind. My concentration was broken when I heard a loud snap and my body started wriggling all on its own. I tried to open my eyes but they wouldn’t move as I heard a parade of snapping sounds and my body writhing like angry snakes in a sack. ‘What the fuck is happening now!? Eris! Are you turning me into something else now?’ I shouted out my thoughts in my head like I was expecting her to hear them. The cracking and snapping soon slowed down as did the writhing of my body, I was able to open my eyes again and the first thing I noticed was that there was a huge crowd of ponies around me, the second was that they were only a little shorter than me. ‘Holy Shit! Did I just shrink or something!?’ I quickly turned my head to look at my body to see what happened to me, to my amazement I now had the body of a pony, similar to when I first saw Elitros but much different in the same way. My scales were still black; my wings as well were still folded up against my sides, hanging out past my hind legs (flanks now I guess), my tail also had the same shape to my dragon form but the bladed tip was gone, in its place was just a simple rounded tip of scales. I opened my mouth and poked my teeth with a hoof and felt that they were still just as sharp as in my dragon form but thankfully much shorter. I brought up one of my hooves and felt around my head and neck, all I felt was hair, I pulled some of into view and saw that it was jet-black, much like my scales, and had grey tips on it. My spines were gone so I continued to inspect the rest of my head, when I reached my forehead I felt a horn. ‘Wait…Is it a unicorn horn?’ I cautiously poked the horn and could feel the cylindrical spiral that ran up the horn, I poked the tip fully expecting it to be as sharp as my spines were but it was fairly dull, nothing like the spear-like spines of my dragon form. ‘So I guess I’m a dragon-alicorn. U mad bro?’ “Taros? Is that you?” I looked through the crowd of ponies, which was much harder since I didn’t tower over them, to see the rest of the Mane 6 staring at me, eyes wide with shock. “Yea it’s me. Pretty cool huh? I didn’t even know I could do this.” My voice was still the same as I smiled at my friends. “Yes, it is indeed very impressive but how did you do it? What was that sound of battle we heard earlier? Was there another dragon here?” Rarity fired off her questions similar to how Twilight did. “Yea there was, come on lets go inside the library, I’ll explain inside.” I waved a hoof as I walked up the stairs to the library. When we entered the library, I was greeted by the further shocked faces of Spike, Rainbow, the CMC and the recently awaken Twilight, who looked like she was about to pass out again. I then retold the story of meeting the green dragon Elitros Venomspitter and everything he told me, the fight and what happened after Twilight was taken into the library. Twilight was able to stay conscious by distracting herself with writing down everything that Elitros had said, no doubt to add to a book about dragon culture. “So Twilight, before you passed out you said ‘Magus Perceptum’ or something, what does that mean?” I asked as she lifted her head from the paper, it also earned a gasp from Rarity. “Spike, get me ‘Ancient Magic of the Ancient World'.” Spike gave her a quick salute and scrambled up a bookshelf and pulled a book and quickly passed it to Twilight. “Well according to the text in this book, there was an ability in the ancient world called ‘Magus Perceptum’ which roughly translates to ‘Magic Understanding’. It was said that those who had this ability could see almost any magic once and instantly learn how to perform it, regardless if they were a unicorn, dragon, earth pony or anything else. Although there hasn’t been a single proven example of it, the legend still exists today, though it is usually unicorns that follow it, hoping that they will be the one to have the ancient ability.” “And you think that I have this ability?” I asked her. “I do, think about it, transformation magic is one of the hardest schools to learn, some unicorns spend their entire lives studying it and end up only able to change from a unicorn into something of equal size, and it takes a great deal of focus to maintain, yet you were able to change from your dragon form into that of an average sized pony, on accident no less!” She was barely containing her excitement. “Couldn’t it just be that dragons are really good at transformation magic?” “Hmm… you could be right, maybe we should test it.” She then brought out a different piece of paper and began to write a list of some kind, mostly likely a gambit of magical tests she wanted me to perform. ‘Great I just set off Twilight’s ‘Let’s learn everything about this’ mode.’ “Oh I know a great thing to test first!” Rainbow quickly blurted out. “Oh, really Rainbow? What did you have in mind?” Twilight looked questioningly. “Let’s see if he can understand how to fly as a pony…dragon…thing.” “That’s a perfect thing to test, since he is a dragon and already understand the basics of flight, it will just be a matter of understanding how magic flows around a pegasus.” Twilight quickly scribbled on her paper. “Fluttershy? If you wouldn’t mind?” She looked over to Fluttershy. “Umm…ok…I guess I can…if it will help.” She spoke quietly as she flapped her wings and floated into the air gently. I focused on her, expecting to instantly understand how she can fly with such small wings beating so slowly. As I watched her, I began to see what looked like air currents whipping and curling around her body, they seemed to hang around underneath her wings, spinning gently but still pushing up when she brought them down. It then hit me that it wasn’t the air that I was seeing but the magic current that she was subconsciously warping around to suit her needs. ‘Huh… so that’s how they are able to fly with such tiny wings.’ “Ok, do you think you can mimic what Fluttershy did Taros?” Twilight asked. “Couldn’t hurt to try.” I shrugged as I stepped forward and unfurled my wings; Fluttershy took this opportunity to land next to the others. ‘Ok, now think of how the air moved around Fluttershy…good, now use you magic to warp the air to mimic that.” I felt the small tug in the back of my mind, which I assumed was me pulling some of my magic, as I felt the air begin to bend around my body. ‘Good, now give your wings a flap to get off the ground.’ I gave my wings a flap, following the instructions of my mental coach; I became aware that I flapped way too hard as I crashed into the ceiling. Everyone gasped as I crashed and began to fall. ‘Ow, too hard, hold you wings out to slow your descent!’ I snapped my wings out, much like I did the first time I attempted flying and met with disastrous results, this time, thankfully, that didn’t happen. I was a few feet (or is it hooves?) off the ground when I suddenly stopped in midair and was floating in the air without even needing to flap my wings, I looked to my wings and could see the magic current under my wings condensed into almost a solid ball of energy, nothing like the ghostly spinning strands that Fluttershy had, holding my wings up. “Ha-ha, check it out, I’m hovering!” I exclaimed as I gently hovered around the room before bringing myself down gently onto the ground. “Excellent job Taros!” Twilight and the others cheered. “See! I told ya it would be a good idea!” Rainbow bragged. “Yes Rainbow, it was a very good test. Next we are going to see if you can do simple unicorn magic, telekinesis to be precise.” Twilight read off the next check on her list. “Ok. What do you want me to lift?” “These.” She levitated half a dozen books onto the table in front of us, making sure that I saw them surrounded by her magic. Once again I stared at the floating books and could see how gravity seemed to reverse itself when engulfed in the magic and how when she floated them in a particular direction the gravity on that side changed from absolute buoyancy to a pull in that direction. After gaining a decent grasp on how to magically lift things, I stepped up to the books on the table and began my mental coaching again. ‘Reach out with you mind and locate the books.’ I did just that, locating each book, feeling the texture of the spine, the weight they each had and even the condition of the books. ‘Now encase them in your magic and lift them into the air.’ All six books were soon encased in a soft black glow and began to slowly rise into the air; a couple of them dipped as I lost focus on them but came back up when I focused again. It was hard at first, I had to focus intently on each book making sure I kept a detailed mental picture of each book, but as I lifted and floated the books around the room, I was able to work with a more and more vague picture of the books until all I needed to hold on to was that I was carrying books. “Full marks again Taros!” Twilight made a quick note in her book. “Man, that’s hard to do, I can only think of how hard it was to hold my mouth shut when we first met.” “Don’t worry about it; you will eventually gain the finesse to do the same thing if you keep practicing. For the next test you will be performing medium level magic, repairing inanimate objects, Pinkie?” Pinkie suddenly appeared out of nowhere with a vase in her hoof and smashed it into the table, sending dozens of pieces sliding across it. “Thank you Pinkie.” Twilight said as her horn light up and enveloped each and every piece of the vase and brought them all together. ‘Ok so I have to use a combination of telekinesis and the repair spell’ I focused on one of the individual cracks as the pieces came together, watching, absorbing every detail of the spell. The spell worked by re-connecting the molecular bonds of the material without actually altering their shape or stretching them, weaving them back together like you would when splicing two pieces of rope. After a minute of analyzing the spell, she was finished; the vase was completely repaired like it was never broken to begin with. “Ok now it’s your turn, don’t worry though; I will break it in two so it will be easier for you.” Twilight’s magic engulfed the vase again and it split cleanly in half. ‘Let’s do this’ I cheered to myself as I lifted the two pieces and brought them together and mimicked Twilight’s spell. The crack in the vase began to slowly stich itself together, sealing itself back into one piece. Once I ended the spell, I looked at my handiwork, the vase was indeed in one piece but the crack was still very visible as well as the fact that I didn’t have the two pieces lined up evenly when I started so the lip of the vase and the designs were uneven. “Well this looks like shit.” I deadpanned as I looked over the vase. “Hey, don’t say that. It was very good for a first attempt. I didn’t expect you to get it the first time which is why I only broke it into two pieces.” Twilight’s words were a little comforting. “Thanks Twilight, so what is the next test?” “The last test will be advanced spells, teleporting across the room, something that only very gifted unicorns can do.” She said as she walked over to the stairs that lead to the second floor and turned to face us. Her horn lit up once again and began to channel her magic into the spell, thankfully doing it much slower so I could examine it. I saw her magic surround her in a sphere of light, once she was completely obscured by the sphere it collapsed in on itself, becoming a singularity of energy that disappeared within itself, then suddenly reappeared a few hooves in front of me and exploded out in a flash of light, revealing Twilight completely unharmed. “There, now you try.” She said with confidence. I let out a slow breath, trying to calm myself for this advanced spell I was about to attempt. ‘Come on, you got this. All you are doing is creating a wormhole, traveling through it, and then closing it behind you. Piece of cake.’ I wanted to punch my mental coach in the face for making so light of the fact that I was about to break the fabric of reality by choice. I closed my eyes and focused on the spell, first creating the sphere of energy around me, then focusing on where I wanted to go. ‘The stairs of Twilights house’ I then unleashed the spell. I felt my body being pulled and tugged as I traveled through the void of in between reality, it was a sickening feeling, and it felt like everything and nothing and being drawn in every direction at the same time. When I felt the comfort of regular space as the spell finished, I released the breath that I was holding and opened my eyes slowly. I saw that I was indeed in front of Twilight’s stairs but I was upside down and smoking a little bit and in a considerable amount of pain which thankfully faded quickly. “Wow… That was a… unique experience.” I groaned out as I struggled to right myself. “Well that proves it! You have ‘Magus Perceptum’ but it seems that you cannot copy a spell perfectly, so maybe you just understand how it works. This is so exciting! I have in my house one of, if not the only true case, of powerful ancient magic!” she was almost hysterical with laughter. I couldn’t help but join in her laughter. “Hee-hee, watch out Equestria, here comes a dragon with the Sharingan.” I giggled to myself. “Katon, goukakyu-no-jutsu!” Pinkie yelled out with a hoof under her bottom lip while blowing out a breath. I stopped laughing and stared at her. “What?” Author’s Note: Thanks to everyone who are enjoying my story, I had no idea it would be so well received, I did it mostly because I had the idea rattling around in my head but now it seems to have grown into a life of its own so I suppose I’ll have to keep going. I hope you all enjoyed the chapter; it took me a little while to think up the most scientific way to explain how the magic worked and the idea for Magus Perceptum for Taros as well as making sure it isn’t too powerful. If it wasn’t obvious where I got the idea from before the end of the chapter, the last four lines should have been a dead giveaway.