A lone figure stood in the midst of the Everfree forest, its eyes closed. A hum and a soft glow of magic encompassed it as it focused on a scrying spell. Eyes like glowing embers darted around in the shadows, eyeing the enticing morsel, but the many wards the figure had placed on the ground made them hesitant to approach, especially after one of them got zapped.
The location of the Alicorn Amulet was still eluding the creature, despite weeks of searching. All the power it could ever desire somewhere in this tartarus damned forest, and it could not find it. At first it had roamed around the forest, thinking that it could find it easily by searching for sources of concentrated magic. Even if the amulet was protected by spells to prevent others from sensing it, it was confident that its magic could overcome whatever meager tricks that zebra had. But the Everfree’s ever erratic ambient magics and numerous powerful creatures had made it unexpectedly hard to find the amulet amongst them. After accidentally walking in to a dragon’s den several days ago and getting its bits and bobs singed, the creature decided on a far less haphazard (and dangerous, although admitting that would be a sign of weakness) approach.
A sigh escaped the figure’s lips as it let the spell die off. Nothing again, it thought to itself, stretching its limbs. The spell it was using now was the most powerful divination magic it knew, rivaling even magic known by the princess. It would be able to, through repeated use, filter out unwanted signals it was getting and find the amulet. The downside was, that since the creature did not have alicorn levels of magic (yet), casting the spell was a long and arduous process, and the scope would be rather narrow. Still, it would eventually find it, it would just have to be patient.
“Maybe I could just force the information out of the zebra…” the creature idly said, toying with the idea of blasting the doors off that bothersome witch doctor’s home and demanding the location of the amulet. It quickly dismissed the thought, for it had an equal chance of succeeding or of undoing all the work it had done. No, now was not the time for rash decisions that could ruin everything. Patience, patience…
A growl snapped the creature out of its thoughts. An entire pack of timberwolves was stalking towards it, finally overcoming their unwillingness to approach. Perhaps it had something to do with the recently arrived giant alpha standing behind them, which for some reason looked oddly charred.
The creature grinned and called forth its magic again, the numerous wards it had placed earlier coming to life with the approach of the timberwolves. It could certainly do with some exercise to vent some of its frustrations, and, calling forth a roaring fire, walking bundles of firewood would do just the trick.
“Concentrate, take it slow…”
Strawberry Dazzle slowly blinked herself awake, taking a moment to look at the unfamiliar oaken bedroom. Quickly remembering where she was, she laid her head back on to the pillow, enjoying the softness of a civilian bed. While she insistently attempted to snuggle back under the blankets and return to sleep for a few more minutes, years of military conditioning soon kicked in. Dazzle found herself fully awake and alert, softly grumbling to herself as Luna’s sweet slumber eluded her.
“You’re doing it!”
“Shh!”
Dazzle’s ears flicked at the voices emanating from the library’s main area, straining to hear what was going on, but most of what was said was too muffled for her to understand. Sighing, and reluctantly getting up from the comfy bed, the guardsmare stepped from under the cozy sheets and began stretching her limbs.
“Now bring it back...slooo-”
“Ah!”
“You were so close! Here, try again!”
Standing straight back up again, Dazzle inspected herself within a full body mirror that was on one of the walls. She ran a hoof through her short mane to get it (mostly) in order, flared her wings to make sure they were good to go, and gave a few brush strokes to her petite tail as well.
“Go forth, you sexy beast,” she said to herself with a cocky grin, giving a cursory glance at her neatly stacked barding and deciding not to put them on for the purpose of just hanging out. She could retrieve them once they left for her charge’s home. With that, she turned and left the room for the library’s main hall.
The library looked like a herd of foals had been playing there, with piles of books, scrolls, pillows, and odd devices strewn about. Most were covering the center table of the room, so much so that it could hardly be seen from under them. There were also two neat towers of books stacked some meters away.
Fluttershy and Twilight’s dragon assistant were sitting a little bit to the side, silently cheering on Scruffy, while he had Twilight on his lap, one hand held out while the other was grasping the unicorn’s horn, a soft purplish blue glow emanating from both of his hands. He had a look of hard concentration on his face as he gently moved his hand from side to side, and Dazzle noticed a quill levitating between the twin towers of tomes. She also quickly noticed a neat stack of broken quills next to his charge, some cleanly snapped in two, others in many more pieces.
“Just a little bit more…” Spike encouraged as the levitating quill made full circles around both of the towers and wobbled dangerously as it made its way back towards them.
“You can do it,” Fluttershy joined in, holding out her hooves as the quill came near. With a final tired grunt, Scruffy’s hands stopped glowing, and the quill dropped down to the waiting hooves below.
“Success!” Twilight shouted happily, clopping her hooves together. Scruffy, for his part, snorted loudly and leaned back, propping his elbows on the table to gaze at the ceiling. For a moment it looked like he was trying to act as if it was nothing, but Strawberry caught the tired smile on his face.
“Well, seems like you have been busy,” she grinned, trotting the short distance to the rest of them.
Spike greeted her with a wave. “They’ve been going at it pretty much since you went for your nap.”
“How are you feeling?” Fluttershy asked.
“Much better now, thank you. Doesn’t feel like there’s an angry bee buzzing inside my head anymore.”
“Mhm.”
“If you start feeling disoriented again, you are free to stay the night here,” Twilight offered over her shoulder as she was nose deep in scrolls and writing once again. Curiously, she had not left Scruffy’s lap. “Concussions are not something to be taken lightly, even minor ones.”
“Oh I’ve certainly had my fair share of bumps and scratches in the military, so I know. I should be fine now,” Dazzle said as she dismissed Twilight’s worries with a wave of a hoof.
“Right, of course you have. My apologies,” Twilight said with a chagrined smile.
“So… Seems like those experiments had some success,” Dazzle commented as Scruffy straightened himself again.
“Jes. Can imagine, I can floot things!” Scruffy laughed. He then picked up one of the broken quills from the floor. “Not eazy. Uh, sorry,” he said to Twilight.
“Don’t worry, I have plenty in stock and I can always get more.”
“So what did you figure out? Is Scruffy going to be the next alicorn princess to rule over them all?” Dazzle asked with a cheeky grin, causing the others to giggle at a harrumphing Scruffy.
“Not quite, but we did find plenty of interesting data!” Twilight squeed excitedly, but was cut off by a loud rumble. “W-which I would be more than happy to share after some dinner.”
A lone figure stood in the midst of the Everfree forest, a massive frown on its face. It was currently standing on the shore of a rather small but exceedingly fetid swamp, located somewhere close to the middle of the forest. It had been excited for the barest of moments when the spell had pinged something in this direction, but once it saw the swamp, all of its mirth fell away and scattered to the winds.
Not only had it no interest to go wade in swamp muck that would undoubtedly reach uncomfortable heights, but it was also pretty sure that the greenish black mound in the middle was a sleeping hydra. It moving up and down and the growly snoring emanating from its direction were a kind of a giveaway.
It looked at the dirty water, looked at the hydra, and let out a long sigh, before stealing its resolve.
“I’m going to get that amulet, and one stupid swamp or one stupid hydra isn’t going to stop me,” it spat and called forth its magic again.
“Thank you for offering to cook something for me as well, although I could have just gone to the guardpost…”
“Nonsense, it’s no trouble at all,” Twilight reassured as she and Spike busied themselves in the kitchen.
“Besides, it’s better when you have more friends,” Spike helpfully added.
Dazzle smiled at the two of them, and returned to the main room where Fluttershy was giving a massage to Scruffy, whose shoulders had started to ache from all the magic practice.
The figure gritted its teeth, having to focus hard on the shield spell as one of the hydra’s heads tried its damnedest to gets its jaws around the creature that had given it ouchies, only to be stopped by the glowing barrier. The other heads looked in confusion, not understanding how the tiny creature was able to fend them off. They growled and bellowed, spraying saliva all over the shield.
“Oh be quiet,” the creature muttered, finally managing to collect enough magic for another spell, and promptly bopped one of the hydra’s heads with a floating tree trunk.
“You go?”
“Yes, I have to go tend to my animal friends. Sorry I couldn’t stay longer,” Fluttershy said.
“No, it okay. Impordant to look after,” Scruffy replied understandingly. “Tell animals I say hi,” he offered. Fluttershy gave back a beaming smile.
“And don’t come back!”
The figure panted heavily, watching the hydra scamper into the forest with massive stomps and a great rustling of branches. A singed nose would have been a good sign for most beasts to back off, but having four at once was outright terrible, as the retreating wail clearly attested to. The figure took one last look before it fell down on to its rump, letting the build up magic disperse and slowly calming down.
Until a manticore jaunted in to the arena, confusedly looking around for what had made all the noises earlier. It locked eyes with the prone figure for a moment, both processing the situation, before the manticore, seeing what it thought to be an easy meal, leapt forwards with a battle cry.
“AND YOU CAN GO TO HELL TOO!” the figure screeched as it summoned another shield.
“So, Scruffy is able to cast magic…”
With their dinner done, the conversation had turned back to the magic tests that had happened while Strawberry slept. And the results were many and varied, so much so that she feared Equestria would soon face a shortage of scrolls and would be plunged to an economical nose dive with the amount of notes Twilight had taken.
The first order of business Twilight had set her eyes on was to figure out how Scruffy’s magic worked compared to pony magic using several tests and the numerous apparatuses she had. Fortunately for Dazzle, it only took a minute of helpless, deadpan staring from her to get the short and sweet version.
Scruffy’s (and hopefully, by extension, his kind’s) magic bared many similarities to pony magic, which in itself wasn’t unexpected. Many of Equestrians races that strongly utilized magic had plenty of similarities between them on how their magic worked, the differences usually being more in the details. Scruffy’s thaumic pool, for instance, Twilight described as less of a pool and more of a river, constantly churning through him. There also seemed to be differences on how his pool would replenish itself after being used, as Scruffy seemed to have some ability to absorb and convert ambient magic to restore his own in addition to what his own body generated, which Twilight described to be an uncommon trait.
What also garnered particular interest from the bookish unicorn was how rigid Scruffy’s thaum pathways were, to the point that he had felt moderate physical discomfort from using magic at the beginning. Such a condition on a pony would only occur in extreme cases of not being able to use magic for decades, such as long term comatose patients. Furthermore, while the pathways seemed to suffer the effects of atrophy, they were still functional. This lead to Twilight hypothesizing that there must have been instances where they had been used, accidentally or not, for they would have been in much worse condition or entirely non functional otherwise.
Satisfied with the knowledge that Scruffy’s body seemed to hold everything needed to make use of magic, the next step would be to figure out how, exactly.
“…and it’s based in emotions?”
“Yes! It’s just so… I mean… It’s incredible! It’s bonkers!” Twilight ranted excitedly.
“Uuh, and why is that, exactly?” Dazzle looked to Scruffy, who shrugged in amusement and pointed at Twilight.
“Because magic that is based on emotion is very powerful! And it doesn’t make any sense that his magic would be based on that and then he somehow is oblivious to its existence!”
It turned out to be rather hard to figure out how a creature’s magic works when the creature in question has no idea himself. Twilight had tried to take various readings and use highly specialized equipment to get Scruffy’s magic to react to her prodding, but none of it had provided any results. Next, they attempted to have Scruffy gather up some magic himself. As he seemed to have no natural concept about such a task, Twilight offered him several different techniques taught to unicorn children to get their magic energy to flow. None of them had worked either.
Going back to the drawing board, Twilight had Fluttershy try to teach him how pegasi were taught to harness their magic to shape clouds and winds, while she consulted some of her books for ideas. With Fluttershy’s methods not proving any more fruitful than the previous attempts, Scruffy remembered that when Twilight had measured his magic the first time he visited Ponyville, there had been an odd sensation he had not been able to describe. With her books not providing any alternatives, Twilight retrieved the thaumometer, hoofing the bracelet and the crystal to Scruffy, and activated it with her magic.
With the crystal constantly making Scruffy’s thaumic pool resonate, he was finally able to get a feeling of the magical energy inside him, although it was a rather fleeting one. The moment Twilight stopped channeling her magic into the crystal, it vanished, leaving Scruffy to grasp at nothing. Even repeating the process several times didn’t offer much help, as Scruffy seemed to be unable to gather or use his magic while he felt it.
Baffled by Scruffy’s inability to access his magic, it seemed like the group had hit a wall again, until Fluttershy offered another idea based on how pegasi were taught on cloud manipulation. Younger ponies who had trouble with this particular aspect of their magic, especially when it came to thunder clouds, would often be taught in a way where two pegasi would work on the cloud together. The more experienced pegasus would use their magic to keep the cloud stable, so that the inexperienced one could get a good hold on the flow of magic required with clouds. And since Scruffy seemed to have trouble gathering his own magic, perhaps Twilight could assist him with that.
Twilight concluded that she should be able to coax Scruffy’s magic to gather by filtering some of her magic in to his thaumic pool and “tugging” at it. This type of magic sharing was very rarely practiced, and as such had not crossed her mind, because having somepony else’s raw magic inside you could feel terribly invasive if not done properly. However, in a few unicornian cultures it was a sign of kinship and could also be used to produce more powerful spells if the participants were closely synced with each other. A prime example of this was the shield spell her brother cast during the changeling invasion of Canterlot.
However, in Scruffy’s case, Twilight would not be trying to perform spells together with him, merely helping him along and making the process much easier. This worked flawlessly, as during the very first test Scruffy managed to levitate an unexpectedly large object for a first timer. Unfortunately, that object was Twilight, and she was not very thrilled to be floating five meters off the floor and doing several backflips before the magic finally ran out.
“Magic fueled by emotion can be several orders of magnitude greater than normal. It is what allowed my brother, Shining Armor, and Cadence to drive off the changelings. Not only did they join horns, but the love Cadence shared with Shining boosted his shield spell to such a level that even in his tired state it was powerful enough to outright fling all of the changelings out of Canterlot,” Twilight explained.
“But, thought you say pony magik not, uh, like that,” Scruffy asked.
“Normally, no. Regular magic that all the tribes use is not based on their emotional level. Only in specific situations does it happen that a pony manages to tap in to the emotional spectrum to increase the strength of their magic. How and why this happens still baffles arcanists to this day.”
“How do you know that his magic is based on emotion, then?” Dazzle asked for clarification.
“It was actually Spike’s observation that sparked the idea,” Twilight pointed out, which made the small dragon puff up with pride. “He noticed how weird it was that Scruffy managed to lift me the first time, but the more I emphasized to him to clear his mind and focus only on the spell, the harder it became for him to move the quills at all.”
“Yeah. And when he started to get frustrated, they snapped,” Spike added, which made Scruffy blush.
“At first I thought it had something to do my proximity to him, but there was only a slight increase in efficiency when I got as close to him as I could, but it was in fact his excitement that fueled the first spell. Once this became the hypothesis, we um, ‘tested’ it out.” It was Twilight’s turn to blush as she scraped the floor with her hoof.
“What she means is that she scared the living tartarus out of him with a loud sneeze,” Spike helpfully supplied with a grin.
“I didn’t mean to do that!” Twilight denied and blushed furiously. “But, uh, it did help prove the point.” Twilight levitated a book in front of Dazzle, and she quickly noticed the small hole in the front. It went through the hard cover and several pages deep. “The quill he was levitating made that,” Twilight explained, slightly miffed.
“Sorry,” Scruffy mumbled.
“Wow,” Dazzle whistled. “I guess I better be on my best behavior around my charge then. Definitely no sudden sneezes.” Twilight did her best to ignore the friendly jab and Spike’s giggling.
“Well, that’s just the thing. Even after all these tests, Scruffy still can’t seem to gather up any magic on his own,” Twilight noted. Scruffy shrugged and shook his head.
“It weird. I feel ma-agic very good vhen Twilight help, but now...not feel thing.”
“I really can’t make heads or tails of it. Are we missing something? How has Scruffy, and I must assume the rest of his species, ended up in a situation where they aren’t aware of their magic potential? It just doesn’t make sense.” Scruffy stroked his beard.
“Longt ago, magic bad thing. Not know if do magik then, thinck not, but when think somepony did, seen as very bat...bad.”
“That’s a bit odd. Why did something like that happen?” Twilight asked.
“It...not thing I have word for tell,” Scruffy shrugged uncomfortably. “It not very good to happen. But, maype it make magic hard?”
“Hmm, I suppose anything is possible, but without any details, there’s no way for me offer any definitive answers. There could be any number of things to cause this condition, or maybe we just don’t know something about how your magic operates yet,” Twilight explained and shook her head.
“Mmh,” Scruffy nodded.
“Don’t worry, I’m sure you two ‘ll figure it out. Soon you’re gonna be flinging spells left, right, and center,” Dazzle smiled while rapidly bucking the air with her hind legs.
“I not know. Maebi not learn more magik,” Scruffy said.
“What?! Why?” Twilight questioned with great surprise. Scruffy laughed and gave a gentle pat to Twilight’s head.
“I thank you for let me know I have magic, but I not want, uh, ‘flinking spell left, right, center’,” Scruffy explained with hearty laugh. “It very tairing and hard. Not have, hm, big ache long time.” Scruffy rotated his stiff shoulders. “And njot use it. Need you to help, so not juse when not here.”
“Oh…” Twilight’s ears drooped in disappointment.
“Not mean kan not help you learn,” Scruffy smiled. “But maeybe take easy?”
Knock Knock Knock
The four turned towards the door.
“Who could that be?” Spike wondered.
“Maybe it’s Rarity with Scruffy’s new pants. She did seem to be full of inspiration, so maybe she managed to finish them early,” Twilight shrugged, and quickly trotted to the front door. Behind the door, however, wasn’t Rarity, but rather Ditzy Doo, who was precariously balancing on her hind legs as she fumbled with her large postmare’s satchel.
“Heyja Twilight,” she greeted, finally yanking the stubborn snap holding the bag’s flap down open with a mighty pull and promptly fell on her back, scattering all the letters on top of her and burying her head under them completely.
“Uh, hi,” Twilight greeted with a mix of bemusement and humor at the grumbling pile of letters.
“Got a letter for you here somewhere,” the pile replied back as two hooves started to blindly paw at the pile.
“Let me help you with that.” With a sharp burst of magic, Twilight gathered all the letters into straight rows that floated in the air, allowing the postmare to get back on to her hooves.
“Thanks,” she smiled, and quickly set to looking through the letters. “Here you go,” she said after a while, snatching one of the floating envelopes with her mouth, and offering it to the lavender mare. Twilight took the letter, and neatly deposited the rest back into the mailmare’s sack. After saying their goodbyes, Ditzy Doo left to deliver the rest of her mail, and Twilight returned inside.
“Who was it?” Spike asked.
“Ditzy Doo on her daily rounds. We got a letter,” Twilight replied happily, already guessing who had sent it.
“A letter?” Spike asked with a sense of peculiarity from Twilight receiving a normal letter. “Who’s it from?” Twilight waited until she reached the table and sat down again to check.
“It’s from Trixie,” she replied, which had the effect of Spike and Scruffy both perking up.
“Trixee?” Scruffy asked, a smile reaching his face. “First letter since go?”
“Yes,” Twilight nodded, using her magic to neatly open the envelope. It contained a short letter and two sheets of enchanted paper. Even Dazzle eyed the contents with some curiosity.
“Can look?” Scruffy asked.
“Of course!” Twilight happily replied, and spread the letter so that all of them could see.
Greetings and sa
The great and powe
Trixie
Hi
This
Trixie does not know what to write here. Trixie supposes she should just write normal things. How are things in Ponyville? Trixie hopes no Ur Trixie hopes it has been calm. Ponyville seems to often be the center of Luna knows what, so Trixie would be sad to find out the town has been flattened the next time she is there.
It
Trixie is currently in Vanhoover, preparing for the most grand display of majestic magics the city has ever seen! Well, not counting the last time Trixie was here.
The group each lifted an eyebrow at the next large paragraph of text, which had for some reason been entirely blotted out, before moving on to the next legible one.
Trixie has practiced the Dragon Fire Correspondence spell every night. It’s difficu mildly cha No, it is very hard. This is one of the hardest spells Trixie has ever tried to learn. She has had to read through the spell so many times, Trixie can probably recite it from memory! But the great and powerful Trixie is not about to give up! She’ll train long and hard, and she’ll make sure it is worked out to the tiniest detail before she makes her triumphant return!
Trixie has enclosed two enchanted scrolls with the letter. Trixie is pretty sure that the first one would was okay but...just to be sure.
Your friend acquaintance I hate letters
The Great and Powerful Trixie Lulamoon
“Wow,” Dazzle laughed. “That was certainly something.”
“Yeah,” Spike agreed. “Trixie certainly has a bit of personality,” Spike continued, to which Scruffy let out a loud snort and a laugh. “She’s a bit like Twilight actually, with all the craziness, and the ‘talks-a-lot’ syndrome, and apparently with how they write their letters full of crossed out sections,” Spike giggled and turned to look at his sister. He was surprised to find, however, that the mare in question seemingly had not heard him at all. Her eyes were fixed on the letter, slowly scanning it from side to side, and a certain expression on her face that very much brought to Spike’s mind Celestia, and how she looked when reading a letter from Twilight.
“Hmm? Did you say something, Spike?” Twilight finally asked, realizing that the others had said something and it probably had something to do with her.
“Uh, nothing, nevermind,” Spike said, and offered his own smile back to the happy lavender mare.
After a few more moments of friendly talk and Dazzle inquiring who this Trixie pony was, it was time for Scruffy and his escort to head back. Twilight, having often helped her brother out, assisted Dazzle with putting her barding back on, while Scruffy looked on and wondered how difficult it must be to put on the armor without hands.
Once they were done, Twilight decided to accompany them to the edge of the Everfree, while Spike stayed at the library. Twilight was undoubtedly going to dive nose first in to all the research material their experiments had produced, so some fresh air before that would be good. But before they could leave, there was a pair of new pants in the making for Scruffy to pick up, and as such the three of them headed to Rarity’s boutique first. When they arrived, Sweetie Belle let them in. Rarity was still hard at work, and thus, they had to wait.
In truth, she had finished the new trousers for Scruffy over an hour ago with nary as an out of place hair in her mane. However, in her usual generous fashion, she had decided that due to the tribulations Scruffy had to go through today thanks to that uncouth timberwolf, she would make something else for him as well. Namely, a much more elegant version of the smaller pants that Scruffy was currently wearing.
“Darling, I simply cannot fathom your dress habits sometimes. Why you would insist on wearing those...dull, and insipid clothes that you seem to have an endless supply of is beyond my reasoning, especially when I know that you have such fine clothes in your closet as well. A dashing gentlecolt needs not only to act chivalrously, but to look the part as well,” Rarity chattered as she added the finishing touches to her latest design. “Especially your current pair of pants. They are...gray,” Rarity shuddered.
“Uhhuh,” Scruffy murmured, utterly unconvinced that there was anything wrong with his choice of undergarment.
“But not to worry, for Rarity shall save you from this drab destiny,” she proclaimed dramatically as she lifted the newly sown small pants for all to see. Pants that were the color of deep magenta, seemed to be very form fitting, and were definitely not boxers.
“...” Scruffy looked at the finely produced garment with resignation, and covered his face with one hand, while the other two mares seemed to be very impressed with Rarity’s newest creation. With some trepidation, Scruffy accepted the...eye catching pants, vowing to stuff them somewhere far back in his drawers, never to be seen again. He did accept the other, less flamboyant trousers graciously and put them on. Unsurprisingly, they were a perfect fit for him. There was only some disappointment amongst the mares that he had not tried the other garment on first.
Scruffy having offered his thanks, the group left for the Everfree Forest. When they passed closeby to the Sugarcube Corner, as if having sensed their approach, Pinkie hopped her way out of the cafê and made a quick circle around the group, giving Scruffy and Dazzle a hug and a goodbye. She then bounced her way back inside, and it was only at that moment Dazzle noticed the strawberry glazed donut that had somehow found it’s way in to her mouth.
“Scruffy?” Twilight spoke up when they neared the point they would split up, Twilight returning to the library and Scruffy and Dazzle returning to the former’s home. When they had started to get close, both of the ponies had noticed the wary and outright hesitant looks the tall creature was giving the woods.
“...” Scruffy lowered his head, absentmindedly rubbing his hands together.
“You don’t have to be worried,” Dazzle reassured with a smile and a gentle bump. “I’m here specifically to make sure you don’t have to worry.”
“...Mmh,” he mumbled, resting one of his hands on Dazzles head.
Twilight wanted to offer that they could stay in the library for tonight if they wanted, but she had a feeling it might be inconsiderate towards Scruffy. Stallions had their pride, after all. Without saying anything else, they waved each other goodbye, and Scruffy and Dazzle continued on their way.
A long figure shambled it’s way forward in the Everfree forest, a very special kind of frown on its face. The kind that can banish even an ursa major would it be so unlucky as to gaze upon it, for it very clearly indicated just how pissed off the creature was. And tired. So very tired.
In reality, while the scowl on its face could make dragons cry, it did not have much fight in it at this point. The day was long over, the pale moon making its way high across the sky, and its search had been long and ultimately fruitless. It was a small comfort at this point that even though it did not find the amulet, the scrying spell would be more accurate the next time. Right now, all the creature wanted was a warm bath, a good meal and a soft bed. Of which the ground was not, the creature having tripped over a root that was sticking out. The creature briefly pondered if it was worth spending the energy to set the tree on fire.
It did not bother getting up right away, the ground being comfortable enough to rest its aching bones for a moment. It had been so tired in its wandering, that it had not even realized that it had wandered right to the edge of the forest already. The forest on the opposite side of the portal. Its exhausted eyes scanned the area just in case there was anything nearby, although it knew there would not be. Except for a single house some ways away, with merry lights in the windows.
Did I accidentally wander this far off? I must be more tired than I thought.
The creature lifted itself up, dusting most of the dirt off itself. While it would be better if he would not spot the figure outside like this, it would not be too big of a mistake. Still, it would be prudent of it to make sure such mistakes did not happen again.
“Focus. Be patient. You are making too many mistakes, and that is not acceptable,” it mumbled to itself, shaking its head to try and get the cobwebs out.
It looked at the house again and the warm light pouring out of it. Its stomach grumbled pitifully, for it was sure there would be food in the house. Tired and hungry, the creature weighed its options. Maybe it was time to visit him again.