July 17th, 1000 Domina Solaria
Twilight Sparkle gazes across her domain. Her demesne. Her dominion. All of her subjects are lined up in exactly their proper place. It had only taken most of the morning, slightly more time than she budgeted, but that was why she always included silly things like mealtimes in her schedule. She can always eat while she works!
Now, the real fun begins.
"Spike!" Twilight Sparkle calmly states, though she cannot yet bear to tear her gaze away from the shelves and shelves of books, all neatly sorted. "Take a note."
"Ready and waiting!" comes the eager reply, the soft scratch of a quill on the parchment as Spike records the time and date. What a great assistant!
"Okay! Preliminary sorting has been completed on the entire library at..." Twilight Sparkle glances outside, squinting a little as she inspects the sun, "Approximately ten thirty on the seventeenth of July."
"Twilight, I already recorded those things at the top," Spike says with a roll of his eyes, spinning the parchment around just in case Twilight Sparkle doubted him, not that she would.
Twilight Sparkle ducks down slightly, her euphoric smile turning down slightly. "Oh! Right. Sorry. Scratch that, then. Okay, approximately ten thirty."
"Twilight!" Spike says, a bit more cross, "Time and date? You act like this is the first time I've done this."
"Fine. Have it your way." Twilight Sparkle clears her throat, "Every book has been sorted by title, and we are now ready to implement the first iteration of the Starkle System!"
Spike raises an eyebrow as he finishes recording, "Now, when you say sorted by title, you mean sorted by author, and then title, right?"
Twilight Sparkle pauses for a moment before collapsing, sobbing into her hooves.
"Hey, maybe it's not that bad," Spike says, holding the quill to his chin. "You were going to reorganize all these books anyway, right? So, it's like you did half the work already! You just got them in a slightly different order than you planned!"
Neither the groan nor the accompanying cushion miss Spike.
"Bad time?" Doug asks as he walks into the library, shutting the door behind him as Spike rubs his head.
"My work is ruined! I spent all morning organizing the library to the wrong specifications! My entire schedule for today is going to be thrown completely out of order!" Twilight Sparkle's horn flares, all of the library books dumped into a large pile in the center of the room. "And after that my schedule for the week! And month! And-"
"Well, that's certainly... not good." Doug coughs into his hand as he looks around the room, "So... I know you probably have it written down somewhere, but last week you said something about helping me out with some of my fears with magic."
"I believe you also promised me to discuss how and why you have no magic. Been a while forthcoming for that, you know," Twilight says as she laments the wasted time spent sorting the books. Well, not so much wasted, as poorly utilized. "And starting a book club."
Doug scratches the back of his head as he forces a smile, "Yeah, sorry about that. After Big Mac got injured, and with all the work on the farm, and then that whole Tantabus debacle, we've been pretty busy. Finally finished with all that. Pinkie Pie is hosting something at Sugarcube corner in a little bit." He leans back, a bit of a pause as Twilight merely looks around the library, eventually continuing, "So, if you had anything in mind that you wanted to talk about, we can go with that. Or just a general discussion, that's fine too; I don't know that I've ever just talked magic theory with Rarity."
"Really?" says Twilight Sparkle, raising an eyebrow. "Then what do you talk about after the sex?"
Doug shrugs as he smiles, sitting down on the floor. "Oh, this and that, I guess. How her store went that day. What Sweetie Belle got into or up to that day. What's going on at the farm or work, but Rarity barely listens to that, really just for me if I want to vent about what kind of letters I got. I think the only real magic theory we've ever discussed was with regards to these essence gemstones."
"Yeah, those are really good!" Spike says, rubbing his stomach. "I wonder if they'll help my scales grow nice and strong?"
"We can hope," Doug says with a smile, patting the dragon on the back.
"Yup!" Twilight says in a cheery tone, nuzzling Spike. Her demeanor changes completely as she levitates over a chalkboard and six different colors of chalk, practically lighting up with glee as she enters lecture mode. Spike groans as if he has heard this particular presentation many a time in the past, though he doesn't seem too put out by having to listen to it again.
"So, imbuing objects, also known as enchanting, is generally part of the Loyalty school of magic. There are six schools in total, corresponding with with six Elements of Harmony." Each chalk color begins writing, making six underlined headers and then jotting down other examples as Twilight Sparkles goes along. "Each school, or branch, of magic also includes it antonym, or opposite. For example, the Honesty branch of magic - which includes communication spells like dragon fire or scrying spells - also includes Deceit magic, such as invisibility."
"Do I need to take notes?" Doug jokingly says, though he is eagerly paying attention.
"Only if you want to pass the test at the end!" Twilight Sparkle retorts with a smile, though it quickly returns to her stern lecture. "Seriously, though, there will be a test at the end." She moves to the pile of books, levitating two out and passing them to Doug. She smiles, "No pressure! These can be the first books for our book club!"
Doug looks at the titles, Basic Thaumatics and Intermediary Thaumatics. A peek inside the first book reveals several pictures of unicorns casting different spells and charts about what different kind of spells, their difficulties, and ways to enhance them. "Am I going to understand any of this?" he asks as he takes the pencil and parchment Spike offers him, beginning to copy down the six categories.
Twilight Sparkle nods enthusiastically, "You were able to learn about weather implementation, correct? It's the same principle, though your understanding may never pass the theoretical stage you should be fine!"
"Alright, then. Please continue." Doug smiles as he finishes writing, eagerly anticipating the next topic.
Twilight Sparkle returns to the chalkboard, motioning simultaneously to the six schools she originally wrote. "So, there are six schools of magic. Honesty, Generosity, Loyalty, Kindness, Laughter, and Friendship. Each is sometimes known by another name, which I may use interchangeably. For instance, Laughter is also known by Optimism. Friendship is Magic. Their opposite branches are similarly named - Deceit, Greed, Betrayal, Malevolence, Despair, and Apathy - though a few of them go by a less... disparaging name. For instance, who wants to be known as a specialist in Betrayal magic? And yet the magic of changing things counter to their nature is extremely important to Disregarders."
The scratch of pencil on parchment continues as Doug asks, "Six schools, their opposites. So, what kinds of things does a Disregarder do?"
"Please hold all questions on other topics to the end, or we're going to be here forever," Twilight Sparkle says with a smile. "This is a huge subject, and I'm merely scratching the surface! Some ponies spend years to learn just a little bit about all the various subjects. Others take a specific school and delve as deeply as they can. Listing out every possibility with magic is a foal's errand, because each branch is as unique as the pony practicing it."
"Which school did you study?" Doug asks with a sly wink.
Twilight rolls her eyes at the question on a potentially gigantic topic. At least it has something to do with what she just said. "My cutie mark refers to Thaumaturgy in general. As such, I can cast nearly any spell, often just after observing it once and not in a 'teaching' variation. My studies have thus taken me into every discipline; I know hundreds of minor spells, many of which are cantrips and transpositions of each other. After all, the caster's intent is nearly as important as knowing the spell itself, and the combination of the two lend themselves to many variations and allow the crafting of new spells."
"Your intent matters?" Doug asks incredulously. "How is that supposed to work?"
"Um," Twilight Sparkle pauses for a few seconds, taken aback at the question. "Besides that it just does? Nopony knows why the rules of Thaumatics are the way they are. Let's say I want to summon a bolt of magic to 'attack' something. I might choose a spell that creates a physical or magical energy projectile. The spell then launches that projectile at the spot or target of my choosing, though 'homing' variations are extremely costly thaum-wise. Oftentimes one is better making ten versions that might hit than one version that will."
"Really?" Doug asks, his excitement plain as he rapidly adds notes to the paper quickly running out of room. And, somewhat to his embarrassment, plain to see; he shifts a leg, covering himself. "Why is that?"
"You're doing it again!" Twilight playfully levitates one of the books, lightly thunking Doug on the back of the head with it. Twilight glances down, Doug's shift not having gone unnoticed, and awkwardly clears her throat.
Doug rubs the spot as he smiles, an exaggerated sigh at not pursuing yet another tangent. "You brought it up," he weakly says in his defense.
Spike rolls his eyes as he walks to the door. "I'm going to grab a few of those items you wanted, Twilight. I should see you at Sugarcube." He exits the library, shutting the door behind him.
Twilight stares at Doug's waist for a few seconds, "Okay, so, we were talking about the sex, I mean, six branches of magic, right?"
"Right."
Spike opens the door, "Almost forgot the list! That would have been very unwise of me!" He grabs the parchment by the door, glares at Doug, then leaves again.
Doug coughs as they watch Spike exit the library a second time. He says, "So, six branches of magic. What does each do?"
"Well, many of the schools of magic have overlapping areas." Twilight turns back to the chalkboard, then shifts so her backside isn't pointed directly at Doug, then realizes her tail was covering herself before and isn't any more. She sits down, continuing, "Honesty is about finding out the true nature of things, the way things are. This includes some Judicial magic, as well as the communication and scrying I mentioned earlier."
"Wait, Judicial magic?" Doug asks, scratching his head. "You can force peo- ponies to tell the truth?"
Twilight nods from the chalkboard, "Well, it is fairly easily countered by Deceit magic, so the actual usage is extremely small."
"Countered?" Doug says, starting a new section on his paper. "Does that mean something specific?"
"Generally, yes." Twilight draws a line between each school and its opposite, "Normally, if I wanted to beat you in a contest, I would need to exceed the amount of thaums that you are spending on a spell. Say, for example, we are both using Friendship to exert a force on an object. A telekinetic tug of war. Whoever is stronger wins."
Doug nods along, "Sounds easy enough. And I bet you have thaums to spare?"
"Well, I don't want to brag, but yes. However, I also know how to exploit an opponent's vulnerabilities." Twilight Sparkle quickly draws two ponies, horns lit, pulling on a rope. She starts using white, then red, "Say my opponent is only using Friendship. Well, I can counter their efforts with about one half to one third of the thaums by using Apathy. It is very difficult to win using tactics like that, but it allows a weaker contestant to fight to a standstill if they know what kind of spells their opponent will be using." Little red 'x's cover the thicker white line.
"Couldn't your opponent do the same to you?" Doug swings his arms out, then bringing his fingers together, "A two pronged attack, one to counter their spell and the other to finish the job?"
Twilight Sparkle shakes her head, continuing her diagram, "Well, not really. Because the counter to the counter is what you were doing in the first place. And as soon as you try to split your spells between the two opposites? Well, your spells come out weaker than an opponent who is heavily invested on one side or the other. And you'll be beaten through brute force. A skilled unicorn, one practiced at quickly transitioning, might be able to, but still not able to cast opposite harmonics simultaneously."
"Fair enough. So, Deceit magic is a thing, huh?"
"Yup! Similar in practice to many mind altering spells, but those generally fall under Kindness and, depending on the spell itself, Malevolence." Twilight Sparkle writes those in yellow, moving on to the blue chalk.
"Mind-altering spells?!" Doug's mouth gapes open, "You can mind control people!?"
"Um, technically, yes?" Twilight stretches her forced smile as she cowers down just a little, the chalk dropping to the board.
"How is that possibly legal?" Doug shakes his head before looking at his hand. "Am I mind controlled right now? The aversion to magic was too much, and you decided I just needed a little 'tweaking'?"
"No! Of course not! I would never do that!" Twilight Sparkle rushes forward to reassure the panicky stallion, but stops herself as Doug flinches. "The existence of mind control magic isn't that widespread. I mean, somepony might know of it, but only an extremely low number of, um, 'gifted' ponies are actually able to actually affect any substantial changes in somepony else!"
"Substantial?" Doug asks, shaking his head. "Do I even want to know?"
"Enough to make you move a muscle you didn't intend, or think a thought that was not your own. A pony's innate Harmony will quickly purge anything that doesn't meet that threshold. Spells do exist that act on a delayed timer, but those would still rise to the level of being restricted." Twilight Sparkle sheepishly smiles, "I'm, technically, classified as a class seven threat."
"How high does that go?" Doug says through shaky lips, trying to relax his body as his mind tells himself that he needs to get away from the potentially dangerous mare next to him. Though, he reminds himself, nearly any unicorn is just as dangerous to him, if they wanted. And a lot of the pegasi, and earth ponies for that matter.
"Eight. Although that's mostly Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. Plus, um, a couple of the threats that they faced." Twilight Sparkle coughs, "Though class seven is more for the type of magic I'm able to wield, not necessarily the power behind it. Self-replication magic that retains that ability. Temporal magic. Gross mind-altering magics. But those are mostly theoretical, if a pony had such an ability. Which they don't."
"Temporal magic?!" Doug snaps his head back, "You can mess with TIME!?"
"Yes?" Twilight Sparkle pauses for a brief moment, "Well, not me, particularly. And it's not like I know that there is a spell in the Star Swirl the Bearded section of the Canterlot Archives that would let a pony go back once for a brief period of time. He made hundreds of spells! Thousands! I probably only scanned the indexes of the spells he crafted!" Twilight Sparkle's eyes shift from side to side as she grins, as she is most certainly not trying to hide anything.
Doug stares at Twilight as if she just grew another head, or told him that radically powerful magic was available that warped the fabric of space and time. Well, more so than most magic.
"But you don't have to worry about that!" Twilight says, her forced smile even more fake than normal. "Knowledge of those spells isn't very wide spread. There's no need to panic!"
"Yeah," Doug drawls out, "Because the spells exist, and existed before, and there isn't really anything that I could do to stop it! So no need to worry!"
Twilight Sparkle smiles, missing the sarcasm entirely, "Exactly! Plus, it's the Elements of Harmony or the Princesses who would deal with those kind of threats."
Doug sighs, thinking back to the question Princess Celestia asked him years ago. It is their choice. And needed. But that did not make it easier to take. He glances up at the clock. Just about that time. "Well, fascinating as the extremes of magic can be, Pinkie's celebration is starting soon." Doug holds up the two books, "And I need some time to process this. Ready to head over?"
Twilight Sparkle sighs, looking over the chalkboard. So much more to cover, so little time! Well, maybe once Doug has read the books and has the basics down it'll go smoother. "Sure. I guess I can tell you about the various spells I can cast as we walk over there!"