//------------------------------//
// Don't Tempt Me, Starlight 
// Story: Resurgence 
// by BronyWriter 
//------------------------------//

Shootshootshootshootshoot. 

I am probably never going to make another evil artifact from literature again. Even if Equestria was in dire need and I alone could save her. 

Heh. 

No, no, focus. The One Ring is lost somewhere in this crowd of snooty ponies, almost all of whom could use magic. I don't know how powerful they were on the whole, but I could definitely imagine that some of them could do more than basic levitation, and if I'd accidentally done a good enough job, the more powerful they were, the bigger the draw of the ring. That's not even getting into the potential ego portion of it. If someone like this Blueblood character my brother keeps mentioning gets the ring, that could also be very, very bad. 

Or it would just make them turn invisible. I really hoped the latter, but a sneaking suspicion told me that I'd done too good of a job.

"Not to worry, darling, we will find your ring and return it to you," Rarity said. Her horn was lit and she was waving it over the ground like some kind of metal detector. "To confirm, you said that it was just a plain gold ring, correct?"

"Uh... yeah." I scanned the dance floor to see if it was maybe being kicked around like in the movies. No such luck. I was beginning to worry that somebody had picked it up and pocketed it, not knowing what it was. 

"Perhaps we should ask your brother or Princess Celestia to help."

My pupils shrank to pinpricks, and I shook Rarity's shoulder. "Nono! Not my brother. I, uh..." I glanced over at him. He was greeting the last of the guests. "I don't want to bother him with something as silly as this."

Rarity gave me an uncertain look, but slowly nodded. "Very well. Then perhaps Twilight could assist us? She would certainly know the kind of spells to locate it."

"Uh..." While that was a better option than my brother, Twilight was a really powerful unicorn. Like, the kind of powerful that the ring would easily corrupt. Still, it's not like I'd let her keep it for more than a few seconds. If I was quick, she wouldn't pick it up at all. She'd just point me to it. Yeah, that was the best option. I nodded to Rarity.

"Yeah, I guess she'd be the best option."

"Excellent," Rarity replied with a warm smile. "I know she's around here somewhere. If I had to guess, if we find Starlight, we'll find her. I know that Twilight wanted Starlight to fit in as much as possible."

"Cool," I said through slightly gritted teeth. 

As Rarity and I began to search, we found that we couldn't see either Twilight nor Starlight anywhere. A tiny nagging voice in the back of my mind began to suggest that one of the two of them might have... found the ring. 

Gulp.

Man that thing can roll.

Makes sense, though. It's the One Ring made by a chaos god. If I had to guess, it'd want to go out and create as much chaos as possible. If it influenced two unicorns as powerful as that, they'd probably be able to do stuff even I couldn't do. I mean, there was a lot that I couldn't do at that time in my development, but they'd definitely be able to mess stuff up. In all honesty, I'm not sure how much of myself was put in the ring. Hopefully not ninety percent, or something like that.

"Hmm." Rarity looked around with a frown. "I can't see them at the moment, darling. Perhaps they've gone out to the gardens to mingle with Fluttershy."

"Hope so," I replied.


*  *  *  *


"Okay, test number one on the ring of unknown power and origin." I adjusted my goggles as Starlight stepped away from the ring. We'd put it on a pedestal in the middle of my old room at the castle. "Alright, Starlight, cast your spell on three, right?" She didn't respond. I saw that she hadn't even put her own goggles on. She just kept staring at the ring. I cleared my throat, and she glanced at me out of the corner of her eye. "Starlight. Count of three?"

She blinked and shook her head. "Sorry. Guess I zoned out for a second, there. What were you saying?"

I frowned. "Cast your spell on three."

"Right, right, spell on three," she replied with a wave of her hoof before putting her goggles on. I nodded back to her and turned my attention back to the ring. 

"Okay. One... Two..." I lit my horn in preparation of the spell. "Th--"

"Hey, Twilight? What if we, you know... don't?"

I frowned and powered my horn down. "What are you talking about? We're trying to figure this out. What if it's dangerous?"

"I know, I know," Starlight replied, taking a step toward the ring. "But what if we, I don't know, damage it somehow? The backlash could level the castle."

"That's why we're doing experiments on it, Starlight," I pointed out. "It's clearly magical, and the chaos magic in it is what's making me nervous. Maybe it's something that Discord left behind!"

"I doubt it," Starlight said, taking another step closer and taking her goggles off. "You said yourself that it doesn't feel like Discord's chaos magic. How do we know it's even dangerous at all?"

"That's why we're doing experiments on it!" I snapped, mirroring Starlight's step with one of my own and also removing my goggles. "Seriously, the spell we were casting isn't even invasive! It's just to do a basic scan!"

Starlight glared at me and stepped toward the ring until she was almost touching the pedestal. "That could activate it." She lit her horn and her magic encased the ring. "I just want us to be safe."

"Starlight!" I snarled, lighting my own horn. I tore the ring off of the pedestal and levitated it over to me. 

"I saw it first!" Starlight cried. She grabbed the ring back with her magic and leaped toward me. I bared my teeth and threw a shield spell between the two of us. She bounced off of it and her magic sputtered out. She instantly shot to her hooves and began trying to break through my shield, unaware that the pedestal had just turned into a seven-layer wedding cake. "Give me that ring, Twilight! You just want it for yourself!"

"I won't let you hoard it for own selfish reasons," I retorted, strengthening my shield as she began pounding away at it with her magic. "This is obviously a powerful artifact. It needs to be studied, not just... I don't know, locked away, or something!"

"I will study it," Starlight insisted. "I just don't need your help to do it!"

I scoffed and rolled my eyes. "What could you possibly find out about it that I couldn't in half the time? I was trained by--"

"Princess Celestia herself," Starlight cut in with a mocking tone. "We get it: you're Little Miss Powerful." She gave me a condescending smirk. "I heard that the spell that turned Antares into an alicorn was supposed to be for you. What's the matter? Did it turn out that you weren't good enough?"

"Oh that does it!" I dropped my shield spell and shot a beam of magic at Starlight. She yipped and dropped to the floor, causing my spell to hit a display case behind her. It turned into a small replica of some wheeled contraption that had the number three pained on it in several places. I barely even noticed. I was more focused on Starlight, who was just as pissed off as I was. Her horn was charging up for a spell that I could tell had a bit of power behind it. Seriously, what was her deal? She should have just let me figure this ring out and then I might have given it to her. That wasn't happening now.

Starlight shot her spell at me, but I waved it aside with some of my magic. Thing is... I shouldn't have been able to. Starlight's spell had some punch behind it, and I shouldn't have been able to just wave it aside like she was shooting sparks at me. 

Starlight seemed to have the same thoughts. 

"Y-you're cheating somehow," she said, shakily pointing a hoof at me. "Princess Celestia couldn't stop that spell that easily!"

Okay, well that just told me that she'd really try to hurt me. Now I knew that she couldn't get her hooves on the ring. Somepony as clearly unstable as her couldn't have an artifact this powerful. No, I obviously needed to take the ring myself for safekeeping. With the power it gave me, I could keep it safe from ponies like her. For that matter, I needed to keep this ring a secret in general. If other ponies knew about this ring and what it could do, who knew what they'd do to get it? I needed to study it to really get a grasp on what it was, then I'd make my decision. It might even be a bad idea to let Princess Celestia take it. She wouldn't have done the research on it that I did. I hoped that she'd understand.

That left the matter of what to do with Starlight. 

"Give it to me, Twilight!" Starlight screeched. "It's mine! I saw it first!"

"Starlight, just calm down and--"

"You stole it from me!" Starlight insisted. "I had it in my magic, and you just tore it away because you're a selfish nag!"

"You're delusional," I snapped. "I'm just protecting the ring from ponies like you!"

"Oh, and what exactly are 'ponies like me', Twilight?" Starlight snarled. "What does a prissy, stuck-up unicorn think 'ponies like me' are like?"

"You stole cutie marks from ponies and enslaved them!" I shot back. Starlight began circling me like I was a wounded animal. "Even Discord didn't do stuff like that!"

"Oh screw you!" Starlight cried. 

Before I could say anything else, Starlight pounced. I couldn't get my shield up in time, and she slammed into me, sending us both tumbling to the ground. She slapped at my horn to get me to drop the ring. I moved my head in time to prevent her from hitting my horn, but she did catch me right under the eye. I grunted in pain, but shot a spell at Starlight that sent her flying back into my old bed, which turned into a pile of buttered noodles. She briefly slipped on the butter in her attempts to get back up to continue what I wouldn't even call a fight. I didn't want to hurt her as much as she wanted to hurt me, but if I needed to rough her up a bit to protect the ring, I'd do what I needed to. 

The ring was just too important to let somepony like her have it. I could probably do a lot of good with the kind of power it clearly gave me. Maybe I could even give Applejack her eye and Rainbow Dash her leg back. Fixing Fluttershy's scar would probably be foal's play. I doubted that Starlight would help ponies like that. She'd probably use it to take the cutie marks of everypony in Equestria! 

But... wait... buttered noodles? I didn't cast a spell like that. Why would...?

I took my focus off of Starlight for a moment too long, and she tackled me again. I lost focus for long enough that I couldn't move my head before she slapped at my horn. Since we were both still falling back, the ring was flung back instead of just dropping. We both turned to where it was flung to just as it bounced off of the wall and slid perfectly over my horn.


*  *  *  *


I was beginning to regret taking the ring out of my room more and more. The longer Rarity and I searched for both the ring and Twilight, the louder the voice that said Twilight had it grew. The worst part was that I still didn't know everything the ring could do. I'd just wanted it to make me turn invisible. Maybe prank TD a bit. Now one of the most powerful unicorns ever might have something famous for corrupting the powerful in her possession. 

"Hmm, I'm beginning to worry for you, Kristen," Rarity said, casting another spell. "Usually my gem finding spell can find things like jewelry, but I'm not finding anything." She grimaced. "I suspect that somepony else might have found it and taken it out of the castle."

"Great," I groaned. "I just wanted to create something fun. If I'd know it would turn out like this, I never would have done it."

Rarity raised an eyebrow and tilted her head. "You created the ring yourself?"

"What ring?"

I yipped as the last person I wanted to hear came up behind me. My wings flared out in shock, and I turned around so fast that I almost smacked Rarity in the face. TD, Celestia and Luna were standing behind me. I gulped and forced a smile on my face.

"Oh, uh, nothing. Nothing important. Just... I tried to see if I could create a ring with my..." I looked around to see if anyone was listening. "Skills."

"Huh, that's kind of random," TD said. "Just a regular ring?"

I scoffed and rolled my eyes. "Out of everything I've created, a simple ring is ridiculous?"

"I didn't know that you were creative like that," Rarity said. "You have some skill in metallurgy?"

I opened my mouth to respond, but before I could, I felt a pull, almost as if somebody was grabbing me by the head and trying to drag me behind them. There was only one thing it could be.

"I think I know where the ring is."


*  *  *  *


"Twiliiiight! Twiiliiight!" Starlight giggled and bounced around the room. "Are we playing hide and seek? Ooh, can I be it?"

I couldn't even begin to respond, even if I wasn't hiding from her. Obviously I was invisible or had some kind of optical illusion around me, but that didn't explain... anything else. The second the ring had slipped onto my horn, the entire room turned into a bright field. The sky was the brightest blue I'd ever seen, the grass was immaculately trimmed and a pleasing shade of green, and every object in the room had turned into giant lollipops and cheerful flowers. Starlight was acting like a happier, more hyperactive version of Pinkie Pie, which was probably the most unsettling thing of all. 

"Twilight, I'm going to find you!" A stream of happy bubbles floated out of her horn. When they started popping on one of the lollipops, the lollipop itself burst into bubbles. Okkkkaayyyy. Whatever the ring had done when I'd put it on, it had clearly driven Starlight even more crazy than she'd already been. 

At least she wasn't trying to kill me anymore. Maybe if I just snuck out of the room I could go get Princess Celestia to help Starlight. This had to be a breach of her parole. No need to bring the ring up, of course. I'd just say we... got into an argument, or something like that. Yeah, that sounded right. I took a deep, quiet breath and began sneaking toward the door. Before I could even light my horn, the door opened. 


*  *  *  *


"Where are you, Twilight?! Give it back to me! It's mine!"

Starlight shot out a beam of magic that obliterated a nearby bookshelf, but barely even reacted to the sight of the five of us walking into the room. Celestia's eyes widened, and she wrapped her magic around Starlight's horn before encasing her in her field. Starlight snarled at Celestia and tried thrashing about. 

"Let go of me! Make her give it back! I saw it first! It's mine!"

A slight frown crossed TD's face, and he slowly turned his head to me. "Kristen? Exactly what kind of ring was this?"

I gulped and began looking around for Twilight. I couldn't see her, but I could sense her standing right next to the door trying to squeeze by us. I sighed and waved my hoof. The ring instantly slid off of her horn and to me, causing her to reappear and make a desperate grab for the ring. Starlight's eyes widened, and she began thrashing harder in Celestia's grasp.

"See?! She stole it from me! Give it back!"

"It's not yours," Twilight insisted. "You could never use it responsibly. I'm taking it back to Ponyville to study so I can figure out everything about it! Once I do, I'll seal it up and only use it when I need to."

TD's frown deepened ever so slightly, and he took the ring out of my grasp with his magic. The ring was bathed in a burst of fire, but before I could register that he was burning the ring, the fire went out, leaving only the ring engraved in black speech. TD quietly sighed and facehooved. 

"You seriously created the One Ring?"

"I didn't know that it would do this!" I insisted. "I thought that all it would do was turn me invisible and just... look like the ring, that's all."

"I see." He glanced over at Twilight, who was inching toward him. "And how much of yourself did you put into the ring?"

I shrugged, but it was then that I noticed the Nascar car replica, seven-layer wedding cake, and the pile of buttered noodles. "Apparently more than I thought."

"How did you even make this?" TD asked, turning his attention to Starlight, who probably would kill all of us to get the ring back, if the way she was screeching and thrashing was any indication.

"I just said the words and pointed," I explained. "You know, just to see if I could."

"Wait, how would that create a magic ring?" Rarity asked. "You're a pegasus, and a new one at that. Creating something like this out of thin air would take serious power."

"A little, yeah," I said, taking the ring from TD. He didn't stop me. I think it's because he didn't want to be affected by it either. Fine by me. I was going to get rid of this thing however I could. TD was probably more powerful than Twilight, and it didn't take a genius to see that it was affecting her. 

"Rarity's right," Twilight said with a frown. "It would take a lot of power to make something this important to just appear. That would take something like..." Twilight's eyes narrowed, and she took a step toward me. 

Gulp.

"You know, I haven't gotten to study the ring much yet, but I have sensed some... chaos magic behind it.," Twilight began. 

Guuulllppp.

"Given everything that's just happened, and that it doesn't feel like Discord's magic..."

I let out an uneasy chuckle and looked around the room. Rarity's jaw had dropped, and the alicorns were grimacing.

"Twilight, you must understand something," Luna said. "Given everything that Discord did, we felt it pertinent to keep Kristen's abilities a secret."

"How could you?!" Twilight cried. She motioned to Starlight. "You've seen what she can do! And if she has that ring..." Twilight gasped and lit her horn. "We have to get it away from her as soon as possible! She could take over all of Equestria with that!" 

I could see that Twilight was gearing up for a spell, and I wasn't sure that the alicorns could stop her before she got something off, especially with Celestia restraining Starlight. On instinct I flinched back, but given my panic, I flew back farther than I intended. Before I could do anything to stop it, the ring flew out of my hooves and out a nearby window. 

Starlight wailed and said something about it being hers, but the rest of us all looked out the window in momentary shock. 

"Uh..." I began walking toward the window. "We should probably go get that."


*  *  *  *
 

I hummed to myself and bounced down the path around the castle. The Gala was so much funner this time around, especially since I got to help make the food! Applejack helped out a lot too, which was even cooler! That reminded me: I hadn't seen any of my friends in a little bit. Not even TD or my new friend Kristen! I still needed to throw her a party. Maybe once the Gala was over I could go into my party planning cave and think of some good ideas.

Just as I turned to go back into the castle, I felt something bump against my hoof. I stopped bouncing (which is too bad since bouncing is so much fun!) and looked to see what my pink hoofsie had hit. Huh. It just looked like a plain gold ring. I looped the tip of my mane through it and tossed it into the air, catching it in my hoof before it hit the ground. 

What was this?!