With the plunderseed vines dispatched by the Tree of Harmony, thus releasing Celestia and Luna from their grasp, Twilight Sparkle hurried over to them and drew both into a hug while her friends looked on, glad that they were safe.
"We know how difficult it must have been for you to give up the Elements," said Celestia to Twilight Sparkle. "It took great—"
"What's with all the racket?" An unknown, female voice interjected.
Everyone looked around for the mystery speaker. Twilight Sparkle was the first to spot her as a pony stepped out of the Tree of Harmony, as if she or it were immaterial. They were large, somewhere around Celestia's size, with a white coat, red hair and blue eyes. What really stood out as she paused to cover her mouth and yawn, however, was the fact that she was an alicorn.
There were several gasps at the sight of her, and a few stunned comments. Celestial was the first to recover enough to speak, who turned to face the unknown alicorn with an expression of awe. "Are you... Faust?"
The name brought another round of shock, and prompted Twilight Sparkle to say, "But isn't she just a myth? Hippological evidence has proven that we're a product of evolution, not creation."
"If that's what you want to call me," the alicorn unconcernedly replied, before turning her attention to Twilight Sparkle. "And if you think you're a product of evolution, then you've probably fallen for one of John's pranks."
"Wha...?" Came Twilight Sparkle's baffled reply.
At the same time, Rainbow Dash flew over to "Faust" and demanded, "What do you mean, 'if that's what you want to call me?' Are you Faust or aren't you?"
The pony being questioned regarded Rainbow Dash and evenly responded, "Well, if it really matters to you, you can call me 'Ranma.' But it's fine if you use 'Faust', 'cause that's what everyone kept calling me after I transformed them into ponies."
Rainbow Dash looked at her with disbelief, and she wasn't the only one, but it was Applejack who stepped forward and remarked, "You can't expect us to believe that you created ponies."
Ranma shrugged her shoulders. "I don't care whether you do or not. I'd rather know why you're here."
Pinkie Pie decided to unhelpfully insert herself into the conversation. "Don't you mean 'we?'" She suddenly gasped in an exaggerated fashion. "Or does that mean you figured out why you're here!?"
"Pinkie, dear," Rarity began, as she leveled a flat stare toward her friend, "it wasn't an existential question."
For the sake of advancing to a subject of greater interest, without being rude, Twilight Sparkle cleared her throat before answering Ranma's question. "There were these vines that had abducted the princesses," she gestured to each one in turn, "Celestia and Luna, and had overrun Ponyville from the Everfree Forest. I drank a potion to gain more insight into what was happening, which is how I learned about the Tree of Harmony." She pointed at said tree. "And it destroyed the vines when we returned the Elements of Harmony to it."
Ranma looked at the tree behind her, as if noticing it for the first time, and absently said, "I think I remember seeing this in a dream..." She proceeded to remove one of the "fruits" from the Tree of Harmony, which happened to be the element of generosity, and looked it over out of curiosity before taking a bite out of it.
Rarity fainted on the spot while everyone else watched in stunned, open-mouthed disbelief and horror, to the extent that Spike didn't have the presence of mind to catch Rarity, or immediately go to her side after her collapse. If not for the fact that the Elements of Harmony had once been restored despite being utterly shattered, they probably would have panicked or gotten a lot more angry.
Noticing their reaction, Ranma paused to swallow before asking, "What?"
Twilight Sparkle opened and closed her mouth several times before anything came out of it. "You... You... You just took a bite out of the element of generosity!"
Ranma straightened out her mane, because it had been blown back by the force of Twilight Sparkle's shout. "Generosity?" She looked at the other "fruit" on the tree and took note of their number. "Hold on... Are the others kindness, loyalty, cheer, honesty and friendship?"
Since Twilight Sparkle was still catching her breath, Celestia decided to answer and keep things civil, finding something curious about the situation. "There are a few discrepancies, but yes: those are the Elements of Harmony."
Turning about to face the tree, Ranma looked over it carefully, as vague, fleeting moments from memories bubbled to the surface of her mind. "I think I had a dream about this, too..."
Celestia and Luna shared a look, before the latter asked, "Did you create the Tree of Harmony, perchance?"
"...It's possible," Ranma eventually conceded, her gaze still on the tree as she set the element of generosity down. "One of the requirements that I expected of the people, who willingly agreed to become ponies, was to live by the six tenets of harmony — the Elements of Harmony, as you call them."
"There is no known record of that occurring," Celestia informed her. "What I know for certain is the name, "Faust", and her appearance, which has been consistent among all creatures. Beyond that, ponies tend to favor the idea that Faust created ponykind, while other creatures mostly believe that she was an evil that had been defeated and cast into a place like Tartarus."
Ranma snorted at that last part and turned away from the Tree of Harmony. "Yeah, they wish." She shook her head and changed the subject. "Well, I'm awake, so I might as well see how the world's doing. Hopefully things have improved since I went to sleep however-long-ago."
"Before you do," Luna spoke up, "would you be opposed to concealing either your horn or wings? I don't know if your appearance is more than superficial, but it has been the trend for alicorns to become royalty, and adding another one to that number — especially so soon — is bound to create some... issues."
"Particularly if you really are Faust," Celestia added.
Staring at them blankly, Ranma inquired, "What's an alicorn?"
"That's what you are, silly!" Pinkie Pie announced after she appeared beside Ranma out of nowhere, who wasn't affected by said appearance. She proceeded to lift up one of her forelegs by the hoof and said, "Alicorns have the traits of an Earth Pony," she pulled out a wing and ran a hoof through the feathers like they were harp strings, "Pegasus," then hopped onto the back of her head and reached around the horn to part the mane in front of it, "and Unicorn!"
Ranma reached up, grabbed Pinkie Pie by the scruff of her neck, then set her on the ground and gave her a few pats on the head, a bit amused by her antics. "So," she began, addressing the three alicorns before her, "you guys are royalty, huh? And two of you are princesses, right?"
"Hey!" Rainbow Dash interjected, in defense of her friend. "Twilight's a princess, too!"
"You're all princesses, then," Ranma acknowledged, not sparing the pegasus a glance. "Is the government a monarchy, then? Do ponies like being ruled by kings and queens now?"
Realizing that the tree-borne alicorn might have actually been asleep for a very long time, and likely under the sway of outdated notions as a result, Twilight Sparkle decided to take the questions seriously and see how she reacted to the answers. "Actually, kings and queens have been stigmatized as far back as our history has been documented. Whenever somepony claims such a title, they usually try to rule by force and don't care about those that they intend to rule over."
"Nice to know that hasn't changed," Ranma muttered.
Twilight Sparkle took a second to gather her thoughts, and to not allow herself to be distracted by Ranma's comment. "As for our government... We still use the term 'kingdom' to describe Equestria, but now nopony thinks of a king when it's used. Ever since Celestia and Luna became alicorns over a thousand years ago, who were given rule of the kingdom by the nobility shortly thereafter, there hasn't been any inheritance of power through blood, or transference by way of election or contest. As it stands right now, while you could technically call our government a diarchy, because the princesses hold most of the power, during the past few hundred years Princess Celestia has been ceding a lot of domestic control to representatives who are elected to serve the needs and interests of the commonpony."
After mulling over all of that information, Ranma determined to herself aloud, "I guess I won't know if that's a good thing or not until I've looked into it myself."
Twilight Sparkle opened her mouth to argue, but Celestia placed a calming hoof upon her shoulder and shook her head when she looked up at her.
"That said," Ranma went on, her eyes narrowing as they scrutinized the princesses, "I'll hide the fact that I'm an alicorn for now, but I have a lot of questions and I'm going to expect your cooperation in general." Seeing the beginnings of several objections, though none from the princesses, she added, "This is nothing against you personally. I've had the misfortune of dealing with a lot of world leaders — and their underlings — in the past, and they tended to be snakes, so..."
"We understand," Celestia spoke for the three princesses. "I have no issue if your concern lies with the well-being of everypony, as that's my concern as well."
Ranma regarded Celestia with a critical eye for a moment, then relaxed her expression before lighting up her horn. Her body began to glow soon after, and brightened until she was a silhouette of light, which quickly shifted into a smaller, hornless form. When the light faded away, she looked like an average adult mare in size; whether or not she was an average pegasus, though, remained to be seen.
"It's been a while since I've been this small," she said to no one in particular as she looked herself over, before she returned her attention to the princesses. "Before we go, let me limber up first. I'm feeling rather stiff after sleeping for... at least a thousand years, it sounds like."
Celestia nodded her assent.
"Oh," Ranma voiced, as she turned to face the Tree of Harmony again, "and before I forget..."
She extended a glowing wing toward the element of generosity, which was surrounded by a matching glow as it was guided back into the tree. Along the way, much to the relief of those who paid more attention to it than the wing that was being used like a horn, the element became whole again when the missing portion appeared to grow back in.
"There," she said, with a measure of satisfaction.