//------------------------------//
// Chapter 3 
// Story: Welcome to the jungle 
// by Hiver 
//------------------------------//

I slowly entered the workshop/lab and looked around. It was always interesting to visit Midnight and Sparks labb, they always had something new going on. This time the center of the room was made up by a big obelisk, looking to be carved from grey stone, faint lines running through its surface and where it narrowed to a sharp tip, it glowed softly.

The rest looked familiar, bookshelves covered most of the walls, covered with books and scrolls and piles of paper. Something in a bulbous flask was boiling over a small flame on one of the desks, releasing a small amount of green steam.

"Hello?" I asked as I looked around, "Anypony here?"

"Oh, hey Page," Sparks said as she poked her head out from behind one of the machines, "One second."

I nodded and settled down to wait, knowing better than going poking around. Well, I did now anyway, last time I turned blue for a week... it even stayed like that in the dream realm unless I actively changed it.

Both Luna and Celestia laughed themselves silly over it.

"You're here," Midnight said as she trotted in from the other room, carrying what looked like a baking tray with a circle of much, much smaller obelisks on it, "Good... evening," she said and then frowned, "That still sounds so odd to say as a substitute to good morning."

"I know," Sparks agreed and scooted out from beneath the machine and rolled onto her hooves, "I say it wrong all the time."

"Well, if it fits," I said and shrugged my wings before looking at the floating baking tray, "Is that what you wanted to show me?"

Midnight glanced at it before she nodded, "Actually, yes," she said and put it down on the ground before moving around next to me and handing me a pebble, "Toss it into the circle."

I raised an eyebrow at her, "Iẗ́'s not going to shoot away and put a hole in something, will it?"

Midnight smiled, "Almost definitely not."

I gave her a wary look and Sparks moved around to my other side, poking me with her wing before brushing it against mine,

"Just toss it."

I took it in my magic and tossed it into the circle. Absolutely nothing happened, it flew through the air and bounced off the baking tray and then rolled onto the floor.

"Impressive," I said with a slow nod, "You seem to have removed any sort of disruptions to gravity."

It's rather funny, Sparks and Midnight's eyerolls are completely identical. And often in sync too!

Sparks gave me a firm push and I almost stumbled forward, putting my hoof into the circle. Or at least, that was what should have happened. Instead my hoof stopped in mid air and I could feel a solid shape beneath my hoof.

"What the buck..." I started and felt with my hoof. It slid smoothly without any real friction along what seemed to a dome that started just outside the tiny obelisks. I frowned and felt around it as I walked in a circle before I picked the pebble up in my magic again, floating it through the space beneath my hoof. No resistance, no different feeling of it at all even.

I quickly turned to the two alicorns, "You made a size permissible shield bubble?"

Midnight nodded, looking more than a little smug, "And the real deal would pull power from the closeby layline. One of the reasons Twi and I recommended we settle just here."

I quickly looked over at the big hunk of rock sitting in the middle of the room and then back to her, "It scales up? How big?"

Sparks shrugged her wings, "Math is a bit unclear on the maximum size," she admitted, "And it still needs to be tested against the magic negating properties of a Rexosaurus. But the bubble would cover the entire city. Maybe the entire valley. We’ll need several hundred at best, thousands at worst. Depends on how efficient we can get it."

"Not that it's perfect," Midnight admitted, "I would still not like to spend a lot of time on the ground here, there are a lot of nasty things small enough to pass through even if it works against larger predators like rexosauruses. But it would make it easier on the Guard."

"But if it works, it could be amazing," I said and looked at the circle again before I jumped up to stand on the sphere, "Now this is cool. How quickly can it get deployed?"

"They take a while to make," Sparks said as she looked up at me, "And they still needs to be tested against an actual Rexosaurus. They are magic resistant after all. But it should work."

"Oh! We can use it to trap one!" I said with a grin and jumped down to her, "I want to ride one into battle!"

Sparks twacked me with her wing, "No! Bad!"

"Okay okay!" I quickly said and retreated out of reach with a grin.

Never let me have any fun.