//------------------------------//
// before 
// Story: Theory of nothing 
// by Elidjz 
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"please don't quote me." - Very quotable man.





After having a mild existential crisis, I felt slightly better. My wounds had been bandaged and I had eaten. I was still hungry, as the fifth box of cookies I was currently eating will show. 

The mace, which used to be a pipe, was currently holding my attention. I had attented reenactments, which ussually ended badly, and many of the more hardcore participants had real maces with them. So I know that they're usually much heavier than the one I currently held in my hooves. They also didn't have a blue glow. It was just another question on top of many others.

But at least I had a weapon that I somehow knew how to use. Not going to complain about that though, as I shoved a hoof full of cookies inside my mouth. The noise of chewing was surprisingly calming. At least when you had recently escaped a life or death situation. 

I would have to practice with it, but first I needed a plan. After peeking through one of the windows I could see the big light in the horizon that was the rift. I could also see the multiple fires burning alongside it and the moving outlines of what had to be some massive creatures which would sometimes swipe at the ground. And from time to time a building could be seen flying in the air. Likely thrown around by one of those creatures. 

While on the topic of non-pony creatures I had no idea where Cosmo's was. The last time I saw him, less than half an hour ago, he was lying in a corner reading some book. I hated that someone that acted so casual in this situation knew so much more than me. But that was probably why he was so casual. Knowledge is power after all. 

I also looked at my amulet. Which now had a faint red glow. It's bright glow had slowly gotten fainter. The glow had appeared after I had hit the first creature with a pipe. And then grew brighter and brighter after every hit. The question was,  was It caused by the violence itself or by any blood that had been spilled. And what did it mean? The alicorn amulet had already been disappointing, so I didn't need for it to be fueled by blood. Way too creepy and impractical.

On the topic of disappointing magical objects, my spell books. One was made by me, so it was obvious why it was disappointing. The other one, which took me moths to properly translate. And now I learned that whoever had written it was dyslexic. The fact that I had gotten stuck here because of a simple spelling slash translation error was infuriating. I was tempted to burn it, but it's other spells had proven useful. So it wouldn't burn, yet.

Well, I had made a list of things that went wrong, I could now focus on solving them. Step one: find Cosmo's.





Easier said than done. I had been searching for him for well over an hour. There were plenty of traces of him. A canvas with fresh paint on it, A still hot oven, The words "I was here" written on a wall... That last one felt like it had been directed at me. This did nothing to help my mood. My mace was gripped tightly in my hoof. I had every intention of hitting him. I was now going to search through the attic.

"That's just mean." Cosmo then slammed the door of the attic open. I would have been scared by it, were it not the fact that the door had been slammed into my face. I was physically thrown back onto the ground with a bloody nose. "Oh, sorry." His sheepish apology made me even angrier. He then helped me back onto my hooves.

I then slashed my mace into his own snouth. His snouth now looked like crumpled paper. "Ow." He did seem to actually be hurt. "I deserved that." He then grabbed his snout and twisted it back into place. I was carefully touching my own snout, trying to feel it was broken. Fortunately it didn't feel like it. Actually , now that we were on the subject of my mace, after I had smashed it in his face, it would now be a good time to speak about it.

"What about this? Trixie is curious about why it hasn't turned back into a pipe?" He eyed me suspiciously as I held the mace up, wary of me hitting him again. "You did use magic to turn a pipe into this. But it's not temporary? isn't it?" He shook his head. "I literally melted the pipe and then forged it into a mace. In mere seconds. Things like star and cosmic fire are really powerful. Bad material does lower its quality, but not by that much" The second he said that, a question popped into my head.

"Can you make armor for Trixie?" "Yes." I mentally cheered as he said that. "But I'll need materials, like more pipes. Not a problem though." I was quite giddy at the idea of getting a set of protective armor covering all the fragile parts of my body. Also known as my whole entire body. Even if it was really uncomfortable as long as it could protect me from things like dying, then it would be worth it.

"But that's not why you searched for me." He raised an eyebrow as he said that. Not a surprise that he knew that, he probably knew that I had been searching for him. And he definitely hid from me just to annoy me. It did make hitting him more satisfying. "Trixie wants to know how Trixie will get back home." He put a hand on his chin, thinking. "It's a pretty easy plan. Get to the rift and allow you to absorb some of its power. Getting there will be the hard part."

"Can't you just teleport there? Or run there really fast?" Cosmo was clearly very powerful, he was so Celestia Damned old. And if anything was powerful (or older) than him, well that was just terrifying. "Teleporting near a rift is NOT a good idea. Also I don't want to face a matriarch while bound to you." Buck, I mentally thought. "So we sneak." He added. It wasn't what I expected, but if we could avoid fighting against anything I wouldn't complain.

"And that's all I have to say. Unless you have better idea." He said very nonchalantly. It was getting very, and I do mean very annoying. But it made sense. The behavior between an expert and someone who has no idea what they had gotten in would be obvious. 

"Trixie doesn't have a better plan. But could you make some armor for Trixie." Some kind of card in four of his claws. "Those are four of my many blacksmithing licenses. I've always loved anything technical. I'll gladly make you something to protect you for the fun of it." I got hopeful. I expected him to dash them instantly. I was surprised when he didn't. "I will take some time to make it. I could make it in an instant. But that would be an insult to all blacksmitters to have ever existed."

He then put on a very dramatic pose. Then pointed at my mace. "That thing is an insult to my skill. Made in a hurry. Can't you see how horrible it is." I looked at it. I actually found it to have a nice shine. And it's blue shine and starry look were very enjoyable. "Horrible I say. Abominable even." His tone was purposefully dramatic. The lightheartedness of his current action did put a smile on my face.  I don't know if it was just him being him or if he actually tried to cheer me up.

"You should rest and prepare until I'm ready." I pulled my spell book out. Things might not be that bad.





I was searching for useful spells in my spell books. Scratching and writing some notes in my personal book. I was also reading the one with a goat skull on it but with extreme prejudice. It was too useful to be discarded, but I was in this situation because of a writing error. But there were some useful large area spells. 

Also a surprising amount of stun spells in such grim looking book. I was now practicing an electricity spell that split in multiple arcs. I put multiple vases and other miscellaneous objects in the only room that wasn't tight or packed. Even then the walls and closets were covered in tiny scorch marks. The spell itself wasn't really tiring and it wasn't hard to learn. It would obviously be useless against anything bigger than, let's say, a purple alicorn. But it would be very useful, and fairly painful, against said hypothetical alicorn.  Said alicorn was definitely Twilight. My end goal hadn't changed.

The only good thing about my situation is that I would gain a lot of experience in new spells that would prove very helpful when I would end up facing Twilight. And amusing. Especially those like the one that caused the target to sneeze a lot. And that one spell that would cause all hair and fur to fall off. Actually a surprising amount of spells seemed to be very petty. Which is odd seeing as the spell book looked like it would contain a lot of evil dark magic spells. But none seemed to be very "evil". And very seemed lethal.

With lethal I mean the ones that could literally do nothing but kill and are useless against anything else. Because even simple spells like levitation could be deadly if used properly. I didn't actually want to kill Twilight, just humiliate her. And have her grovel in front of me.

I salivated at the thought. I also felt peckish. I had been training for a while. A light snack and maybe a short nap would be a pretty good idea. And maybe I should find a backpack and pack some food and other utilitarian items. I had no idea how long it would take to reach the rift. But I also didn't think that finding food would be very hard. It was likely that most buildings would be as packed with food and items just as this one.

I left for the kitchen. While going through the hallway I saw Cosmo working on own set of armor. I had obviously taken a few peeks in the past few hours. I saw him bend and mely knifes, pots, spoons and more with blue, purple and red flames. He would then bend them into rudimentary shapes which would then be combined in a very nice looking set of armor. I could see armor for all of my hooves laying on the ground. He also had enchanted some of it. Which would potentially be useful against a certain pony. Which might be purple. Cosmo's also seemed to have fun forging it.

I started chugging some fresh cold milk. Cosmo then entered the kitchen grabbing a box of cereals. "So how is it progressing?" Cosmo opened the box before answering. "Good. But I would like to have better material. But I promise you will love it. If not I have a no refund policy." I chuckled. So did he. "You know this remind..." He was then interrupted by a loud crash.

And he then dropped onto the ground and dug his claws into the floor. "Brace for impact!" Before my brain could process what had happened I was slammed into the wall as gravity shifted.

I could feel my body and the entire room rotating around. I was being thrown around with everything else that wasn't bolted to the ground. Including sharp knives and a very heavy fridge.

Which was getting closer to me.

"Oh, buck trixie."