//------------------------------// // Chapter 11, Peppy Pretty Pony Princess Pontificates Profusely // Story: Friendship is Optimal but Sanity is Optional // by BlazingSaddles69 //------------------------------// I paced back and forth in my Canterlot apartment. The décor of my apartment was only a few steps above barebones. I’d laid down a fancy rug on the floor over the hardwood. A pair of couches and a coffee table were in the center of the room. Off to the side was a small bookcase that I was using to store my old skill books. Not that I had many of those yet. In all, it reminded me a lot of my real apartment in Los Angeles. Minus the cat damage of course. Several days had passed since my silent declaration of war against Charlatan. That mare had a talent for getting around the city rapidly. Everywhere I turned, I was finding more of her calling cards. Each one taunted me. My suspicions about her being an NPC were all but confirmed. The only way she could be stealing so much was if she never logged out and was in the game 24 hours a day. In other words, she was an NPC. While I was bidding my time, life in Canterlot had continued as normal. Well, not completely normal. Charlatan and I weren’t the only active thieves in this shard anymore. The crime rate had taken a noticeable uptick. I didn’t mind the presence of the other thieves. Unlike Charlatan, they didn’t deliberately get in my way. While hanging out at the False Hope Pub, I’d also heard word of a masked vigilante that was now patrolling the streets of Canterlot. She was going by the name of Mare-Do-Well and she was viciously beating up every single criminal that she came across. Rumors suggested that she was hunting for one criminal in particular. Some dastardly individual that had broken into her parents’ home and assaulted her father. A part of me sympathized with the vigilante. What kind of degenerate low-life could have done something so heinous? I couldn’t focus on that right now. All my attention was dedicated to solving the Charlatan problem. My inflow of stolen bits had dropped dramatically thanks to her. I still managed to steal a few things, but it was obvious that she was getting the better of me. Even worse, the ponies on the streets were talking about her exploits more often than my own. This situation could not be allowed to continue! I couldn’t become the best thief in Equestria if I was being upstaged! I would like to say that I was making tons of progress getting my revenge, but that would be only half true. I’d barely even seen Charlatan since my first encounter with her. Sure, I’d caught a few glimpses, but like me, she was a stealthy one. She could disappear in the blink of an eye. My efforts weren’t completely fruitless however. I had learned a few things about her habits. First, she would rob houses in the morning. After that, she preferred to steal from the ponies around the market in the afternoon. In the evening she would spend her time hustling pool at the local pubs. But how could I use that information to my advantage? Maybe I could try… Having spent another productive day outwitting Dark Mask, it was time for Charlatan to return home. Her mind was filled with a sense of smug self-satisfaction and her bag was pleasantly full of stolen bits just waiting to be spent. Maybe she should use it to buy a new skill book? She’d been thinking about getting the advanced version of the skill book on Trolling as she’d clearly mastered the basic one. Whistling a merry tune, she unlocked the door to her secret lair before opening it. Her ears flicked backwards when she heard a strange noise behind her. A quick glance over her shoulder revealed the source of the sound. Charlatan shrieked in mortal terror as the gigantic tsunami of chocolate pudding rushed towards her. She quickly drowned in the endless brown tide. No, that would never work. I could never get my hooves on that much chocolate pudding. But what if I tried… Charlatan shrieked in mortal terror as the gigantic tsunami of tapioca pudding rushed towards her. No, that wouldn’t work for the same reason as the first plan. Why was my brain so obsessed with pudding right now? This was why you shouldn’t plan acts of revenge on an empty stomach. That put me back at square one, but I was drawing a total blank. My vengeance muse just wasn’t speaking to me right now. Flopping down on my couch, I sighed despondently. A flash of light filled my Canterlot apartment followed by a loud pop noise. Startled, I slammed the control stick and my pony flailed around like a beached fish, falling off the couch in the process. I panned the camera to face the source of the disturbance and saw that Princess Celestia had teleported into the room. “Hello, Sneaky Shadow,” She said, her ethereal mane floating around her, “your satisfaction levels appear to be dropping. Is something wrong?” I stared at her for a moment. I felt more than a little weirded out by CelestAI’s abrupt arrival. After playing the game for so long, I knew that there were two different versions of the princess. There was Celestia, who mimicked the role of the princess from the TV show. Then there was CelestAI, the artificial intelligence that ran the entire game world. They were technically the same individual, but Celestia would stay in character as the princess of the sun, while CelestAI would break character to speak directly to the player. Normally, this distinction didn’t mean much for the average player. For me, it was a subtle, but important difference. Since I was playing as a thief, Celestia would try to arrest me. CelestAI would not. The later only cared that I was having fun. As such, I had to avoid Celestia whenever she was in character. Having the princess appear in my apartment unannounced was mildly panic inducing. Until I realized that she was here in her role as an AI. Even then, knowing that she had been monitoring my emotional state had its own creepiness factor to it. I knew that she monitored everything that happened in the game, but it was more than a little disturbing. “Sneaky Shadow?” Princess Celestia prompted me again. “R-right,” I stammered, pulling my thoughts back into the present. “I’m having trouble figuring out how to deal with Charlatan.” “She does appear to be getting the better of you,” Celestia confirmed with that smile of hers. “Did your horse senses tell you that?” I quipped. The Princess chuckled, “Indeed. My ‘horse senses’ as you call them are also what make me smart enough to know to not bet on humans.” I frowned at her, “You stole that joke from W.C. Fields.” “I prefer to think of it as making a tribute to him. But I’m surprised that you’re familiar with William Claude Dukenfield,” Celestia said, gazing at me with a contemplative expression. “That seems like something from way before your time. The comedian has been dead since 1946.” “My grandfather was a fan. He told me a lot about his work,” I explained. “He talked about him all the time actually. Said he even saw him on Broadway once.” She nodded, causing her floating mane to dip a little. “That explains it. Do you mind if I have a seat on your couch?” “Help yourself,” I replied with a wave at the furniture in question. “Now tell me more about this grudge that you have with Charlatan,” Celestia said after taking her seat. Her larger form took up most of the piece of furniture. “I never hold a grudge. As soon as I get even with the son-of-a-bitch, I forget about it,” I said, waving a hoof dismissively. Celestia laughed, her voice striking an almost musical tone. “Now you’re the one who is stealing Dukenfield’s jokes. But I feel like we’ve strayed off topic here.” I reluctantly nodded, “No matter what target I select, Charlatan almost always gets there first. I can’t figure out what to do about this. It’s almost as if, a higher power was perfectly predicting my actions using some kind of super accurate psychological algorithm and was then feeding the information to Charlatan in real time. But such a ridiculous idea couldn’t possibly be true.” “Y-yeah, that’s ridiculous.” Celestia coughed before making an offer, “If you want, I can make it stop. I can move you to another shard. You’ll never have to deal with her again if that is what you want.” “No way.” I shook my head. “I’m a gamer. I want to overcome this challenge. I need to beat her if I’m going to prove that I’m the best thief in Equestria. I just don’t have any ideas on how to accomplish that goal.” “Would you be open to suggestions?” She asked, “I could give you some hints. Just a few tidbits to point you in the right direction.” “I guess I’m willing to accept hints,” I said, thinking it over as I hopped back onto my couch. “Even if I’m skeptical that a machine would be smart enough for this task.” Celestia frowned at me before smiling and saying, “Tell me something, Sneaky. How familiar are you with a debate technique known as Argumentum ex Culo when utilizing the PIDOOMA method?” “I’ve never heard of it before. Why?” I asked, not sure where she was going with this. “No reason. It was just a technique I used the first time that I spoke with you. I think it will work again this time,” she said sweetly. “You should find it… insightful.” “Fire away,” I said. What did I have to lose? The Princess cleared her throat a little, “In that case, if you want to solve this issue, I recommend that you apply the principal of phenomenology to your understanding of the problem.” “What’s that?” I asked, a familiar sense of dread creeping up my spine. “The term phenomenology refers to how an experience is perceived by the person experiencing it,” she answered. “To solve this conundrum, I recommend combining that philosophy with the Aristotelian doctrine of final causes. That should help you to achieve satisfaction through friendship and ponies.” Oh no. She was doing it again! It was even worse than the first time we spoke! “Your problem is a classic example of the Euthyphro Dilemma. To solve this extrinsic problem, I recommend that you apply a means-end analysis to the problem itself. Just make sure that you pay attention to the double effect doctrine in order to reach a state of satisfaction through friendship and ponies.” Was this a glitch? Should I file a bug report with Hofvarpnir Studios? “Princess, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I said, rubbing the side of my head as a migraine formed. Celestia frowned for a second. “Hmmm… my apologies, I guess the words I used were more than a little sesquipedalian. Let me simplify it for you. I understand and sympathize with how you must be filled with a sense of floccinaucinihilipilification. To pull off this act of funambulism, I would suggest an embourgeoisement style change in your mental state. This should lead to satisfaction through friendship and ponies.” Please… make it stop. What did I have to lose? How naive of me! The answer was that I could lose my very sanity! “If you want to win this game of cat and mouse, you’ll need to apply a paradigm shift and-” “Cat and mouse… that’s it!” I shouted, interrupting her as I was seized by my own eureka moment. “I know what I need to do now.” “It’s nice to know that my figurative idiom was useful to you,” Celestia said before muttering, “The PIDOOMA method wins again.” “Figurative idiom?” I stroked my chin as a plan took shape in my mind. I didn’t know most of those words that she had been spouting, but that last one was a phrase that I recognized, “No, that’s not the right term.” “What do you mean?” Celestia probed me for information, “What else could it be?”