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// All the little stuff 
// Story: Theory of nothing 
// by Elidjz 
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"Knowledge is power."





I, Trixie, entered the office that the six legged pony headed shadow being, with an unreadable name, stayed in. I had decided to help him as I came to the conclusion that I needed his help more than he needed mine. I bursted in, taking him by surprise as he was busy reading some book about engineering or something like that.

 "I need to know how everything the uuhm... people that you want me to convince." He somehow managed to raise one of his non-existent eyebrows. I simply continued speaking. "Like how are they organised, why are you all here, are there different gangs or cliques or anything like that like that."

He nodded in understanding and started writing. 'We are technically a "clique", in the same way that all of those living in the harbors would themselves be considered a clique. Meanly because were born in or near those area.' "Living in the harbor?" I asked confusedly. He tilted his head staring at me before continuing with his writing. 'Well not all of us live near this stadium. Actually there are only around less than twenty thousand people that live around. The harbors have a population double that size and even more up north near the old factories. Millions if you cross the bridges west of here.'

I stood there with my mouth open (figurativly) and probably looked very stupid. The being stared at me, his face slowly shifting with the realisation. And then he started laughing, or at least the way he moved his body and the strange sound he made looked like laughter. He picked up another piece of paper and then quickly started scribeling. 'You thought the entire population of this continent lived in one single place?!'

I shamefully nodded. He slammed his hand on a desk, before laughing some more. Which then turned into wheezing. ''This city alone could hold like three million people and the cities around it can hold just as many if not more. And then there's the hundreds of known islands, multiple peninsulas, three archipelagos and two other known continents. Not counting the one we are currently standing on. Doesn't the place you come from also have that?!

"I kinda thought so because everything is empty. This is the only place with any kind population that I've seen all the time that I have been here." He steadied himself, trying to stop laughing. 'To be fair there's only a few million of us spread over a landmass that can theoretically support billions.' I tried to change the subject away from my little mess up, but then a thought came up.

"Wait, you only want me to convince those in these stadiums to fight, but what about the rest?" 'Were the closest to the things near us. Also we don't have any real way to communicate with the rest. So the plan is to either defeat them on our own or to slowly retreat while fighting, which would cause all of the others to notice us and prepare then join us in the fight. Which will be more likely.'

I was slightly baffled by his plan. "And what if they don't join the fight?" He chuckled a bit. 'Maybe not all of them but Allegria will join the fight. She can't conquer this continent if we're all dead. She also has a very big army, has some six million subjects and twice as many weapons.'

I audibly groaned as there was even more stuff I didn't know and all of this would definitely come into play. "Who is this Allegria?" I asked reluctantly. 'Just some gall whose tail was one day crushed by a big metal object, that we now know to be a tank, and at the same time a big book with cool pictures fell on her head. And since then she's been trying to unite everything, whatever that might mean.'

I inhaled deeply. "So you're hoping that a violent conqueror will come to your help? I that right?" 'Actually to be a violent conqueror you would have to be violent. And seeing as the only thing she does is walk in and tell everyone that she has more stuff and is smarter she is the leader. So she can't be violent.' He retorted.

"Politics'' was the first thing that came to my mind. "Okay let's put that aside, I need to know more about this place so I don't do anything wrong in my speech or whatever I try to do to convince everyone to fight." He happily nodded and pulled a sizable stack of paper out. 'I'll keep it simple.' He had a featureless smile on his face as he wrote that.





"Okay so ninety percent of the people here, stay here because they can be as violent and wild as they want to be and demolish everything?" He nodded in confirmation. "And the other twelve procent, because both groups intertwine, are here because they can tinker with all there broken stuff or learn medicine by healing everyone that gets wounded here?" He nodded again.

I took a very deep breath. "And you're part of both?" He pointed at some, using one of his fingers, contraption in a corner that looked like it was made with not-so-peaceful intentions. I also felt slightly jealous, because those fingers looked extremely useful. How do earth ponies even grab stuff, especially the kind of stuff that you don't want to have in your mouth.

That would a question for another time. Probably never. Back on point I discovered quite some interesting stuff. They had been living here for around four centuries, assuming that time here is the same as in Equestria, though the stadium was already there from what he and his kind could recall. This was also a cult of violence to put it bluntly. They took immense pleasure from both inflicting and receiving wounds and blows. Some even got aroused by it. That made me want to puke when I first heard... well read that. 

They were careful not to inflict any fatal or maining wounds, but broken bones and the occasional scar were fair game. back In Equestria this would have been horrifying, but here it's just a normal tuesday. And, I did find that to be slightly reassuring, they would only inflict wounds on those willing to receive wounds. Meaning that they would first ask If you wanted to get hurt and if you said no then they would respect that.

This however did make my task at hoof easier. I needed to convince them to fight, which they loved doing. I just needed to find the proper way to convey said message. Also the shadowy being in front of me, I wish that I knew how to read his name, that he had some two-a-three hundred beings already on his side.

He also mentioned that there was some kind of leadership role or position. He skimmed over it, writing that it wasn't that important.

They used the stadium because it was big, sturdy and filled with a whole bunch of miscellaneous items. They also organised a whole bunch of games and fights in the center of the stadium. One of which would start in half-a-day. Everyone would be there. So it would be a perfect occasion to give a speech to everyone.

I had been given a pen and a piece of paper to write my "speech" on it. I still had some time, so I went to work on it.





I moved through the now crowded hallways and stairs in search of a good seat. More and more of the shadowy beings were pouring into the stadium. I had decided to keep my armor on as pretty much every other spectator had some kind of protection on.

They sat on piles of boxes or makeshift platforms to watch the proceedings. I was fortunate enough to find one of the few chairs that had not been brutally butchered. I held a pile of paper with my "speech" written on it. It was mostly empty with a few words written on it. Talking in front of a few spectators watching my magic show was one thing. But now I was trying to convince a lot of very violent beings to go to what was basically war.

But for now I would watch the games, which would give me some more time to think. 

There were currently two teams on the field. Well I assumed those were two different teams because on one side they all wore red clothes, rags and helmets and the other wore the same stuff but green. There were also two flags, one on each side and the field had been filled with temporary structures.

Another I noticed were three beings that were seated in a more luxurious and less damaged looking stand not too far away from me. The three of them also wore what looked like silver bracelets and pendants alongside intact clothes. Actually those looked more like ceremonial robes than the kind of clothes you would normally wear. Possibly the leaders or higher ups of this place? One of them was much tinier and actually looked much younger than the two others.

I decided that it was currently not important.

I saw one of the mouthless, as in no mouth, shadowy beings somehow use a whistle. The games then started. Both sides then proceed to carefully advance through the maze of boxes and scrap piles. And then both sides reached each other. I then winced and ended up half covering my eyes as the violence started and then quickly escalated.

The show had started





I had to admit that some of the events were quite fascinating. Some actually were simply about acrobatics. It was both fascinating and oddly morbid to see beings with snake tails for lower bodies compete with beings with six or eight legs. Though it did often escalate in violence.

Some of the events also were much more graceful than others. During one of those events, the participants wore intricate, graceful and well designed robes made out of silk instead of the torn rags that everyone else was wearing. They then proceeded to either dance, do acrobatics or a combination of both and it did not end in violence.

Some of the other events involved shooting big metal and wooden cylinders at immobile piles of scrap, shooting those same cylinders at each other, multiple ball games with a varied amount of violence, throwing stuff including each other far away, straight up boxing and wrestling and a whole bunch of other stuff.

They were also playing music this whole time through some broken loudspeakers. Except when some musicians went on a makeshift stage to play with their instruments.

I would have to go to that stage and talk to the thousands of beings present here. This made me nervous and I started sweating. Especially since this was the last game and the shadowy being that had asked to speak in front of everyone had come to bring me there.

I started following him inside when I suddenly heard something crash into the ground. And everything had gone silent. No clapping, no whistling, not even the sound of something getting hit. We both turned around. All eyes were aimed at the stand that I had seen with the three more luxurious and elegant beings. 

One was holding the tiniest of the three in its arms. The tiniest and youngest looking one looked utterly terrified and huddled in the arms of it's taller compatriot. The third one was nowhere to be seen. Instead a railcar stood in its place, having crashed into the stand and likely crushed the being there.

Another wagon, this time a locomotive, landed on the playing field crushing multiple of the participants.

And then another.

And then a dozen more.

The destruction left by the wagons, carts, pieces of buildings and even boats was quickly overshadowed by a humongous screech let out by what had to be thousands of creatures.

This was then answered by the sound of just as many knives, swords, axes and other miscellaneous weaponry being unsheathed.


"Oh, fu...