//------------------------------// // Combat and Magic // Story: Messing up timelines sure does cause mayhem // by ShadowLord Ver50 //------------------------------// The wait for Twilight Sparkle to be free turned out to be...longer than expected. The Princess of Friendship was horribly busy this entire month, with the School Of Friendship slowly gaining more and more traction, this resulted in her having to hire more and more staff to cover for things her friends couldn't handle, and generally, managing a school was hard. She did promise them a meeting sometime, but it likely wouldn't be for a while due to all the stuff that kept popping up. The EEA was quick to warn others of the fact that the School Of Friendship wasn't approved by them, and attempted to frame it in a way more akin to a Summer Camp. (Perhaps they would've done more, but this was a school supported by a Princess and saviors, they couldn't just tell people not to go like that). Of course, by now, the knowledge of there being another Draconequus in Equestria was confirmed by Celestia herself. The result was predictable; mass mayhem. Some thought that the Princesses were being too lenient with Discord and that he couldn't just bring another reality-bending entity into the world. Others believed that while Discord certainly wasn't in the right for his execution, he hadn't done anything wrong either. And then some were simply interested in the Draconequus species in general. How many truly were there? And is Discord really one of a kind or just another member of his species? Discord himself refused to answer any of their questions or even show up for the matter, simply observing the mess they made from afar. Aster did venture into Equestria during this time period, partly because Discord's realm was only so interesting and partly because he was curious about how it would feel to be in an area when mayhem was running through the populous. Being in Discord's realm was always comfortable, perhaps it felt nicer to Discord but the energy there was comforting. Being in the middle of town when mayhem was running amok, however, was like being in a 10-course all-you-can-eat buffet. And the best part is you can't get full or sick. If he had to describe the difference between the two energies, he'd say one felt richer, more energizing than the other. It was like swimming through an ocean, but with every stroke you swim energy rushes into you nonstop. By the end of the day, he was basically a jittery mess that had to turn a bit of the Everfree upside down to actually calm down enough to think straight. And even after he still felt like he could run a mountain. So he figured he might as well try some more training to get all this energy out. "To your right!" Aster braced as he saw dozens upon dozens of tennis balls flying towards him from the cannons that launched them. With a quick breath, he expanded his magic, feeling every individual ball for a moment, before commanding his magic to act. With a flash of white light, all that remained of the projectiles were flakes of confetti. But it wasn't over yet. Suddenly something roared from behind him. A giant mechanical dragon screeched at him, with Discord in the cockpit. "Well, well, well! Seems like you've learned how to use Chaos in self-defense! Now let's see how if you know how to use it in offense!" Aster teleported into the air as the beast smashed its hand down, his wings feelings the rush of the wind against them. He soared into the clouds, thinking, Chaos magic holds the energy to alter the reality, and thus it was him that needed to figure out how to take the thing out fast. Suddenly an idea came. As the robot screeched once, preparing some beam attack, the air around them cackled wickedly. From within the cockpit, Discord could sense something gathering, scowling before his eyes went wide and- BOOM! Debris was all that remained of the once-mighty robot as the sky shimmered with lightning. Discord appeared in a flash of white light, looking completely unharmed. "Funneling your magic into lightning, eh? Well, you've always had some affinity for the stuff..." he mused before vanishing once more. Suddenly, 10 more dragon robots appeared, far larger than the one before them. Their screeching could be heard all throughout their forest arena. Aster glanced at them, wings beating as he kept himself in the air. 'They won't go down to the same kind of attack.', he realized, before glancing up to the air. 'What if I were too...' Distinctly, he heard the sound of several more beam attacks charging up, and suddenly an idea came. Instead of retaliating, he formed a shield, deciding to take the blast head-on. He could feel the energy of the beams race into the shield, attempting to crack it with all their power. Aster smiled,' Just as I thought.' When the barrage ended, the full energy of the beams still crackled from within the shield before Aster collapsed the shield, and with it the energy, into a single focus point before shooting it into the sky....where the beam suddenly tore open it rushed out as shockwave of lightning rained on the area. Almost instantly, the machines were decimated by the sheer force of the attack, vaporized into nothingness. It was pure silence for a moment but then... "Bravo! Bravo! Bravooooo! Simply marvelous!" Smiling more than a little with glee, Aster turned to the control panel within the mountain where the actual Discord was. "Such power! Such Ingenuity! Such sheer destructiveness! You, my friend, have earned a full twenty out of twenty!" Aster laughed a little, flying down as the terrain reverted back to how it typically was with the realm of chaos. To his relief, he actually felt somewhat tired, not like he wanted to run ten marathons. He landed on the island, where Discord was waiting for him. "You certainly outperformed my initial expectations I had for you," He remarked, "Of course, the energy high would likely have helped." "Honestly, I'm just glad I can sit still now," Aster replied, simply content to sit down and breathe in and out. His wings fluttered lightly behind him. "Well, at least now you know how to get that extra boost of energy in case you ever need it." Discord replied, taking a sip of chocolate milk that he just materialized. "Wait...why is that I was so energized?" Aster asked. Discord paused for a moment before sighing, "Oh well, I suppose I can play teacher more time." Suddenly they were back in a classroom, with Discord now adorning a professor's outfit. "Now then," He said in some vague accent, "if you had to describe the interaction between magic and living things, how would you do it." Aster thought back a little, too how he was practically bouncing around before he managed to blow some of that energy off. 'An amount of energy that decreases the more of it you spend...hey, wait a minute.' "Like a battery?" He answered. Discord nodded, and a drawing of a battery and a pony appeared on the whiteboard. "Yes, precisely! Magical Energy is stored as Mana in an individual's Mana Pool. Now, this pool is a measure for the amount of magical energy an individual can have at maximum, and the larger the pool, the more energy the magic user has." "Now, remember, the size of the mana pool is not a measure for strength," Another doodle appeared on the board, a sign which showed a ridiculously long battery and a dumbbell, between them a not equal sign was there, "Strength, is measured via the power of the mana. A lot of Unicorns in the olden days made the mistake of believing a larger pool meant more power; it led to a few amusing incidents to say the least." The drawings on the board flashed and suddenly were animated, with what appeared to be Unicorn Stallion bragging with the speech bubble showing a large battery, the other Unicorn (who looked vaguely like Starswirl the Bearded), was getting increasingly irritated before his horn lit up and he blasted the bragging stallion, whose eyes comically were still visible through the blast. In the end, the stallion was charred completely and quickly faceplanted into the ground as the surrounding dust from the blast formed into a dumbbell. The stallion who fired the blast looked very proud of himself. Aster giggled a little at the gag. Whether or not this was a problem the actual Starswirl had to deal with is something he'll likely never know. Mainly because Discord is only somewhat trustworthy as a source, and he doesn't know enough about the actual Starswirl to figure out if he'll tell the truth. "Anyway," Discord continued, "Mana pools, like actual batteries, can be recharged. One universal recharge method that applies to every species is rest. Simple, efficient, and with the bonus of getting a goodnight's sleep every day. For individuals like us or the Alicorns though, there is another vastly more efficient method. Drawing power from your Element." Another drawing appeared, this time, of Princess Celestia and the Sun, with a link between the two. "Now, take Princess Sunshine, for instance, her connection to the Sun effectively serves as a massive generator to her mana pool battery. At any time she pleases, she can almost instantly replenish her mana via her connection with the sun and even enhance it with the said connection. The same applies to you and your elements." "Oh..." Aster murmmered in realization, "So me being near Mayhem just charges my mana a lot?" "Not just your mana, but your energy in general." Discord corrected, "For magical spirits like us, energy is our lifeblood. So when we are near our element, we draw energy itself from it. Be it physical, or magical." Aster digested the information for a bit before an idea slowly started to form. If magical energy could be replenished then... "Hey, Discord? Do you mind explaining one last thing?" "Ughhhhhhh!" Discord groaned, "I swear, these past few days, I've practically been reduced to an exposition officer...Fine, what is it?" "Couldn't Ponies have just...replenished their magic if Tirek took it from them?" Suddenly, the world went dead silent. Discord himself, who was just bemoaning having to do more exposition suddenly stood very still, almost like a startled cat. The Realm itself suddenly felt eerily quiet. Even though he was in a makeshift classroom, things just felt...silent. This wasn't a natural feeling in the Realm Of Chaos, noise was typically everywhere if not literally, then magically. But now, that noise sounded like a painfully awkward silence that was waiting to be filled. And then suddenly, he wasn't in a classroom anymore. They were simply on an island in the Realm Of Chaos. Aster blinked a bit at the location shifting, before looking at the Draconequus in front of him, who casually walked out to the edge of the islands, glancing up at the sky of the realm. "I'm afraid it doesn't...work that way." He said after a while, and never once, in his now 3 weeks of living here did Aster ever hear the Spirit of Chaos sound so old. "What do you mean?" He asked. Discord sighed, "If their magic could regenerate, then Tirek wanting to take it would've never have been an issue. You see, every magical creature has an amount of magic within them that is designated as 'not for use by their body and souls. This magic is what is used to aid in sustaining them, doing things like increasing healing or helping fight diseases, manifesting and sustaining cutie marks, and recharging the mana pool. Now, you see...Tirek's draining technique didn't exactly discriminate when it came to magic." "So wait..." Aster murmured, his eyes going wide, "...if that magic was gone..." "Then they truly had nothing." Discord finished for him. "But what about the Princesses? Aren't they similar to us?" The Spirit Of Mayhem wondered "Not exactly," The Spirit of Chaos replied, "While their soul structure is similar to a magical spirit's, at the end of the day, they are still ponies. That magic was also used to sustain their connection to their elements. Without it, they lose that connection and can't regain it unless something else empowers them." "But what about you?" Aster inquired, "Were you also affected the same way when Tirek drained your magic?" "No, I wasn't," Discord answered, "You see, because magical energy is the lifeblood of a spirit, it is impossible truly strip them of their magic. Our bodies and souls are simply designed in a way that makes it impossible. It will simply regenerate. However, Tirek was strong enough to drain my magic, so I wouldn't have been able to do much even If I did regenerate it, and it would've taken me around 2 months to fully regain my power." "I see..." Aster murmured, digesting the information. However, there was something else on his mind as well... Never once before did he ever hear Discord sound so...solemn. The Spirit Of Chaos was typically whimsical, a jokester that never seemed to take anything seriously. But now...he almost sounded like a weary old man. Someone who's seen the very worst of the world, and is merely relaying it through words that could never hope to capture the full experience. "Is..." Aster started, tentatively, "something on your mind?" Discord didn't answer back, simply looking at the chaotic landscape around him, perhaps in contemplation. "Do you know the moment I truly gave up on conquering Equestria?" He said after a painfully long pause. "Um, was it when Fluttershy befriended you?" Aster answered. "I mean, there you said you'd use your power for good from now on so..." "No, it wasn't then." He gave a humorless chuckle and turned to face Aster, and for once, Aster actually felt like he was staring at an ageless Deity of Chaos. "I made it my life's goal for Chaos to rule the Multiverse, do you really think the words of a single pegasus could change my mind about that?" "But, didn't you value her friendship?" The boy asked back. "I...didn't realize its value up until Tirek betrayed me." Discord answered, "you saw how it was in the Plunder Vine episode, didn't you? I could hardly be bothered to remember her name. Granted she did start growing on me but...I always felt like it was a leash of sorts. That, whenever I did anything, they would just go tell Fluttershy, and since I couldn't bear to lose the first friend I ever made, I had to comply. Looking back it now, it felt as if I were trapped and well...you know how the Spirit Of Chaos reacts to being trapped." "W-well, I guess that's kinda obvious, but...if you did feel trapped, why didn't you just...try saying anything to Fluttershy? Or to Celestia?" Aster questioned. "Again, I didn't think Fluttershy would've cared, and I didn't think Celestia would either. Their duties were to their nations as leaders and role models, why would anyone care about what the Spirit Of Chaos thinks? All they'd see is me terrorizing their people." There was a bitter resignation in his voice, not anger, but a quiet, bitter acceptance. Discord sighed yet again, staring out into the endless void of the Realm Of Chaos. "This brings me to the next thing," He said, turning back to face Aster after a moment of contemplation, "I always thought that my rule over ponies would've made them stronger. If they could adapt, they'd survive practically anything. The thing with Order and Harmony is that Ponies often end up complacent to authority, and that allows authority to steamroll over them. You've seen it with King Sombra, haven't you?" "Mhm, the Crystal Ponies were too afraid to challenge his rule, and then he bought out the mind control helmets..." Discord nodded, "I wanted Equestria to be the polar opposite of that. I wanted to abolish the concept of authority." "But," Aster spoke up, "Anarchy isn't a good basis for any civilization. I read a little about it back in the human world, but out of all the governing philosophies, Anarchy is probably the worst. You'd have freedom, but you'd have to sacrifice everything else for said freedom." The Spirit Of Chaos snorted, "Had you told me that before, I would've laughed in your face, probably making up half a dozen arguments to make Anarchy appealing, but looking back at it now...I was being selfish. The only person that would've ever benefited from Anarchy, would've been me. I was just making up excuses to justify my beliefs to myself." "That's...surprisingly reflective of you," Aster stated. He'd be lying if he said he wasn't somewhat surprised at how easily Discord was admitting his faults right now. Typically, it would take him getting in trouble with Fluttershy to get him to admit anything. "Yeah, well, in a way, I have Tirek to thank for it." Discord muttered offhandedly. "Oh, that's in- wait what?" Aster spluttered. "Believe it or not, it is true," Discord replied, "You see before Tirek betrayed me, I always thought I was the better ruler for Equestria than Celestia is. I always thought the ponies were simply being bratty about all the chaos; not seeing the newfound freedom they had. I always thought I was doing a thankless job for them, that I knew what was best." "And...Tirek somehow convinced you otherwise?" The boy asked, his tone sounding a bit skeptical. "Oh he didn't just convince me I was wrong, he showed me I was wrong." The Draconequus responded, "having my magic be taken from me was a vastly unpleasant experience, one that left me so utterly drained and made walking feel like lifting ten tons of bricks... And that was the fate I nearly condemned every pony in Equestria to." Aster shifted uncomfortably, now having Magic himself, he could feel how intertwined the stuff was with his essence. Having that be taken by force...even though he would eventually regain it, he shuddered to think how it would feel. "How exactly did that show you were not a good ruler, though?" Discord crossed his arms, "Because a good ruler would never have let any of that happen in the first place. Celestia saw the danger, that's why she sent me. She knew that looking for Tirek herself would've been useless because she'd have no idea where to start and every pony Tirek came across was just more magic for him to absorb. She sent me because I was her chance at ending the problem as soon as possible. I, on the other hand, didn't even realize the potential ramifications of helping Tirek, I was too tempted by the chance to spread and create more chaos to care. It never once occurred to me that through his method of draining magic, he could become strong enough to drain me of my own magic or that he'd backstab me when really, it was obvious he would." "And, at the end of the day," He continued, "It wasn't me who stopped Tirek, It was Harmony's chosen. After seeing how my actions had set everything spiraling down and then seeing how Harmony had actually done what's best, how could I call myself a good ruler or say I knew what was best?" "Well," Aster interjected, "Some people theorized that you planned the betrayal to get Twilight the final key..." He quickly stopped when he saw Discord looking at him in with an expression that he hadn't seen before. Pure and utter disbelief. "Do you really think I would've gambled an entire nation to get someone a key for a crystalline box, a box with contents that I didn't even know what were?" He asked rhetorically, still utterly dumbstruck by the notion. "I appreciate the acknowledgment of my Chessmaster tendencies, but a lot of my plans tend to have reasonable chances at success. I wouldn't, in a hundred thousand years, ever gamble on a newly-minted Alicron Princess forgiving me for causing the events that destroyed her home, capturing her friends, betraying the nation she served, let alone her thinking that after all of that, I was worth the power of 4 Alicorns." Aster winced, "well when you put it that way..." "Doesn't exactly sound like an argument that makes sense, does it?" Discord finished for him. At that comment, Aster went silent for a moment, before a sly smile formed on his face. "Oh? But what fun is there in making sense?" Discord stared at him blankly for a moment, before burning out in laughter. "Oh, sweet Chaos, I'm creating a monster here aren't I?" "A monster that will eventually destroy Equestria with bad jokes," Aster agreed happily. "The worst part is, Celestia's likely going to be too busy laughing at the jokes to notice the anvil floating on top of her," Discord wryly lamented. "Anyway, I think that's enough serious, boring discussions for one day," The Spirit murmmered, pulling out an entire clock and studying it for a moment before suddenly gasping. "My, my, would you look at the time! It's nearly time for my Guys Night with Spike and Big Mac! Well, I'll be off now! Don't stay up too early!" And with that, The Master of Chaos vanished in a bright flash of light. The clock he brought into existence quickly fell to the floor and shattered. The pieces remained motionless on the floor for a moment, before suddenly, a man made of broomsticks emerged, dragging the pieces(which had started screaming, one saying they were too young to die) away. Aster, of course, didn't notice any of this because he had once again wandered into the realm of his thoughts. 'I never expected Discord of all people to be so...open about his mistakes. He never acted that way in the show, not unless he screwed up big time. Well, I guess helping Tirek is a big-time screw-up, but still, I feel like there's something I'm not getting here..' Aster wondered to himself. Looking back at it, this was one of the two times he's ever seen Discord behave in an almost...melancholy way. One was when he mentioned the bewitching bell, Discord's reaction to that was pure confusion without any humor, questioning himself why he ever thought that was a good idea. The other was now when talking about the Tirek incident. The latter wasn't as notable due to him clearly explaining his feelings about it, but the former... 'Does Discord have some connection to Grogar?' Aster questioned internally. Admittedly, the prospect of finding something out about the actual Grogar excited him a little. Truth be told, Grogar likely would've been one of his favorite villains in the show...had it not been for the abysmal ending of Season 9. Since then, he has long since resigned himself to the fact that he likely wouldn't be getting much information on the actual Grogar. (The comics were already a rather...dubious, source of information and their canonicity wasn't exactly clear). But now, he could actually gain genuine information on the Father Of Monsters himself! And he's pretty sure there was no shortage of questions he wanted to ask. However, before he could get too carried away with this knowledge, another thought quickly arises in his head, a counter to his excitement: How exactly was he going to get any of this information? Then, Aster paused. Really, the answer should've been simple. Just ask Discord. However, forethought revealed that it was probably much more complicated than that. Discord doesn't like playing exposition officer, and Grogar might actually be a sore subject for the Spirit Of Chaos. (Well, judging from his reaction to the Season 9 stunt anyway- He was curious about why Discord reacted like that but had a feeling he wouldn't get anywhere if he asked). Sighing a little, The Spirit Of Mayhem and former human deflates, 'Guess I'm not getting anywhere with that anytime soon, huh?' As badly as he wanted to know more about Grogar, he did have other things he should likely be doing right now. Such as plotting his next moves. Right now, he needed to wait for Twilight Sparkle to be free, so he could finally gain entry to the School Of Friendship. But he also needed to plot how exactly he was going to deal with Cozy Glow. 'From what Discord said about how it's like to have magic be taken from you...', Aster shuddered slightly again, 'Yeah, I really don't want to go through that. I need to be careful when befriending her, and I should probably figure out more about how exactly Cozy drained the magic...didn't she use some set of Artifacts? He needed to find out more about normal magic in general, how it worked, and what limitations there were. If he could, then he could figure out how properly set up a failsafe in case he couldn't just convince Cozy to stop. And since Discord probably doesn't want to continuously answer all his questions, he should probably start researching somewhere else. 'I should probably go to a Library, but Golden Oaks was destroyed and I don't know where any other Library is...' Aster pondered for a moment, 'maybe I could ask Celestia? She seems to be generally fine with me so she shouldn't have any problems showing me some basic books about how magic works.' "SKREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Aster jumped as something suddenly let out a loud piercing screech. 'What on earth!? Did something manage to get in here without Discord knowing!?' He turned to the sound of the screeching and saw a giant eagle directly coming at him. With barely any time to react, he quickly manifests a shield...only for impact never to come. He felt strong winds blowing against the shield, and he looked up to see the giant eagle...that he now realized was wearing a mailman's uniform. "You have: one new message." It spoke in a voice and tone practically stolen from message bots in his world (he never exactly learned what they were called). It then reached into the bag it had and carefully picked up a letter, which it gingerly placed on the ground before him. It then proceeded to fly away as if nothing ever happened. Aster stared at the thing uncomprehendingly for five seconds, breathing heavily all the while before letting out a sigh of pure relief. "Oh thank goodness...This realm sometimes, I swear..." He huffed, dismissing the shield before telekinetically opening the letter: "To Aster the Draconequus, Hi Aster, This is Twilight Sparkle. I'm sorry it's taken me so long to finally reach out to you, I've been incredibly busy as of late due to the School Of Friendship opening up. Lots of new students are wanting to join, and then there's a bit of PR mess I've been having to deal with concerning the Equestrian Education Association. But, I finally have some free time next week, so I was thinking we could maybe have our appointment then? Please do note that Discord can't come with you. This meant to be an examination of your behavior independently to determine if you can join the School Of Friendship. (No need to stress or anything, from what Fluttershy's told me you seem to be doing just fine in the behavior department, I just need to check myself to make sure it's okay for you to join the school with other ponies and students). Of course, given the nature of my schedule over the past few weeks, I would prefer if you answer this as soon as possible so I can book an appointment and set it in stone. I'm looking forward to having you potentially join our School! Sincerely, Twilight Sparkle, Princess Of Friendship." Silence rang out for a moment after he read the letter, before a small smile formed on Aster's face. "Guess it's time to start phase 1 of the plan."