//------------------------------// // Chapter 7 // Story: My Little Schnee // by Krieg cormac //------------------------------// "Oh no." Spike muttered under his breath, which did little to cure Weiss' unease as Twilight's grin started to grow a bit too large for the Huntress' comfort.  "What's Herzlander you ask?" Twilight said, scooting a bit closer towards Weiss. Giving her other visitors a glance, every fiber in Weiss' being told her not to continue, mostly Spike and Luna bobbing their heads no violently as Princess Celestia slowly made her way out of the room.  Still, Weiss needed to know more about this world, even if the process was tedious and rather annoying. It would be like ripping off a bandaid in one motion, instead of doing it slowly and only causing more pain.  "Yeah." Weiss shrugged her shoulders. It should have been obvious by her question in all honesty.  "Glad you asked! You see, Herzlander is the primary language of, as you may have guessed, the Herzland!" Twilight Sparkle started ranting. The cute dragon flashed her a betrayed look before settling in on his chair, while Luna sighed, but remained seated. "The Herzland also happens to be the heartland of the Griffonian Empire, ruled by the line of Grover. Grover the First founded the empire by defeating the neighboring kingdoms of Wingbardy and Aquileia, and went on a warpath with its surrounding nations."   "I see." Weiss forced a smile on her face as she nodded along. She did ask for it after all.  "By the way, did you know that your name means White Snow in Herzlander?!" Twilight continued. She started scribbling in her notebook before levitating it over to Weiss' hands. Grabbing it hesitantly, Weiss still didn't trust magic, her eyes started to scan the page. Twilight had written her name in Atlesian. "Isn't that so interesting? And it's the same language as German from the human world!"  "It is." Weiss murmured as she ran a finger over the freshly written words. After the Great War, the Schnee family had made it a habit to name their members with words related to snow, after their family name. "Atlesian has the same alphabet, and language."  "Atlesian?" This time it was Luna who had spoken.  "It's one of the four languages where I'm from." Weiss explained. She was fluent in all four of them, Valish, Atlesian, Mistralian and Vacuan. One of the many benefits of not having any friends when she was younger. "What language are we speaking in right now?" She held out the notebook again.  "Ponish, you might know it as English." Twilight took the notebook, her face scrunched up in thought.  Weiss shook her head. "Valish." It looked like they had something in common at least. What was with the alicorn and assuming the names of the languages Weiss spoke? Sure she was the so-called expert on humans, but that was still a bit too assuming.  "Oh." Twilight turned her head towards Spike so fast she almost broke her neck. "I'm going to need you to bring more notebooks, Spike, and bring some coffee while you're at it."  Coffee did sound nice, and it made Luna perk up from her spot, but it did little to ease the discomfort Weiss was starting to feel in her stomach. It wasn't the fish, she knew that much. As nice and cute as these ponies were, Weiss just wanted to go home.  She missed Ruby.  Weiss Schnee was not from the human world that Twilight had been to several times, that much was extremely obvious. Especially when she started to explain the Grimm, and a brief history of Remnant, Twilight was definitely to ask more questions about that later.  "So this 'Dust' allowed humanity to fight back?" Twilight had gone through several pens at this point. She would have gone through more, had Princess Luna not been there to hold her barrage of questions back. Princess Celestia was long gone, which was understandable.  "Yes, along with our aura." Weiss said a bit distracted, but that should be normal given the circumstances. She was definitely from another world, unless her world was the future of Sunset's old friends! That could help explain the similarities in their languages, and time did pass differently in both worlds.  It was just a theory of course, and not even a fully thought out one.  Weiss spoke again before Twilight could ask another question. "When you found me, was there anything else?"  "A sword and a few gems." Princess Luna answered. "I kept them in a chest in my room, just in case."  That helped Weiss feel relieved, judging by her facial expressions, or at least Twilight thought so. It's been a while since she had seen a human, and their customs were foreign to anypony. In all honesty, Sunset would have been better suited to handling this, but that didn't mean Twilight wasn't going to do her best! She still had a lot of notes from her experiences at Canterlot High.  These 'Huntsmen' and 'Huntresses' sounded so interesting! Was their aura related to magic? How did Dust change the way their civilizations formed? Sunset's human world had dopplegangers of Twilight's friends from Ponyville, did Weiss' world have the same? If so, that meant that there was somecreature on the planet that also held the name of Weiss Schnee, with a similar personality.  "I'd appreciate it if they were returned to me." Weiss also mentioned that she was the heiress, former heiress now that Twilight remembered, of a large company that handled Dust, which was perfect! That meant that there was more for Twilight to learn.  "Of course." Princess Luna smiled. "I was merely holding onto them until you woke up."  "And these Grimm, what did they look like? Where did they come from? How many variants of them are there? How dangerous are they?" Twilight asked as soon as there was a lull in the conversation. Weiss had only mentioned the Grimm briefly, monsters that had pushed her world to the edge of extinction. "Did they all originate with a common ancestor? Are they also able to use Dust or aura? And what about magic, you mentioned that it's rare in your world."  It worried Princess Luna, even Twilight could notice that. If Weiss could somehow end up in their world, what was stopping the creatures of Grimm? Would the Royal Guard be able to stop such a horde of creatures? And their standing army was even smaller, half the size of the Guard!  "Uh, one at a time please." Weiss' grimace went unnoticed by the Princess of Friendship. "And I think it's my turn to ask a few questions."  Twilight nodded. "Yes?" This was so exciting!  Weiss took a deep breath. "Is there a way to send me back home?"  "Possibly, but there isn't a guarantee that it would work." Twilight didn't want to offer any false hope. The mirror that connected to the human world wouldn't activate again for several moons, especially since Sunset and her journal were now on this side. And since the human world that was connected by the mirror was of a different reality, that would just be another deadend, unless Weiss' world was from the dystopian future, which again, was just a wild guess.  That seemed to have crushed Weiss' spirits, but she nodded anyway.  "I want to try."