//------------------------------// // Training Arc pt.3 // Story: Runaway to the Future // by TheGreatEater //------------------------------// It was a busy month leading into Soul's biological augmentation. Starting with the Matron, she had whittled away at the Blood Silk clan. Taking away the power of the clan's members had taken a week of solid preparation; it was a bit tedious to create the perfect spells to eat away at their minds while simultaneously implanting her will upon them. It was instant loyalty from one of the top seven predators in the Everfree, and a way to milk components that would net her a small fortune over time. Other than her leaps and bounds with her study of extraplanar planes, though, she made very few breakthroughs. However, what she did actually create was going to make her further innovations amazing, since all she needed to do was to start with a programmed core, then plant a seed to grow the plane. By time the final test project was needed, she’d have it complete. She would be the goddess of her own little world in a sense, although an actual goddess would out power her in every other area. But in her world, she’d have some semblance of control. The main problem would be entering and leaving, not because it couldn’t be done, but because programming it to be less uncomfortable than her usual form of extraplanar travel would be tricky. And even then it would probably still be uncomfortable to some degree. These thoughts and others ran through her head as she approached the eight golden orbs before her. She felt the rhythmic pulse they gave off, perfectly in sync with her heart. When she went into this entirely unknown plane, there would be no going back. However, there were two major upsides that negated any possible downsides (in her eyes, at least). One was that she’d be bumped up to an S-Rank Unicorn in terms of magical power (at least, as much of an S-Rank as a pegasus could be), and the other was a pony's ability to live and retain his or her youth depending on the amount of magic they held. With the power of the universe and nature running through her, she’d be virtually immortal; short of lethal injuries, murder, or black magic, she’d live forever! So with her mind made up, Soul affixed the nodes into her own arcane nodes,the eight magical centers that regulated magical energy within a pony's body. As she did so, she felt numbness spread through her body before being racked by violent convulsions. Just as she thought things could not get any worse, a burning sensation from the tip of her spine flooded up into her skull, washing her entire body in pain and torment. Just as she felt the fire reach its peak and she felt as if she were going to incinerate inside and out, she passed out into a sweet oblivion. As she drifted through what felt like a sea of darkness, she saw a spark of light, pulsated and growing brighter and brighter until it was blinding. She woke up drenched in sweat, and a dull burning ache radiated through out her body. She munched on her healing plant, appropriately named “Lunestia” by Soul after the inspirations for the plant. Although it was able to ease the burning sensation, the aches persisted as her muscles spasmed repeatedly from the jolted nerves, jerking with high amounts of magical energy as her body started the process of adapting to a higher state of being. Throughout this intense sensory overload, Soul only know one thing: She was in for a long ride. ************************************************************************************** As she took time to recover, Soul decided that it was time to put more effort into her network, considering she needed it to make her transition into business more efficient. The only other concern for her business was her age, which she altered by casting a simple age spell on herself, giving herself a more adult appearance. Aftergathering her fifteen gallons of Arachataur venom, ten flawless, colorless, and five carat round diamonds, and a 1 yard roll of Arachataur silk, she would end up with 2,307,100 bits. It was a good fortune, and while she didn’t need to go to Las Pegasus to gain more, she had built it up in her head for so long that she was going to do it anyway. Even if it was only for a well earned vacation, she could also use it to show off her skills before she started getting her business up and running. It was smooth sailing by the time Soul finally got everything set up, and things were only getting better for her. While sitting in a Donut Joe's, she saw a golden unicorn with green hair. He was sitting next to an older unicorn with a white coat and a gold mane, with a cutie mark of a contract on his flank. She remembered the colt as one of the ponies in her contacts. Walking over she said, in a more higher pitch, “I apologize, but I feel like I recognize you from somewhere. My daughter has spoken about someone she met at the CAfYL, and you bear a striking resemblance to her description of him. you must be his father? My name is Aurora Shard.” “I guess so, yes." the unicorn said, still a bit wary of this stranger pegasus. "My name is Asset Management, and I’m one of the best lawyers in Canterlot. Exactly who is your daughter, may I ask?” “Her name’s Soul Shard.” “Ah yes! I remember Goodwill talking about your company." It was a tedious conversation to say the least, but Soul eventually heard what she wanted to hear. "If you’d like," Asset finally said. "I can schedule an appointment with you next month, this day, around noon.” “That’d be perfect. But I thought that I’d meet the unicorn my daughter told me about, and would offer you a business deal as well as pay for your meal. My treat.” Giving a short nod, Soul paid the price for their meal and walked out. After a nice distance, she teleported to her cabin. She ventured into her Mindscape, when she finally confirmed her isolation. Inside her laboratory she was working on storing power away inside herself, for the purpose of powering up a spell, taking the massive surge of power and diverting a small amount of it into seal. She worked on creating the seed on her very own plane. Using raw spirit, as well as the positive and negative elements, she worked on slowly building the laws of reality that would govern the plane. Making a universal computer core was more difficult for larger planes than it was to make the core of the small globe that held the Lunestia Bush. The seed needed to create stable matter, boundaries. It needed to have some concept of gravity and atmosphere. It was going to be Soul's greatest achievement to date. It was going to be beautiful, and by programming viral components into it she was hoping that it would naturally grow into the size she wanted, while at the same time linking to any other planes or natural demiplanes that it came into contact with. She was also hoping that when her creation ran into other areas, it would link to doors that would allow her to go to places and take things from that place at will, while keeping everything she wanted in, in. With everything programmed as well as she could, Soul walked out of the Mindscape and saw that hours had passed and the moon had risen high into the night's sky. Walking outside, she looked up to see the Mare in the Moon, “Hey Mare on the Moon. Do you mind if I call you Moony?" She took the lack of objection as a yes. "Anyways, I did a lot of awesome things lately. I dominated and gained control over the Blood Silk colony of Arachataur. I made a massive fortune by myself, using magic to make diamonds. Soon, all of Equestria will have my brilliance stamped across their face then they’ll see how foolish they were to judge me. "I will be accepted and show everypony that a Pegasi can do magic just as well as a unicorn. Their superiority is coming to an end, and now that I’m immortal, all those Unicorns who hurt me will be dust within the ground.” There was a tinge of anger in Soul's voice, a tinge of hurt. She almost thought she saw the moon flare up in response to her, but decided to ignore it. “I don’t know if you can hear me, but soon I’ll be sending you a letter to go along with Friend Mark 2. Also, I’m making a viral demiplane. At least, I’m calling it a demiplane. And if any others naturally exist, this plane will send a link to... wherever you are... and attune to it. I will not only be able show others my power, but I will have entire worlds open to me. If your spell ever degrades fully, I’ll be able to take you into there to share my invention with you. Sweet dreams, Moony." ************************************************************** Over the last five months, Soul slowly overcame the random spasms that flared through her body, and while she still had moments where she’d suffer from magical migraines or random aches, it was not as chronic as it once was. Her social dates had proven successful in keeping her network strong, and while she was still socially inept, her dictation was great enough to ensure that she didn’t make a mule out of herself. It was through her alter ego Aurora Shard that she was able to set up several retainers for her future business. She also got patented several of her inventions with enough legal representation to rightfully control over all aspects of her intellectual creations, from the spells that governed them to the containers. It was going to be perfect when Soul's vacation ended. The creation of Shard Industries was going to be amazing, and Soul had four mastered inventions to start with. there were simple ones, like the Light Orb and the Mage Battery, but the other two were more complicated. She had devised and mastered a system for teleporting Mage electricity to pre-approved systems, thus sending electricity not only to homes, but throughout a home to things that needed electricity. This allowed people to access electricity without resorting to unicorn magic. Soul had effectively one-upped the unicorns, something in which she felt great pride. Soul's fourth, final, and perhaps most innovative invention dealt with intangible data; it was a way to store sound and data as well as send it over long distances. It had the potential to transform how people listened to music and transferred information; it would be so easy now. It had so many uses and was such a simple, although outside-the-box concept that it was amazing how easily she patented all the needed aspects of the invention. The time had now come to put in motion the final stages of her Demi-plane spell. She had planted the seed of the spell months ago, and was steadily working on placing together the plane. Sadly, though, she had run into some problems along the way. The central core was the strangest part of the demiplane to program. Over the months she had to set up a number of redundant systems to ensure that it was able to maintain stability as it grew exponentially. In addition to that roadblock, the maleable gravitational fields and raw magic caused the demiplane to have strange zones that were in hyper and hypo time. She had to work on giving a uniform flow of time to her new world, and that was very strange. Although, when Soul thought about it, it gave her hands on experience on seeing the mechanics of time up front. The next series of problems came as the demiplane was growing. While in the baby phase, spells that dealt with all the main mechanics needed for life were simple to cast and apply. But as the plane grew, and more and more complex patterns emerged. The spells needed to keep things in order needed more systems in place, and in the end her core was a complex set of redundant systems and reinforcing spells that kept the plane's magic heavy while orderly. Now it was time to ignite the final aspects of the spell and see if the demiplane could be self-sufficient. As she summoned herself into the plane, she looked around herself. Above her was the Plane’s core, held within a pale white sun. Around it were two moons, slowly circled the sun. Each Moon was part of the cores programming, and they reflected the light of the spell throughout the plane into distant stars, which were essentially miniature cores within themselves. It was what was gave her the idea for sending data over distances. Looking away from the sun and its twin moons, she took in the sight of the sky. One half of the sky was a beautiful night sky, while the other half was lit up as if it were daytime. Across the sky, the clouds turned from nice and dark to that of a fluffy white spring cloud. It was amazing to Soul that she could form clouds at will and make them move where she willed them without having to touch them. Looking a little lower, Soul saw the World Helix, a giant double helix of all eight elements flowing together and holding in its center a raw spring of spirit. On the bottom of the World Helix was a castle that took the power of the plane and, simply put, would allow Soul to travel to different multiverses. No matter how long she would have to wait, Soul would eventually have access to everything Equestria’s universe had to offer. Releasing the spell key for the plane’s core, she walked into the giant computer and looked at all the various interactions going on. In here, Soul felt like a goddess. This room was, in addition to an information hub, a good way to see background magic, something she had never considered before she made her own plane. It was amazing to see the background magic form and shape all the components that the foreground magic used to maintain form. What was truly amazing, though, was that it wasn’t a two dimensional field, but a six dimensional field, each aspect of it playing upon itself and allowing for multiple systems and interactions. The only thing she was waiting on was the formation of life. There was the components needed for it, and even though she had a multitude of plants and other flora that she never witnessed before, she needed fauna to make things truly interesting. But she was going to have to wait to create the perfect animals later, and even know she had basic fauna starting to form, all she needed to do was wait for things to progress or, if needed, to have a moment of inspiration from which she could form her own denizens. When that happened, she would be able to transport them to Earth. I have made something so beautiful that words can not capture it. I have something that allows my will to directly create what I wish to create. And here I am a goddess. I have such a rare gift, no others have even written about it. I am now ready to move on to my next phase of things. I will wait until the time is right, and when it is I will show Princess Celestia that I am a great mage. She will learn that Pegasi CAN do magic, and that I am worthy of being accepted. Then a change will be a coming. I need to go to Las Pegasus and relax first, though. I deserve a vacation. A+.