A combination of morbid curiosity and boredom drew Twilight’s gaze across the table to her companion’s table settings. Sitting with her was a mismatched creature with a lion’s paw and an eagle’s claw attached to a slender body. In both the claw and paw, the creature held two wooden manipulators with missing strings. As he moved each manipulator, his utensils and dishes would move about. Two pieces of bread had skewers through them and were hovering over a small fire. A fork turned the skewers as if it were roasting the bread. Standing in front of a plate was a miniature cow made out of butter with a string leading to a knife. The fork lifted one of the skewers, pushing a piece of toast onto the plate. While the fork returned to roasting the other bread, the knife led the butter cow to the center of the toast. The knife bowed with its teeth cutting through the cow’s neck. The butter animal screamed in pain, part of it oozing out onto the toast. The knife scrapped itself along the now dead animal, spreading its remains on the toast.
The creature looked up from his work. “Is there a reason you’re staring at my breakfast, Doctor Princess Sparkle?” he asked. “Am I bothering you?”
Twilight pointed at the creature’s plate. “That’s disturbing, Discord,” she said. “How do you sleep at night?”
“Well, I’ve never seen such an extreme reaction to playing with food before,” Discord chuckled. “It’s fun, something you obviously don’t know about.”
“Creating a slaughter scene with realistic screaming is fun?”
“Schadenfreude is part of my nature.”
“You sicken me.”
“I love you too, Princess Doctor.” Discord returned to his miniaturized world. Twilight stared at the manipulators as he moved them around. Though objects on the table were moving about, there was no magical aura surrounding them. The manipulators like the utensils and food lacked a magical aura yet they somehow controlled everything like magic.
“How are you doing that?” Twilight asked.
“Pardon me?”
“Your magic. You’re clearly using those manipulators as a focus like a unicorn horn but there’s no trace of an aura. How’s it work?”
Discord tilted the right manipulator forward making a fork stab another butter cow. The cow moaned as it fell onto a piece of toast. He pushed his plate forward and placed the manipulators down on the table. Discord snapped his talons. A tape recorder and a cylindrical microphone appeared on the table in a flash. “I’m sorry, but I have to record the next part of my self-help tapes,” he said. Discord pulled a pair of black headphones over his ears. “I’ll explain later.”
“We’re not done-“
Discord pressed on the record button. The tape’s clicking stopped Twilight from speaking. He cleared his throat as he brought the microphone close to him.
“Congrats, if you’ve gotten to this tape, then there’s no going back,” Discord recited. “The world you know will never be the same and you probably don’t want that. Then again, if you’ve bought this, you already see things like I do.” Twilight rolled her eyes. “There’s only a few steps left. To do what I do, you need to know one of the greatest secrets that pony kind has forgotten. A secret that will let you shape reality however you choose. So allow me to share with you a lost piece of knowledge from Starswirl the Bearded.” The purple princess’ ears perked up.
“What?!” she shrieked.
“Starswirl, that poor fool,” Discord moaned. “He knew the truth, and he… shall we say ran far past the line of sanity because of it. Anyways, he observed that every creature had a set of universal beliefs. For example: all species subconsciously believe that gravity will pull them to the ground, all species believe that the sky is blue, and all creatures believe that rocks are hard. Starswirl theorized that these universal beliefs were programmed in each creature and helped form reality. Since everyone believes them, we all perceive reality the same way.”
Discord held out a claw. “But what happens if we changed our beliefs to something else?” he asked. “What happens if we truly believe something different to what we’ve taught? Would that change our reality?
“Let me give you an example. It’s impossible to make a blueberry jelly doughnut appear out of nowhere. Everyone knows and believes that. But…” Discord snapped his paw. Up above Twilight’s plate, a small speck appeared. The speck grew in size, turning a light shade of brown with spots of white powder on it. “If we believe, with our heart and soul, then reality will change.” A powdered pastry the size of a doughnut dropped onto Twilight’s plate. She reached out with a hoof to touch it. A shadow rose up from behind the plate, eating the doughnut’s shadow. A bite mark appeared on the doughnut where the shadow bit. Dark blue jelly oozed out of the bite. The shadow swallowed the last bit, the doughnut disappearing with it. Twilight threw Discord an annoyed look as he burped.
“What Starswirl discovered with that if you can shift that unconscious belief, you can shift reality. That truth brought an endless number of possibilities to his mind. He, like any pony would do, lost himself to the possibilities.” A manic smile stretched across Discord’s mouth. Madness hung in his eyes as a dark chuckle left his lips. “The endless possibilities of what the world could be. If he could make something small like making food appear, perhaps he could change the colour of the sky, or how clouds work, or gravity itself! Or the cycle of night and day! It’d be a glorious vision of fun that would-” Discord coughed.
“Pardon me,” he calmly said. “The point of this is that belief can change the world. To truly change your beliefs, you can either psychologically focus your thoughts, or you can take the easy choice of letting go of sanity. It’s your choice.” Discord pressed on the record button again. The tape stopped with a click and he removed his headphones.
“What you said can’t be true,” Twilight deadpanned. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“Hellllo? Spirit of Chaos? Of course it doesn’t make sense, chaos never does.” Discord stood up. “Believe it if you want, it doesn’t stop it from being true. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Angel Bunny and I have a game of Hide and Go Boom to finish. He’s beating me two to one and I will not lose to that rodent.” He snapped, himself and his recording equipment disappearing in a flash.
Twilight stared at her empty plate. “Belief makes reality, huh?” She closed her eyes. All logic said that a jelly doughnut wouldn’t drop on her plate. It was physically impossible without an actual doughnut or a way to make it. Despite it being impossible, she told herself that one would drop on her plate. She repeated the sentiment twelve times, a faint tingle itching the base of her horn. When she opened her eyes, nothing was on her plate. “Of course not, that’d be impossible. But I am in the mood for doughnuts now.” Twilight pushed herself out of her chair.
“I wonder if Spike wants to come to Joe’s with me,” she mused as she headed towards the exit. Unnoticed by her was a spec of sparkling dust floating above her plate. A single drop of blue jelly slowly seeped from the dust. The drop splattered on the plate as the dust disappeared.