She was determined to ace the entrance exam today. She was still faced with what to do about Spike's egg, though. Maybe she could still pass without hatching Spike if she did exceptionally well on the rest of the exam. No, that would leave Spike as an egg. It looked like she was stuck hoping that her MP was high enough to hatch him without the Sonic Rainboom. Maybe it would be with her Efficient Spellcaster skill cutting the cost by 25%.
Anyway, she was going into the palace for the 'first' time. First for this lifetime anyway. Her parents were there for moral support more than anything else. She reached the gates and her parents showed the guards the necessary papers. They let her group inside, and she was quickly escorted to the examiner's building.
'Main Quest. Pass the Exam. Pass each part of the exam and become Celestia's student.'
She knew they would examine her theoretical knowledge, her intelligence, and then there was Spike's egg. In that order if she remembered correctly.
First was an examiner with a much harder test than the previous one. She knew all the answers to the questions off the top off her head at this point, surprising both her parents and the examiners.
Second was an examiner with an IQ test. "Now, I want you to try to solve the puzzle as quickly as possible," he said, only for her to display the already finished puzzle. He stared at her in disbelief.
"You might want to use a different one, I've done one of these before," she said, holding the puzzle out for him to take. He'd used this same puzzle the first time she did this, so it was probably the standard puzzle for this part of the exam.
He took the puzzle back, and gave her a different type of puzzle, she solved that one almost as fast. He tried a different puzzle, to the same result. Three types of puzzles later, he said, "Well, you're probably a lot smarter than anypony I've ever met, including me." He chuckled, apparently amused that all the puzzles he'd thrown at her, supposed to be difficult, were solved so easily.
She thought it was this easy because her Int was a little more than double what it had been the first time through. Which would make her IQ more than twice as high.
He asked to speak to her parents privately for a few minutes. She waited in a room back the way they'd come.
*** With the examiner ***
"Let me be perfectly frank. I've never seen what just happened. She solved those puzzles with a total lack of effort. Most adults with some practice wouldn't be able to do any of these easily. I could tell she hadn't been practicing with these types of puzzles as well," the examiner said.
"That's good, isn't it? She really couldn't have done better on this part of the test then," Night Light said.
"I think what he means is that that's not normal. We don't have any super-geniuses in our families, so where did the genes for that kind of an intellect come from?" Midnight Velvet asked.
"Exactly. What's more, it's well-documented that most of the most brilliant ponies in history have been erratic at best. A lot of them could have tried to take over the nation they were from with their talents and often natural charisma. Luckily they've all been lacking in that sort ambition thus far," the examiner said.
"Are you suggesting our daughter would-" Night Light began, voice rising in anger.
"I'm only trying to warn you that she's got the potential to do so. We'll have to keep a close eye on her, since I've no doubt she'll be the first to truly pass the next test," the examiner cut him off.
"What do you mean?" Midnight Velvet asked.
"I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell her, but the next test is hatching a dragon's egg. We don't actually expect a child to be able to hatch the egg of course. If they make it that far, they've already passed. We just want to see their reaction to failure. If they give up, we work on building up their confidence, if they get angry, then we work on helping them rein in their tempers.
However, I can guarantee that she'll be made the school's top student if she succeeds and hatches the egg." He chuckled. "We'll have to find a new test for the other foals, and a way of testing how she reacts to failure. Though if a dragon's egg isn't enough, we'll really have trouble finding something," he said, amusement lacing his words.
*** 2 minutes and 30 seconds later ***
She was back at the auditorium with the examiners watching her. Just like the first time, a stallion pulled in a cart with a dragon's egg. She smiled at the MP cost. 1000 MP to hatch the egg, but only 750 MP thanks to Efficient Spellcaster. That would leave her with 53 to spare. A tiny amount by her standards, but the point was that she could do it without the boost from the Rainboom.
She concentrated, and fired a beam of magic at the egg, with the intent of hatching it. She succeeded, and the egg cracked in half to reveal a familiar baby dragon. She smiled proudly. The examiners and her parents had both lost composure and were openly gaping. There was a flash, and her eight-point star cutie mark was back. The rainbow-colored shockwave from Rainbow Dash's Sonic Rainboom happened seconds after. Well, she'd hatched Spike, and managed to not turn her parents into plants. Certainly a win in her books.
After they'd regained their composure, the examiners immediately took her to Princess Celestia in her throne room.
"I understand you hatched the dragon's egg used in the exams," Celestia said, calmly sipping her tea.
It didn't matter that she'd technically been Celestia's student for years, she'd never been completely able to shake a feeling that she was doing something wrong or not well enough around her mentor. That was especially true since this was her mentor from before she knew Twilight.
"Yes, was I not supposed to?" she asked nervously.
"Technically no, you see, that test was meant to see how a pony would react to failure. Then the instructors at my school would know what to work on. However, you succeeded in something most adults wouldn't be able to do. Therefore, I would like to welcome you to the school, and to offer you the position of being my personal protege," Celestia said, smiling calmly.
"Really?" Twilight asked.
"Yes, really." Celestia's smile became reassuring.
Twilight looked over to her parents, who both nodded eagerly.
"YES!" she cried out, before clearing her throat and saying, "Yes," more quietly.
"Good. Now we'll have to have a more comprehensive test to see where exactly you are in your studies. As well as draw up a schedule for your classes with myself and the other teachers. You're going to have to stay at the castle as well. I look forward to teaching you," Celestia said.
"Right, thank you!" Twilight said.
'Quest Complete! +100 exp, +100 Bits, +5 skill points.'
She raised Positive Magic to 49/1000 with the points and Combat, Resilience, and Blade-wielding to 37/1000 with the points.
She went home, and they found Cadance and Shining Armor waiting there.
"How'd it go?" Shining Armor asked.
"Great! I did so well that Princess Celestia wants me to be her student. I'll be living there from now on. Speaking of which I have to pack," Twilight raced up to her room to do so.
"Wow, how'd she attract aunt Celestia's attention?" Cadance asked.
"She passed all three parts of the entrance exam, even hatching the dragon egg," Night Light said.
"Huh, that is impressive. Normally it would take 10 adults to do that, more to keep them from being exhausted afterwards. Dragons are naturally resistant to magic, but they need magic to hatch their eggs."
"Aunt Celestia has to hatch a few of them every year as part of the treaty between us. She's been the only one who could for a long time. I think Starswirl the Bearded and his apprentice Clover the Clever were the last ones, and even they'd be exhausted after just one each. How was Twilight afterwards?" Cadance asked.
"She was a little worn down, but she perked right back up a few minutes later," Midnight Velvet said.
"Wait a second, doesn't that mean Twilight has more magic at her age than Starswirl the Bearded did as an adult?" Shining Armor asked.
"Not necessarily. She might just have a stupidly fast recovery rate in comparison," Cadance said. They thought that over.
"Well, she has always healed quickly, more than twice as fast as normal," Night Light offered.
"That's probably it then. She just recovers more quickly than usual," Cadance said.
*** The next day ***
Twilight had packed up her stuff, which consisted of her notes, her books, a couple pictures, and a few articles of clothing. The clothing was mainly a dress she could wear to some sort of fancy gathering.
She said goodbye to her parents and brother, hugging each of them. Cadance lived at the palace, so Twilight would probably see her more than the others.
She levitated the traveling bag behind her as she walked over to the palace. Right, now to figure out how to tell the Princess. If she put it off, she'd never get around to it. She supposed her best bet was to just turn the Visibility to 100% and explain herself.
She'd have to talk to the princess alone, though. Anyone else would likely think she was crazy, no matter how much evidence she showed them. Not that she could show them that much.
She made her way to the throne room. She'd also be looking for more stars and quests while she was here studying. There were a lot of places to hide one in the palace. Though something told her quests would be slim pickings for a while.
A guard led her to Celestia's private quarters. She already knew where it was, but there was no way of explaining how she knew. So she played along and pretended not to know.
When the guard left, Twilight turned to Celestia and said, "Princess, there's something I need to tell you."
Celestia waited for her to continue, and Twilight turned the Visibility up to 100%. She also opened up her Stats screen and explained it's function. Celestia's eyes widened.
"I see, your life is a game," she said.
"Yes, but wait, do you have experience with this sort of thing?" Twilight asked.
"No, but when you've seen everything I have, you stop being surprised by most everything. Though I don't like the idea that we may not have any control over our destinies, I suppose we've had little to begin with. Besides which, you have both foreknowledge of events and a great deal of flexibility. So, you certainly have a great deal of control." Celestia answered.
Twilight explained as much as she could about the game to the princess, showing a screen to demonstrate if possible.
"Hm, that explains a lot. Did you become my student the first time?" Celestia asked.
"Yes, it took a boost from the Sonic Rainboom to hatch Spike's egg the first time," Twilight answered.
"I suggest that you utilize these other Avatars to study aspects of magic you have trouble with. Your Genius, Pegasi, and Earth Pony Avatars should prove most useful in this regard." Celestia suggested.
They discussed various aspects of the game for another fifteen minutes, and then Celestia gave Twilight the test sheets, before having to take off for the Day Court.
Twilight spent the next few hours doing the incrementally more difficult problems, handing it in to the princess the next day. After looking through it, she nodded, and drew up a schedule for her student. From 7:00 a.m-10:00 a.m. she'd be tutored privately with Celestia. From 10:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. she'd be taught by the academy professors. After that she was free to do as she wished.
Twilight agreed to this, and the teaching began the next day.
She learned quite a bit since Celestia was teaching her a lot of new material at the level she'd been at. The professors taught her about as much together.
The palace was indeed slim pickings for quests, there wasn't a single one to be found, but not so for stars. She found a grand total of 6 stars! 4 in the library, one in her quarters here at the palace, and one in Celestia's quarters.
Str 48, Int 48, Agi 48, Con 48, Will 39, Regen 48, Wis 38, Chr 40, Lck 38. HP 790, Shd 50, MP 941. She raised Positive Magic to 55/1000.
'At 50/1000 or more, you've reached the level of understanding required of a professor at Princess Celestia's School for gifted unicorns.'
She raised Combat, Resilience, and Blade-wielding to 47/1000. For Combat,
'At 40/1000 or more, you're adept enough that the only way grunts could beat you is by attrition.'
For Resilience,
'At 40/1000 or more, you can take hits that would knock down a normal person and stay standing.'
And for Blade-wielding
'At 40/1000 or more, you're good enough to give any amateur some pointers.'
Her studying was paying dividends to her experiments as well as sating her natural curiosity. It was suddenly came clear to her how and why so many of the experiments went wrong.
She spent the years between becoming Celestia's student and going to Ponyville in this way, visiting her family every Saturday.
One day she was wondering if there was a way to divide herself into two so she could get more studying done. This led to a series of experiments before she created a spell that allowed her to split herself into multiple copies of herself.
The copies were identical in appearance, abilities, personality, and memories. They also obeyed the original and gave her their memories upon their destruction. However, her MP was divided amongst them equally and each cost 100 MP even after Efficient Spellcaster, an additional 5 MP was drained from the copy's MP per minute, completely disregarding the Regen stat for MP, making the lifespan of a clone a maximum of 84 minutes (1 hour and 24 minutes) if she made just one. They were also almost stupidly fragile. Bumping their heads into a doorframe was enough to dispel them. She theorized that Resilience didn't affect the damage because bumping one's head into a doorframe could be construed as self-inflicted damage. That, or Resilience didn't apply to clones at all.
They weren't really useful in a combat situation unless you were trying to distract your enemy, or you were already so much better than them that you could completely avoid their attacks. Observation and scouting would be what they were best for, due to returning their memories to the original after their demise, but not much else.
She did speed along her studying with them though. She didn't really use most of her MP over the course of a day normally, so she could have a clone study while she was experimenting.
She was also waiting for Spike to be old enough that the Princess would let Twilight raise him from that point on. She was becoming a bit lonely for her friends she had yet to get back.
Well, she was sure the princess would decide she was ready soon enough.
***Celestia's Quarters***
Celestia was a bit saddened when her student told her she was in a game. From what she'd been told Twilight had died at least once already. She'd managed to prod Twilight into confessing that she was the one who'd helped Shining Armor with that raid, only after a promise not to tell him or her parents was extracted from her in return.
She'd also found out that Twilight had fought a Queen Spider and King Rat. However, she was fighting to get to a level (ability level, not Level) where she could protect not only herself, but her friends and family as well, not out of any enjoyment of fighting.
She seemed to have been affected deeply by having been killed. Celestia also got the impression she herself had been involved somehow. Whenever she herself accidentally brought the conversation in that direction, there was something about how her student avoided the subject of just how she had died the first time. There was always a strange look in her eyes, as if she was trying to protect Celestia from something.
She supposed that if her student wanted to keep it a secret, then she shouldn't pry. She'd just have to trust her student like her student had trusted her.
'Chapter Progress: 6 stars found, 1 quest completed, 600 exp to next level.'