//------------------------------// // Funny Floura // Story: My Little Witch // by PoisonJoker09 //------------------------------// I awoke with my eyes crusted over, I coughed out a stale breath that was lodged into my throat. I didn't have the best sleep for some reason... it feels like I slept on a rock. I yawned and immediately spat out the weirdly foul tasting saliva that had accumulated in my mouth, I frowned at this. Did I get sick? No, that's impossible, I make sure to drink a brew every week to raise my constitution, getting something as simple as the flu is not in the realms of possibility. Perhaps it was the close proximity of Zecora? Foreign influences sometimes lead to such things. In fact... it might have been an adverse effect from one of the ingredients I gathered. I lifted myself off the bed... and fell down again. It seems like one of my legs have a limp, joy. I tried again, this time focusing more of my strength into my left leg, allowing me to shakily pick myself up from it. I then scanned my body for any other abnormalities, I could already see from under my fur an amount of wrinkles and boils present, from the way my face feels like it was a piece of cooked leather, I suppose it's where the changes are most prominent. The vision in my left eye is faded, not so much as to say blind but I will certainly be having to watch where I am walking as to avoid walking into something, the limp in my front right leg was only one source of pain, several parts of my body such as my joints were also aching, I hazard a guess that this must be similar to the wear of age on an elderly pony. Not looking closer to my fur... it has dulled significantly, and also changed in color to become a pale green, my mane from what I could see also likewise had changed color and had a noticeable greasy shine to it, like I had dumped my head into a hayburger. I hobbled to my case where I took out a mirror. I was right, my face was marred with a number of boils, spots and wrinkles, I looked worn down and much older than I should be, my back was also feeling rather strained holding up my weight. My left eye was not only faded with age but also slightly lazy, not as much as Derpy but enough that it was noticeable. And if that wasn't disgusting enough, my snout somehow manages to stick out to some sharp degree, all the while looking wizened and shriveled, looking at my hooves confirmed that they had managed to procure an array of cracks and dirt, and my tail looked like it was cut wrong in several places. "... Wel- ACK!" My throat ceased with it's attempt at speech as an unexpected rasp combined with harsh rattle managed to issue from my lungs, I took a shuddering breath as I I tried to grow accustom to the shift in my voice box. "... Hello?" I frowned briefly, which made my face look all the more wrong and I decided to look away from the mirror not to see anymore. All in all, this wasn't a normal illness, it was magic related. I gave a rasping sigh and pulled on my cloak, I didn't need to look at myself anymore than what was needed. Time to begin with finding out what happened to me. I managed to narrow down the recent events that could have led to my current predicament, a natural disease of course was crossed off the list, so due to the all powerful entity I had met recently I am inclined to think it might have had a hoof in this. But as he is limited I doubt he could have set upon me such a curse if he couldn't wipe me out immediately. It wasn't a process of me getting older, because otherwise I would be having muscle degradation of some sort, I am still solidly built yet somewhat fragile in some other areas. My back aches a little more as the cold air aggravates it. It was more like I was hit by every ailment possible from a result of allergies, poor hygiene and bad circumstance, a limp that feels like years had taken it's toll on it does not appear overnight, that's not including all the other changes on my body as well. Tracing back my steps the only time it could have been possible was when I ventured into the Everfree, I likely fell to something that has an adverse effect on ponies. Looking into the other world, allowing me to see through all of them, until I eventually found the problem, the blue flowers were giving off a level of chaos off them, on one hoof it's not evil so I should be thankful, on the other... it's chaos. You can never predict chaos and what it can do, it was like putting a coin flip in every instance it changes something, and then a dice roll, one hundred leaves fluttering though the trees and how many mice live in a home. Chaos never can be predicted because of this. But it was muted thankfully, only fulfilling the effect and nothing else, if I were to use an array of potions I could get rid of most of the unsightly parts of my body, still, I would prefer to use the actual cure to this if there should be one. The effect that these flowers seem to have is near random but there was definitely some sort of purpose behind it, I can't tell what exactly, so I simply chalked it up to 'making the infected look ugly and crippled'. Examining them closer would take some time but I would eventually work out the problem, for now I would stay in doors and wait for it, if I need to purchase any ingredients I will simply go with my hood up. Dear equine Grumpy here Ah... brilliant, just what I need. Since Killdork "misplaced" my Playcat magazines (As for what they are here is a pony equivalent beamed right to your brain hehe) My mind suddenly was hit by an amount of images and explanations that suddenly brought an utmost understanding to what it meant. I stopped thinking for several seconds... ... "What? All I'm seeing are several pictures of ponies lying on silken beds or posing for camera's, I can understand this being reminiscent to posing for fashion from what I've see in some magazines but they aren't wearing anything except some forms of accessories or something else." Filtering through the images I shrugged. "I guess you must be feeding your need for a female figure in your life by looking at so many images of attractive females, your right, maybe Killjoy shouldn't keep you from them, it's the only thing you have to get by." I'll be misplacing some of his stuff into your hooves via courier (no refunds or returns). Very well, thank you. The cloak of Balderian (he has like 10 of them since his old apprentice copied the original for his grad test...to bad he was too stupid not to tap into his life force when he did. Surprisingly he is one of only five people to graduate post-mortem though so his family should be proud *snicker*.Yours is the original by the way.) Hmm... if I recall it had something to do with... turning into a wolf? I can't remember right now. Mind cage ring ( It will protects the wearer from any type of mental effects. Side effect is that the wearer starts to feel "detached" from everything around them if they wear it for longer then 10 minutes.) I need to feel some form of empathy to deal with situations... so this will likely have to be used when I'm sure other things are trying to affect my mind. And the ring of Folly for you to give to a certain noble I call blueballs. You will know who he is when you meet him as you will hear acclaimed signature line (focus here for sample). And no it wont kill him. Hmm... 'Silence I kill you' seems to be followed with an amount of laughter afterwards, maybe some form of joke with an audience? Oh and if you do summon Killboy I hope he becomes some sort of fish horse so i can laugh my ass off at him. From Proffessor Killjoy's familiar Grumpy cat P.S. Go to the spa. You look like hell. Yes, because of course that is a crack at my overall appearance isn't it? I dismissed the insulting advice and continued analyzing the sample of pollen I had cut from out of one of the flowers, under a glass tube of course. It seems to be showing signs of instinctive intelligence, only so much as to seek other ponies to affect, so I will work off there. After a few minutes I looked at the next message sent to me. Ah, it is good to be hearing from you, Scry Fortune. A Flux storm cut off the connection for a few weeks, from my perspective at least. Nasty things, Flux storms. They rattle the branches of Yggdrasil in a most concerning fashion, and wreak havoc with temporal causality. Hmm, troublesome, well you weren't missed here rest assured. Curiously, Flux storms always seem to occur more frequently when multiple worlds are in temporal sync during their transition between spring and summer. I would have understood if the process was Winter-to-Spring since that is the general belief of when time for the seasons stop and start, so otherwise I would not know. If you find yourself needing to journey into the Everfree, be sure to.......on't bla....rything will be fine. ... You are likely trying to warn me about this plant I presume, well, the message came rather late as the case might be... I will be solving my predicament in the future rest assured, it will just take some time. In other news, I've at least managed to find the general area of the multiverse you reside in. I just have to sift through 182756873569128751234^2 parallel versions of Equestria. ... Good luck... It's like looking for hay in a needle stack. Till next time, Machina. I could imagine, well all the same, I hope you reach your destination soon. With that I moved onto the next. ...One hundred and eighty two quintillion, seven hundred and fifty six quadrillion, eight hundred and seventy three trillion, five hundred and sixty nine billion, one hundred and twenty eight million, seven hundred and fifty one thousand, two hundred and thirty four, to the second power, seems like a bit more than a needle in a haystack. Maybe more like a needle in a haystack, in a field of haystacks, in a country of fields of haystacks, on a world of countries of fields of haystacks. ...That sounds like a lot of haystacks... I'm sure you would be able to feed a country for a while with such a large farmland. That aside, it's good to see you making, friendly acquaintances, with ponies and a zebra. Any chance of you inviting them to tea somewhere down the line? I'd love to meet them face to mask rather than do.... the magical viewing thing your magic lets me do. I would say that reaches in the realms of impossibility, Zecora as levelheaded as she is I would not ask to dabble in my affairs, just as she wouldn't ask me to help in her own, she might be more cordial than some Shaman might be, but even then we are likely to be strangers in a way. It's just how our bloodlines conflict with one another. On that note, I have a bit of a surprise for you the next time you visit. One I'm fairly certain you'll enjoy. ~Daideo Hmm, I will be sure to visit eventually at some point then. I drew my attention back to the results I had proceed through several tests done to the various parts of the flower, I managed to find that it had a much more potent and dense form of chaos than expected by putting a madman's rock next to it and gauging how many spins it made in midair before dropping down for orientation. So that simply meant it wasn't limited to one effect, it is likely the one given to me was completely random, yet it was grounded enough to limit possibilities to simply the body being altered in some respect. I took a moment to ponder what exactly it could be that makes that small bit of Harmony magic guiding the plant to do what it does. Heh heh heh, your reaction to my comment was quite humorous Miss Fortune. I actually hadn't laughed that hard in 252 years. If my domain wasn't so secure it could've caused dimensional instabilities or even a Flux storm. ... Ah yes... you were the reason I nearly died drinking water. As for the recipe, *Ahem*, 6 ounces of quickgold, 1 gram of finely ground mana, a pound of sugar, and a heart from a virgin mare... ... Excuse me? Hehe, I'm just kidding about the last one, it's actually a 1 ounce ruby. Once you mix it all up turn the heat to 500 degrees Fahrenheit for 12 hours. This must also be made on a Full Moon. Urg, don't joke about using sentient organs, that's the first path down using black magic. This will net you 5 ounces (like many potions the end result is smaller than the ingredients you put in) of luck. Only use 3 ounces every fortnight or the effects may take a turn for the sour. Here's a small sample. I heard a clink from my bags indicating something was dropped in there. That is worth one hour of good fortune. Try using it during your next lunch with Flutters... you might get lucky. ... I will kick you whenever I have the time to go to your realm, you know that right? Au revoir! -Archmage Urg, I suppose that the last one after this would be... Voidwalker, Pinkie doesn't seem to be in the writing here. I hear a soft piano play, and was followed up by a voice that reminded me of Vinyl strangely enough, seemingly enough it fit me well, 'walk alone' is definitely some representation of me in a way. I'm back! Just ripped the Thing I searched for apart on sub-atomic level. So, now the Void's Horrors are less likely to come to the universe I lovingly created. Hmm, indeed. Also, the song above is from one of the alternate Equestria where a great war turned their world into a post-apocalypse wasteland that I happened to passed by. It is a rather fitting theme for the heroine of the Equestrian Wasteland. The Lightbringer to many survivors (2 centuries after the War), Littlepip to friends and friendly acquaintances. She indeed sounds like quite the hero... but I lack the exact of the situation your speaking about with her, unless you plan to drop her story into my bag I'm not going to understand what your talking about. Anyway...Let's go through the events and see what i missed...Huh...I didn't missed much after 10 millenia of fighting...Interesting. The time dialation is fascinating...Working on passing that...Void Eternal doesn't have the concept of time so it is rather difficult to track...Luckily I am powerful enough to do a few adjustments. Of course you are, otherwise you wouldn't be talking to me right now. My hip accidentally hit the edge of a table as I walked by, causing my weak joints to creak in protest as I fell to the floor feebly, I took a second to evaluate how fragile my body was now. And you still haven't got any lovers...Meh, The Ship Gods will hook you up with one...or several...eventually. "Even if I wanted such a thing, if I still look like this I doubt it." I muttered quietly, hoisting myself off the ground again I limped towards the door, my mind set on going to the same batch of flowers in order to research their effect once again on the normal creature. If anything it would at least do me some good to get fresh air after such a troublesome morning. "And for that matter, why in Tautarus does a god of ocean transportation have anything to do with romance?" Hmmm...It seem something is attacking you mentally...or attacked...I will be seeing about sending a small group of combat psychics. They will help suppress that presence or eliminate it completely when it become too much to deal with normally. ... It's nothing, I have that situation dealt with. You won't be seeing them, but you might be able to feel that they truly exist and are nearby. Because this is not my world or the worlds that I have certain privileges...I can't send them to directly assist you in many situations and solve your problems for you which to be honest, I won't do...How else are you going to learn? I've already learned, and I needn't require their assistance anyway, it is my problem alone to deal with this. Again, they will only assist you with mental problems...And they might watch you when you're asleep...probably...could be...maybe not...maybe yes...perhaps...perhaps not... You don't need to worry about them my little pony...Hehehehehehe... ... Now I want them to leave for an entirely different reason, do I have to talk to your wife about encouraging such an idea among your underlings? On a second thought, that is actually wise considering recent event. Just don't mind them and act like nothing happens. They can warn you ahead of time without alerting anyone. They are called The Ghost by the way. You will always know that they are there, but never truly being able to tell exactly. Of course, because everything must guarantee my safety... I've been doing fine against mental intruders for a long time, I will be fine dealing with my problems on my own. A very atmospheric song with a deal of humming voices, and with lyrics starting off in 'The misty mountain's cold', building in voices and building and dropping in volume several times in the song. -Voidwalker- P.S. I don't really have much time at the moment...Pink is approaching. Well, hello there, Pi- *GLOMP* You're back! I missed you!...Wait, are you being meanie-pant again? You should know better! I am ve--- System: Connection lost. System: Attempting to recconect. Please wait. ... You know that is going to bite you in the flank later right? Especially since she can review the message you sent to me correct? Then a quicker paced song started, the third one during his message that included a drum and managed to flow from note to note in a ferocious pitch and speed. It was quite a bit shorter than the others and ended within two minutes. System: Attempt unsuccessful. Please, try again at later time. ... I simply opened the door of my abode and walked out, the trip down the hill was going to be torture on my newly fragile legs, but I would make the effort just to get some fresh air, I really needed it. I took a special effort to avoid any contact in town as I moved towards the Everfree, the town was actually empty thankfully enough and I managed to move ahead uninhibited, perhaps Zecora was visiting town once again for some reason, I didn't stick around to ponder what else exactly could be happening. Eventually I found myself at the clearing where the flowers resided, flashing through the various perceptions I managed to trace a number of new things about the plant, such as the fact that it drew most of it's chaotic potential to hold the effect on the victim from it's roots, deep into the soil... there was a large amount of chaotic poisoning in the area. I grimaced a little at how the shifting colour and shape was from underground, I blinked back to real time view and simply stared at the floor. I needed to find the cure of this... or it's never going to come off... But first, what was that other signature? I looked back up at the edge of the clearing, my eyes already shifting. A large amount of energy... a lot of it, warped and strange, festering in the distance, it was like a foul smell the way it appalled my sight I grumbled a little and wiped my eyes with the crook of my hoof, they were getting tired and strained all too quickly. For now it was in one place... I would have to investigate when I'm in better shape. I took down a few notes about the damn flower, and walked as fast as I could with my lame leg back home. Within the day I made a working antidote, but it took sometime... it was rather slow when repairing the damage so it felt very unnerving, at the end of the day however, I was back to normal, I made sure that the flower was contained in a sealed container and decided to hold off experimentation until I make more effective cure... again, the experience felt unnerving. The day ended with the paranoid feeling that the Ghost's Voidwalker sent were still watching, I was irritated, but paid them no mind. I spent the rest of the night reviewing the day in my mind, working out all the details and making a note to look up for any records of the flower in the local library, official records didn't even cross my mind... perhaps the flowers managed to make me temporary senile as well, it wouldn't have mattered anyway, spending any close proximity with Twilight would have not ended well. Sometimes I wished that I could have a simple dreamless night, without even this meadow of calm and serenity bearing on my consciousness, but it would have led to normal dreams and nightmares as well... so this is preferable. The night passed on slowly...