History is a vague thing. It is written by those who are left behind to tell the tale. Who can tell truth from fiction if any chance for a viable reference is far beyond reach?
What knowledge is altered? What is lost? What is hidden away?
And for what purpose?
Knowledge can be a powerful yet dangerous tool. Especially dangerous for those that rely on knowledge alone.
---
This is my first try on writing. Any feedback is welcome!
I will add more character tags as the story progresses. Don't want to spoil the fun after all.
Chapters (1)
Since I don't like author notes I will drop it here!
Thanks to BubuJones, Starfall, Elathres, and AAAAAAAB for proofreading and feedback on the story.
It's nice to see this up here now.
And didn't I proof read your story too?
479650
Of course you did. :p
479657
But yeah, tracking!
Yeee-haaaa, it's up!
I'm looking forward to reading more of this story
i do like it well made and you fell....well you fell something ( i don't know what but i like it)
A Sorceror's Pledge - Candlemass
479787
You are awesome! \m/
479734
Good to hear. :D
The chapters will become longer now so it might take a little while. ;)
Very well written, interesting premise, and good characterization. This fic deserves ALL OF THE VIEWS
480145
cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/13792619.jpg
Thank you!
It feels good to hear people like it. I was pretty unsure about how it worked out... It's my first piece after all.
Yeah!
Definitely tracked. That dream scene has a bigger implication that Twilight realizes.
Yay~ its up! Looking forward to the rest
lol
THIS. IS. THE. BEST. POSSIBLE. THING
I have no idea what's going on.
BUT that doesn't matter! you've captured my attention! Also, it seems like everyone else has a clue on what the deal is with this piece so I await later chapters eagerly. I wonder if this is like one of those Twilight is really an Alicorn/Supernatural entity of unknown power or some deal.
As you can tell, this is my first time seeing this fic. Keep at it!
Intriguing story. Can't wait for more.
This is your first written work? Damn.
The Twilight-becomes-alicorn trope is a little played out, but I think the premise of Twilight's research has a lot promise and I hope it leads to a unique take on the idea. Very, very good stuff for a first story, the characterization is good and the prose is better than could be expected. Celestia knows most people's first story (mine included) is barely readable, let alone good. I look forward to seeing where this goes.
480771
This is the first time someone reads this apart from my proof readers. I got the general plot down I just need to churn out the chapters now.
Glad you liked it ;)
You sure this is your first piece?
It's so well written...
Anyway, this is awesome so tracked.
482380
Yeah it is. But it went through numerous revisions with my proofreaders beforehand. ;)
Review time: (Warning Massive Spoilers)
Ive been meaning to do a review for a while and i happen to come across your story. Do know that i may sound harsh in this review but i do it in the thought process of helping you and not mocking you. Also take with what ever i write below with a grain of salt and know that it is simply an over glorified opinion. Now that introductions are out of the way lets look at your story.
First Section: Ok so lets look at the first part of your story. i will admit i was annoyed and a bit frustrated at the start with you not telling who 'She' was.
*Ex* "There she stood on the highest tower in the palace."
Now i automatically assumed it was Twilight Sparkle, Which turned out later i was correct, but the fact that i had to read through the whole first part knowing and not knowing if it was her was very frustrating. I ended up Speed-reading that first part for the sake of knowing that it was truly her, only to then go back and re-read it in her point of view so that it made more sense.
This could have been easily avoided if you just hinted a little bit like 'Purple mare' or 'Prized student of said Princess'.
"The inhabitants of Equestria needed their princesses back.
They needed Celestia and Luna.
The portal closed shut behind Twilight Sparkle.
A long night of lonely study ahead.
Again."
But there is some good you did, like the breaking of lines in some parts such as the start and end. They were properly used and served its purposed. Dramatic thoughts or actions.
Section two: Ok so i just finished the first part (For the second time) and now to move on to see what happens next!
"~~~~~~~~~~~~ ++++++++++++++++ ~~~~~~~~~~~~"
Suddenly new scene, Spike is here, No longer an Alicorn, What is going on?
You need to tell people when your going to go back in time or have flashbacks. Sure i eventually got it but i am a slow thinker and well this totally caught me off guard. Perhaps at the start you could have simply put '2 weeks earlier' or at the end of the previous Section you could have put 'She thought back when this all started...'
Section Two and Three: Whats with this random break?
"The sadness in his eyes vanished as he flexed his arms and smiled genuinely. “You can bet on that! Don’t worry, Twi, just pulling your leg a little.” While moving the freshly made sandwiches to the table he added, “Trust me. I learned my lesson from that too.”
With everything in place, they dug in.
~~~~~~~~~~~~ ++++++++++++++++ ~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Listen, Spike, we have been over this a hundred times by now.” Twilight was pleased to see that Spike was concerned about her, but she had to do her work. ”I am fine. I lack a little sleep, I agree on that, but that just happens sometimes.”"
You could have simply removed the break and had this conversation while they ate. At least that would make more sense.
Section Three:So Spike falls asleep...
"Spike didn’t wait to indulge in his treats, and with a satisfied smile on his face, fell asleep soon after."
......
"Back at the library, Twilight placed Spike in his basket upstairs and decided to write the letter that was riding on her mind all day."
The whole visit and never wakes up once?
Now i know he must have at one point but this little information just annoyed me a tad bit.
Section Five: I laughed.
"Dear Princess Celestia,
Physics is painful.
Your hurting student,
Twilight Sparkle"
Final Thoughts: If you have not noticed yet I spaced out the 'Sections' according to your breaks. Section Four (The dream) was not included because i have no bad or good thoughts about it. Also the characterization between everyone was fine and nothing was amiss. Overall this was a very good first attempt but i have to admit this is simply to predictable. Twilight somehow discovered some ancient power, Somehow the Princesses die, She has to take control and find a way to restore peace (with bringing the princesses back or stopping what ever killed them). Or maybe not, but either way I am not interested.
Bravo and Encore for your first chapter. I do hope I am wrong and this turns out to be a great story. Have a good day.
492993
First of all. Thanks for your review, I really appreciate it.
I try to go through your points in order.
Yes, people probably figured out early that I try to dodge Twilight in the first part. Why is that?
Because Fimfiction forces me to do add a character tag.
All of the pre readers went crazy on me because they didn't predict it was about Twilight. They were, as you, annoyed that I didn't spell the name out but as soon as I revealed it at the end it made sense. But they didn't get "spoilered" by that character tag as you did. I will add the Celestia tag to remove that spoiler. (because I actually tried to mislead the reader to think about Celestia instead of Twilight)
--
The break to the second part. Yes... you are perfectly right about that and I will definitely change that. In retrospect there is no reason why I shouldn't make this more clear.
The scene in the kitchen is supposed to just make Spike joke around a little. I probably made that sound too serious and people can't figure out that he is just playing the sad part because of that. (How could the reader figure out? I didn't show it
)
--
The scene where Spike bugs Twilight *again* while they are on the way to S.C. was just to have Twilight have her little outburst and to show that Spike is seriously troubled by Twilight's behavior. And sort of to make Twilight realize that her current project eats away at her more that she was willing to admit.
--
"Section Three:So Spike falls asleep..."
Yeah he did. I just wanted to remove him from the conversation because he couldn't add anything except initiating another argument. I probably should wake him up when Twilight leaves or something... it's not like they spent the whole day over at Rarity's.
"Section Five: I laughed."
I was actually unsure about that *a very long time* this seemed almost too harsh as a mood break after that dream.
Also:
I got the plot worked out. And it doesn't seem to be all that predictable considering how far off you are.
Thanks for the review.
I will take your advice to heart!
492993
With due respect to your opinion and review, not naming Twilight in the first section was sorta the entire point of the first section. I was trying to bribe Dreec to change it to Rainbow Dash, personally. Can you imagine the freak-out she'd have if she became the only alicorn in Equestria?
517726
Yeah i know it was the point. Its just, well i really don't know but the way it was written just annoyed me a whole lot. Maybe I am getting really picky? Also i would have totally flipped out if it turned out to be Rainbow Dash.
It's a good start, but I can't really judge it until we get to the real meat of the story. Points for originality... I haven't read anything where Twilight has to replace the princesses before.
And now I have this totally hilarious image of Trollestia dragging Luna on a road trip and telling Twilight that she's in charge for the duration.
*cough* anyway. A great start, especially for your first piece of writing. It did seem a bit wooden here and there, but that's one of those things that's hard to define the why of, and occasionally even the where.
Interestprotocol : [Relevant]
Tracking="True"
Let's do this.
543695
You are just poking for the next chapter aren't you?
543739
Defiiiine poking...
Great story, seems to have potential... tracking.
Well, I'm interested. You get a watch and my highest hopes for the chapters to come.
I didn't mind the obfuscation of the alicorn's identity at the beginning, or of it being Twilight (yeah, Alicorn Twilight is overdone. So are Sad Immortal Celestia, DashShipping, RandomFics and plenty of other things. This is a rather prolific fandom. What matters is the story). What I minded was that the initial in-medias-res section was pointless. Nothing happened. We learned some things, but the rest of the story gets on just fine without those revelations, except now the reader is spoiled of the surprise of Twilight becoming an alicorn, the royal sisters disappearing and Twilight apparently taking their place for a time. The story would have been better off without that first section. Now, if you plan on having each chapter start off with an Alicorn Twilight section, that's fine, but always make sure something actually happens in those sections.
The only thing I will say about the exhaustion plot point is that spellcasting does induce physical exhaustion...in canon. This is your story and your interpretation of how magic works.
Nothing wrong with the characterization here. You’ve got Twilight, Rarity and Spike down, except for one part in the dream.
“but her heart skipped a beat as she was suddenly terribly afraid to move even a single step. The surface was some sort of liquid. The only coherent thought in her head was that she was in fact standing on that other mare.” - She already could have guessed the surface was a liquid since the sun and moon made ripples in it (if she couldn’t have realized it before, why was she suddenly able to realize it then?). I don’t see why she would suddenly be afraid of this. Also, it’s hard to believe she only has one coherent thought in her mind when you keep writing coherent thoughts in her mind.
Now, to some more nitty-gritty stuff.
“Her sleeping habits had become affected by her staying up way past midnight on a regular basis, working all night just to sleep late into the following day.” – Could definitely have been written more actively.
“Carefully, she lifted the books up with her magic, engulfing them in a purple haze and stacking them neatly.” – Could have been written more actively.
Also, this might just be me, but I’ve always found it redundant to the point of tedium when stories describe the use of magic for mundane tasks, telekinesis especially, when it isn’t necessary. To expound, take the above sentence, rewritten by me: “Twilight carefully lifted the books and stacked them in a neat tower.” The reader already knows she’s a unicorn at this point in the story, if they didn’t already, and can logically assume she either did that with her mouth or her magic. Does it matter which method she used? No, unless you make it matter through the addition of some other element. The action itself doesn’t change. Regardless of which method the reader imagines, they still know and understand that Twilight carefully lifted the books and stacked them in a neat tower. No need for the unnecessary description—you have a story to get to, after all. A later sentence could say: “Twilight trotted down the stairs to her library’s main floor, the long stack of books floating behind her.” (That doesn’t happen in the story, I know. I’m just using it to demonstrate my point.) Now the reader can make a reasonable assumption she used magic before, and in this line the magic is a meaningful part of the description because there's no other (reasonable) way she could carry the long stack of books down a flight of stairs.
“Her horn glowed again, levitating a scroll and quill from her nightstand.” – No need to mention her horn glowing—and she’s the one levitating the objects, not her horn.
“A glowing, purple layer of magic formed around her horn, an indicator of how much the unicorn was straining her magical abilities. Then a second layer appeared. And a third.” – The first aura always appears when magic is being used. It’s the other two that only appear during times of particularly intense spellcasting.
“Before heading downstairs she tended to her mane, the condition of which gave the false impression that she had had a horrible night.” Sounds a bit too technical. I’m not saying she should freak out over it, but a little surprise at what she looks like wouldn’t be amiss.
“After a few minutes she felt almost newborn, clean, all the dust from the library falling off of her.” – ...Please tell me she took a bath before leaving.
“He put his arms round her neck her from behind.” – I guess you meant to say “He put his arms around her neck, hugging her from behind.”?
“I haven’t figure out” – Figured.
“Twilight had read through the letter three times but found nothing to fix.” – Well...
---“And while they” – The thing about starting sentences with “And” is it’s almost always unnecessary.
---“If they are worried enough” – How did she bold the “are”? Did she use extra ink?
---“However, I do not write to you” – To me that doesn’t sound like her.
---“My chosen subject of study turned out to bear no fruits so far except uncovering more questions.” – My research into the source of magical energy remains fruitless so/thus far, only unearthing more questions.
---“Thank you again for the books you have sent me. Sadly, they turned out to be not that helpful.” – Thank you again for allowing me to borrow these books, but they haven’t been that helpful. (Isn’t that how it went? Celesta let her borrow them? “Usually no pony was allowed to remove them from the palace, but Celestia herself gave permission.”)
“It was the first time that books, hoofpicked by the princess no less, didn’t hold the answer to her questions. They didn’t even help.” – Second sentence is redundant. Also, the only thing she expected them to do is help so the "even" is unnecessary.
“She was determined to find out how magic works, where it came from, and how to aid those with less magical talent.” – Well, she doesn’t know if learning about the source can help unicorns with lesser ability (which, lest we forget, is the majority of unicorns). Also, “worked”, not “works”.
“Spike and the letter were gone, indicating it had already reached the princess,” – The sentence subject is Spike, not the letter; there’s certainly no indication that he reached Celestia or that he is genderless. Nor is there any real indication the letter reached Celestia.
“it started to move upwards, describing an arc above her.” – It described an arc? How did it do that? You could have just said it moved in an arc.
The guards switch from “Miss Sparkle” to “Miss Twilight”, and I can’t see why they would suddenly become so informal with her.
610519 I like your argument about 'cliche' story themes. I may end up using it at some point.
Anyway, great critique, in depth and easy to implement, from the looks of it. I didnt really read it end to end, but Im not the one with the story.
AARGGGHHHH WHY AM I META-CRITIQUING YOUR CRITIQUE IT ISNT EVEN FOR ME AND I JUST WANTED TO COMPLIMENT YOUR AWESOME POINT!
I apologise, it is late at night for me, and I tend to get this way late at night.
That opening bit is a pretty strong hook. It certainly got me, at least.
awesome opening chapter!
i can hardly believe that this is your very first story!
that first section (everything before the time skip) really lead me to believe it was celestia who we were seeing. i had the entire section "painted" up in my head ("seeing" her talk and "hearing" it in her voice), then you revealed that the mare in question was actually twilight; which forced me to re-read that section with different images and sounds in my head. not quite sure of my opinion towards that section, i liked it in some ways; you got us to assume it was celestia we were "seeing", then you turned that around, nice job. although, at the same time; it was kind of annoying that you really painted one picture, then all of sudden you changed the base to someone else; therefore crashing the entire picture. that "crash" could have been avoided if you used the guards for example as the base, we don't really need twilight's thoughts to be fooled into thinking it's celestia. ah well, it's just slightly annoying.
to finish, *ahem*: MOAR!!
897757
Glad you liked it! (I think?)
As you described it, the opening achieved it's goal.
I was pretty confident that I had the thoughts pictured to be like Celestia, but not unfitting for Twilight as well (the hardcore fan might be able to spot a few hints here and there before the actual revelation 
). Maybe that needs some further tweaking though.
Considering her close relationship, and the stuff that will unfold soon, this will probably make more sense later.
Thanks for the feedback!
897781
"Glad you liked it! (I think?)"
you don't need to worry about that, definitely liked it, i was hoping i had made that abundantly clear with the initial and finishing sentences
i can see why you wanted us to believe that it was celestia in the beginning, and don't get me wrong on that part; i loved it, but think of it like this: you want us to picture celestia, and you succeed, but you also get us to base everything we read on that we're actually "hearing" and "seeing" celestia, when that is torn down; everything else goes with it, which practically forces some ppl to re-read the entire first section. if you would have instead focused, for example, on the guards while they walk to her chambers, they could be talking about the "princess" (making us believe it's celestia through their discussion instead), and then unveil that it's actually twilight they're talking about when they greet the "princess" and then cutting it there after something similar of what you used in the actual opening. that still forces us to change our view, but it doesn't change anything in the given picture, just whom they're talking about, therefore our "picture" still stands.
but as i said, this is just a minor annoyance on my part, it would have been worse if that part had been over half the chapter or something like that
fitting picture i guess:
image1.masterfile.com/em_w/00/54/42/700-00544284w.jpg
897945
Very interesting! I keep that in mind.
Hmmm this is interesting.
897992
Please to update?
1079989
Still working on it. Had to rewrite a lot to make it better.
Woot. I am 100th like.
It's good so far. Looking forward to moar.
I hope you do update this at some point, because it's very good.
1691571
Neat. It probably looks like that, huh?
Pretty awesome story. I can't wait for more of this. Also, I absolutely love your avatar. Cheerilee is best background pony.
This is vey promising. I hope it comes off of hiatus soon, and we won't have to play 1691571
I await. .... slowly.
R.I.P
1691571
1693603 I would say it does.