Browsing the bookstore, Sweetie yawned. Canterlot didn’t have the best selection, but she had found a small section on what she was looking for. Browsing it, she smiled as she found the plant she was looking for. It was commonly found near forests, which was just perfect for her needs.
“Excuse me miss? Are you going to buy that?” Looking toward the store clerk, Sweetie pursed her lip. Turning, she headed out the door without another word. Of course the clerk gave chase, but by then Sweetie had teleported away. Flipping through the pages, she headed for Whitetail Woods.
“Okay, so it looks like a purple corn cob of flowers…” Looking around, Sweetie settled into a glide. She spied a small outcropping of it buried deeper into the woods, and flew towards it. Giving a smile, she plucked two stems from the plant. Turning, she began to fly back towards Ponyville.
“Ahh, Larkspur Delphinium. You and me are going to have a little...chat.” Giggling, Sweetie headed for the main source of Ponyville’s drinking water, the huge tank kept near the outskirts of town. Tossing one of the stalks in through a small hole in the top, she then glided to the second source, a freshwater lake, and did the same.
Those who noticed were more caught aback by a white Alicorn with Pinkie Pie hair flying around town. They could see it wasn’t Celestia, so their confusion only grew. Teleporting away, Sweetie found herself a place to return to filly size, and covered her Mark in some white powder. Nodding, she then teleported to her room, where she was being ‘sick’.
All that was left to do was wait.
It took a day for symptoms to appear, and when they did, Sweetie watched the show. The first sign was ponies tripping over more often, with some even having Pinkie Pie level twitching. Eventually the hospital was overrun with ponies suffering from bloating or irregular heartbeats. Rashes began to appear, and it was finally declared a grave problem.
Celestia and Luna brought down their best doctors, and began to look for the problem. They quickly found the half-rotted plants in the water sources, and went to Zecora, who brought some sort of potion. Listening in via her scrying pool, Sweetie tilted her head.
“This potion may help save them, but the substance may also bring an end.” Eventually, the Princesses were forced to make a difficult decision. To use the substance, or hope the ponies could fight it off. With no conclusion in sight, they went to the room the Main 6 were staying in. Barely conscious, Twilight simply smiled, giving a nod in encoragement.
“We will try it.” Closing her eyes, Celestia forced her own fears down, standing tall as she watched it being administered. Days passed, and the effects of the potion both helped and hindered. Many Ponies died, while most managed to pull through. All the Main 6 came through, but with a newfound addiction that had to be curbed.
“So someone sabotaged our drinking water?” Mind still slightly distracted due to withdrawal, Twilight managed to focus as Celestia nodded, and considered the information. All searched for leads, but all witnesses agreed a white pony with Pinkie Pie hair had been seen doing it. Rubbing her forehead, Twilight knew neither Pinkie Pie nor Celestia would have done it. Not to mention the fact Pinkie wasn’t an Alicorn.
“So much life,” she muttered to herself, breathing in and steeling herself to find the terrible person responsible for this. Glancing to the corridor, she blinked as Sweetie Belle passed the doorway, leaving the hospital. Looking out her window, she watched as the filly left, and felt a nagging sensation in her stomach.
“Ugh, I’m still sick.” Laying back down, she curled into her blankets, closing her eyes.
“Alright, next up is to give myself a challenge.” Putting a strike through the last item on her list, Sweetie rolled around on her bed as she thought of the best way to do her next challenge.
Ok Sweetie has gone over the edge here. She needs some professional help when this is all over or somepony to knock some sense back into her. Keep up the good work!
I'm glad this was a bit less... creepy than the last one.
D: *stunned silence*
Barely conscious, Twilight simple smiled
Twilight knew neither Pinkie Pie or Celestia
1. Simply.
2. Nor.
Hmm... One might think Starswirl was right from the start but slowly as the ciphers go on... One might think he was also giving in to the madness that mere mortals cannot comprehend of loving forever. He mentions of learning everything, seeing everything but really, what would happen after? I imagine Sweetie Belle right now would be the result.
Think about it. Sweetie is technically living forever on that one week. She can see everything and just about do everything. Well, almost but yes. Once 'everything' has been seen and done, what happens after? The mind is a mysterious thing.
This would be much creepier if the mass genocide is what 'broke' the loop.
Sweetie could go to the moon! Or Maybe artifacts to mess and study?
6153655 Get Celestia to do the whole 'Bananas' thing without getting her in on it in the first place.
6153585 Really, immortality is insufficient to experience everything, because you'll have missed your chance when deciding between time-limited options.
Well there's no end in sight and Sweetie is losing her mind the dragons need to give her a pillar to stand on.
The message so far:
One is good. Half the town is better. Let's see if we can do the whole fucking village!
You do seem to be slamming them out pretty damn fast, and as a result a lot of these chapters almost read like overviews rather than actual chapters. It might be worth considering going back over the story and beefing up the worst affected chapters.
Mane 6 [and Cap. Since it's a name of a group.]
Kill one pony and it's a tragedy.
Kill half a town and it's a statistic.
Kill everypony and you're a god?
Sweetie Belle.
I'm impressed that Sweetie managed to last this long before turning to the "Evil" portion of the alignment chart for ways to amuse herself and kill time. Kill. . . time. Huh. THAT'D be a spell to see in action, the absolute eradication of time. After all, you can't be looping through time if there's no time to loop through. Come on Sweetie, you know you want to!
Kill them all. Or just celestia. Thats fine too.
6154258 Next, Equestria. Then, THE WORLD! insert mad scientist laugh here
6154672
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I just have one question.
Is Larkspur Delphinium the name of the plant?
~Leonzilla
6153585 possibilities are endless,
The concept of doing everything is unreachable.
You might do everything you could think of at the time; but that does not mean that you have actually done everything.
So in other words, no matter if you have an infinite amount of time at your disposal you will still have an infinite amount of things to do with that time.
~Leonzilla
Now she just needs to sacrifice her soul as fuel to engulf Canterlot in Tartauran flame.
All hail Thrackerzod the Destroyer!
Okay...I don't really see how poisoning the water supply is at all an entertaining way of killing ponies, but whatever.
Joke's on her when it turns out each of her loops do in fact continue in their own timelines.
Am I the only one who sees her accidentally killing Opal and saving the rat? That event has been mentioned too many times. It's becoming a 'Chekhov's Gun'.
6154258 I agree if were gonna have a Sweetie belle going nuts she might as well do it right.
6155432
I figure Opal is actually Starswirl in disguise.
Is she going to casually see if it's possible to wipe out all life on the planet in under sixty seconds, just out of boredom? Presumably she's going to get bored of ever-increasing gigacide at some point. Maybe she'll see if it's possible to ascend all life to alicorn levels?
6154083 Ah, but if one it truly immortal then they'd eventually be able to experience the exact same timed choice again in the future - it might take an infinitely long time for it to come around again, but it will happen.
I liked this story better when it wasn't torturing innocent ponies maliciously. I mean, we're supposed to root for Sweetie Belle, aren't we? How can we keep rooting for someone when they are knowingly hurting their friends and family? What if she does succeed in killing them all, only for the resets to end and the blood on her hooves for real?
6155171 Yeah
6155933 I think she's a full-on antihero at this point, although it's been a coming on for a bit.
Ha! Infinite understanding is NOT something you would want.
What a way to have fun. What I would give to have that kind of power...
6155933
Get stuck in a time loop long enough, and eventually you'll start to treat other people like disposable playthings. Once that starts, yeah, it's a slippery slope to eating babies.
Sweetie needs a distraction... Desperately...
6155369
Tick...
(Cube turns from blue-black to red-black)
She is so broke. ANYPONY OWN A PONY REPAIR SHOP?
6155933
yeah, my interest and care for this story is dwindling. She could have tried so many different things to keep herself occupied. Like control the sun and moon. But she reverts to twisted torturing...
6155933
She's not doing it knowingly. At this point, she could've done more civil things, but it's like grand theft auto. At some point, you just start massacring them because in the end, it doesn't matter. Just go back to square one. She hasn't been the original sweetie belle since the first ten loops. It's like in Hard Reset (It feels kind of messed up to compare them, but it's the only one to bring forth in my head. I could go with the Best Night Ever, but that one doesn't feel right.) when Twilight starts eating donuts instead of doing something about the oncoming attack. No one blames her because it wasn't going to matter in the end. The thing is, at this point, nothing matters to her. She's a broken shell of her former self. At this point, you just hope she gets bored of pointless slaughter quickly.
I wonder how many more loops it would take for insanity if she wondered if the loops spawned tangent timelines.