From the Griffon Imperial Library

by Wages of Sin

Crystal Empire: Recovering Nation

Agent Deep Mind’s preliminary psychological evaluation of the Crystal Empire:

Dear Princess Celestia,

As I write this I am in my extraction carriage leaving the Empire after completing my reconnaissance assignment.

This is my early report.

I was at first surprised by the exuberant nature of the Crystal ponies. I had honestly been dubious of my prescribed disguise, wondering why I was to disguise myself as a tourist, when from my understanding, the Empire was going to be a horrifying necropolis of slavery and corrupting dark magic.

Rather than this bleak picture, when I arrived I was greeted with a populace in carefree celebration. I would later discover this to be partially due to the defeat of their long time captor Sombra, and moreso due to a collective amnesia which had helped to reduce the mental and emotional scarring wrought by his rule.

It is my professional assessment that this amnesia is too widespread and regular to be natural, and is instead likely due to a sudeeffect of the magic that had held the Empire for a thousand years. If this is the case, I would recommend testing to see if the amnesia will wear off with time. Should it be the case that the memories lost to the Crystal Ponies will return, it is my suggestion that steps be taken to prevent this.

Though the public consensus is to not speak of or try to remember any of their captivity under Sombra, I fear for the stability and productivity of the Empire should the citizenry become re-afflicted with the mental traumas no doubt inflicted during their enslavement.

On the surface they all appear happy, but upon keener inspection the signs of coping mechanisms can be seen. Though they were ostensibly celebrating, the majority of the drinking that was occurring in the many converted beer-halls had the signs of stress drinking.

Should it become necessary, and should any more subtle means be deemed non-viable, I feel strongly that the citizens would voluntarily subject themselves to memory suppressing magics rather than face their pasts.

Moving on to the other matter I was assigned to address. Though a more nuanced thing to assess, the aforementioned joviality and alcohol consumption proved a boon for my reconnaissance.

In a direct response to the question posed: No, the Crystal Ponies are not receptive to Princess Cadance’s rule.

At least not currently.

It is my assessment that the Crystal Ponies prefer the yet-unknown rule of Cadance infinitely more than the barely-forgotten rule of Sombra, but that there is still at least a serious resentment underneath.

No pony would outright say so, at least not without being so dosed in alcohol as to be out of coherent thought, but there were three major reasons for their resentment and fear.

The first reason, and the one that the ponies I interviewed most easily shared, was a general uneasiness of being ruled by someone they did not know. They can tell from her cutiemark and alicorn-hood that she is likely fit for the role, but knowing nothing about her has many concerned.

For this I would simply recommend a PR campaign, and a subtle influx of media that can promote her merits.

The next issue was harder to get out of them but it was clearly there nonetheless, and that was a resentment for having their last unwanted foreign ruler replaced by another mostly without their consent. Largely they feel a loss of self-determination because they didn’t bestow the crown to her, she just kind of “showed up and took it as if it was hers”.

I am confident that these feelings will mostly fade with time, and that no action on our part is particularly necessary, but if these feelings do not fade, they could lead to problems later on. I would recommend monitoring this.

The final issue was one which I only had one individual actually say, but that others seemed to feel similarly too. This was the fear that Cadance’s ties to Equestria, and particularly to you, princess, mean that the Empire is being annexed by Equestria.

The fear is that after thousands of years, surviving the Windagos, Discord, countless conflicts, and even Sombra, that the Empire is finally going to fall. Losing its independence as the cost of being saved.

For this I can only recommend publicly distancing Cadance from Equestria. Having her somehow show her commitment to the Empire first and foremost may foster positive popular opinion behind her which could place her firmly in the position of Empress that they actually do want her to fulfill.

Overall my assessment of the Crystal Empire places it on its way to recovery, but in my professional opinion it will take time and effort to foster the kind of environment we have in Equestria.

Author's Note:

TL;DR: The Crystal Empire was not a part of the unification of tribes, existing as its own nation separate from Equestria. On the outside they were proudly independent, but beneath the surface somewhat resentful of the success that the Equestrian three-tribe union had, especially after they gained the leadership (protection) of the Alicorns who defeated Discord.

Eventually Sombra comes, claims kingship and enslaves the population for a not insignificant amount of time. Eventually the alicorns show up for a bit and fail to save them. One thousand years go by, and after a crazy few days it starts to sink in that while they were "saved" by the alicorns, the cost of that was having a new ruler installed that they honestly know nothing about. What's worse, as best as anyone knows, their nation just became a vassal state of Equestria, which doesn't sit well with a population who's identity is critically tied to their independence (being the ponies who made it 'alone' for thousands of years).

Celestia's solution to this: use old laws* to make it look like Cadance forsook her princess-hood to save the Empire. The Crystal Ponies see it as Cadance being punished for refusing to be a puppet, removing their fears of losing their independence, and also endearing her to them. This maneuver works out just fine, because preparations were in place, the pony nations are naturally close, and proper information control in Equestria makes no one question it.

DFTS impact:

The nuances of this are lost on poor Commander Friendly Fire, who only understands that what Twilight did looks a lot like what Cadance did, and thought the same rules applied.

*May go into detail about these later. Let's see how far down the rabbit hole you guys want to go.

Comments

[Hopeful_Ink_Hoof]

Reading through the report without the author's notes, it almost sounds like Twilight's mission with The Crystal Heart was somehow a publicity stunt orchestrated by Celestia to get the crystal ponies to accept Cadance.

[ponygrad]

Yeah, I've never really seen the prospect of Crystal Empire self-determination addressed. It would be amusing for Cadence and Celestia the benign chessmaster to disagree over a minor issue in public just to put on a show of independence.

[Wages of Sin]

7693615 it was to indicate both copies, but I pulled out the note and forgot to pull the asterisk...

[AleaJactaEst]

The nuances of this are lost on poor Commander Friendly Fire, who only understands that what Twilight did looks a lot like what Cadance did, and thought the same rules applied.

You lost me there.

[A.P.O.N.I.]

et's see how far down the rabbit hole you guys want to go.

For those of you, like me, who are reading this on a phone, here is the miniature portion of the Author's Notes.

[nightwalker]

Hm, pretty neat stuff so far. Look forward to seeing how much of this winds up getting incorporated in the grand narrative.

[pahnazd]

Small shorts, but interesting nonetheless. Would definitely like to see more of what you can come up with later

[Katadactyl]

Take me down the rabbit hole. All the way. Tell me about intricate legal backup plans and government systems. Get me all up in those Alicorn legislative brains.

[Cursed Quill]

sudeeffect

side-effect

ater. Let's see how far down the rabbit hole you guys want to go.

GROUND FLOOR OF THE LIBRARY!!! :sparklemania:

[Cursed Quill]

7701192
Child kings are often uninformed and foolish. I suspect that his minions wrre doing a work-to-rule bit rather than seriously rebelling against the general.

[The Great Derpsby]

7705766
It's said they passed Alrek in the hallway without even attacking him. That's one of the biggest sign that all of this was a false flag operation.
I am wondering how Grover fits into this. Did he really steal the idol? Or did the Empire give it to him? That would be a great way to turn Griffonstone into a puppet state.

[Kamunari]

7707193
Im not sure, but it definitely works to the betterment of the Griffon here. The competent ruler stays in power and any decenters are given pause as any question of legitimacy is removed. Wether or not this was an elaborate staged coup, or a botched grab for power only matters to who you want to belive what. The former sounds better to the people as it shows a kind ruler who has handled a hardship of an incompetent figurehead. While to foreign powers it shows a level of cunning that you wouldn't want to mess with. Im sure the griffon spies used both versions.

[PostPony]

Take us as far as you possibly want bro

[Draco Dei]

I would focus on the main story, but these are interesting enough and short enough I doubt they would take too much time away from it.

[ferret]

sudeeffect

[Latrans]

How did I just now find this?!?

MOAR!!!

Please?