2 - It's in a Book
Luminace approached the books that laid open on the floor, her eyes scanning intently over them. "Are these spells? They are... curious."
Twilight moved alongside her, eyes darting between her large guest and the books below. "They are Equestrian spells." She put a hoof to her snout. "Oh! Of course they look a little different. Only unicorns cast spells here."
Luminace raised a brow. "That feels like a waste of thought. Surely your other ponies have things to contribute to the pursuit of the underpinnings of the universe? Is that a legal mandate?"
Twilight shook her head manically. "No! No, that would be terrible." She pointed up at her horn. "Unicorns have magic, and all magic, in Equestria, that ponies have is done by the horn. No horn, no magic. It's simple biology for us."
"Fascinating." Luminace leaned towards Twilight, studying her spire. "You have seen this is not entirely true. Have you considered, perhaps, your people discovered the easy way and never looked beyond it?"
Twilight's expression creased into a soft frown. "What? You're saying a pegasus or earth pony could do Equestrian magic? Now, don't get me wrong. I know all ponies in Everglow could, in theory, learn to cast spells with sufficient study. But this is an entirely different world. A different universe, even!"
Luminace gave a slow bob of her head. "That may be true, but I choose to believe that, since I know it is true in more worlds than our own, that yours obeys this rule, which seems constant, until proven otherwise, of course." She raised a hoof at Twilight. "You were able to learn non-Equestrian magic, were you not?"
"Oh, yes!" Twilight suddenly galloped away, just to snatch a book off the shelf with a glow of magic and return with it. "I still have my spellbook, even if I haven't been using it..."
"Whyever not?" Luminace reached for the book, gently brushing it with a hoof.
Twilight set the book down on a podium carefully. "Most of them were... kind of violent. I don't even want to study much magic like that. I'd rather make friends than blow things up."
Luminace smiled at that. "In this, I agree, but not all Everglow magic is meant for war, you simply learned those first due to your... situation." Her horn lit with a white glow as the pages of the book turned slowly. "Do you know an enterprising youth, one who may benefit from this?"
Twilight paled slightly. There had been a set of ponies that had studied her book, and had learned from it. "The fillies..." At Luminace's querying look, Twilight shook her head. "A trio of friends snuck into my castle one day and stole this book." She tapped it lightly. "They studied it and did learn magic."
"And this tells you?"
Twilight sank to her haunches and put a hoof over her face. "That anypony could learn magic."
"I would venture further," spoke Luminace in a kindly tone, "that it may mean all thinking beings may, in theory, be capable of it. I have yet to meet a species, given sufficient capacity for thought, to be incapable of learning magic entirely." She inclined her head at the conjuration books still abandoned on the floor. "These Equestrian books are built solely for unicorns. Unicorns got there first, and it was accepted as a fact that magic was their domain."
Twilight lifted one with her magic and placed it beside her Everglow spellbook. She looked back and forth between the two. There were similarities, and yet, so many differences in the syntax and flow between the two. They were describing the same thing, but one through the lens of unicorn horns. "I've been a fool."
Luminace shook her head at that. "You are only made a fool if you do not take this discovery and revel in it. To be proven wrong is an occasion for celebration."
Twilight blinked at that. The idea of failure being good was somewhat foreign to her. "But I'd rather succeed. What's the point of studying, just to fail anyway?"
Luminace lifted her shoulders. "Knowledge itself cannot be 'succeeded'. It replaces and refreshes itself every time one learns they were wrong. Each wrong brings one closer to right. What lays behind the last wrong? Even I cannot know, but I am eager to find it." She reached a hoof and set it on the back of Twilight's neck.. "Take heart and be joyful. Today you learned something, and that's never a thing to be bitter about."
Twilight couldn't hold onto that sour note, not in the presence of the kind mentor. She couldn't feel the slightest scrap of scorn or mockery in Luminace's words. She gently, carefully, and with some trepidation tried to let go of that feeling of foolishness in herself. "Alright... so we take that as a wrong made right. Any pony can, in theory, learn magic." She thrust a hoof at her library. "But most of these books won't help. They all focus magic through unicorn horns." It came to her. "So we'll have to start writing new books..."
Luminace smiled brightly. "Fortunately for you, you have three talented disciples that sound eager to put their knowledge to work." She glanced around suddenly. "Something approaches."
Even as she spoke words of magic and wreathed herself and Twilight in shimmering bubbles, a figure popped into existence with the sound of a cork coming loose.
Twilight rolled her eyes. "What do you want, Discord?"
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*Anti chaos procedures engaged*
I will murder the Typos....
They shall not find foothold in this story!
*preps tactical precision laser cannons*
Luminace can understand Discord, because he is a local deity.
But when Pinkie Split Screens, well, thats what she just talked to Twilight about comes and cream pies her in the face.
PCGen is coming along nicely as well, although still no Fey Ponies that I can see, and they have dedicated entries for Half-Form, instead of the Generational Matrix. Simple version, take two entities and average their modifiers as this works mathematically correctly.
Maybe Twilight will have to go back to Magic Kindergarten, in order to start at the beginning of understanding and applying magical theory and practice.
After all, just how quickly can Griffins, Minotaurs and Spike and Ember pick up V,S,M Humanoid magic?
This should be interesting.
I see Twilight fell into the trap that only unicorns and alicorns can do magic. Then what is the Sonic Rainboom, The Stare, weather control, or earth pony agromancy? Pinkie is outside even Princess Luminace's understanding I bet.
7698289 Magic is not the same as spells.
7698306
Me realizing the deference and why I was wrong.
Perchance Luminace can find a friend in Discord better than she can Unspoken... Time will tell, of course.
Dammit other god I hang out with, not now!
Poor Twilight doesn't see the unspoken irony yet.
Cute chapter titles. Levar Burton approves.
7698289
No, she fell into the entirely understandable (well, sort of - not taking into account earlier fics in this series) line of thought that only unicorns and alicorns can cast spells, which is different from "doing magic." The series flat-out tells us that every pony has some magic, both due to their race and their cutie mark.
Just a function of breaking the sound barrier in Equestria.
Nothing magical there; that's just Fluttershy giving a really scary look at someone, even if it has a(n intermittent) leitmotif.
Racial pegasus magic (and griffon magic, and quite likely a lot of animals, since we see some birds sit on a cloud during the "Find A Pet" song in May the Best Pet Win!).
There's considerable evidence to suggest that earth ponies don't have "agromancy," per se, but rather enhanced strength. In Princess Twilight Sparkle - Part 1, Princess Celestia says "There is word he has gone after Earth ponies as well. Without their strength, they will not be able to tend the land." In other words, it's their strength that lets them tend to the land, rather than any sort of direct magical ability. Likewise, in the episode "All About Alicorns" of Baby Flurry Heart's Heartfelt Scrapbook, Pinkie says "There are Earth ponies, who get their strength from the land." So in that context, it's also strength, even if that strength is attributed as coming from the land.
I see Pinkie as having "party magic" as an effect of her cutie mark (save for the Pinkie Sense, which seems like a psionic wild talent).
EDIT: Whoops, David already spoke to this. Nevermind!
I'm rather surprised that Twilight doesn't remember that she taught Applejack how to be a magus, admittedly while on Everglow, and in doing so disproved the idea that horns are necessary to cast spells. Heck, we've seen AJ using her magic on her farm in a previous fic.
7698696 She put up blinders between her Everglow experience and Equestria. Her Everglow time was mildly traumatizing. A friendly voice to point out the pieces let her snap to a conclusion swiftly, yes?
that ponies have are done - that ponies have is done
on Twilight's back of the neck - on the back of Twilight's neck.
inclined her heard - inclined her head
*****
A reading rainbooooow...
A scientist learns as much, if not more, from a failure as from a success. Or to paraphrase from Mythbusters, "This isn't a failure. It's a result!"
7698874 Typos corrected before Luminace and Twilight could turn their mutual hatred upon them. Close call, there. :)
Well I am sure discord is going to add some fun. I like to see how she see him next to the unspoken one
So...next chapter ought to be interesting. I predict at least a semi-freakout from Lumi, due to Discords near-identical looks(and personality?) to the Unspoken...
Spoken like a true scientist.
7698903
This one is a sneaky bugger.
Perhaps you mean "lay"? As in present tense? I think they are doing that now, rather than before.
Plus it just seems weird that she says they are curious after scanning them curiously, try changing that. Don't want repeat words.
And Discord is not a source of typos, he is the source of typos. All chaos comes from him.
7705620 Curiosity tempered.
i feel like these chapters are much shorter than ususal
7708697 1000 vs the usual 2k.
7708841 YOU MUST MAKE THEM LONGER! We need more horse words.
I so want to see that dialog!
7706163
Curiosity may have been tempered, but the books are still laid open.
Luminace is technically correct in that not all Pathfinder/d20 magic is meant for war, but that's drawing a pretty thin distinction. By far most of the spells in that system are meant for attacking or defending. There are utility spells, of course - and we even see Applejack using a floating disk spell to help with her harvesting apples at one point in the previous fic - but for the most part the magic is focused around tactical combat.
Of course, any world that uses those game rules is going to be one that's saturated with magic, and so it makes no sense that there's so many different spells for killing things, whereas performing household chores is limited to unseen servant, prestidigitation, and a few others. In fact, most of the non-combat spells are cantrips/orisons, with the majority of the rest being very low-level, though exceptions are there (e.g. move earth or control water), which suggests that these should be the most common spells, and have the most variants and new applications being researched, rather than more ways to kill your enemies.