How does one describe a bar?
Perhaps they would start with the physical appearance of it, or the mood it carried. There wouldn't be anything wrong with that, but you don't think that really gets to the heart of a bar, certainly not one like the Mountain's Crown.
You, as the bartender, would describe it by the regulars.
"I can't believe it," Presti remarks with a displeased upturn of his nose. "A wedding in the castle, and I wasn't invited."
Prestigious Rise, "Presti" for short, is a rather interesting stallion. His goals often seem to far exceed his means, but he never gives up on them. Admittedly, you can't help but respect him for that.
You cross your forelegs together and rest them against the rich mahogany counter, your ears perked with interest. "A wedding?"
He huffs and raises his large glass of red wine with one hoof, its weight made negligible by his take on levitation magic that was just as interesting as he was. Instead of actually levitating, he made the object nigh weightless.
"Yes, a wedding," he repeats with a bit of distaste in his voice. "No matter. It was merely the princess's aide. It wasn't the princess herself."
The gold-coated stallion at his side snickers behind the rim of his mug. "Oh, you certainly sound like it's no matter." He sets his mug down and pushes it toward your side of the counter. "Another!"
Ah, Glitter Gold. You and he go way back. His wife complains that he drank too much; he proclaims that he didn't drink enough. You are inclined to agree—the answer of with whom is something you hide behind a smile as you refill his mug.
While Presti shoots Glitter a sidelong glare, your gaze travels the bar to keep an eye out for any raised hooves calling for your attention. Tonight, all of the social elite that frequent your bar seem to be slow to drink, more interested in the murmuring gossip that drifts between the slow croons of smooth jazz.
"I'm just surprised I didn't receive an invitation." Presti sighs in the way a stallion mourning a lost love might. "While the bride is nopony I know, I am friends with a friend of the groom's."
Presti had a great deal of friends—or, at the least, he had a great deal of ponies he called friends. Whether that was true or not was no business of yours, so long as they didn't draw his attention to another bar. You top off his wine glass to ensure he remains satisfied, and he flashes you a smile.
Your fine-tuned ears catch little snippets of conversations down the row. The grapevine seems overripe with too much information this evening, but you can start to piece together the puzzle.
Somepony near to the princess—her personal chef, aide, or masseuse—had a wedding in the palace today. She married a wealthy stallion, but details of him are entirely clouded by gossip of an ex-lover. The bride had once been entangled with somepony of note; his name is only shared in hushed whispers that you can't make out.
"Bartender, another!" Glitter chuckles and shakes out his mane of bronze and silver. "I'll need you to keep up if I'm to keep up with Presti's bemoaning."
Presti glares at Glitter, but there's no malice in his eyes. Irritation, perhaps, but they had drunk beside one another too many times to let hard feelings rise between them. "I am not bemoaning. I am merely expressing my displeasure at the Wonderbolts race."
You chuckle and refill Glitter's mug, the cider sloshing against the sides as it poured in. Strange as the pair may be, they are your best customers. The nights just wouldn't be the same without them around.
Your attention is called away from your regulars, and they acknowledge your departure without so much as a glance or a nod. Such is the life of a bartender: you drift in and out, there when they need you, not when they don't. Nopony regards you at the grocery store any differently than if you were a complete stranger—and other than knowing their deepest secrets, that's exactly what you are.
On the other hoof, bits flow into your pockets just as steadily as liquor into their mugs, so things more or less even out.
The light that slips in from around the red velvet curtains slowly fades as the evening carries into night. The smooth jazz glides through the air, entangling all of the patrons in relaxation and warmth. You begin to catch more details of the day's prestigious event as tongues become more at ease.
"I heard he left the wedding early," one voice says behind a light guffaw. "How embarrassing to be rebuked by a mare of such lower standing than him."
"Rebuked by her? No, no, that's not quite right at all. He spurned her long ago. He showed up merely to laugh in her face."
The gossip twists and turns over itself, becoming a mess of a knot that you don't have time to suss out. The Mountain's Crown will not run itself, after all.
A hush falls over the bar when the door opens and you look up to see an unexpected sight: Prince Blueblood himself. All eyes are on him as he stands in the doorway, his appearance nowhere near as perfect as anypony would expect a noble of his station to have. With clear contempt on his face, he strides across the room as effortlessly as if he were gliding through a waltz and takes a seat at the end of the bar.
Murmuring follows in his wake, and glances chase after him. Not even the gentle music can soothe the rising curiosity that buzzes in the air.
"The stallion of the hour," Presti comments as you pass by on your way to the prince. "See to it that he's in a good mood for me."
There is a certain taste to the air that invades your senses as you draw near to Prince Blueblood. You can feel uninhibited ire radiating from him, turning the whole room sour and giving you pause. Before you can make a decision whether to press forward or withdraw, however, he lifts his head to acknowledge your presence.
"Whiskey," he says, the word rolling off his tongue with a hint of desperation.
You merely nod and take a step back to retrieve a glass and the bottle, then bring both over to him. "Here you are, sir."
His magic grips the glass from you, his head tilts back, and the whiskey is gone. He sets the glass down a little harder than necessary and doesn't regard you as he says, "Another."
As you pour the dark golden liquor into the glass, you can already tell: this is going to be a long night.
Prince Blueblood dismisses you with a wave of his hoof after the third refill, and you have no choice but to oblige him, even if the hoof-waving is a little rude. You're not a servant of his, after all.
But he is a prince, so what else can you do?
"So?" Glitter leans in, his ears perked and alert. "What did he say?"
You just smile pleasantly. "Another cider, sir?"
His nose scrunches up and he shakes his empty mug at you. "Don't play coy. You spoke with Prince Blueblood himself! Gossip that juicy can't be kept all to yourself."
"Another cider it is," you say as you exchange his mug with another. If there's one thing that the Canterlot elite love, it's gossip. However, ponies would stop talking to you if you started talking back more than necessary, and that isn't good for business.
Presti turns his head to look down the bar. "Perhaps he requires the camaraderie of a pony more of his station." He starts to rise from his seat when Glitter bursts into laughter, and he glares. "And what, pray tell, strikes you so amusing?"
"No, no, nothing at all." Glitter grins. "I would love to see you endear yourself to the prince."
Presti's ears fold back and, slowly, he lowers himself. "Perhaps I shall wait until there is less of an audience."
The prince is taking his time with this glass of whiskey. You watch from afar as he only takes an occasional sip, otherwise sitting still and not looking at anypony. Whatever is bothering him must be deeply personal. You can't lie—of course you're curious! But he's not exactly the sort of pony you pry information from.
And that's why you find yourself a little excited when, as the crowd starts to clear out, Prince Blueblood beckons you over.
"Do you have anything stronger than this?" he asks, still not looking at you.
"Certainly," you reply. "I have just the thing."
From the many bottles that line the wall behind the counter, you retrieve one of a bright, almost acidic green.
He doesn't look at you, instead eyeing the bottle. "What is that?"
"Our best absinthe." You pour him a small shot glass, and slide it to him.
His magic caresses the glass and raises it to his eye level. "Hmm." He swirls it as if it were red wine and inhales its scent. After a derisive snort, he tosses it back, sets the glass down, and crosses his forelegs on the counter. "It will do."
You haven't been dismissed... yet. You take his whiskey glass and remove the chilled soapstones. He doesn't seem ready to talk, and you aren't going to press him for details.
There is a clear weight bearing down on him, though. His bow tie is undone and hangs from his hunched shoulders. The artery on the side of his neck pulses from a heavy heartbeat. Most of all, however, are his eyes: the whites of them are almost entirely red, and the lids are swollen.
Is he angry, or has he been crying? He doesn't strike you as the type of stallion to cry. Anger seems to suit him better.
Presti's hoof raises to call your attention, and you excuse yourself. Prince Blueblood probably doesn't hear you—or if he does, he doesn't care.
"His mood?" Presti asks when you're close. "How is it?"
You offer a wry smile. "Perhaps another night would be better."
Presti glances down the bar and frowns. "But when will I find such an opportunity to speak with him alone?"
"Perhaps another night," you repeat, inclining your head to look at the selection of alcohol behind you. "Tonight, might I suggest trying a new drink? On the house."
This serves enough distraction to draw Presti's attention back to you. "Who can say no to such an offer?"
"Certainly not you," Glitter teases and laughs at Presti's indignant glare. "I, however, shall call it a night, lest the wife berate me again. See you tomorrow, Presti."
Presti snorts, but he does nod to bid his companion farewell.
You smile and look out into the bar—your smile falters. All eyes are on you. Hooves begin to beckon you over, and you allow a sigh.
Everypony wants to know what you know, to find out what he's been drinking, to hear anything they can sink their teeth into. Just as with any patron of your bar, however, you aren't one to betray their trust. Even if Prince Blueblood hasn't trusted you with anything yet, you are still his bartender.
Given no gossip and stuck only with dwindling hours that threaten to become morning, it isn't long before even Presti gives up on the chance encounter. Now, it's only you and and the prince.
"Sir?" you prompt as you approach. "I'm afraid it's closing time."
His head lifts and, for the first time, he acknowledges you as a pony and not just a supplier of alcohol. His eyes search you for something and though he doesn't seem to find anything, he mutters, "It should have been me."
Your ears perk, but you try to keep an even expression and say nothing. A little extra time at work won't be the end of you if it meant hearing his story.
"But it couldn't have been." His normally radiant blond mane hangs around his face in darkened, tussled strands. "We could never be together."
After a moment of consideration, you ask the obvious question: "Why?"
His eyes widen, as if surprised you are capable of responding—or that you're brave enough to respond to him. "Why?" he repeats with a slow, tired chuckle. "You couldn't possibly understand."
A smile tugs at your lips even though you do your best to stifle it. "Try me."
There is a pause that drags on just long enough to seem like the opportunity is going to pass, but his nostrils flare as he snorts. "I—I fail to see why not. It's not as if I have anything left to lose."
You pull the stool that sits behind the counter over and take a seat, crossing your forelegs and hooking your hooves. "I'm listening."
Prince Blueblood draws in a breath. His head tilts back, his eyes gloss over, and his voice falls in low, almost lilting waves. "Her name is Raven, and she is—she's the love I can never have."
A glow erupts around his horn and you hear the sound of something moving behind you. Just as you turn to look, you watch as liquor lifts out of a bottle on the wall and slips through the air in several shimmering streams.
"Hey, what—"
You're silenced when the liquids join together and, slowly, become the form of a mare that hovers above the counter to your right. She seems rather ordinary, if you had to be honest, but what is extraordinary has to be the prince's exceptional grasp on levitation magic. You can not only make out the curves of her cheeks and jawline, but each individual lash that frame her big eyes.
Her glasses far exceed what seems necessary, carefully perched on a perky snout, and her mane and tail are both wrapped in tight buns. She has a shy expression on her face, and if there were color beyond whiskey to her, you imagine she would be blushing.
Prince Blueblood's gaze is fixated on her, the clearest his expression has seemed to you all night. "I am called a prince, but I have no more power or responsibility than a—than a mere duke."
Considering a duke is an extremely high rank in the noble world, you aren't quite sure what the problem is, but he doesn't seem to be looking for your opinion on the matter—or any matter, really.
Though he largely seems to be holding his liquor better than the average pony, the whiskey and absinthe are clearly working their way through him. Raven's form starts to lose its shape as his head bobs and eyelids droop, but he jerks himself upright and she snaps back into place.
"But," he growls out, "because I am the firstborn stallion in the direct line of the ancient Princess Platinum, they gave me the false title of prince. Pitiful. Meaningless." His unsteady hoof raises and traces the outline of the watery mare's cheek, which ripples at his touch.
She gazes back at him with a soft smile. He returns it with a suddenly sober scowl and the magic surrounding his horn vanishes. The alcohol loses its shape, falling onto the counter and the floor. You pull back as it splatters against your chest and face, the scent of it filling your nostrils.
"Excuse me, I—"
He looks at you, gaze unsteady. "If you wish me to leave, I shall."
If he's going to make a mess of your place, then perhaps you should kick him out! But you'd be lying if you said you don't still have unanswered questions. And, after all, he's a prince. Meaningless or not, he certainly has the bits to cover the expenses.
Begrudgingly, you settle back onto the stool and gesture for him to continue.
Prince Blueblood raises a hoof to try to push his mane into some semblance of order. "Very well." He turns in his stool and looks out into the empty bar. His magic alights and from behind you, streams of rum, vodka, and tequila slither through the air into two forms this time: a young filly and colt. Their bodies glow from the dim light that is refracted within them, but you can still make out their details clearly.
The colt is, without a doubt, the prince's young self; you can only assume, then, that the filly is Raven. Her mane and tail are down, her glasses are absent, and her appearance is still plain.
"We met as foals, both trapped in a path with—with no bends, no forks, nothing but forward." A bitterness seeps into his words as he continues. "I, the beloved descendent of Princess Platinum, was destined to be a prince. A token of rarity."
His ears flatten to the sides. "Had she had sons, and those sons had sons, and those sons more sons, and—and then I would be nothing more than another stallion. It is by mere chance that I am special, but I am special nonetheless."
The colt gallops silently through the air toward the filly, the liquid that gives him shape rippling and waving as Blueblood's focus drifts in and out. He comes to a stop and looks at Raven, who pays him no mind. You watch as his expression becomes confused, then dejected, then determined with each attempt for her attention. It's almost endearing, really.
"And what about her?" you ask.
His voice softens, a small lull in the storm. "She? Raven, the only daughter of Inkwell. She served as Princess Celestia's aide, as did her mother, and her mother before her. If she did not succeed her mother, then—then the disappointment would have surely suffocated her. So, of course, she followed in her mother's hoofsteps. I thought we might be kindred spirits, but she? She would have none of me."
The filly turns her head away from the colt. No matter how he moves or what he does, she is stalwart in ignoring him. Light shimmers off their bodies like rays of sunlight playing with the waves, some of it reflecting onto the chairs and tables around them. It's almost a dance between them—he hops up, she looks down; he ducks low, she looks high; he jumps around, she turns away. All of this plays out with only a quiet sloshing from the liquid that makes up their forms.
"She was the only pony who had no interest in responding to my demands. It infuriated me." His eyes closed for a moment. "I sought to have her removed, but Celestia was fond of her. My cries for her dismissal fell upon deaf ears."
Droplets of liquor fall away from the filly and colt as they become distorted in the air, their movements growing erratic. They swirl and stretch and contract until they are one as the Raven from before.
Prince Blueblood sighs as he gazes upon her. "And so I grew to hate her, and she me. I spent my idle days seeking nothing but new ways to make her miserable until I gathered the idea to court her."
"Court her?" Your nose scrunches up, but you can't tear your eyes away from Raven's watery doppelgänger as she glides in a slow circle around the prince, a ghostly visage of his heartache. "I don't follow."
"How could you?" He chuckles and leans back as Raven brushes against him, leaving his coat wet with liquor where they touch. "Your thinking must be abominin—abominan—"
His tongue clicks as it stumbles over itself and he momentarily scowls. "It must be terribly simple. What a pity. Let me explain it to you in terms you will understand: I would court her, woo her, pin her beneath me, and then shame her in front of Celestia. That would get rid of her for good."
Raven settles beside him and runs a rippling hoof over his mane to push it behind his ear. He closes his eyes, savoring the touch. "As you are hopefully capable of surmising, my plan backfired. I fell for her. She opened her heart to me and I fell in, drowning in her love."
You watch him as his expression flickers between delight and pain. The conjuration of her seems more of a torture than a comfort, but he hasn't dismissed her like the first one yet. "Then why did she marry somepony else?"
Prince Blueblood's eyes snap open and the withering look he gives you sends a chill down your spine. The alcohol seems to burn from his blood under the seething anger in his gaze. "Why? Because I let her go. Do you think a simple, common mare—no matter her station as the princess's aide—could find joy in the life I lead?"
He shifts his attention back to Raven and she wraps her liquid forelegs around his neck. As she does, the tension leaves his muscles, his voice falling low and quiet, but clearer now. "I am lavished in praise for being, by chance, born a stallion. I am haunted by an ancestry of noble blood that I must uphold. I am watched at every step, every turn, every success, every mistake. She stands beside Celestia, but Canterlot hardly knows or cares for her. She can live in peace and do as she pleases, while I will no doubt be endlessly reprimanded for the rumors that shall spread regarding tonight's visit to your establishment."
You open your mouth, but he doesn't let you speak.
"That is my gift to her. My parting gift. My last act of love, though she will never see it that way. And that is as it should be. The stallion she has found is common-born and will bring her the common-born happiness that she deserves."
Raven's form begins to waver and her features become muddled, but his focus doesn't seem any lessened. She loses her shape and merely becomes a wave of mixed drinks that engulfs him before crashing to the ground. Soaked to the bone in liquor, he heaves a sigh. "And there you have it. Are you satisfied?"
"Satisfied?" You blink. Satisfied with what? The story? Or the fact that the place reeks of alcohol more than normal and looks like a bath house instead of a bar? A frown crosses your lips and you reply, "Not really. If you love her so much, why didn't you fight for her? If she loved you, then couldn't you have made it work?"
Prince Blueblood returns your frown with a wry smirk while liquor drips from his muzzle. "Because this isn't a foal's tale," he says in a condescending tone. "Welcome to the real world. Hearts break and that's the end of it. I have many mares to choose from, all of whose ancestry hearken to some ancient noble. That is the path I have always had in front of me, and love is hardly enough to change that. Now that she is wed, I can forget her. We have nothing more to do with one another."
You watch as he rises from his stool and turns away. "Wait—"
"I believe you have heard more than you deserve. Goodbye, bartender."
You start to stand. "No, you—"
His horn lights up to open the door.
"Prince Blue—"
A trail of liquored hoofprints follow him outside.
"—blood, you—"
The door closes behind him. You stand in stunned silence for a long while before your gaze falls to the slick, shining floor.
He hadn't paid for a single one of his drinks, much less the alcohol he wasted in his needlessly showy display of liquor levitation, and now you are stuck with the decision of sending him a bill or letting him have something go his way.
What a long night it is going to be, indeed.
Poor Prince Blueblood. At least this explains his actions in the main story.
Let him have something go his way!
Let him have something go his way, I feel bad for the poor guy.
Yup. "I" am totally going to be the one married to Raven by the end of this!
Why not both?? He should pay but he should have something go his way
I read both ENDINGs. Man, what a downer.
From the bartender's viewpoint anyway... Who's to say that nopony else can do anything, except for CW?
While I'm in favor of seeing both, I'd rather see you let it go his way. It's unfair making me have feelings that aren't spite towards blueblood
This feels like a riddle. If there's nothing we can do about it, then how do we make it a happy ending?
Hmm... Gotta say that I wasn't expecting a Choose Your Own Adventure at the end of this story.
Chances are I'm gonna be poring over this mystery for a good while now... At 4:30 in the morning.
Thanks for the good read, Crystal.
Edit: Wait a sec. Assuming that both endings are correct in their events, then Blueblood's tab comes to 83 bits. If a bill gets sent out, only 66 bits are sent back.
Blueblood still hasn't paid off his tab! He's still got 17 bits left to pay.
We can use this to further our goal for a happy ending.
There are no happy endings, of course. There are simply endings, and whatever happiness we find in the world, we will never find in them.
So ist das Leben.
The happy ending is worth its search, even if Blueblood is... who he is.
Very nice, little tale.
8095143
I'm a bit confused by what you wrote. As I understand it, there are only two endings, both of which are essentially the same, and neither are what I'd call "happy". Did you manage to find a third ending, or something?
8095514
That I have, my friend. And I encourage you, and everybody else, to try and find it. Sometimes when you look very close at the two choices, you can find out that they both, together, add up to the solution.
8095514
You know what this means, don't you?
bit.ly/2nMWCx4
Am I missing something? I read the chapter and clicked both links but they're password blocked.
8095552
Let me put it like this: the author left a hint.
I found the third ending! Kudos for the clever way of hiding it. And it is as heartwarming as one should expect.
8095543 Thank you. The clue helped tremendously.
Crystal. You sly fox, you. That was a brilliant puzzle. I knew you'd never leave a story with a sad ending like that.
That is not how you drink absinthe, silly prince.
8095574 I tried ENDING but it didn't work.
8095900
Don't shout it. Endings are tender beings.
8095543
Hmmm...
Okay. I think I've found the solution.
Where do I put the solution?
Well, at least somepony got a happy ending. I usually don't read 2nd person stories, because the ones I. Amen across were atrocious. So much so they turned me off of them.entirely. this one is not so bad. I may have to give another one a chance. Thanks for writing it.
Alright, I'm bad at puzzles. Can someone PM me the passwords?
Edit: After giving up I tried one more time then got it. Wow. It's like when you wait for a page to load and you're so frustrated that you press refresh RIGHT when it loads.
What I don't understand now is how to get to the third ending D: D: D:
EDIT: after figuring out the rules of this story, I now see that what looks like the awful ME3 rainbow ending is quite deliberate and intentional in order to provide clues to the 3rd ending...
8095653
Indeed. Missing the all important louching!
But that is neither here nor there. Excellent story over all.
I am not too fond of the two "endings" though; far too much like Mass Effect's "Choose Your Own Rainbow" train wreck. The story as presented at time of reading stands up quite well on its own, and the two password protected chapter endings feel quite superfluous. Especially since they are practically identical (baring two sentences). Did I miss or overlook something?
8096106
At the risk of sounding too mystical, but not to ruin the fun for others - each chapter leaves its unique mark. Embrace one of the endings, then change its value.
8095543
Your suggestion involving adding was misleading and led to long division. Somehow.
All of your other suggestions, however, were quite helpful.
8097316
"Adding" simply has more than one meaning, my friend... I couldn't make the game too easy.
8097126 Well done, took me forever took figure out what you meant by "Unique mark" never expected to have to look beyond the story to find it. Would never had done it without that small piece of advice.
For anyone wondering Addition can mean connecting.
8097817
I'm glad I helped out. I love to drop hints for others, I do the same thing in my stories.
8097317
Bah! You're just a lucky guy that I'm a benevolent and unmotivated evil overlord.
Verily, 'tis time to thank y'all for reading this little foray into writing experimentation! Clearly there are some hits and misses here for some folk. I'm going to do a general reply to all (forgive me for no personal touches this time around) since there are a fair amount of repeated remarks. ^^
I'm glad those who enjoyed it enjoyed it, and I apologize for anything that was less than enjoyed!
In regards to the endings, I view it and intended it as like a game that has multiple endings depending on your choices. Some people play through one time and are content with the ending they received. Some folks will try out another, and others still will try to get them all. There's no right or wrong method here; if you are content with where the story proper ends, then there is certainly no need to read either of the two offered endings, and further still no requirement to seek out the secret ending.
I wanted to offer them, because it seems a waste to give a second perspective but give no sense of You. You have the choice: leave it as it is, try different paths, or seek out to solve the puzzle. If You don't enjoy doing that, then You don't have to! This is up to You; this is Your influence on the story as You see it from Your perspective.
8094490 8094612 8094660 8094678 8094681 8094808 8094811 8094829 8095025 8095143 8095552 8095625 8095653 8096536 8096692 8096827
8097894
I'm sorry, I am holding the role of the Evil Overlord, and I shall not suffer a subpar sham...
8097915
We appreciate you not taking the Chrono Trigger approach and giving us fifteen possible endings.
8097918
Yeah, well I'm the Evil Alien Overlord, so there!
Alright, time for a downer comment. Yeah, nobody will like this, but this one has to happen.
8097915
I kinda figured that the multiple endings came about because of the second person storytelling. But please read below...
8097126
This is becoming unbelievably frustrating. I still can't find the third ending! I figured out the passwords for the first two endings readily enough, but the path to the happy ending I keep hearing about seems to be shrouded in mystery to me.
I have 66 and 83.
I have 1065311 and 1065338.
But I just don't know what to do with those. Or if I even have the right clues! I tried entering different passwords to the chapters, changing the URL's and trying some passwords on the links that didn't come up to be obviously unrelated to this story.
And none of it's worked so far! This is immensely exhausting, and it's starting to get to the point where I don't think the payoff of finally getting the third ending will actually be worth what trouble I've gotten out of this.
But please Gulheru - don't send me any more cryptic clues! I don't think that any more from you will help me, since from what experience I've had with you so far is that you don't seem to be very good at giving these kind of clues without giving it away entirely.
Or to be more fair, I'm just bad at them. After all, I do always have to use a guide when doing treasure trails in Runescape.
Please just PM me the solution... okay?
And to Crystal Wishes... I didn't really have fun with this "hidden ending" shenanigan. I did choose to try to get a better ending, but as of now, it doesn't feel like that choice has really mattered yet.
8098063 Not everything is for everyone. This wasn't for you, but it was fun for others. I will never please everyone, and unfortunately, you're in the camp that wasn't pleased. I'm sure there will come a time when you join the other camp.
8098063
Yes, I agree, I was able to find the password but not the third ending.
I want to read the third ending, though, so if someone could PM me the solution then that would be great. I don't really understand puzzles very well :(
8098181
I know, Iknow. I wish I could enjoy everything I read, but sometimes things just are the way they are. And there's nothing necessarily wrong with that.
EDIT: A nice person just PM'd me the solution. I didn't realize that I wasn't considering enough of the numbers.
But regardless, I really did like that ending. It didn't have anything too out-of-character in it, and nicely wraps up everything that the story brought up.
I would have liked to have solved it myself, but I'll take what I can get.
There are sooo many things I like in this chapter, I could probably write a 2k report on it.
To sum up
-Presti and Glitter are adorable and obnoxious in the way that a lot of real (snooty) people I know can be. Harmless, yet still a part of that self-absorbed, self-aggrandizing mindset of the nouveau or fringe rich. That bit about being a friend of a friend cracked me up.
-The bartender was hilarious. And waaay better at keeping his mouth closed around some juicy gossip than I'd ever be!
-I love your Blueblood. This is the quintessential portrayal captured in a way few understand and even fewer can replicate successfully, in my opinion. It is easy to dismiss Blue's strengths in the face of his many failings, but here is where his flaws show how strong he is. He puts happiness so far away from himself that he can't even fathom the idea that something or someone might be really good for him. He's grown up expecting something more and that mindset just destroys any chance of him finding true happiness. His haughty demeanor and viewpoint are both off-putting and pitiable but I can't help but admire his pride, even when wounded.
-Liquor levitation and manipulation. Now that's not something you see everyday! I love it, showy but not overboard. In a word: poignant. Other stories have you wondering whether Blueblood even notices the ponies he uses. Here, we know he does, and somehow that's even more sad.
That happy ending, though. Don't know if you'll ever get to continue his story in the QnBverse, but that ending just makes me wonder.
And then get a little more jazzed to write my own Blueblood.
Took me some frustration, but I finally found the 3rd ending! Victory is mine!
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I love CYOA stories (my Da and older brother have a complete collection of them) and once I stumbled upon the rules of your story, I enjoyed it much more. I now realise that the structure of the two "standard" endings is quite deliberate and intentional.
The way to get to the 3rd ending felt a bit unfair, almost too meta, like having to solve a printed CYOA book by performing concatenation of all the street numbers in a story to get the ISBN number for the addendum that has the real ending. Sure it is obvious in retrospect, but as a first time reader to your (admittedly excellent) work, there was nothing that suggested that this was a solution. To further compound the issue, at time of writing many of the partial solutions that only used 1 or 2 of the elements also happened to resolve to password protected chapters (presumably from other, very confused authors who are now wondering why their unpublished chapters got hammered).
I remember a rather infamous CYOA story titled Inside UFO 54-40 that my Da and I read through together. The story has you trying to avoid creatively gruesome deaths while trying to escape off the titular spaceship and run away to a paradise called "Ultima". There is one semi-goodish ending where you are safely reunited with your family on Earth, but it is so perfunctory and unsatisfying that it still feels like you failed, because you never made it to the promised Ultima. You can do the book over again, making different choices, always getting closer to Ultima, but never reaching it.
Turns out the Ultima ending is in the book, but you can never legitimately reach it; none of the paths lead to that particular page. To reach the "happy" ending, you have to break the understood rules of CYOA and flip through the pages until you reach it. The book then acknowledges that the ending is impossible and then pours salt in the wound by berating you for cheating. My initial read-through of Lucky Guy brought bad, frustrated memories of that miserable book.
However, once I figured out the rules and expectations for Lucky, I can see that it was not nearly the unfair arse-pull that UFO was, and I enjoyed the story much more.
For the Frustrated who may be reading after, here are some straightforward hints I wish I had to explain what was going on:
(hints are spoiler'd and encoded in ROT-13 to avoid accidental disclosure)
0. Gurer ner guerr jevggra raqvatf. Gurer vf ab jnaxrel (nf V vavgvnyyl gubhtug) nobhg vzntvavat n arj raqvat sbe Oyhroybbq
1. Gur gjb erthyne raqvatf ner yvaxf va gur fgbel: 'fraq uvz n ovyy' be 'yrggvat uvz unir fbzrguvat tb uvf jnl'
2. Gur cnffjbeq sbe gubfr gjb fgbevrf vf va gur nhgubef abgr
3. Gur cnffjbeq vf nyy gur fnzr pnfr, ab zvkrq pnfr. Vs bar irefvba bs gur cnffjbeq qbrf abg jbex, gel hccre/ybjrepnfvat gur jubyr cnffjbeq
4. Gur fnzr cnffjbeq vf hfrq sbe nyy guerr raqvatf
5. Lbh unir gb trg n ovg zrgn gb ernpu gur guveq raqvat. Vg erdhverf znahnyyl glcvat va gur nqqerff bs gur guveq raqvat puncgre
6. Jngpu bhg! Fbzr cnegvny puncgre HEYf whfg fb unccra gb tb gb bgure nhgubef' cnffjbeq cebgrpgrq puncgref. Vs gur bevtvany cnffjbeq qbrf abg jbex, gurl lbh unir tbar gb gur jebat HEY!
7. (This one has major spoilers! Do not read it if you still want to try to figure it out!)
Gurer ner rknpgyl sbhe ahzoref va gur gjb puncgref. Gurl ner hfrq va gur RKNPG beqre gung gurl nccrne.
EDIT: and now I see you have posted the solution on your blog...
8100065 This by no means excuses what has been essentially a regrettable decision on my part, but I was attempting to work within the confines of the website.
1) Unpublished chapters must have a password.
2) Users must have a link in order to reach said chapter.
3) Links are identical save for the numbers.
So, this meant that the reader needed numbers.
Alas, it was poorly executed. Rest assured it won't be something to be seen from me again, not because I do not wish to try once more, but because the reactions have ruined any sense of fun for me and, largely, overshadowed the story itself, which I was actually quite excited to share.
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The story itself was quite enjoyable. The CYOA/puzzle adventure concept seems like a neat idea even if it did fall flat this time around. I know in my case my first read-through was initially soured through no fault of your own by a perfect storm of FimFic site limitations, bad, frustrating memories from the genre, and the curious happenstance of partial links to the third chapter resolving to other password protected chapters from other stories.
Oh well...
Still, I see that this story is part of a larger series. I will need to check Crystal's Wishes universe out further...
Cool Story, I liked the choice of endings
well that was an interesting way to have endings. dont know how i feel about that third ending. feels like you achieved the same ending just different events
8101298 The intent was for the third ending to be optional, a better ending but not so important that people who didn't know of it would miss out too much.
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*insert long string of noises of frustration* only after this comment did I put together the sequence of events to the happy ending, glad i finally got so far..... only if it didn't involve an bar full of alcohol to get there.
also a good thing i didn't read this in the .epub version, no Author's Note or links in those
Crystal, I appreciate the idea and I'm glad one of my favorites on this site is experimenting
But please do not pull this bulls#@$tery again, getting to the three endings was just painful. (as a side note, passwords ARE case sensitive, apparently)
Though I did find it amusing that one of the hints required you to have Blueblood under-pay for the alcohol. It's a very enjoyable story with an... ill-advised bit of experimental storytelling.
Even though I didnt figure out the last ending, cause at times I can be about as sharp as a sponge, I still really liked the puzzle and seriously good for you for trying something new. I personally like it when there's more to a story in the 'you figure it out' sort of sense, its a nice little thing to think about after reading a story. Personally I dont think you should completely give up on the puzzle idea, yes some people did end up getting a little frustrated with it (and thats perfectly okay+life would be boring without a bit of challenge and frustration) but some still enjoyed it atleast and as a writer you should write what you want to.
I read this too late to ever see the puzzle as curious as I am now what that entailed exactly.
But Crystal, you are awesome and I support you an a general, unconditional way!