Chapter the first, and the last
Twilight ruffled her wings in slight frustration before continuing. “Alright Rarity, I need you to focus, you aren’t making this any easier on yourself”
Rarity, who was in the middle of pretending to admire a particularly shiny stone on the ground, jumped slightly at this, quickly looking back to the larger stone on the table, still exactly where it had been for the last few minutes.
“Sorry darling, I must have been distracted by something, yes, that’s it, not that this is boring or anything!”
“Alright, I understand this isn’t the most useful spell for you, but you never know when you might need it.” She turned to the table again. “Here, let me demonstrate, first I picture the object, then I imagine it being where I want it. A small burst of magic and…”
The stone vanished in a flash of lavender magic, appearing on another table a few meters to the right at the same time.
“See! That wasn’t so hard was-”
And then all hell broke loose. A few sparks shot from the tip of the alicorn’s horn, followed by larger sparks that exploded in mid-air, and finally, with a sound like Pinkie’s party cannon, a shower of confetti and streamers shot out seemingly from thin air, coating a very startled Twilight Sparkle in a rainbow of assorted paper.
“Really Twilight? I don’t believe the lightshow was necessary…”
“I didn’t do that! I was ju-”
“CONGRATULATIONS” Said an overly enthusiastic voice, seemingly coming from all directions at once. Twilight jumped back at this, interestingly, Rarity didn’t seem to notice the voice.
At the same moment, words started forming in Twilight’s vision, huge block letters spelling out the words “LEVEL UP” and “2” faded into existence, disappearing just as quickly as they had come into being.
“Darling are you alright?” Rarity rushed forwards in concern for the now largely confused princess, who had now fallen to her haunches.
“I… what?” She sputtered, “Level up?” Before she could regain her bearings however, another set of words appeared before her.
“Skill tree? What on earth is a-” And with that, she vanished into thin air.
Blue. Sapphire, cerulean, navy, cobalt and indigo. These were the first words that went through Twilight’s head as she opened her eyes. For a brief moment she considered the effects of being around Rarity on the size of her colour vocabulary, before returning to the situation at hoof. She was floating in a sea of swirling shapes (all various shades of blue of course), with constellations and individual stars drifting past occasionally. If she had been slightly less gobsmacked at the time, she might have noticed that this was the same place she went during her ascension.
Since she was still quite confused however, she didn’t notice this. What she did notice though, was the enormous crystalline tree in front of her, each of its hundreds of branches containing different symbols, all arranged near others of similar colour or design. In the very centre of the tree were two much larger symbols, and just below them were another two slightly smaller ones. These symbols were a sun, a moon, a crystal heart and finally a pink starburst with five smaller stars surrounding it.
As she looked closer, she noticed that all of the symbols but the ones directly connected to hers had a small padlock wrapped around them. The remaining seven were glowing slightly, each one similar in some way to her cutie mark, with different colours or different numbers of points or stars. Below the tree, more writing appeared; “Points: 1”
As she leaned in for a closer look, she heard the distinct sound of a teleport behind her, followed by a familiar voice. She turned around, to see another tree had appeared, this one with only a few symbols still locked, and standing below it was a rather disgruntled princess Celestia, muttering under her breath about something.
“...discord...took…hundred years...few...to…”
Twilight let out a small noise of surprise, which Celestia seemed to hear, as she stopped her mumbling and slowly turned around. For a good few seconds she simply stood there, her bottom jaw hanging well below where it should have been, before she finally broke her own silence.
“What the shit,” she phrased, as delicately and eloquently as only an alicorn princess of Equestria could.
This seemed to snap Twilight out of her stupor, as she immediately broke into rapid fire questions. “What is this place? Why are we here? Are we dead? Is this real? Am I dreaming? Am I real? Are you rea-” she was cut short by a gold clad hoof over her withers.
“You see, Twilight, I really didn't expect you to be here so soon, nopony actually managed to get to level two since Starswirl, not including myself and Luna of course”
“What do you mean by level two?” By then, Twilight had mostly calmed down, though she was still just as confused.
“Back in the times well before Discord, ponies were given a skill after completing a number of different tasks, usually this skill was based on the last thing that pony did before earning that skill. Of course, this most likely sounds familiar to you doesn't it Twilight.”
“You mean this all has to do with our cutie marks?”
“In a way, yes. Most ponies nowadays have already achieved this, though you are the first in a long time to get any further. Ponies used to be able to do what you did today, known as ‘levelling up’ as many as twice a year by working hard on their special skill after gaining level one, or as we call it now, earning their cutie marks. Each time this happened, they were sent here and given one point to spend on the skill tree.” She gestured in the direction of her own tree for emphasis.
“So, when you ‘level up’ you can buy new skills with these points?”
“In a way. You see the seven symbols around your cutie mark that are glowing? Those represent abilities you gained with your first level, as you can see, they are all based around magic, which is what gives you your unique and powerful skill for it. Each of the locked symbols can be purchased for one point, as long as that skill has a direct line to one of your existing ones.” She ruffled her wings for a moment before continuing. “All of this used to be completely achievable, one pony could relatively easily unlock all the skills in their area in a lifetime, and I managed to get most of mine done before Discord ruined it for everyone, myself included.”
“So, what did he do?” Twilight asked, intrigued by the story.
“He somehow changed the requirements to reach each level to be just out of reach of the average pony, and as for me, he made it unbelievably difficult to complete my tree!”
Looking at the far-left side of Celestia’s tree, Twilight noticed about six symbols still locked up, they seemed to all be related to playing marbles.
“For the past millennium, I have been trying my hardest to get all the skills unlocked! Even though there are only a few left, it's going to take me centuries to get them all…” She looked at the ground solemnly for a moment before looking back to Twilight, who was now staring at her own tree.
“Princess?” Twilight began.
“Yes Twilight?”
“What do you think I should spend my first point on?”
“Aim to the left, you would be surprised how effective marbles are for palace defence.”
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Dip into the pegasus tree and fly faster than Rainbow Dash.
I think she would dip into Luna’s tree. Dream magic would rock.
Darn it now I want to see what skill options she has.
so does that mean pinkie competed the skill tree?
8536034
IKR! I want to see them so badly!
8536194
That makes sense because she is constantly embracing her destiny (Fun, laughter, and parties). BUUUUUTTT it would be even funnier if she hadn't unlocked level two yet and that she just does ... Everything she can do just because. What would happen if she did unlock it though?
8536034
When I was at work last night I was thinking about how this could work in a bigger, multi chapter fic.
I'm probably not going to be doing that any time soon, what with school, work and other stuff going on, but consider it a definite possibility!
8536090
I'm glad you liked it!
8536288
My idea is that she just started with everything unlocked, either through sheer force of will, 4th wall breaking, or a combination of both
8535993
I agree, that would be super cool
8536072
That pinkie pretty accurately sums up my face when I saw it in the feature box!
But yeah, I'm super pleased you guys like it, I had a lot of fun writing it
Wow, that was awesome. She should spend her first point on affinity boost, that way she earns them faster.
I would love to see a whole fic to see where this could lead as well as seeing what discord did to ruin it for everyone?
What would derpy's tree look like? Think she would be able to pop people into bubbles? Or be able to view in higher dimensions?
Each point on the tree is another aspect of the mark, so of someone has an entirely different possible interpretation of the mark, would that different mark skillset become available?
THE POSSIBILITIES WILL LAST FOREVER!!!
Clever and funny; this was a nice quick read. Congratulations on making it to the featured box!
Now, is Twilight's going to want to specialize, go for completionsim or min-max? Decisions, decisions...
Wow! First fic and made it to the feature box! You sure you aren’t the kid from Aouth Park: The Fractured But Whole?
8536570
Maybe I am
You get a follow.
I had an idea similar to this once. But I am no good at writing so it never came to fruition. In a way, this fic gives me a sort of satisfation. Thank you.
8537016
you're welcome, I'm glad you liked it!
Really?
....
i dont know if this was Awful or decent
8537373
I'm very new to writing, what didn't you like about it?
Silly twilight, you MUST put all the points in spookyness
I'd say steel smithing, sneaking, pickpocket, or the magic school of preference. Those'll make the early game a lot easier.
... wait, that's Skyrim, nevermind.
That was just beautiful!
Oh, this was a good one. Have an upvote!
Oh, and if you didn't know it, you made the feature box. Congrats on that.
8536359
Most likely scenario for Pinkie: she pre-ordered (bonuses) the Day One (more bonuses) Special Collector's Editions (even more bonuses) at all of the locations that had the game (retailer-specific bonuses), and got all the Season Passes (therefore all of the DLC) that were available. She then found whatever guides were available to power min-max as much as possible, and found several exploits to jack up her EXP, money, and skill points at such a rapid clip that the system probably won't even be able to catch up. She power leveled and ground out the system so hard, she's able to actually (probably) jump to other's skill trees and start picking up stuff from there.
Pinkie Pie found a way to break the system and just be massively over-leveled for ALL of the content. She's probably farming the endgame bosses for loot on a hourly/daily/weekly basis, depending on progression lockouts and server resets/maintenance.
This will only end badly, for you see... Twilight will become the Princess of Min-Maxing! Go for the Meta, Sparkle!
8537518
The power to spook is the strongest of them all
8537552
I'm now imagining Celestia trying to sneak around stealing stuff, and it is amazing.
8537679
Simpler explanation: She found the dev console.
8536359
More likely Pinkie Pie has no special power other than maybe [Luck]. She's a cheater and figured out how to enter a tilde key to get at the command console, giving herself NOCLIP for funsies and occasionally GOD mode before something squishes her dead.
8537680
Twilight's gonna sim the hell out of all her talents and gear while working on her optimal rotation.
Good job! I too have just finished my own story, called The Cuddle Of The Night. since I have no clue how to link stuff, just press my profile and I forget what you have to do after. MARBLES!
Wat.
On a more detailed note, I feel lile this could be the start of a truly memorable adventure-comedy, especially if Twilight finds a way to respec and this explore all the possibilities. From there, she could confront Discord and make him lower the XP-per-level rate, or at least get him to give her access to console commands.
All told, you could do quite a lot with this. I'm not sure if it would kill the joke or not, but I'm seeing a surprising amount of depth in the concept. The story itself is rather shallow, mostly just talking heads discussing the idea, but you have some great ideas. Now you need to work on better realizing them, which is a lot trickier.
Well, Twilight's gonna be grinding for the next few millennia now. Hopefully she doesn't put all her points into the dark magic school. That ended very badly for Luna.
Dang it Discord did you have hack the game so the xp is annoyingly low?
This is a really well written piece. I’d think it was amazing if it wasn’t your 50th story, never mind first.
Later...
"I just don't understand," said Twilight Sparkle, nearly inaudible due to the amount of frosting on the cupcake. "There are so many options with leveling up, which I didn't even know was possible. I could have even picked Increased Cupcake Consumption to go up the Cake tree, which I noticed Celestia had cleared right up to the top."
"It's a mystery," said Pinkie Pie from behind nearly a dozen cupcakes crammed into her face.
Twilight stopped, then very slowly turned to her friend. "Wait a minute. I recognized some of those points as things you do. There's even an Unexplainable Precognition talent, but it's several links up the chain. How--"
"Cheat codes, duh!" Pinkie Pie finished stuffing the rest of the cupcakes into her mouth, gave a massive swallow, and bounded up onto Twilight's back. "Let me see here, since you're got a horn, this should be easy. Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B--
"Ow!" Twilight winced at the hoof in the eye she had just gotten.
"--and A," she finished with a boop on the nose.
One explosion of confetti and familiar fireworks later, Twilight found herself staring at the skill tree with "Level 100' floating above her.
"Oh, nuts," she muttered when Celestia's tree flickered into life nearby. "How am I going to explain this?"
Thank you for creating this masterpiece.
8537949
I can admittedly say that your little mini-story makes flawless sense. Pinkie Pie is a fourth wall breaking physics defier. So obviously with a game feature world she would have the cheat codes. Discord could never hide them from her or stop her from using them. I don't think he reasonably could anyway I mean when you think about it if he took away those aspects of Pinkie Pie that would allow for her to find and use the codes it would only cause chaos for her but it would subject a lot of order into the world by removing the random and chaotic nature that is Pinkie Pie which would go against his very nature as a being of chaos. Alter her personality is the most he can likely do to her but can't take away the other parts that make her Pinkie Pie. It's basically a sort of law for us all by this point. Pinkie Pie will never make sense and can do whatever she wants. Don't argue or question our logic just accept it.
Now as for this little story itself I have to say this is a nicely written little story and could either be the start of a good fan fic or the basis of one.
8536194
Pinkie Pie's skill tree has only one entry: "Be Pinkie Pie".
Either that, or she found the dev console.
(I'm kidding. She's clearly leveled up and spent points on parties rather than rock smashing; the question is how come Celestia did not notice. )
8537820
Yeah, I think it could work as an epic adventure, but I'm not willing to tackle something that massive just yet, as a very new writer and all.
It is definitely a possibility for the future though!
8537949
This is actually perfect omg
8538355
DO IT. DOOO IIIT!
I saw a Pokemon ad under this. Literally. And how appropriate it seems... Anyway, nice story man!
8538355
I also recall in “My Little Investigations” Pinkie possessed ‘a walkthrough’ for the game. So there’s also that option.
Featured first try on first completed story ever? Damn. That's got to be some kind of record. Can't wait to read this!
i.imgur.com/EEfHUhx.gif
Pinky is obviously a dev and opened hers all the way
hopefully this leads to a quick surge in popularity of similar type fics. I'd be down to read a few more like this.
Neat.
"Really? How?" Twilight tilted her head and raised an eyebrow. "I mean, you're immortal. You've got all the time in the world to work on it!"
"Time isn't the limiting factor..." Celestia shifted uncomfortably, then shook her head and murmured, "It requires the most unholy, detestable practice known to ponykind. Even the Eldritch Lords beyond the veil of existence tremble at the mention of its name."
With each passing word, the very sun itself dimmed, until it looked as if they were in the middle of a solar eclipse. Thunder rumbled in the distance.
Twilight shivered when she felt goosebumps popping up underneath her coat and whispered, "What is it?"
Celestia cast a scowl out the window, presumably in Discord's general direction, gritted her teeth and growled, "Microtransactions."