Queen of Storms

by Via

[9] Olympian

Olympian

---

Apollo, Serenity, Artemis. Thank you for your gift.

---

The air here is strange. It's thick and heavy - like walking through syrup. The ground underneath me is soft and pink, fine strands of wispy sugar sticking to my scales and changing their colors. My scales turn black. My scales turn pink. My scales turn yellow, they turn any color but white. There's a faint hint of wispy vanilla that permeates the air, and there's the taste of iron in my mouth. Blood streams from it, and as I look down I see the corpses of the alicorns that I ate. Apollo has Celestia's face, and Artemis has Luna's face. Serenity's charred corpse has the face of that young little colt, who I had come so close to eating in cold blood. I scream, but my mouth is gone and I have no more mouth to scream with anymore.

There's a strong taffy scent, like candy. A strong smell of berry - a much fainter one of salt, but my nose can pick it up. I see his monstrous, distorted face - slightly draconic, primarily equine. I see his coiled body that ripples with sinewy muscle, and in some places it's so thin it looks like he could snap at any moment. His lips are faintly curled, his predator teeth shown and his eyes, his eyes. I see the pink and red and yellow spark off of him. He lunges forward and his teeth dig into my neck. I try to scream, I try to do anything but I can't. He overpowers me, and just as I die in front of him he whispers into my ear, softly, ever so softly-

I wake up, panting heavily. I feel icy cold, although I know I'm not. Luna and Celestia are cuddling with one another in their sleep. Luna is resting with her back against my soft underbelly. My tail is curled tightly around a tree, so tightly that some of the bark has peeled off. Flames dance around my claws and my horns, and there's this tightness in me. Slowly - muscle by muscle, it begins to fade. I let out a long overdue breath, and feel a weight rise off of my chest.

Another nightmare. And another day of travelling.

---

The settlement was in view now. The two of them were still asleep. I'm not sure how many days we've been moving for sure - but soon after leaving the town where we had been we - or really, I, decided that we had to move. Being in an area where Chaos Beasts and Timber Wolves had attacked, not to mention being directly over a ley-line...that made me uncomfortable. It was too noisy, for lack of a better word.

I didn't know exactly where we were going at first, but I...borrowed a map from the ruined village nearby. After about an hour I was able to figure out, more or less where the nearest town was - and we had started heading there. Travelling was much slower for both of us. I wasn't able to go at my own pace, and they weren't able to chain-teleport via Starswirl. But it was safe - the most dangerous thing was Luna almost being attacked by wolves. But overall, it was quiet, and it was slow.

But I didn't know what I was doing. I was putting on a facade, a farce to keep them secure. Starswirl left me with a "train them, guide them" as his only instructions. Did he expect me to shelter them for the hundreds of years it would take them to mature? If they weren't allowed to use magic, how could they fight against Discord without any training?

But they weren't alone, were they? There were more Spirits, according to King Gryphus. "Somewhere - the Spirit of Harmony and the Spirit of Order Exist. Find. Them. " Those were his words. The Spirit of Harmony and the Alicorn of Order. So what did I know about them?

The Spirit of Harmony is a tree. Her sphere is Harmony, Peace, Calm, Individuality. All of the years of peace lead to her becoming absurdly powerful - potentially more-so than Discord. Discord seemed to have waited until she rooted herself. I vaguely recall something about her not always being a tree, but that doesn't matter - right now, she is a tree. She rooted herself in a hidden location to prevent herself from abusing her power. Harmony possesses the power to weaken Discord and to weaken Order - but it can't kill either of them.
The Spirit of Order is an alicorn. His sphere is Order, Control, Absolute Unity, Conformity. He was one of the weakest Spirits, as his sphere was rarely seen - only seen in nature, most of the time. He's supposedly able to kill Discord, and Discord is able to kill him - but he's not dead. Missing, but not dead.

So what does that give me? Nothing, at first glance. Harmony is rooted, and Order is MIA. But...Order. The Spirit of Order is an alicorn. All alicorn Spirits belong to, or belonged to the Alicorn Pantheon - where they made their home at Olympus. Potentially, there was a clue to his whereabouts there? Unlikely, but at the very least there'd be information about him there. So that'd be my first stop.

But what would I do when I found him? He was weak. Very, very weak. Well - he was still probably strong enough to literally melt me with a blink, but he was weak relatively. Maybe he'd be able to counteract Discord's ability to detect magic? That would be-

Luna prodded my chest with a hoof. "Ms. Drag- Drakon!" She said loudly. "Are you there?" She squinted and tilted her head to the side.
I blinked and looked down at her. "...Hm. Oh. Yeah I'm..." I shut my eyes and cleared my throat. I nodded. "I was thinking."
"I've said your name like...a bajillion times!" She stomped her hooves and humphed at me.
"What is it?"
"I'm hungry." I frowned. When was the last time they had eaten? Wasn't it a few hours ago- no. They didn't have food today. The last time they ate was before they went to bed. Great job, Tempest. Maybe Discord will get lucky and you'll accidentally starve the Spirits to death. You'd spare him the work of actually killing them.
I nodded at her. "I'll get you something to eat."

---

It took us another twenty minutes to get there. There being a small town that was distant enough from any nearby leylines. The two had eaten a small "salad" that I had made that wasn't very substantial. They were standing behind me now as I entered a group of trees that were tightly packed, just underneath a small rocky outcrop that was covered in grass. Here was where we'd set up a more permanent camp - we'd probably spend a day or two here. It was nearby to a town, so we had access to resources - magical tomes for me, more filling food for them, and potentially other useful supplies like bowls, plates, and blankets. Of course - it was awkward for me to stand in there already, so some work had to be done. I quickly strung together a bunch of glyphs in my head.

Ter was the glyph for earth. Terraforming spells were incredibly mana-draining - so shaping the earth directly was out of the question. I'd have to remove the trees as opposed to flattening the outcrop. I don't think my air blade was sharp enough to slice through wood, and while I could do it with my teeth? Honestly, I just wanted to do it with magic. I hadn't used magic in a while. The glyph for Nature was a compound glyph, Virter, a fusion of Life - Virtrus, and Earth - Ter.

Mys, Virter...then what? What did I want to do with these trees? I wanted them gone. I could put in a Destrum, which would make it Magic - Destroy Nature. But that would destroy nature, not just trees. If there was a way to limit it to trees...if I could make it ignore anything else - oh. Yes. Ignum. Ignore. I could make it ignore things. The method through which it ignored something - going through it, or just avoiding it could be changed with intent. So Mys, Virter, Ignum...Mys? I could make a magical "cylinder" of sorts around a tree, and destroy it just like that. Although, I would have to state the method of destruction. Mys, Destrum, Virter, Destrum, Fyrd, Ignum [A], Mys. Magic - Destroy Nature through Destructive Fire that Ignores [Avoids] Magic.

I had two things to do, and four horns to do it with. I let magical energies flow through my ley - two of my horns created and maintained an invisible magical cylinder around a tree, while the other two filled that space with destructive magic. The tree began to melt into a puddle of fluid. This was quite taxing on my magical supplies - I would have enough to do it to each and every tree, but it would leave me tired.

After about twelve minutes, all the trees were gone except two. I had enough magic to probably melt them, but I was running low enough and I still had more to do. I had scratched my magical itch and stretched my magical muscle. It was enough for me. I held up my tail and channeled a bit of magic into the spike at the end of it, to unflatten the spike. Luna stepped backwards. Celestia flinched and stumbled backwards, using a hoof to push Luna behind her protectively. I squatted down awkwardly and stared at the tree, before shooting my tail forward and anchoring myself by digging my claws into the ground. The blade effortlessly cut into the soft wood of the tree. I wiggled it side to side a little bit, and it awkwardly started to fall over. I lunged to catch the tree before it fell down and hit something.

I'll save you the rest of the detail - but more or less, I...skinned, I suppose, the trees, gathered some rocks and made a small firepit with a bundle of firewood, and a spot for them to sit at. I also had it so I could comfortably curl around the entire camp. I'm not sure how large I was by then, but I'd guess...almost thirty feet? I was a good bit longer then I was taller though. As they settled in, the sun began to set and the moon began to rise. I rested my head against that aforementioned outcrop and watched as Luna and Celestia settled in by the base of my tail.

"What do you two know about Spirits?" I tilted my head to the side and stared at them. I opened my mouth, and through the ley present in my tongue I channeled a bit of magic. A ray of fire left my maw, the logs bursting into a roaring flame. The faint crackling hiss of burning wood, coupled with the scent of ash rose up into the air.

Celestia opened her mouth to start, but was quickly interrupted by Luna. "They have wings and horns and we're them and so is Discord but he's a mean one." She spat out rapid-fire.
"You're...not wrong. But they're more than that." I turned to Celestia. "You?"
"They embody something. I embody the Sun, and Luna embodies the Moon. Only some people can be them. They...reincarnate? And there's the Spirit of Chaos, who wants us...gone. Because he...um." Pause. "Starswirl never told us why."
I nodded. "So not a lot.

When someone is born - they have a chance that they can have something that people call a Shard of the FIrst Divinity - or usually just a Shard of Divinity in them. And that Shard can activate if you have enough magic, or if you do something that's...great, I guess. Like...the Spirit of Peace. She ascended after she convinced a dragon to spare her village during the earlier years." Celestia shivered. I blinked and looked at her, but her face was untelling and she wasn't looking at me with her eyes. I squinted, then continued.

"Spirits don't embody something - rather, they represent it. You aren't the Sun, but rather a representation of the Sun. You aren't the Moon, but rather a representation of the Moon. Spirits draw power from their spheres - the more love there is, the stronger the Spirit of Love would be. The more hate, the stronger the Spirit of Hate would be. A sphere is everything that you represent. So say, the Spirit of the Sun." I turned to look at Celestia.

"The Sun represents Light, Vision, the literal Sun, Heat, Fire...and you represent all of those things. But if someone ascends to say, becoming the Spirit of Fire - the Spirit of Fire now represents Fire, and you just represent everything else I just listed. But no one can take the Sun from you - the Sun will always be yours. You draw power from the Sun, but only a tiny bit of power from everything else. So much that it's basically negligible."

"What does neg-lidge-bowl mean?" Luna chimed in.
"It means insignificant. That you can basically ignore it." I explained. She nodded, satisfied with my answer.

"There are five Spirits that are particularly special though. People call them the Essential Spirits. Life, Death, Discord, Harmony, Order. Life is the original Spirit. She's an Alicorn - like you two. Or, was? I'm not sure. From Life, came Death. And from Life and Death came Discord, Harmony, and Order. Life and Death were so powerful though, that they left this planet and haven't been seen since. Discord, Harmony, and Order are the only remaining essential Spirits. Discord can hurt Order and Harmony. Order can hurt Discord, and Harmony. Harmony can't hurt either of them, but can weaken both of them. She's...she manages them, basically."

"There were plenty of other Spirits, though. And each Spirit remembers details with their past lives-"
"I don't remember any past lives though." Luna frowned.
"I don't have any memories that aren't my own." Celestia added in.
An icy dagger of empty fear raced through me. Did...potentially eating the corpses...did that interfere with their memories? Did-
I didn't know that for sure. I couldn't think about that. I couldn't think like that.
"You'll probably start remembering them soon." I nodded. The two were silent.

"Each Spirits remembers details of their past lives - so usually, they group up and form factions. And mortal people-" Luna looked confused, "people who aren't ageless like Spirits - Spirits stop aging after a little bit...they grouped Spirits up into their own...scientific groups. Most of the Spirits are gone now - you two are the only left. That's what Starswirl said, right?"
Celestia nodded.
"What if I told you...that you aren't?"
Luna looked even more confused, but was silent. Celestia blinked slowly. "...we aren't?"
"But Starswirl said that all the other Spirits were gone." Luna added.

"Well - not entirely. Order can hurt Discord. Harmony can weaken Discord. One day - Harmony decided she was too powerful, so she rooted herself. I don't know what happened to Order - but King Gryphus told me that he knew Order wasn't gone. Order and Harmony are still around. The two Spirits who can damage Discord the most. What if...we could find them?"

"Where are they?" Celestia shot up, her eyes filling with hope.
"I don't know." I winced slightly as the hope in her eyes faded. "But - I do have an idea as to where we can find out. Olympus. Order was - or, is, an Alicorn. He operated from the Pantheon. At the very least there'd be more information there."
"So...we're going to Olympus?" Celestia said slowly.
"Auntie always told me how pretty it was!" Luna stood up and began to walk in circles around Celestia. "When are we leaving? Can we leave now? Why did we come here if we were going to Olympus?"
"We need things from this town. I need to learn more magic. You two need real food. And we wouldn't have to keep eating on flat rocks - we could get bowls, plates, new blankets, water, drinks."
Luna squinted. "Why are we here, instead of in the town though?"
"Because people are scared of me. It happens, when you're as large as me. And also happen to look like a dragon. We'll wait until night-fall to go into the town."
"Why until night?" Luna said.
"Like I said, people are scared of me. I don't want them trying to hurt me, or worse - trying to take you two away, thinking they're helping you. They’ll sleep during the night." Luna frowned for a second. That was part of the truth. The whole truth included the fact that they were Spirits. I didn't want anyone taking advantage of them. “

"I'm not scared of you!" Luna said triumphantly. She stood up. "I'm an unstoppable force! Nothing can beat me." Celestia rolled her eyes and giggled softly at her sister.
"Oh, are you sure about that?" I tilted my head to the side. I grinned at her.
"Mhm!" She said. I reached over with my tail, flattened the spike on it so it didn't cut her and tipped her over. She squeaked and flailed as she rested on her side. "N-no fair! Cheater!" She yelled.
"All is fair in love and war." I grinned at her.

The rest of that night went by quickly. They cuddled by the fire, and I told them stories of some Spirits that I had read about. We added some wood to the fire, and the two drifted off to sleep - leaving me alone with my thoughts.

I picked them up and rested them on my back, taking great care not to wake them up, before I left the camp. I wormed my way slowly through the trees, making sure not to knock a small one over or to bump into one and knock them off. After about an awkward five minutes, I was out of the forest, and heading towards the town. I'm sure I'd be quite the sight - an alabaster "dragon" (I use the term dragon because that's what I'd be mistaken for,) with rings on her horns, two children on her back, covered in armor. Although - not really covered. My horns were defended, my tail had a weapon on it, and my paws were covered. That was about the extent of it. I suppose I didn't really need armor though? The scales of a drakon were stronger than dragon scales. I was basically immune to purely physical attacks. Magical-physical attacks...I'm not sure.

In terms of magical tomes - I'm not sure entirely what I was looking for. I wanted to learn more about artificing, golemancy, illusions, and storm magic. Storm magic was genuinely fascinating, and channeling it made me feel powerful. Which made sense, considering how my affinity was perfect for it. Illusions would be a useful tool for hiding and masking myself if I needed to do something in the future - and while artificing was quite simple, it could become very advanced and complicated. Having some useful artifacts would be...well. Useful, as the name implies.

I quickly crawled up on-top of a building. I didn't rest my entire weight on there, but just my chest and head so I could look around better. The town was quite small, but was pretty close together. I began to circle it, peaking into each and every building - there was no one visible in the dark, let alone anyone awake. I didn't have very good night vision compared to say, a gryphon, but it was probably better than an average pony. After some more searching, I finally found what I was looking for - a quite large building filled with books. I squinted as I realized I was too large to fit inside.

I laid down flat on the grassy floor and used a bit of magic to pick up Celestia and Luna. I was able to telekinetically move them for one reason - they trusted me. Celestia was much harder to move than Luna, but Luna trusted me, so her hold subconsciously leaned into my magic, for lack of a better term. I set them both down and turned to look at them. "Wake up." I said in a low tone. Not a whisper, but just speaking quietly. Celestia stirred slightly. Luna woke up and blinked. She looked around confusedly. "...huh...?" She squinted. She then looked up at me and her eyes widened, before she yawned and stretched and calmed down.

"Where are we?"
"By a library. I need you to go inside." Pause. "You can read, right?" I tilted my head to the side.
"Mm...yeah..." She murmured. She rubbed her eyes with her hoof. "Why can't you go inside?"
"I'm...too big." I said. I turned my head. I was thankful for my scales that hid my blush.
Luna kneeled down and shook Celestia awake. Celestia's eyes opened and she blinked a few times before quickly shooting up. She looked around. "WHere...oh." She cleared her throat, straightened her posture and looked up at me.
"I need you two to go inside of the library. I'm too large."
"What do you need from it?" Celestia's eyes met mine for a second. Luna was shaking her head to wake herself up fully.
"Magic books. On artificing, golemancy, illusion, and storms."
"Arti-whatting?" Luna squinted.
"Artificing. A, R, T, I, F, I, C, I, N, G." I spelled out for them. "It has to do with the creation of...useful magic tools, basically. Can you two do that?"
Luna looked down. "...I'm hungry."
"I'll do it." Celestia said. "Take Luna and go find food." She said.
I nodded at her, and scooped up Luna in one of my arms. I held her to my chest. She rested against me. I crawled around the outskirts of the town until I came across a house that particularly larger than the rest - I made sure I was still within thirty seconds, magically assisted, and hearing distance of the library. I set Luna down.

Mys, Virtrus, Lusm. Magic, Life, Light. Light, in addition to meaning literal light, could also be used to mean see, or view, or vision, or knowledge. The spell I cast was Magic - View Life. I saw small little pulses of energy come from within other buildings, as well as coming from Luna - and from the library, Celestia. They were all white, except for Luna's, which was blue, and Celestia's, which was gold. There were two life signs coming from within the building, from within the same room. Hm.

I opened up my mouth and channeled a small heat ray through the ley in my tongue. I burnt a hole through the wall of the house, then using a gust of wind to put it out. I took the bag of holding off from my neck, and then quickly used a bit of magic to put a rune of Cyrd on it. Everything inside of it would be rapidly cooled. I handed the bag to Luna and kneeled down. "Go inside." I said very, very softly. Whispers were louder than talking softly, due to the sharp hiss of air you get from whispering. "Eat, and get some food for your sister. Put as much food as you can inside of that bag. It'll fit, okay?"
Luna nodded. I picked her up with my tail and moved her inside of the house.

My eyes shot up as something came to my attention - the white pulse that had just entered the library. A pit of dread formed in my stomach. Any attention right now was severely unwanted.

I turned to look at Luna. The ponies inside of that building were asleep, most-likely. So I could go to Celestia, or I could stay here under the idea that Celestia would be fine - she was the older sister after all. But Luna trusted me. If I went after Celestia to get her and left her, I might betray that trust. But at the same time, Celestia didn't trust me, and I could gain her trust.

I turned to Luna. She was looking through the cabinets - she would be too slow. I growled, and lit my horns up with magic. I picked up Luna and floated her away. She looked at me confusedly. "What are you-"
I then quickly pulled her onto my back and set her down on there, before - quite noisily - I tore the cabinets off and floated them in a telekinetic glow. I then began to sprint towards the library on all fours, using magic to keep Luna on my back and bringing the food cabinets with me. I basically had a portable kitchen. I could see the pulses quickly moving down to the hole in the wall as I turned to glance at it - but that wasn't important right now.

"W-what's going on?" Luna said fearfully.
"There are people by Celestia. I'm going to get her so we can leave."

I slid to a stop by the library and peeked inside. I didn't see Celestia, but I did see a unicorn stallion with his gaze turned away from me. He quickly turned to look at me. His eyes slowly widened and he let out an incredibly loud scream. I rolled my eyes, and watched as a bolt of magic quickly threw itself at me. It was an incredibly simple spell - it was Mys, Fres, probably. I didn't even have to block or dodge. But as the spell hit me, there was an awful sound like a bomb going off, and an explosion of energy that broke some of my scales. I fell down, steam rising from my chest as I looked at the unicorn fearfully. He looked just as confused as I felt.

"Tempest!?" Luna yelled. "Are you okay?"

I grunted at her in response as I pushed myself up. I lit my horns up and channeled a simple spell of Mys, Somn, and Fres. I threw the force-bolt at him, which he quickly tried to block with a shield. The reason why Fres was in there was because he'd block the more obvious force aspect of the spell instead of the more subtle somn - the sleep aspect of the spell, and would probably block instead of dodge. As the spell Somn struck him - there was a deafening bang, and a wave of energy sent the pony flying backwards and caused steam to rise from his body as he tumbled through a wall. The wave of energy was so forceful it even knocked me back, and hurt. Many bookshelves were knocked over, and some of the library collapsed. It was much stronger than his - I hadn't intended for that to happen, though. Celestia stepped out from behind a bookshelf, thankfully unharmed, and looked terrified.

I charged in, then picked up Celestia. Celestia flailed fearfully, but I ignored that and set her with Luna on my back- and then met myself with a horde of unicorns, with their horns glowing that were all staring at me. It seems that I had ended up attracting the entire town. They began screaming, yelling, and speaking to one another and at me in a language I didn't understand. Luna and Celestia tried saying something, but their words were drowned out. A bolt of energy shot out towards me, where it struck my scales and stung.

I turned, and ran. I began sprinting as fast as I could, bounding towards our makeshift camp while still floating out the bag of holding and the cabinets. I tore the bag of holding open as wide as it could, and began emptying out the cabinets. I dropped them out to the floor when they were all empty. Bolts of energy that cast light on my scales whizzed past me - I had to make more distance, and quick. But I couldn't. Even with the speed-boost spell that Starswirl taught me, I wouldn't be fast enough - no, I had to do something more. I turned to Celestia and Luna.

Mys, Boryd, Prosr, Tesfyrd, Auden. Magic - Protect Body from Sound of Lightning. I cast that spell twice on both of them, before turning - and for the first time, but not the last, I cast a warspell.

Mys, Tesrun, Fres, Auden. Force of a Storm's Sound. A warspell meant to stun and daze. Warspells were in 99.9% of cases meant to kill - but some of them were meant to cripple, stun, or distract. I didn't want to kill the ponies, so I couldn't have cast a fatal warspell. I did want to cripple or distract them though. A thunderous boom, with such force that it sent a flurry of wood splinters, dust, dirt and leaves up into the air erupted from my horns. My ears began to ring, and adrenaline pumped through my veins. I couldn't see any unicorns directly, but I could feel their magic still. I'd still have to do more than this.

I didn't have a lot of mana - but I had enough. I channeled all of my rage, all of my anger, all of my grief, all of my sadness - every single negative emotion that I could. I focused it all, all of it into doing something I hadn't done since Gryphus - creating a storm. As I imbued it with Cyrd, icy rain began to fall from the clouds down on the hoard of unicorns that had almost entered the forest. I manually cast Tesfyrd, blasting lightning up into the sky and sending it arcing. I then slammed both of my claws into the ground, threw my head up and, with all of the anger I could muster I let out a roar. This roar echoed over the forest, over the unicorns. Struck by a deep, primal fear, they turned and began to run away. And then I began to sprint.

I ran, and I ran, and I ran. By the end of it, my legs were so sore they felt as if they were burning. My broken scale had fragments digging into my flesh uncomfortably, and I think there was a bit of blood leaking out. I had taken refuge on the other end of the forest, opposite of the town. It was quite a large forest, mind you. I was exhausted, magically, mentally, and physically. Celestia and Luna had tried to talk to me, but they stopped after I didn't respond - I didn't have the energy to do anything right now. I shut my eyes and drifted off into the realm of sleep.

---

My eyes fluttered open, and I immediately groaned. My head was throbbing and my horns felt like fire. Luna and Celestia were asleep against my tail. They had pulled the broken scale fragments out of my flesh, and they had made a small fire - it was of a decent quality. They had probably learned by watching me make campfires for them. Their stomachs were rumbling in their sleep, and they looked uncomfortable. I groaned and slowly pushed myself up, shaking my head side to side in an effort to wake myself up faster. I stretched out my tail before I telekinetically rummaged through the bag of holding. After that, and some hunting of fish, I created three dinner platters. A large platter of roasted, almost burnt fish for myself, stacked about to my ankle - and hay and tomato sandwiches for the two of them. After quickly and silently snacking to make myself feel better, I tapped them both with my claw to wake them up.

Celestia woke up first. Her eyes widened when she saw me and she flailed to get away - before immediately relaxing and sighing. "You...scared me."
"Are you alright?" I frowned and looked at her. She clearly distrusted me - she wasn't making an attempt to hide it, but never before had she had that bad of a reaction to seeing me.
"I'm fine. Just...um." She shut her eyes. "...Did..." She turned to look at Luna's sleeping form. "...That...pony. Is he...is he dead?" She looked up at me. "Did...did you kill him?"
I blinked. "The one in the library?" I tilted my head to the side. "No. He's not dead."
"Why were you...why were you so violent? Were you trying to-"
"I didn't mean to. It was supposed to just put him to sleep."
"Then why did it-" Celestia started. I knew what she was going to ask. Why did it react that violently? At the time, I didn't know why - but I had a hint of an idea, now.
"Do you know what an affinity is?"
Celestia nodded.
"My affinity is Air, Chaos, and Light. And sometimes your affinity can react to other people with similar or different affinities - if someone else was Air, Chaos, Light, my magic might be stronger around them, or we'd both be weaker around one another, or...there's no one effect. If it's a different affinity, usually nothing happens - but if it's the complete opposite affinity...say, Earth, Order, Darkness - then it could react like that. Violently."
"...Oh." She blinked. I could see her untense and look up at me. Oh - the poor dear probably thought I tried to kill that pony.
"I don't want to kill anyone." I said softly. "Food is one thing. Taking a life is another."
"...What about Discord? Isn't that...the whole point of this? To...to kill him?"
"That's different." I shook my head.
"How is it different?" She frowned and leaned in.
"He's killed so many people. In such horrible, brutal ways too - he deserves death."
"But surely there's a better alternative-"
"If you find it, Celestia." I said softly, too drained to raise my voice. "Then you can tell me."
She was silent as she considered that. I tapped Luna a few times in order to wake her up. Luna blinked and looked up at me. "Mm..?" She squinted and yawned. Her eyes then widened. "Oh!" She said, before she yawned again. She stood up as her stomach rumbled. "You're awake! Um...what...um-"
"It's okay. I made food for you." I pointed at the two sandwiches. I wasn't sure what she was going to ask - but she looked scared, she looked confused, she looked worried. I don't think she wanted to talk about what happened - and honestly, I didn't, either.

Luna took a tentative bite, before her eyes widened. She took another, much larger bite. She looked at Celestia. "Ish...guud!" She said through a mouthful of food. Celestia took a small bite, before her eyes also widened and she did the same. The two began to ravenously eat, going through their sandwiches in less than a minute. We had raided some spices and food from that kitchen, which is why it tasted good probably. I doubt it was actually good, so much as better than their usual.

"So...uhm." Luna looked up at me. "Are we going to Olympus now?"
"I...suppose so. We can start moving today - I think I know where it is. I have a general idea, at the least. I'd like to-" My eyes widened. I tore the bag of holding open (as in, the entrance to it, I didn't cut it open,) and telekinetically tore the now frozen books out of it. They were covered in a layer of ice. If the books that Celestia had gotten were useless, I'd be mad. I quickly set them on the ground and looked at the books. They were bound in paper - ponies didn't like leather - and they had a thin sheet of ice over them.

I pulled together some glyphs - Mys, Fyrd, Fres, Cyrd, Destrum, Virter, Ignum, This was a fire breath spell that would ignore nature. I blew it out of my mouth and watched as the ice melted, but the books were left only partially water damaged. I quickly flipped through them. Some pages were unreadable, but the majority of it was fine. I growled and angrily thwacked my tail against the ground. There was a loud slapping noise that caused Luna and Celestia to flinch.
I sighed and turned to them. "Sorry. I'm just...I froze the books." I growled at myself. "I was planning on using them. I suppose..." I paused to search for words and to formulate a plan. "We'll head over to Olympus. We'll look through the ruins as to a clue for where Order is. We'll find Order - and we'll go from there."
The two nodded at me, and then we were out on the path again.

---

The trip took four days. The journey itself was boring and quiet - which was preferential to loud and dangerous. But the books had made the trip much, much more interesting. There were four books - Storm Magic, Illusions, Golemancy, and Artificing. The order they're in is from the most damaged to the least damaged. Each day, I had studied from one of the books, and tested practical applications from it.

The first day, I spent on illusions. Illusions are different from most schools of magic in that nearly 80% of all illusions are accomplished with the same set of glyphs. Mys, Dis, Lusm. Magic - Lying Sight. The more direct translation would be Magic - Chaotic Light, but as I've previously mentioned, there is no intensity in the language of glyphs. Dis means everything from a slight change to a total change - it's determined by intent. Light is a synonym for vision and knowledge - so Lying Sight lies to your eyes and convinces you to see other things. Illusions can be targeted at specific people, or bound to specific objects. How the illusion is visually isn't shaped with glyphs, but with rigorous concentration and using your mind to shape the visual aspect of it. I was only somewhat interested in that - moreso, I was interested in Glamours.

Glamours were very similar to illusions. The glyph series was slightly different - Mys, Dis, Boryd. Magic - Lying Appearance. The spell was different in that it only changed how people perceived you physically. A regular illusion spell could accomplish the same thing, but Glamours were superior in the fact that they didn't have to be constantly maintained through concentration, and instead were just a slight, but constant drain on one's magic. It didn't actually affect your body, either. I could make myself look like Discord, but I wouldn't actually be shaped like Discord. If someone touched where my paw was, and where the glamour said there wasn't a paw, then they would touch my paws. Glamours were also restricted in terms of your physical appearance. I couldn't make myself look like Celestia. I could make Celestia look like Luna, and vice versa, and I could make myself look like a dragon - but I couldn't make myself look smaller then I was, or like a different species. I had tested the practical applications on Celestia and Luna, after getting to the water-damaged parts that were talking about "True Transformations."

My horns lit up as I began channeling the glyphs. Celestia and Luna both stood in-front of me, as still as could be. Luna was holding her breath.
"You don't have to hold your breath." I said quietly. I dedicated half my ley to Luna, and half of them to Celestia. I didn't need to use all of my ley for this - glamours were low-level spells, but it would make it a bit easier.
Luna took a deep breath in. "Are you sure? What if something goes wrong?" Dis. Chaos. Madness. Anarchy. Deception. Falsehoods. Lying.
"If something goes wrong, it'd be better if your lungs were already full of air." I replied. Celestia suppressed a snort. Boryd. Body. Form. Shape. Appearance.
Luna opened her mouth, but was interrupted as a translucent wave of magic washed over her and her sister. She blinked and looked up at Celestia. Celestia blinked and looked down at her. I had made them look like one another - both of them looked like Pegasi. Luna pointed. "She's me!"
"No, you're you." I said. "She just looks like you. And you look like her." Luna looked down at her paw. Or...hoof?
Luna blinked a few times. "Um. No. I still look like me."
"I still look like me. You look like me." Celestia said. She turned her head to me and tilted it to the side, silently asking for an explanation.
"You can't see other people's glamours, but you can see through your own. For me - both of you look like each other."
Luna frowned. "This is weird. Can you take it off?"
I shrugged. Mys, Dos. Pulsating white washed over them and returned them to their natural states.

The next book I read was on golemancy. You might be a little confused as to why I was interested into this school of magic - so far, I hadn't even mentioned it. Golemancy, to the layman, is shaping clay and animating it with magic. But in reality, it's so much more. Golemancy has to do entirely with the creation of Magical Cores. Magical Cores range from extremely basic to extremely complex. They can be physical and they can be purely magical constructs, too. They consist entirely of glyphs arranged in an extremely specific pattern that will cause whatever that core is bound to (physically inside of, or magically inside of) to repeat the same tasks again and again. Golems are often clay because of how simple clay is to be manipulated by a magical core - a golem made of iron, for example, might be more sought after for protecting villages than a clay golem - but the magical core has to be powerful enough (as in, imbued with enough magic) to be able to move iron. The imbuement is one time - if you fill a core with enough to move iron, that core will be able to move iron until it's drained. Cores slowly degrade into nothing when they have no magic fueling them.

The reason why I was interested in golemancy is for two reasons. One - for its applications in terms of sentries. If I was able to create clay or dirt golems that would alert me to whenever there was someone that wasn't me, Luna, or Celestia was around, that would be extremely useful. Two - it was getting inconvenient to physically enter villages, due to my ever-increasing size, and I didn't want to send Luna and Celestia into a library and have them search while I couldn't watch them. I could create a golem to do that for me. And three - for its applications in terms of storm magic. Storm magic had turned into a passion of mine, and I had a theory that with golemancy I could create...Storm Grenades, so to speak. A physical object that I could throw up into the air, and would create a storm right then and there. I'd be able to pre-prepare storms, basically.

The book on Golemancy in detail described how to magically and physically shape the magical core. In the case of a physical component - it required a magically conductive gem surrounded by three rings of a magically conductive metal. The more conductive the components, the harder the core would be to break and the more magic it could store. In the case of a purely magical construct, you needed to make a physical construct first, and then cast two spells - Mys - Doreus, Aesr., and also Mys - Mys, Creut. Magic - Deny Aether, and Magic - Magic Cut. Shield the construct from aether, but allow aether to enter into this world - the physical core would absorb the aether and be turned into dust, and for a few seconds the magical core would be there. It had to be stabilized with Mys - Hos Magic - Restore Harmony. Mys - Dos would just end up destroying the core, while restoring harmony would allow the aether to exist in this world in exchange for removing some of it's traits. This was how magic was solidified, usually.

The advantages of physical components were that they required less magic to create, but could only be set to one golem core, and were susceptible to breaking. The advantages of magical components were that they required less physical components to create - from one physical core, you could create an infinite amount of magical cores. However, they didn't have quite the malleability and flexibility of a physical core.

During our travel towards the mountain, we had come across the a large hill with speckles of gold and pale white on it's side - likely gold and iron. This was why I had decided to experiment with golemancy, as I knew it required physical components such as gold. I decided to make a magical core. In search for components, I dug into the earth with my claws, to save magic for later - I didn't know how much magic creating a magical core would drain. I gathered up as much gold as possible, and using a bit of magic - Mys - Fres, Ter Magic - Force Earth, I created a large bowl that I dropped the ore into. I ground it up into a thin powder, and using that same spell as before I seperated all the rock from the gold. I used the tongue in my ley to empower a spell of fire, and began smelting the ore at an extremely slow pace. It had been dusk when I started, and was quite late at night when I finished. I had to do it slow to make sure that I didn't accidentally burn the gold too much - if gold was burnt past significantly past it's melting point, then it would lose a lot of magic conductivity.

Using a slightly more specific terraforming spell - Mys - Fres, Fyrd, Ter Magic - Force Fire Rock, or Magic - Force Metal, and some basic telekinesis, I shaped the gold into a set of three, centimeter or two thick gold rings. The gold vein had been very shallow, so I didn't have much spare. I didn't have a gem, and I hadn't been lucky enough to find one on my journey. So I substituted with glass. I smashed stone into a thin powder, which I ground up into sand and then heated at a much faster rate to create a glass sphere. Luna and Celestia were fast asleep by this point, but I was still quiet as could be to avoid waking them. I leaned in, and with telekinesis I began the tedious part of this - carving what I wanted. I thought it would be most useful to create a sentry that would tell me when there were others around. I had to carve in runes into the gold rings.

Mys - Ter Boryd, Virtrus Mys, Ignum Virtcel, Ignum Virtlun, Ignum Virtterfyrd, Myr Vitrus, Moreut Virterfyrd, Mys Tesrun, Aude Murn. This was a lengthy set of runes, but it meant - Magic - Earthen Body, Magic Life. Ignore Life of Sun, Ignore Life of Moon, Ignore Life of Earth-Fire, Search Life, Movement to Life of Earth-Fire, Magic of Storm, Sound Empowerment.

The new glyphs in this series that I haven't mentioned would be Murn, Myr, Cel, and Lun. Lun and Cel were the glyphs for Moon and Sun respectively. Murn and Myr were the glyphs for Empowerment and Search respectively. The compund glyphs I used - Virterfyrd, Virtlun, Virtcel, were used to identify me, Luna, and Celestia. They were beings of Sun and Moon, while I was a being of Earth and Fire. The glyphs for "Mys Tesrun" were identifying my magic specifically - my affinity was an affinity of "Storm." The whole glyphs series meant:

Magic - Earthen Body given Magic Life, that ignores the life of the Sun, the life of the Moon, the life of Earthen Fire, but searches for life. When life is found, move to Earth-Fire with Magic of Storm, and Empower Sound.

So basically, it would ignore us three, and other drakons too (it ignores drakons by virtue of the Ignum Virterfyrd, drakons are beings of Earth and Fire.) I should've specified that it should've only ignored drakons with my affinity to be as specific as possible, but I had messed up. But there weren't any other drakons to my knowledge, so it was fine. It was a little sloppy, and much too wordy for my taste.

With telekinesis, I held the ring in the pattern that I needed to - one ring held horizontal to it, one held vertical to it, and one held diagonally. I cast the spells that I needed to - shielding the core, and creating a small rift that allowed aether to enter our world. A magical blueprint was made of the core, and I quickly banished the excess aether away. And then I cast Mys, Hos. Magic poured out of me like a broken dam. I fell down against the dirt below, my legs giving way under me as I lost the energy to move. I nearly passed out from exhaustion right then and there, but luckily the spell ended with maybe...2% of my total magic reserve left. I laid there for a long time, shocked at how much that took out of me. I knew solidifying magic was costly, but I had used Astrabelle's techniques of dividing up my ley properly and channeling it efficiently - with that, I could teleport four or so times before running out of magic. So this was four times as costly as teleportation. Was it because of the size of the core? The core itself was quite small, maybe about the size of what you'd call a bowling ball.

I fell asleep, having not regained the energy to move. The next morning, when I woke up, I quickly fed Celestia and Luna. As they were eating,
"I have a surprise for you." I said in a soft tone.
Luna blinked and looked up at me. "A surprise?" Celestia looked curious too, but was silent. "What is it?"
"It won't be a surprise if I say." I responded.
"You said "I have a surprise" though." Luna squinted at me.
"We need to go on a little trip, first. To the lake."

There was a small lake on the way to Olympus, that our path had nearly come across - I knew it was there because I had come across it on my first trip. Later on in the day, we made our way there.

I began wading through the water, slowly. Drakons couldn't float or swim that well, and if I sunk to the bottom of the lake I'd drown - I'd be too heavy to pull my way up there. I could hypothetically call up spells of flame to vaporize the lake, but it would be too important a resource to be willing to do that. Anyways, it didn't matter much because I wouldn't get that deep into the water. I dove my head into the water, and dug my claws into the floor below and began pulling out large handfuls of clay. I shovelled them up onto the shore.

"What are you doing?" Celestia called. Luna and her were sitting from a safe distance, watching me. I poked my head out of the water and looked at her. "Getting clay."
"Yes. But why?" Celestia seemed a little more at ease, recently. She was still jumpy whenever I made any sudden movements, but she had gotten used to sleeping against my body (if only for the warmth) and didn't flinch every time I spoke. She was however, still on the quiet side. A small part of me was curious as to why that was, but another part of me said that it wasn't my business.

I crawled up onto the shore and shook myself off like a dog or a cat. Water sprayed everywhere. I kneeled down and, ignoring her, I began to create the physical shape of my golem. I had been keeping the magical core inside of my pouch of holding. I didn't much care for the golem's durability, so I was just going to make it out of clay. I might've used enough magic to have it be able to control a golem made from stone? But I wasn't sure. And clay was easier to shape, anyways.

I created a smooth ball from the clay. The ball was roughly the size of Luna, as I had grabbed a whole lot of clay. I channeled some magic into my tail to unfold the blade that was at the end of it, and cleanly cut the ball in half. Using telekinesis, I shaped half of the clay into four curved, spider-like legs. I attached them to the clay ball, still using telekinesis, and pulled the spinning magical core out of my bag of holding. I cut open the top of the sphere-spider, slid the core in, and filled it with magic.

The sphere-spider began to twitch violently as it moved for the first time. The slit on it's back began to close up, the clay rippling like a fluid. It sensed and saw and moved entirely through my magic supply. It's legs tapped on the ground rapidly as it got used to moving - and then it began to move rapidly across the ground, circling all three of us. Celestia shivered and shied away from it, yet spread a wing over Luna. Her wing reaction was noticeably delayed from the rest of her body. Luna gasped.

"What is it??" Luna looked up at me excitedly.
"It's a golem." I responded softly. "If it senses anyone other than us three, then it'll make a noise." Hopefully, I added mentally. It might actually just make noise louder in an area - after all, this was my first golem.
Luna leaned in. The golem didn't have eyes, but its main magical focus was on her now. I could sort of feel what the golem could see - likely as it was using my own magic - but I couldn't exactly see it myself. She reached out, and with the tip of her hoof slowly carved a smiley face into it.

I blinked a few times. She looked back up at me, shrugged, and said - "it's kind of cute." For a split second I could see Luna's worries just disappear. A smile split my face. It dulled a bit when I saw her eyes darken just a bit, her gaze turning back to the golem silently.

I didn't say anything as I picked the golem up with telekinesis and let it rest on my back, along with the two of them. "We should go now." I said softly. "We'll be able to make it to Olympus in a day or two." I tilted my gaze up. In the distance I could faintly see a mountain - towering so high above its surroundings that it was almost like a spear, its tip sticking through the clouds themselves. And as I began walking back towards Olympus, some part of me knew that something was waiting for me - no, for us there.

Only time would tell.

Comments

[alarajrogers]

I like the magical system with the glyphs. You might be going into a little too much detail about what glyph sequences mean what, but some degree of detail is a good thing, here.

If the affinity of the unicorn she fought had to be opposite hers to get that reaction, and so he was Earth, Order, Darkness -- did she just fight Sombra?

[Via]

10428317
I definitely got carried away with this chapter moreso than others. It's pretty fun to write but it'll definitely start detracting from the story if I keep up at this rate imo. Thanks for the comment, I'll definitely cut back on it a bit.

That is Sombra's exact affinity, but that unicorn himself isn't Sombra. As it currently stands, Sombra would more or less wipe the floor with Tempest.

[Via]

psst;
anyone reading this
the story is still alive! just a bit on life support