The Magic Smith

by Arceaion

Returning to Canterlot and Celestial Secrets

Twilight groaned as she sat in the carriage, her eyes were bloodshot and she leaned heavily against the side of it; meanwhile Celestia stood talking with the five mares that had joined Twilight to free Luna. "Thank you all for your assistance with freeing my sister." She said with a bow causing the mares to nod and smile. "Also how is Ms. Pie doing?" She asked with some slight concern.

Applejack frowned. "She'll be fine, but fer now she's sleeping off 'er hangover." She said as Rainbow snorted.

"I don't know how she drank that much but the next time Twilight comes down here I'll show her what real drinking looks like." She boasted as he puffed out her chest however everypony froze as they heard what sounded like drunken laughing coming from the carriage. Slowly everyone turned to see Twilight looking at Rainbow with a mix of amusement and disappointment.

"You would die after your first gulp of what we were drinking." She said as she slowly stood and staggered over to the group. "I'm an Alicorn so drink fine and the only reason Pinkie not dead is because she has Chaos Magic." Twilight said causing Celestia to freeze.

"Did you say Chaos magic?" She asked as her eyes narrowed however Twilight simply walked over to her and booped her nose causing Celestia eyes to cross and her wings to shoot out.

"No, Bad Celestia!" She said in as serious tone she could muster before booping her again with the same result. "No killing ponies simply because they have weird magic, what did I tell you the last time you tried to destroy dark magic?" She asked.

Celestia frowned as she looked away from Twilight. "That magic is simply a tool and its how one uses it that matters." She said grumpily as she deflated a bit.

Twilight smiled and nodded. "Pinkie uses her magic reasonably and to help, she's not a threat." Twilight continued as she glared at Celestia. Celestia sighed and nodded as she walked toward the chariot.

As she left Twilight sighed and looked at the group. "Sorry bout that." She said as her demeanor changed back to happy though still drunk. "Celestia has a bit of history with Chaos magic users... let's just say they didn't leave a good impression." She said in a loud whisper voice.

"Will she be alright?" Fluttershy asked quietly causing Twilight to smile.

"She'll be fine, she's just a very old mare with a lot of scars that haven't healed. Sometimes you got to boop the snoot reset button a few." She said as he waved a hoof. "In any case I gotta go before the nobles overthrow princess Cadence and I have to crack some skills... or was it skulls?" She asked before shrugging. "When the Pink One wakes tell her to remember the lime is in the coconut, the alligator is in the tub and not to take the blue pill." She said as she staggered back to the chariot and as soon as she got on passed out.

Celestia sighed and nodded to guards who began to pull the carriage into the air. As they rose Celestia looked down at the village. "What an odd town." She muttered as she stroked Twilight mane.

"I wonder when Pinkie will pay the tab?" Spike said as he sat in the back of the carriage.

Celestia looked over at Spike. "If she truly has chaos magic then I’d imagine she'll have already paid... somehow." She said as he rubbed her forehead.

"So what do we do for young Twilights soon to come hangover?" Luna asked with a yawn.

Celestia sighed. "I'm sure she'll stumble down to the kitchen and make one of those damn prairie oysters." She said with a groan.

Luna looked confused. "Aren't oysters aquatic?" She asked. "And how does young Twilight make them?"

Celestia groaned. “It’s a drink that helps with hangovers, from what I hear they're disgusting but Twilight swears by them." Celestia said with a groan.

"Oh, I see." Luna said before looking at her sister. "What's it made of?" She asked.

"Raw egg, Worcestershire sauce, vinegar, hot sauce, table salt, and ground black pepper." Celestia said calmly as he watched the scenery pass by.

Luna raised a hoof to her mouth as Spike made retching noises. "Oh god, I'm gonna be sick." He said as Luna nodded.

Celestia sighed. "From experience it's honestly the best cure but it is gross." She said as she turned to her sister. "Luna... there's something we need to talk about when we get to the castle. Something that Twilight can’t find out about." She said in a quiet voice.

Luna looked at her sister confused but nodded. "Very well sister, we may speak this evening."

---

Several hours later a knock was heard at Celestia's door causing her to look out the window and sigh before sitting down her tea. "Come in Luna." She said loudly as the door opened. "I suppose you want to have that conversation now?" She asked.

"If you don’t want to we don’t have to sister." Luna said as she joined her sister and sat across from her.

Celestia said nothing as she poured anther cup and filled it with tea and pored some sugar in to it before passing it to Luna. "Do you remember the stories I use to tell you when we were younger?" She asked.

Luna frowned. "Yes, I remember the stories." She said a she took a sip of the tea. "You always seemed so sad about them but you never told me why."

Celestia nodded. "You were too young at the time, and I didn’t want to burden you with... the truth." She said sadly. "Luna what would you do If I told you that I'm not exactly your sister?"

Luna paused and looked at Celestia. "Tia, family is what we make of it." She said calmly. "Blood is but only a small part."

Celestia smiled sadly. "Remember the story of the Magic Smith?" She asked.

"Of course, I remember she was somewhat of an idol to me when I was young." She said happily before frowning and looking to Celestia. "It was also the story that always made you so sad."

Celestia nodded. "Luna, she wasn’t a story but real." Celestia said calmly. "I knew her well; she was like my mother in many ways. She took me in, raised me and cared for me." Luna set the cup down and looked out the window as she quietly listened to her sister. "Where I am from, nothing is ever truly... finished. We were all incomplete things born from the failures of our creators, shadows of what could have been but never was meant to be in the end." Celestia took a sip of her tea and looked down at the table. "Like the Magic Smith I was more complete then the others, I felt and in so doing was in constant emotional pain. Then one day I was not in that empty world but this one. It was cold, and for the first time I felt something other than emptiness. She found me in the snow and seemed to immediately know what I was but... instead of throwing me away she took me in. I lived with her for what felt like years, I was so happy but the she had to go..." Celestia trailed off.

"She gave you her soul and you became Celestia." Luna said calmly.

Celestia shook her head. "More like I was able to actually live, she completed me." She explained before shaking her head. "You would- no... You can't understand, despite everything you've lived a normal life. Being such as I are incomplete and we could never hope to be completed."

Luna frowned. "Sister, what brought this up? You never needed or at least felt the need to tell me this before."

"The Celestia that was meant to be here never was born; I took her place in this world and was adopted by our parents." Celestia explained. "I have always done what I could to make ponies like me, because if I didn’t then I always feared I would disappear once more but in doing I hurt you." She said sadly. "When you needed me I was never around, always away or lost in my search." She said as she stood and walked over to Luna before draping a wing over the smaller Alicorn. "I'm so sorry, I know I was wrong and it’s a poor excuse but I want you to know the truth; I’ve hid it for so long and I never should have hid it for you." She whispered.

Luna shifted uncomfortably before sighing and pulling Celestia i to a hug. "You're my sister; nothing will change that no matter what." She said before pulling away and looking at Celestia. "Of course that doesn’t explain why you haven't told Twilight, from what I can tell she is like you."

Celestia bit her lip and looked away. "She's... not exactly herself right now." Celestia said slowly. "Something that escapes that endless nothing can't be returned, so when the Magic Smith 'died' she couldn’t return to that nothing but instead was forced back here in a broken form."

Luna's eyes widened. "So that means that young Twilight is the Magic Smith!" She said in a gasp.

Celestia nodded. "She has no recollection of who she was but she still seems to have the memories even though she can't access them." Celestia explained. "There are times she seems to unconsciously act in a way the Smith would and there are even times I feel like she's still there but other time she's like you saw in Ponyville."

Luna frowned. "I've never heard of such a phenomenon but then again we’re not exactly a pony but something else even if you all were meant to be ponies."

Celestia nodded. "I call our kind the Perdidit et contrivit."

Luna nodded. "I see, well it stand to reason that if giving her soul up reduced her to a state such as this then perhaps returning the soul would fix it." She said as he looked at Celestia before frowning. "But then we would be back to the same problem as you would not have a soul." She countered before looking at Celestia "Tia, you told me that the Smith used her soul to fix ponies that lost their magic if she couldn't do it by normal repair means. Could we perhaps use those fragments to restore her?"

Celestia sighed. "As you saw she already has a soul thanks to the Elements." She countered. "The problem’s that even the Elements can’t fix is that whatever constitutes a soul seems to be only temporary for her."

Luna nodded. "So we need a powerful source of whatever makes up a soul, combined with a way to insure it never runs out... what’s the state of her magic core?"

Celestia frowned. "From what I've learned over my studies the Magic Core, emotions of a creature and soul are all one single thing. It goes by different names and can be described in different ways but in the end they are all the same. The Modern Pony calls it a Soul but in the past they were called Magic Cores."

Luna nodded. "I'll start looking into a way to restore souls."

Celestia shook her head. "No, you’ve been gone for over a thousand years. You need to study up on what’s happened since... the incident. Also you should get acquainted with the ponies of this age; I promise they won't fear you, I may have fudged the history books a bit on what happened." She said with a small smile. "While you get reacquainted with this new more modern age I will start the research." She said as she pulled Luna in to a hug. "But for now I simply wish to be with my sister." She said quietly receiving a nuzzle from Luna.

Author's Note:

A chapter for this story has been long overdue but I've been busy with other stories so I apologize. This chapter was rather explanation and lore heavy but I'm satisfied with it so there's that. I do hope you enjoyed it and I will see you in the next one.

Comments

[manacar]

UPDATE YEAH!!!!!!!!

[Viper Pit]

Deep

[PonyofEntropy]

Cool story, looking forward to more.

[Alectra24444]

This au was interesting!

[DzikutheDzik]

Very oryginal and awesome story:)

[blaid23]

I find it really amusing and hilarious to see that Twilight acts a bit if not a lot like Pinkie. I am seriously loving this story. I hope you’ll be able to keep it going. 👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍

[funtime_foxy455]

Wow, this story definately went off the rails with the sequence of events from the original series. But I definately like it keep going and never give up.

[Breaking the void]

I hope this story isn’t dead.

[Arceaion]

11145251
It's not and the next chapter is being worked on but due to events in both 2020 and 2021 as well as me currently having to work a lot MY TIME FOR WRITING Has been significantly reduced. I also have other large scale projects outside of writing I'm involved with.

[Breaking the void]

11145275
Nothing, I can wait for you.

[Arceaion]

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It's fine, I know my lack of updates has been annoying.