A Library
“Darling, you should really go rest,” Rarity implored later that afternoon, “Surely your brother could do something?”
Twilight sighed, “Neither of them has slept properly for who knows how long. The least I can do is sit here for a while longer. I’m not tired, I promise,”
Rarity bit her lip and bowed her head, “You know, sometimes I wish I had not brushed off magic training as a filly. Then perhaps I could help you at times,”
“Rarity,” Twilight waited until Rarity raised her head, “A unicorn’s worth is not determined by their magical prowess,”
“I- well, of course, darling,” Rarity trailed off and Twilight waited patiently until she spoke again, “It is just that many of the adventures we go on tend to lean more toward…I despise feeling so- so useless! I am a unicorn am I not? I should be helping!”
And there it was.
“Rarity, what does your cutie mark mean? How did you get it?” Rarity looked thrown off by the radical change in the subject but answered immediately.
“My horn took me to the gems. Darling, I told you this story already,” Rarity frowned, “Please do not change the subject to spare my feelings Twilight,”
“Humor me. What did your horn do?”
“It was as if an invisible force dragged me a few miles outside of Ponyville. It stopped at the rock spire and Rainbow Dash’s rainboom opened the rock,”
Twilight smiled, “So your horn turned into a gem radar?”
Rarity nodded and Twilight sensed the beginnings of annoyance within the pony.
“And you think just any ol’ unicorn can do that?”
Twilight cracked up at Rarity’s gasp of outrage, “Well of course not!”
“Where ever are you going with this Twilight?” Rarity huffed.
“My point is, there’s only one you. Only you would have the knack for finding gems and find a way to mesh it with your passion for sewing. You don’t need to be a magical prodigy to be an Element Bearer, Rarity. It chose you for a reason,”
A soft smile lit up the unicorn’s face, “While that may be true. It is still a bit much to always see just how good you are at magic,”
“Rarity, I’ve been training under Celestia for over nineteen summers now. I started when I was a little over four summers old,” Twilight reminded gently, “That’s what my cutie mark means. My talent is Magic,”
“Well when you put it like that, my worries do seem a bit silly,” Rarity said ruefully.
Twilight held up a claw, “It wasn’t silly. It was something that’s been eating away at you for a while. It’s alright to feel like that,”
“Thank you, Twilight,”
Twilight nodded, “Do you mind telling everyone to meet down here when my brother wakes up so we can get briefed?”
“Consider it done, darling,”
Six hours later, Shining and Cadence woke up. Both looked slightly better, but exhaustion was still the primary expression on their faces. At least Cadence’s wings were preened and her coat wasn’t as dirty.
“Thanks for coming everypony,” Shining began tiredly, “As you know, our job is to defend the Empire from King Sombra. He’s out there somewhere and his only known weaknesses are bombardment rays and dragon fire. No pony leaves the shield without one other pony,”
“He feeds on hatred and fear,” Cadence continued on, “Since my husband and I have been so busy with the shield, we haven’t had time to gather knowledge from the crystal ponies,”
Rarity gasped in delight, “Crystal ponies? Do they look like the Castle?”
“We haven’t seen too many of them, but from what we’ve seen, yes,”
“I can handle the shield for now,” Twilight offered, “It’s not that hard for me and I’ve been doing this for the whole day and it’s not bad,”
Shining snorted, “Anyways, do you think you all could start some reconnaissance? Gather information and see how the residents are doing. Err, Twily, I think it might be better if no one saw you… yet…”
Twilight shrugged and smiled ruefully, “I suppose someone needs to be the magical expert to prevent things from going boom, huh? Besides, you two still need to recover, no magic for at least a full solar cycle. I don’t want magic-less vegetables for relatives,”
Immediately, Shining Armor and Cadence burst into a cacophony of protests. Twilight simply sighed and waited for them to fall silent again. When they did, Twilight raised an eye ridge. Shining’s eye twitched rather dangerously and Twilight knew she won this silent argument.
“Alright then,” Shining said grudgingly, “Regroup at the castle doors in two hours. Cadence and I should probably eat something and then rest again,”
The first to be back was Fluttershy and Spike. Fluttershy’s wings rustled uneasily as she sported a troubled look.
“No one remembers anything. They think King Sombra disappeared yesterday,” Fluttershy said softly upon seeing Twilight’s inquiring look.
Twilight closed her eyes to compose herself and Fluttershy continued hesitantly, “They might still be under a spell or something, but I don’t know magic all that well. Sorry, Twilight,”
“Well, that’s rather disappointing. Their memories, not your magic sensing abilities,” Twilight hastily added seeing Fluttershy’s crestfallen look, “I wanted to know if anyone could tell us how life was like before Sombra,”
Applejack joined them, shaking her head, “I heard y’all. No pony remembers nothin’. It’s a might annoying. Everypony all depressed lookin’, almost like Pinky when she gets sad.”
Twilight became faintly amused at Applejack’s comparison, “No luck for you either Pinky?”
“Wha-?” Applejack didn’t get to finish her question before Pinky landed on the farmer’s back, buckling her knees from the unexpected weight.
“Nope-aronie! But I heard there’s a library in town!”
Twilight’s eyes blew wide and her legs tensed as if she was going to make a break for the building in the next second. The shield around the city faltered slightly in Twilight’s excitement.
“Only books would make Twilight get so excited. What happened?” Rainbow touched down, “Everyone’s so skittish here. It’s weird,”
“There’s a library in the city,” Twilight managed to say evenly as her tail lashed side to side impatiently, “We need to go, like, right now,”
“Hold it, Egghead! We need to wait for Rarity, then we can go find your precious books,”
Just as Rainbow said that, Rarity trotted up shaking her head silently. Twilight did a quick mental headcount and without a word, darted off into the city.
“And there she goes,” Rainbow sighed, “Alright, I’ll follow her by air. Meet you guys there,”
When the group finally caught up to their dragon friend, she was already several shelves deep into the library. Books lay in mountains nearby and more were flung to the ground when it wasn’t the one she was looking for. The books that were still up for inspection moved in a conveyor belt-like fashion in front of Twilight’s snout.
“Oh great, now Twilight can literally eat books,” Rainbow deadpanned upon seeing the crystal covers of the books, “Hey Egghead, make sure not to eat any encyclopedias, we might not survive,”
“Oh, I didn’t even know you knew what an encyclopedia was. Are congratulations in order?” Twilight quipped back without missing a beat, not even looking up from her floating books.
Fluttershy snickered at Rainbow’s insulted expression. It evolved into a peal of full-blown laughter when Rainbow whipped her head around to glare. (“Flutters, you’re supposed to be on my side!”)
“What are ya lookin’ for Sugar Cube? Maybe we can help,” Applejack offered despite Rainbow Dash dramatically gesturing not to.
“A history book,” Twilight snapped before angrily slamming all the books to the ground, “Honestly! Who organizes books like this?! Myths and legends next to architecture? Really?! Am I the only competent librarian in Equestria?! Tell me!” she hysterically threw up her claws, “First it was Celestia’s personal Tartarous ridden mess of a mini-library. Second, it was the Royal Archives! Then it was the Golden Oaks Library! Now, this?! Ugh!”
A beat of silence passed before anyone made a move.
“There, there. I’m sure you’re not the only crazy Egghead in Equestria,” Rainbow patted Twilight’s shoulder with her wing, trying desperately not to laugh.
Twilight exhaled loudly and dragged her claws down her face. Everyone cringed away from the noise.
“‘The History of the Crystal Empire: The Complete Edition,’” Spike read aloud from a few shelves over, “Found it, Mom!”
“Thank the Moon!” Twilight exclaimed, jumping over her friends to land next to Spike, “How do you always do that?”
Spike shrugged happily.
Sombra pondered in the darkness. What unicorn prodigy would his little spy find? That little foal was simply too easy to bend to his will. A few choice words and she agreed. What a weak-minded cretin. His future apprentice better not fall prey to such simplicity. But in the end, his spy would bring them to him. After all, his orders were clear, “Bring me the unicorn prodigy,”
So far, his little spy had only found the five outsiders. She hadn’t made any contact with the ones that reside in his castle. Her emotions regarding the five were rather pleasant, but there was one where bitterness and jealousy festered under the friendship. When he found her, that bitterness was dying down but it only took a little nudging in the right direction for it to return full force. He would work with that, just fan that jealousy even more and it would be the end of it.
The one his spy was jealous of was probably his potential apprentice, after all, if such a beautiful unicorn was jealous of another, the only plausible conclusion to draw from that was expansive magic power.
It’d taken every ounce of his willpower to not blast his spy when he first came across her. Once her job was fulfilled, he would take her husk to be his own, no more of his unnatural bulkiness from his earth pony days.
He was King Sombra, the self-made unicorn king of the Crystal Empire. He alone had uncovered more magic than Princess Celestia. It was he who fashioned himself his horn and built his own leyline. It was he, a small earth pony foal with no parents that figured out what leylines were. He was King Sombra, and the Empire would be his.
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People were seriously upset about the last chapter? Really? I find the potential apprenticeship to be pretty interesting... no idea why people would freak out about it. You do you author, I'm really enjoying the story.
Burn him with Fire Twilight.
That's neat, i guess. If sombra was doing body modification, you'd think he'd go for something that would extend his lifespan along with doing spells. Your Twilight's probably done it. I guess she won't know unless she's not dead a century or two from this point in the story
That's a really great background for sombra there, we'll see if it will lead to Twilight really become his apprentice or not like with Discord. And it's sad to see that people don't appreciate your story, it's a really nice one. Keep going! 👍
So i Don't think Sombra has found out that his target is a Dragon thats Going to be a shock for him
About the pitch and fork reviewers, I think they were just a vocal minority. Actually, reading back I think it was just a single comment.
Don't worry too much about it, mate. When writing you can't please everyone, just try to listen to the reasonable reviewers but stay true to the story you want to tell. It's your story, afterall.
11058785
i have a failure complex, unfortunately, all it needs is a single comment and ill literally fall like a house of cards lol
11058848
Then if your ever feeling down from a comment, look at the likes on your story. There are literally only 3 dislikes, whereas there are 174 likes. That's really impressive. If people "really" didn't like your story then it wouldn't be rated so highly. Nor would you get so many positive comments.
And if someone can't post criticism without being an ass while doing it, then I wouldn't put much stock into what they are saying, even if it's the secret to all life in the universe.
Awesome story👍
OK Twilight aside and that envy over rarity also aside, I want to know who that spy is