A lilac unicorn ran straight into the door of the Crystal Tree’s map room. It was a pull, not a push. She rubbed her nose, a small trickle of blood running down from where she’d slammed it right on the door.
“By Starswirl’s bearded arse crack,” Starlight muttered. “Stupid spell couldn’t have reset me to the moment I cast it, oh no, why not ten seconds before I cast it when I was trying to enter the room.”
The door began to glow teal, surrounded by Starlight’s magic, until it slowly crumbled down to dust. Only once it was a small pile of crystal dust on the floor did she bother to walk through.
After she got to the table, she pulled out her scroll and tried casting the spell again. Nothing happened. She began to examine the table and scan it with her magic. She had spent months planning this, studying every spell she could find. Breaking into the Starswirl the Bearded wing to steal his work on time magic had been easy. With an invisibility spell and a silence spell she’d learned, she was in and out of the deepest parts of Canterlot castle with none the wiser. Starlight had found flaws in Starswirl’s time travel spell, and had worked hard to make her own version that could go back further in time than a single week.
She pulled out his opus magnum, a thick tome filled with spells that could easily restructure the four dimensions that Equestria existed in. It was no wonder that it had been kept under lock and key. Starswirl's Guide to Time, the Universe, and Everything may have been pretentiously titled, but contained every finished and unfinished spell he’d ever created. Once Starlight was done here, there were at least a dozen other spells in the book that she would have fun completing.
Yet try as she might to figure out why this simple time travel spell had failed, she could find no flaws in her calculations. Clearly something had gone wrong, or she’d be in Cloudsdale right now. Instead, she had spent the last few days stuck in this empty castle with only the baby dragon as company. Of course, Starlight avoided him so as to not waste time or possibly get recognized.
If her spell was flawed, then perhaps she should cross-reference any books in the castle’s library to determine if she forgot to carry the zero or something. As Starlight headed down the hallway towards the library, she realized the hallways and doors all looked the same.
Sure enough, she was lost and going in circles only a few seconds later. She heard some talking coming from one of the rooms, and slowly approached.
“Got any four’s?” a stallion asked.
“Go fish,” a dragon replied.
Starlight trotted closer, realizing the crystal floors and walls made for a very loud echo.
“Hear something?”
She ducked behind a curtain and cast a spell to make herself less interesting, then peeked out. If anypony tried to look at her, they’d find the curtain painfully boring and look away.
A blue pegasus trotted out into the hallway. Starlight tilted her head curiously. She thought Spike, Twilight’s assistant, was the only one living in the castle. Perhaps this other pony was the foalsitter.
“Yeah, I thought I heard somepony out there but I didn't see anything.” The stallion closed the door and went back into the room.
Starlight let out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding, and cast a teleportation spell to cross the hallway and land at the intersection about four doors down. She looked around for any distinctive markings. Now that she knew where the dragon and it’s foalsitter were, Starlight could just avoid that hallway. The pony and dragon would be stuck in the loop, reliving the same day over and over. Meanwhile, she’d be free to fix this spell, travel to Cloudsdale, and have her revenge once and for all.
Methinks Starlight is going to be a bit surprised.
My only response
though I wonder why Dawn is having a wildcard affect?
I should have guessed this honestly. Should have realized your selection of Season to advance the show to was specifically deliberate. Should have realized it would line up with Starlight's time travel shenanigans.
Sounds like we're seeing foreshadowing that she'll figure out Dawn's aware of the looping before he figures out she is. Good stroke of luck for her considering he wouldn't recognize her as being from Ponyville so would be suspicious from her even before he would figure out she's not looping.
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Dawn's got Plot Armor. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PlotArmor
Since the culprit is no surprise, and the interlude is short, I'll just comment on the one, small thing that stood out to me. So, I'll recommend being more specific about the color of the unicorn. When I think of pink, strictly pink, I imagine a pony like Pinkie Pie or Cadence, so I was confused until the expected name was dropped. While I believe that Starlight's color is a pinkish color, it's also a purplish one, and my mind thinks it's more purple than pink. For me, at least, it's the sort of color that's best given a more specific name than drawing on one of the colors it's composed of.
She's not invisible, even though she could be. She's just so boring no one cares.
10/10. Best idea ever.
Oh yes this is going to end up getting messy.
Kaidan, if you kill Startlight...
encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTws9FM6s--yas9nu1LoaOdOw0oHAFWvJisKg&usqp=CAU
You got my respect and a free drink
he pony and dragon would be stuck in the loop, reliving the same day over and over.
Complacency gonna rear it's head I can feel it! (I was wrong about my first prediction, but this one I think is gonna be right)
Huh. I didn’t expect Starlight. Mainly because her canon time spell worked, and was cast while Twilight was in Ponyville. Those butterflies are doing their thing, I guess!
Cheesy evil villian doing some not so cheesy evil things
Welp.
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Yeah, it was kind of fun butterfly effecting the story since it became effectively an AU after what happened to Discord. That lead to Dawn filling in for a piece of the magical castle McGuffin, and perhaps has something to do with the current situation too.
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Well now I'd hate to disappoint you. Celestia had some very specific things to say about killing being wrong... but she was somewhat fuzzier on the subject of kneecaps.
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I liked the magic system in Dresden Files, and one of the cooler thing was how invisibility worked. If you bend all the light around or through you so it can't reflect, then none of that light would hit your eyes, rendering you blind. So I figure for ponies, why go invisible and nearly blind, when you can just make yourself uninteresting, or compel anyone that looks at you to get distracted? Anyway next chapter goes into the magic system, and I probably could have gone on more about it, but I figure not everyone wants to nerd out about magical theory... especially Dawn.
Now I just need to find a way to work a Loup-garou into the story...
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Glad you have you back! I'll leave a chapter update under your tree tomorrow.
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I struggled to figure out what color she was, and didn't think to just google it until you pointed out, so that's on me. Light purple? light pink? lavender?...
I think it's fixed now that I googled it. I'll start referring to her as lilac with a purple mane and a teal highlight. Now, to remember what color her magic was.
And I would agree with her... Except Starlight not only brainwashed an entire village and stole their cutie marks but also stalked Twilight for months (that's a rough estimate) and committed the cosmic sin of messing with time! Hell she is extremely lucky for not destroying the universe in the process. And did she get punished for it? NO! she gets to walk freely like nothing bad happened. *SIGH* at the very least punch her in face until she's knocked out
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She's definitely earned some blunt force trauma.
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Has anyone ever told you you're better than Santa?
cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/326753478212845569/924080308414971904/kaidan.png
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Awesome, it's Santa Dawn.
11095232
1000 hours in MS Paint
so this is 100% a stargate ep ;P
So let me guess...the bucking Tree called Twi and Dash away, purposely screwed up Starlight's time spell and trapping them in Ponyville, so Dawn would have to be one too stop Starlight this time around and learn a lesson or some shit.