Spike has been Twilight's loyal Friendship Ambassador for many years, sorting problems and building bridges with other nations.
Sadly, the customs of his ancestral home remain a mystery to him. On a diplomatic visit to the Dragon Lands, Dragon Lord Ember decides to enroll Spike in a ceremony that all young dragons must pass, the communion with the deity of the dragons.
Yet, in this unfamiliar realm, a world of dragons he knows so little about, Spike is forced to grapple with profound questions of identity-who he truly is, what he aspires to become, and whether he can ever embody the essence of what it is to be a dragon.
Surely speaking with a God can't be that bad?
Set sometime before The Last Problem during Generation 4
Art is by Noben at https://www.furaffinity.net/view/16601690/ all credit goes to the artist and their works exclusively.
Humming De Falla while reading about Pangu dragon spirit.
This was a fun read
Nice prose. And fascinating take/version of dragon culture and life. I just want to learn more now lol.
Sweet ending as well. I somewhat wish we could have seen Twilight in the end there, but understand how that might have detracted somewhat from the pure dragon-focus of the story too.
I am left with one question, and perhaps it's meant to be unanswered: was Spike actually enhanced somehow, unlock more of his potential, or did he basically just gain a confidence boost?
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Thank you for your kind words!
The show often did not focus very much on other cultures, so I wanted to explore a bit of the dragons and how they function as a society. Thus the lack of pesky ponies!!
As for the last bit Spike didn’t receive any powers or anything, everything was already in him, he just had the equivalent of a spiritual revelation.
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It's really good.
I now have to ask, do you have any plans for any more fics like this? Whether focusing on Spike and the dragons again or on other cultures and characters
Not that this story needs a sequel to be good of course. It's just that this sort of thing is one of my favourite things to see in fiction, so I'm always on the lookout xP
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I probably won't do a sequel to this as I covered what I wanted to cover. But yeah I might consider dripping into other cultures and how they work, its really fun kinda world building so I definitely see the appeal and such stories also catch my eye too.
Feels like this was inspired by Brutal Legend.
Good read.
Hey elders don’t be insulting your future dragon lord which I still don’t know how that happened
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I was thinking Aang and Zuko doing the dance.
This was great. A different writer would have injected waaaay more drama into this idea, but I feel like short and sweet works better. Spike's honesty, his immediate rejection of the Elders' ancient racism, and his brief stumble before greatness is completely on point for my perception of his character.
In spite of Spike's doubt about his place in the world, he's always struck me as very self-assured. Sure, he'll bend a tiny bit to peer pressure and be a bit of a coward at first, but it doesn't take long for him to do an about-face and act according to his moral compass against even the worst of odds. That's how I've always seen him. All the heart and might of a big dragon condensed into a small package.
Ahhh ,.. tradition, one does have to keep an eye when once claims this, it is unifying as well as separating ... when hung onto too long, it's as discriminating as any 'Jim Crow' law (us vs them at its finest).
The Elder did remind me of Naysay(?) head of the EEA, hidebound, hiding behind tradition ...
Thanks Spike, for once again showing that chaos (or change) does have a place ...
Image sauce btw: https://www.furaffinity.net/view/16601690/
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Oops, my bad on that; thanks for the spot on the error.
I really appreciate the art link, too; I'll go give proper credit there.
Oh hey, Noben fanart for the wallpaper. Naisu.
This was awesome.
11901897 Silly, you can't create an EMPIRE without wiping out a few (or all) of the INFERIOR races!
Hail Daleks.
Spike may be many things, but one stands clear: he is a dragon. And another point is that Spike, being a purple dragon, is a noble dragon.
The dragons of Equis are not the dragons of, say, Game of Thrones, or many movie-type dragons. Nor are they the dragons, both Chromatics or Metallics, of D&D. The dragons of Equis are both funny, yet also serious, keepers of ancient knowledge, but also willing to find their paths amongst the so-called "lesser" races. They are the keepers of the Fire that is Life, and I have always thought that Spike was one of the better characters in MLP. He is a survivor, willing to accept the derision of Rainbow Dash for wearing an apron while serving snacks to the other ponies while the ponies watch the dragon migration above.
Darn good tale there. You get my thumbs up and a moustache:
Babe wake up new Dragon canon just dropped.
100/10
"Wall scones" - did you mean "wall sconces" (light fixtures)? Scones are baked goods, which seems somewhat out of place on the walls. Unless Pinkie did it?
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lol the corrector on Grammarly can be bit iffy at times, this one must have slipped me by. Wall scones do sound delicious.
Hot damn, this is a great piece.
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Thank you very much!
It is mortal foolishness to claim to know the will and form of a God. They think them high and mighty things, able to cast great works into the world by Word alone, but they are wrong. A real God, a true being beyond the ken of mortals is something that is writ into the very fabric of reality, at once beyond it and beneath it at the same time. A God changes the world just by being there, but by that same token, is changed by the world as it is. After all, the world changes, the course of rivers shift, the tides flow, and even the very land itself may rise or sink. If Gods are to be here, they must not be immutable, and so traditions sometimes must change, and what is known becomes different entirely.
You say you would speak with a God? But what you really must do is listen to the World, and there alone will you hear the Words of the Divine.
11912502 The law of the universe is immutable. Lesser beings change. But that which is the Foundation does not waver or crack. Simply being incapable to comprehend the eternal does not imply it must change.
Those who are mortal cannot comprehend that which has endured when their planet and star were mere collections of dust floating in the vastness of the cosmos. It's like asking AI to comprehend hands...
11905150 Cinnamon or blueberry? This is important.
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And yet, even the stars live and die. What Mortals are is the blink of an eye to beings and things that dwell between them. Nebula become stars, becomes worlds, becomes land, becomes seas, becomes life, becomes people, becomes civilization, becomes reason, and becomes one with the stars when it is there time.
To exist is to change. To cease to change is to stagnate, to allow everything else to move on without you. The Great Wyrm once sailed the star ocean, once plumbed its depths, but here has curled up, and allowed its form to become the ground on which others might walk.
Thus does its change give way to this world, and these people. Its flame inside them, but not all they are, for the soul is more than that. And it meets each of them not as a thing of might and power, for if one is truly above it all, then coming down to the level of a mortal is no more than a thought and whim.
That is a God. A being above, beyond, and within.
12157825 And some stars become black holes which will be around for at least 100 trillion years. Such stability is the FOUNDATION of the universe. Without a stable foundation, there can be no structure above.
That which endures is what everything transient is built upon.