Delving back through the depths of time, mysteries abound, uncovering the veiled origins of everything we think we know. Journey back to a world before Equestria was founded, before the dark forest of Everfree blighted the land.
What shaped the land of ponies all those millennia ago? This is a tale of love turned to jealousy and then hate. Of sacrifice and vengeance. Of pain and desperation in the face of overwhelming power. Was all of it justified? You be the judge.
Lingering questions demand answers: What compelled the forging of the Elements of Harmony? Why have the ponies of Equestria been kept oblivious to their own ancient past? What dark secrets were too terrible to be passed down through the generations? What truly corrupted Sombra and led to Luna's tragic fall from grace? Most importantly, who set all of this in motion, and is everypony safe from it happening again?
Thanks to everyone I've worked on the lore of the saga with over the years.
I loving this story so far ^^
Lovely story. Hope this AU is well received.
Very interesting vision of the ancient past of Equestria. This story reads as if it was one of myths written in “Myths of Ancient Equestria”, and I think it is quite fitting.
Hyperion and Periapsis are basically treating the planet as their own personal sandbox. I guess that’s what happens if an Alicorn is not following Harmony. They are very powerful, more so than Celestia and Luna, but they barely even notice anypony else, let alone try to have friends. Can’t wait to see how their reckless behavior will impact the world. It’s quite easy to say it won’t be anything good.
Even without any dialogue, this story is very good. Mostly thanks to the climate. Can’t wait to see how the myth of Hyperion and Periapsis will unfold.
I also wonder how Celestia and Luna managed to be more compassionate than their parents, and how they became the benevolent rulers we know them as. It will be interesting to have a look at their childhood.
Overall, this is a very good story. I’m waiting for the next chapter.
BTW: you said the story was written in 2016. Is it still canon to Black Feather and to the Equinox saga, or is it a separate but related story?
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Yes, the way it works is ponies have a set of forty positive traits or virtues that they exhibit in their lives. Most ponies have a few but nobody anyone has all of them. Nobody besides Equinox himself I suppose. So if a pony exhibits a trait in the 99th percentile, it's called a 'Virtue of Harmony'. About a third of the mortals have one. Some have two.
What's different about alicorns is that as they mature, they hit a transformation point, around the age of 22-25. Up until this point, the young alicorn is very much like a regular pony in terms of where the magical energy comes from and the fact that they can actually use up what they've got stored internally. The transformation itself has several key stages, beginning with nightmares and some magical outbursts. Early uses of magic directly drawn from the Aether for example. Black Feather showed Nyx doing this after she saved the child from the sniper. That was not her own energy she used, and the clues in the story follow her trying to understand it. Her conversation with Twilight and later Luna are all meant to bring Nyx closer to understanding what is happening to her.
After the young alicorn completes the transformation, they no longer store energy internally. It's channeled directly from the Aether through the horn and into the world via the alicorn's actual will rather than spells. The other effect is the alicorn loses all connection with the traits of Harmony as well as losing almost all memory. They become "amoral" which is to say they lack any specific morality. They only do as they please and while not malicious (usually) they really don't view the mortals as people anymore. You could think of it like Doctor Manhattan from the Watchmen if you want a solid analogy.
Thanks! I was hoping that would be the case. It's technically not a "story" in the sense of there not being a protagonist. That's why I called it a chronicle. But I still wanted it to be emotionally rich.
Prior to being fully matured, even alicorns born of alicorns have a connection with the ethics of the mortal ponies. If they go through the transformation of fully maturing, they will become exactly like their parents. It becomes a strong temptation in the early 20's to abandon one way of life and embrace the other.
Yes, I've been working on the same project since late 2014. It's all related, though it has gone through several evolutions. But yes, my magic system was firmly established as early as 2015 and Hyperion was probably my single most influential character ever in terms of the sheer impact he had on absolutely everything. Originally, I just wanted to be able to explain why everything we see in MLP was the way it was. But now my motives are obviously quite a bit different.
As much as the old mythological vibe of this story is fun... There's one aspect of it which doesn't make much sense to me. If Hyperion and Peri are these planet-wide uber-powerful beings, teaching their children global-scale deep magics... Why are ponies the only lesser species mentioned? What about the various other species in the MLP world? The griffons, and minotaurs, and zebras, and so on? The only way I'd view the story as making sense is if those species are somehow all introduced later on in history by some force currently not introduced.
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lol... you been reading my notes?
Griffins and minotaurs were indeed artificially introduced into Equus by some force not currently introduced. So you pretty much nailed it, although that force isn't part of this slice of the timeline. There's a broader conflict going on that is visible only by zooming out even further to the more ancient past and then into the future when the saga enters a technological revolution, including space travel.
While all of that isn't part of this story, I might as well state that there's an ongoing interstellar war between two titanic races known as the Alcora and the Windigo. (yes, those Windigo.) The focal point of the conflict is that the force of Harmony, generated by ponies of all three tribes getting along, annihilates windigo. The Alcora discovered this and want to weaponize it to destroy their enemy.
You can read a finished story in the sci-fi future part of the saga by checking out Flurry in Time.
But yeah other mortal races do still exist during the calamity Hyperion brought. But they were not the target of his wrath. His aim wasn't to demolish the world. Just to wipe out the ponies specifically. Collateral damage would have hurt everyone, to varying degrees, but that isn't the focus of this story. It's just mentioned in passing. Next, the story will cover the aftermath and what the sisters did to help rebuild.
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So the part that confuses me is... Why did Hyperion hate ponies specifically, when other intelligent species were doing the exact same thing in terms of building cities and stuff that he would have viewed as blemishing his landscape? By the way, thanks for such a detailed answer.
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Oh he tolerated them building stuff, though he found it somewhat irritating. The crux of the issue is what the early chapters introduce, where Periapsis took a special interest in the ponies.
The reason Hyperion never got upset with the other races is because his mate never spent her time paying attention to them. The mortal ponies were her fascination and she wasn't willing to give that up.
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Oh right- I guess I got the reasons mixed up in my mind. My bad- and thanks for being patient with me!
Is that the one where they kick in the door, and kill every hostile, or just glass them from orbit with beam spells?
BTW, I like what you have here, the story itself is kinda lore-dumpy, but it's enjoyable nonetheless. What a coincidence I also just started publishing a story featuring Celestia, Luna, and alicorns.
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Glad you're enjoying it.
Yeah that's probably because this is a lore dump.
Though it's at least a lore dump that builds an emotional narrative.
So we're going PAST the present day? That was unexpected. I've been checking in on this story occasionally, and I had expected it to end about the time the show started, with the elements curing Luna being treated as a good ending point. Now I have no idea where the story is going to go or where it's going to end, and it's kind of exciting.
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The chronicle has an epilogue I'll be publishing shortly with an Author's Note at the end.
So while you were originally correct about it only giving history up to the point of the mane-six, this is only the beginning of a much, much greater journey.
Solid read. These chapters have been a joy to bury my face into on a slow night.
Lore books are an unappreciated lot. Fascinating and engaging.
I liked that this one reads like a mind in turmoil. Masterfully done.
So now it's over with the epilogue, just like you said. I think that the next fic I start reading is going to be Black Feather.
Ultimately, I liked this, even despite the unique format. And I can't help, but wonder if the traditional story form would have made this better. As in, focusing in on characters, and telling things from a few perspectives instead of relying on the narrator all the time.
Still, thank you for writing this, new takes on MLP FiM lore are always welcome, even if lore-heavy stories went out of style by now.
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Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it.
And I did originally intend to make this into a proper story with character POVs and so on... but time constraints and the fact that we left the MLP fandom years ago to write in our own independent IP have severely limited the amount of time we can put into writing for Fimfic. This lore story was finished several years ago so I had it sitting in GDocs and figured what the heck may as well publish it.
I wonder whether they created any offspring.
Would especially interesting, if said offspring would be a "normal" pony. How would they (especially Hyperion) deal with that?
Whatever the case, I look forwards to see where this story goes.
It certainly has a very interesting and unusual (in a good way!) writing style.
On another note:
It was the cover art which had originally caught my interest. Where did you get it?
I couldn't find any references towards a source.
Maybe she could have delayed that action and waited for her powers to grow further.
Especially since conflict with Hyperion seems more and more likely.
(Which actually happened in the last paragraph.)
Periapsis: "I call this project 'Stable-Tec'!"
The City Must Survive!
(I have no idea why I suddenly had to think of this. I mean the situation isn't even particular comparable...)
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My friend and artist BernardDK made it for me. It's a combination of multiple AI images and his own artistic talents.
He requested not to be credited in the description. He made the cover art for my story Ashes and Black Feather as well. Also the comic images that are interlaced into Black Feather chapter one.
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If she had waited until after, then she would not have cared one bit about the fate of ponykind. Such is the consequence for fully maturing as an alicorn -- a loss of morality and youthful memory, followed by near-omnipotence.
Maybe it would be wise to do something similar for Earth Ponies and Pegasi to prevent a possible imbalance in the future.
Just like founding a school for them, instead of just a school for gifted Unicorns.
Or may that already be a hint for some long-term problem Celestia is currently planting without her knowledge?
In the end they loved their crystals so much they literally became walking crystals themselves.
Dedication!
To quote an age-old meme video:
Let's hope this won't cause any long-term problems...
Is there any lore about the changelings?
Do they not exist yet, being a younger species?
Or maybe they do already exist, but nobody knows about them...
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Very much.
Which is very good!
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Yes, I have quite extensive lore about them. But their creation is much further back in the timeline than this story shows. My lore goes back about 25,000 years.
Here you go.
[edit]
Oh sorry I just noticed that this document was last edited after we left the MLP fandom. The changelings were renamed the Kindred. So if you see Kindred, just think Changeling and that was the lore for them.
According to every-movie-ever it's probably a bad idea to assemble them back together...
Maybe now is the right time to get a hint?
...Nah. Let's continue and se where it goes. I mean what's the worst that could possibly happen?!
Hopefully Luna is mindful enough to try and remove it altogether once they are back home.
Says the one being who is responsible for this whole mess in the first place.
Using dark magic is like drinking strange wine. It may go well for a while, but eventually there will be a price to pay.
Too bad that didn't happen the first time, would have make things far easier.
In wonder why though?
The foal herself? Or rather her descendants?
I mean it had been quite a while, way longer than the most pony's natural lifespan.
I feel like this point will be addressed later.
(Or had it already been addressed somewhere else?)
Or you can reject your given purpose, choosing your own path.
(Judging by the Author's Note that's what will actually happen eventually.)
Good lore dump!
I enjoyed reading it.
Small note:
If you want to answer to a comment make sure to put your reply into the same chapter as the original comment.
Otherwise the author of the original comment won't receive a notification, never knowing about your reply unless he stumbles upon it by chance.
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That's MLP's issue. Why did the Elements do something different the first time they were used on NMM than they did the 2nd time? Who knows? But in my story, the Nightmare was defeated by war spells and left for dead but actually survived, hid away in exile for a long while and then came back to finish what she started.
She's an immortal alicorn, so...
All of this was meant to lead into Past Sins.
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When she was under compulsion by Hyperion's directive, she had no choice but to follow through with it.
When the Elements were used on her, separating her from Luna, this compulsion was destroyed and she had free will.
Glad you enjoyed the read!