Chapter 9: Sub-Harmonic Particle Theory
The Wizzard and the Pony
The Librarian, returning with an armload of herbal remedies he'd learned of from a combination of the books in his care and occasional run-ins with one of the few females ever to be granted entry onto the premises of Unseen University, was lost in thought. He was deeply worried about his... friends. It felt odd to even think the word, but there it was.
Wizards did not, as a rule, make friends.* In point of fact, wizards are, for the most part, one of the most fractious groups on the Disc**. And yet, here he was, out in the wilderness, gathering herbs to treat the injuries of a friend.
It all came down to Rincewind, he decided. He'd grown rather fond of the fellow over the years. When Rincewind had vanished into the Dungeon Dimensions at the end of that incident with the sourceror, the Librarian had felt a keen sense of loss. And, he recalled, he hadn't been alone.
Conina and Nijel, whom he had encountered on his way to meet up with Rincewind just that afternoon, had both come to inquire after Rincewind in the wake of that incident.
So. Rincewind, as yet another example of his difference from most wizards, made friends. He'd befriended that tourist fellow, the Librarian heard, over the course of their adventures. He'd befriended Nijel and Conina. If Rincewind himself were to be believed, and the Librarian judged him so, he'd even befriended the legendary Cohen the Barbarian. And, of course, he'd befriended Star Swirl the Bearded in rather short order as well.
Rincewind made friends. The Librarian was quite certain that meant something. Something important. Something to do with these Windigo things his newest friend had told them about.
Rincewind, it must be noted, also made enemies. Quite often against his wishes; without his knowledge, even. This time, the Librarian thought, he'd gone and done so deliberately. And for what?
To save a pair of talking equines.
There was something about Rincewind that wasn't right, the orang-outan mused, as he knuckled his way back towards the cave. Or at least at odds with both Rincewind's extremely honed survival instinct and with the natural wizardly tendency towards self-interest. To be honest, which the Librarian generally was, he rather liked that quality in the man.
Of course, it led to problems from time to time.
Problems like the one the Librarian was becoming aware of: the sound of fighting coming from the caves ahead.
* Golems, yes. Homunculi, definitely. Friends, not so much.
** Considering some of the people living on the Disc, that is saying a very great deal indeed.
Rincewind grimaced. The situation had gone from out-of-hand to well out-of-hand quite rapidly. One moment, he was marveling at Star Swirl's near-complete recovery. The next, the lot of them were being assaulted by angry trolls.
What really infuriated him was that it didn't make any sense. There weren't any trolls in this part of the country, he was certain of it. There certainly hadn't been any on the way up to the cave.
Someone, he concluded, had sent the trolls. Someone had gone and plucked them out of whatever hillside they were occupying and deposited them outside this cave. It wouldn't be the first time.
They weren't equipped for trolls, Rincewind thought furiously. Well, Conina was, but she was equipped for anything and everything, wasn't she?
He spared a moment to look around the cave. Conina was, of course, doing quite well for herself. He didn't expect anything different. Nijel was doing poor-to-middling, which he had to admit was a gross improvement over his performance some years ago.
Star Swirl and the "princesses" were holed up in the back of the cave behind one of the pony wizard's azure shield-bowls, which was holding up nicely.
The Luggage had taken up a position between them and the oncoming trolls and was doing terrifyingly well, dancing furiously about on a pile of gravel that Rincewind was quite sure hadn't been there moments earlier.
And Rincewind himself was... largely being ignored. That stung. He hadn't much pride, he would be the first to admit, but he did have some. Letting out a battlecry that sounded more than anything like a terrified yelp, he launched himself at the nearest troll.
As he made contact, wrapping his spindly arms around its granite throat, he realized that he had made a colossal misjudgment somewhere along the line. As the troll reached back to dislodge him, he scrabbled desperately for purchase. He tried punching it in the face, but it was, understandably, like punching a rock. He tried kicking it, but his feet couldn't find anyplace vulnerable to connect.
As he felt the troll grip the back of his head, he wriggled loose, and as this brought his face close to what, on a human opponent, would be a tender spot, he bit down.
This, too, was a mistake. The troll adjusted its grip and, with a sort of long-suffering grumble, tossed Rincewind aside like a rag doll.
This, to Rincewind's embarrassment, was when the Librarian made his entrance. The orang-outan dropped what he was carrying, seized a large chunk of rock (possibly detritus from the Luggage's furious assault moments ago) and began laying about with an unbridled fury that gave even the largest of the trolls pause.
Rincewind shook his head. Amidst the sounds of fighting -- the furious screeches of the Librarian, the grunts of Conina and Nijel, and the hard sounds of stone or metal striking rock -- he could swear he heard laughter.
Frowning, he took another look around, trying to find the source of the sound. Instead, what he saw chilled him. One of the trolls had managed to skirt around the Luggage and had been assaulting Star Swirl's shield. The shield, and thus Star Swirl, had just collapsed.
And the troll, for whatever reason, had immediately seized the smaller of the two alicorns.
The larger one, Celestia, angrily moved to intercept, shouting "Put her down, you brute!"
The troll let out a chuckle that sounded quite like a rockslide, and roughly backhanded her into the wall of the cave. Rincewind watched, horror-struck, as the pearl-colored equine collapsed.
Something in him flared up.
No, it said. We've gone through too much to lose now.
No, it said again. They can't take her.
No.
NO!
Rincewind found himself reaching out desperately towards the troll. The cave took on a surreal atmosphere at that moment. All of the colours became brighter, less subdued. Time seemed to freeze, and Rincewind found that a split second was plenty of time in which to wonder at the change, then to realize the reason for it. Light on the Disc consisted of eight colours: the usual spectrum of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet, and the eighth colour, Octarine. The colour of magic. Of Disc magic, at any rate.
And somehow, all of the Octarine in the cave had vanished, as though driven away by some opposing force. In response, all of the other colors became crisper, clearer, to Rincewind's eyes.
And then everything went white.
* * * * *
Ridcully the Brown stamped his feet in an effort to both restore circulation and break apart the ice that had formed on his boots during the hurried trip back from Unseen University to the Patrician's home. The Patrician, for his part, just waited patiently.
The situation, Ridcully had to admit, was grim. He had gone to the University to make preparations for... Not a party, he told himself sternly. An experiment. A proof of concept.
Not that the wizard had anything against parties, mind. He simply didn't see how such a thing could, well, achieve anything other than inebriation, embarrassing anecdotes, and, in the wake of one particular such event, an inexplicable aversion to pasta.
The Patrician watched expectantly. A lesser man, impatient and worried, might express exasperation. He might arch an eyebrow expectantly, or say "Well?" or "How did it go?"
The Patrician was not, as many could attest*, a lesser man. Ridcully would naturally answer his unspoken questions, or he would not have come.
"We'll know soon enough," Ridcully said, once his teeth had stopped attempting to get the message across in Morse code. "I've got a man watching the Great Hall, and those members of the faculty and students who are able will be at the feasting and partying for as long as they can manage."
The Patrician nodded. Another reason he hadn't asked Ridcully how the excursion had gone was that he already knew. Ridcully had a man keeping watch on the University during this crisis. The Patrician had several on a rota, and had done for years.
Nonetheless, there were gaps in the information he had. He looked at the Arch-Chancellor, who had apparently over the course of his brief journey foregone the traditional robes of his office in favour of something... quite different.
It was, first and foremost, form-fitting, which, on many wizards, would yield quite a disturbing image. Therefore, it was, secondly, as black as magic and a skilled dye job could make it, which is quite black indeed.
Ridcully smiled at the Patrician, taking in the very slight amount of perplexity faintly visible through the man's otherwise unflappable expression. "It's experimental," he explained. "A safety measure developed by our Professor of Alchemical Studies. It's completely flame-retardant, but more importantly for our purposes, it traps body heat."
The Patrician frowned, taking the similar suit being offered to him by the Arch-Chancellor.
* Provided one could employ the services of a skilled necromancer**.
** Necromancy having been something of a forbidden, or at least severely disliked***, art for years, the odds of this happening when you need it to are a million to one. Naturally, when it comes time for a heroic quest, necromancers tend to be rather thick on (or under, as it were) the ground.
*** It's not the strange smells and apparitions. Wizards are used to those. It's not the grim disposition. Those are a dime a dozen on the Disc. No, wizards argue, it's the loud music and the inexplicable urge to wear makeup that's the problem.
When the light had cleared, so, too, had the trolls. There was rather a lot more debris in the cave than there had been earlier, as well.
"Oook?" asked the Librarian.
"Don't ask me," Rincewind answered. "Everything went white, and here we are."
"Eeek."
Rincewind was about to argue the point further, but Star Swirl, still dragging himself to his hooves, chose that moment to speak up.
"He's quite right, lad," the old pony said. "I'm not quite sure what spell you cast there, but it was quite powerful."
Rincewind found himself at a loss. "But that's not--" He couldn't bring himself to finish the sentence. It was possible, or the Librarian wouldn't have suggested it.
"Look," Conina put in, "you three can blatter away if you like, but I really would rather not stay here."
Rincewind frowned. Everything in his life had gone topsy-turvy. It had started with the weather, but it hadn't stopped there. Talking equines, his own inexplicable* urge to actually go forth and rescue damsels in distress**, being accused of performing magic, and now Conina was advising flight before he could?
Conina of all people?
"Trolls've gone," Nijel put in. "This cave seems pretty well defensible."
"The problem isn't that the trolls have gone," argued Rincewind, trying to get his metaphorical feet under him again. "It's where they came from."
"Oook."
"D'you think?" asked Rincewind.
"Ook."
"He certainly didn't have any trolls working for him when we rescued the Princesses."
"Eeeek."
"Too right," agreed Rincewind. Nijel and Conina watched this exchange with utter bafflement writ large across their faces***. The ponies seemed to be following the conversation well enough. No one could, or indeed would dare try, speak for what the Luggage did or didn't understand.
"Where shall we go?" asked the large, pearl-colored mare. "If Al Qurad can simply conjure trolls now, finding us should be no problem for him."
"I've an idea about that," the stallion said with a note of pride in his voice.
"You've an idea where to go?" asked Rincewind, incredulous. "You don't even know where we are!"
"No," the pony corrected. "I've an idea how to keep us off his crystal ball, or whatever it is you bipedal wizards use for scrying."
Rincewind's frown deepened. In times of life-threatening danger, his instincts served him in good stead, even if they all told him to flee post haste (or used to do, at any rate). In other times, when the danger was vague and nebulous, however, he had a different impulse. "I want to go home," he muttered. "I want a nice quiet beer at the Drum, and maybe a game on that contraption if the Librarian will let anyone else have a go."
"Oook," the Librarian said gently, laying a leathery, long-fingered hand on his shoulder.
* Rincewind, like many wizards, was never very good at headology. A good experienced witch, preferably a spindly one with a hooked nose, could have told him a thing or two about himself he would scarcely believe.
** Quadrupedal ones that tended to whinney when startled, but damsels nonetheless.
*** Not literally, of course, to the inevitable confusion of any Ankh-Morporkeans who may stumble upon this text.
Zephyr had never been happier in his existance. Where he came from, he was a lesser member of a small herd, nearly an outcast. Now, however, he was the largest, most powerful member of his race in the world. His herd covered fully half of the Disc from hub to rim -- and wasn't that particular geological feature a surprise? he thought to himself.
This flat world, in many respects vastly different from the one it had come from, had proven to be a cornucopoeia of seething hatred, barely (if at all) repressed anger, and other delicacies. As large as his herd had grown, there was an absolute bounty, a surplus in fact, of negative emotions.
He was feeling magnanimous, he decided. That was the reason he didn't smite the peculiar creature standing on a cloud in front of him. The cloud was sleeting, Zephyr observed. He couldn't help but observe it, because it was sleeting upwards, which Zephyr was fairly certain was impossible.
"Who dares interrupt my repast?" he demanded of the intruder, his voice seeming to thunder from the air all around. In point of fact, it did no such thing -- he was limited to telepathic communications.
"Call me dIsQurad," the bizarre patchwork being replied. It had clearly once been human, but as time went on and dIsQurad's magic continued to adapt his body to the mind it housed, any resemblence to that race was visibly being expunged. dIsQurad's neck had elongated, his arms and legs shortened, and his torso was beginning to slim down. His limbs were quite mismatched and no longer resembled anything human at all, except in their arrangement.
"Discord?"
"Oh, that works, too," the once-human creature said happily. "Discord it is!"
"Why should I not have my herd freeze you in place and shatter you?"
The newly-christened Discord grinned. With the highly diminished number of practising wizards left unfrozen in the world, the magic being ground out by the Disc's rotation was coalescing about the remaining practitioners, such as himself, quite thickly indeed. "What," he asked the Windigo smugly, and held out a hand that was well on the way to becoming something altogether more paw-like, "you mean this herd?"
There, floating above Discord's paw-hand was a collection of small, equine ice statues. Zephyr's eyes flashed coldly. He was the most powerful Windigo ever to exist, and this creature thought to mock him?! And yet...
And yet, there were markings in the tiny statues. Miniscule though they were, he could identify each individual member of his herd. Warily, he cast his eyes about. The winds about them, caused by the herd's constant galloping, had died down. The herd was gone. He glared at the bipedal creature.
"What," he nickered, every letter glittering with frosty malice, "do you desire of me?"
Discord grinned lopsidedly as his jaw jerked out of its former human configuration and into something slightly goat-like. "My friend," he said, draping a skinny, taloned arm over the equine creature's shoulders, "let's talk about ponies, shall we?"
* * * * *
It hadn't taken much to persuade the others to leave the cave. A few pointed nods towards the piles of gravel littering the floor had quelled any arguments.
Nijel moved over to walk by Star Swirl and Rincewind.
"...of course," Star Swirl was saying to the human wizard, "even an exhaustive study of the nature of Harmony hasn't uncovered all of its secrets."
"Oh?"
"Yes, why, just a week or so before I set off on the journey that, well, eventually brought me here, a former pupil of mine was drawing up a thesis on the possibility of sub-Harmonic particles."
Rincewind frowned. "What particles?"
"Sub-Harmonic," Star Swirl explained. "You see, the deeper we study the nature of Harmony, the more it becomes apparent that it itself is comprised of even more elementary forces interacting with each other in surprisingly complex ways."
Rincewind nodded. He vaguely recalled a similar discussion in the halls of Unseen University. He remembered concluding at the time that it was either very profound or very silly. "Go on," he said, if only to pass the time.
"It came from her observations of Harmony in nature, and especially in the interactions between ponies."
"I'm sorry," Nijel interrupted. "Did you say the interactions between ponies? I thought you were talking about, well... magic."
Star Swirl grinned. "Well, that's just it, you see," he said. "When two or more ponies get together to do something, harmoniously, cooperatively, they are capable of so very much more than any of them alone. What is that, if not magic?"
Rincewind frowned. "But," he said, "what does that have to do with, well, actual magic magic? Proper magic."
"Well," said Star Swirl, "everything. You see, with the power of Harmony, a pony can do all sorts of things that would be impossible without it. Harmony allows us unicorns to raise and lower the sun and moon, it allows pegasi to control the weather, it allows earth ponies to grow the foods that we all need to survive... Without Harmony, very little, if any, of that could be accomplished."
Rincewind's frown threatened to deepen, so Star Swirl continued.
"When a pegasus pony sets up a storm cloud, it is their Harmonious connection with that cloud that allows it to respond to them. Without Harmony, their hooves would simply pass through the cloud like, well, any other pony would without magic. With Harmony, a pegasus can apply just the right pressure in just the right place to trigger anything from a small shower to a massive thunderstorm."
"Okay," said Rincewind. "I'll grant that sounds an impressive bit of magic. And you say this is how your world is?"
Now it was Star Swirl's turn to frown. "Well, how it should be, I should say," he said. "The fact is that right now, Harmony between the three races is strained at best. There has been a problem with the Earth Pony Kingdom not producing enough food for all three Kingdoms, therefore not providing enough food."
Rincewind nodded. "That makes sense," he said.
"Sadly," Star Swirl continued, "the problem is compounding itself. The Pegasus Kingdom is threatening to withold the rain needed for the crops unless they get preferential treatment, and the Unicorns are demanding preferential treatment for providing the sunlight."
"Providing the sunlight?" Nijel frowned. "One would think the sun did that well enough on its own, no?"
"Ah," said Star Swirl, "but without unicorn wizards to control its path, there may be too much or too little sunlight, ruining the harvest by either drought or malnutrition. It's a very delicate system, and the moment a single thing goes wrong with it, tensions rise and things get entirely out of hoof."
He sighed. "I'd thought I was well out of it when I retired from my place on the Circle of the Sun in order to take on an apprentice, but when things started to go wrong, I just couldn't stay away from it."
"So," Rincewind said, "what went wrong to begin with?"
Star Swirl blinked, stopping short. "Why," he said, "didn't I tell you earlier? The same thing that's gone wrong with the weather here: Windigoes."
"So," said Nijel, "what, you brought them here?"
Star Swirl frowned. "Hmm. Or I followed them. I really don't know, as I'm still working out the details of how I got here at all."
Rincewind nodded at the two alicorns, traveling along behind them and talking animatedly with Conina. "And them?"
"Another mystery, I'm afraid," Star Swirl said. "Certainly nopony matching their descriptions lived in any of the three pony kingdoms, or they would be, well, incredibly famous. Legend has it that alicorns are immortal--"
"Hmm, Death said something of the sort when they saved your life earlier," Rincewind interjected.
"...ah." Star Swirl spent a moment processing the implications of that. "I... Death, you say?"
"Oh, yes," Rincewind said. "Tall, skinny fellow, pale complexion, has an affinity for sharp farming implements and black robes?"
"Are... are you quite sure it was Death?"
"Quite," said Rincewind.
"Oh, my." He was spared further contemplation on that subject, however, by the Librarian, who had gone ahead in search of shelter. Preferably troll-free shelter.
"Oook," the orang-outan called out.
"I'm sorry," said Rincewind, "what?"
"Ook!"
"Really? Furnished?"
"Eek," the Librarian said, coming into view. He nodded, for the benefit of those who couldn't understand him.
"I'm sorry," Nijel said, "but what's furnished?"
"A cottage," Star Swirl and Rincewind said simultaneously.
"In the middle of the forest?" said Nijel. "Well, that's convenient, isn't it?"
"I much doubt that," Rincewind said. "I just hope it's not gingerbread this time."
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Yay, new chapter! It's been way too long. And now we see where a certain chaos elemental came from... can't wait to see what'll happen next.
Hot Damn. First Binkie Pie and now this one? Awesome :D
1369181
Yeah, my previous laptop was stolen. As I average two nights off a month and work at least 14 hours a night most nights, without a laptop, I have no time for writing.
Hopefully you suspected Discord's origins back in Chapter 6? That was the intent of that whole "Buzz, Isrim" section.
1369418
Whoa, ninja'd. Yeah, I've been working on this as much as possible, given my limitations, but Binky Pie updating pushed me into overdrive. I gotta keep up, ya know.
1369419
Yes, I noticed that part, I was just noting our suspicions had been confirmed.
I finally had a chance to read this one. It's very good, very well written. I think you have the Discworld style down while still adding your own distinct flavor. Rincewind is perfectly in character, and Starswirl's personality is fun and believable. This is one of those stories that has nowhere near the attention it deserves.
You've done a very fine job, here.
I love the complex interplay you've got going here between the forces of the two different worlds. At the core of the conflict we've got basically a big showdown between harmony (the princesses, Star Swirl, and Discworld-side harmony sympathizers like Rincewind) and disharmony (the Discworld's natural state, now with an avatar-in-the-flesh) But then all twisted up in it are Equestria's rainbow magic (which I do believe Rincewind just managed to wield, albeit clumsily), the Discworld's octarine magic, the windigoes (who, bred in a mostly harmonious world, are growing frighteningly powerful here), the immortal princesses, and the aforementioned avatar of disharmony, Discord. Oh, and the gods, but I think they're less twisted up in it and more the cause of it, the gods being what they are.
And I doubt I'm the only one getting my hopes up that there's some significance to the fact that there are now six characters plus the princesses traveling together. I should reread the previous chapters to refresh my memory and scour the current one for more hints before I start making wild allegations, but if I were to pick out element bearers, I would say... hmm. The easiest one for me is the Luggage; it could easily claim Loyalty. Conina gets Generosity in a big way for her sacrifice last chapter. Rincewind or Star Swirl could do Magic, but most likely Rincewind, since you made it very clear that he's the driving force of friendship, which is central to that element's nature. The Librarian could be Honesty, though I'm just basing that on his straightforward (okay, downright blunt) nature and the line you dropped offhandedly in this chapter about him generally being honest. I might be able to categorize Nijel better if his canon character were fresher in my mind, but I'll just give him Laughter because he's comically inept. That would leave Kindness for Star Swirl, which isn't a bad fit. Of course, like all good multi-faceted characters, their traits do overlap, so I could be way off.
Since this post has apparently gotten long enough to warrant its own conclusion, I'll end by saying again how much I'm enjoying the story. It's fun, and funny, but it's also got some deeper, more thought-provoking elements that make it much more than just a series of cheap laughs. Just like both its source materials.
1374642
Thank you very much! I'm glad you're enjoying it. Fortunately, Pratchett has a very distinctive style, so for the most part I can tell when I'm keeping in his voice. For the most part. Every once in a while, I have to really think about whether he would handle something one way or another. At those times, I take my best stab at it and hope that even if I'm wrong, it doesn't break the narrative flow.
1375401
I'm saying nothing.
...Nothing that hasn't already been said at any rate:
"He was very resistant to the idea of putting bells on, or one of those little puffball things, so it's perhaps not as silly as I'd like."
"You know," he told her, "he is entirely too nice to be a proper barbarian hero."
There is something I wanted to point out, here, since I'm not entirely sure the narrative makes it clear.
Basically, the effect I was going for here was that the lack of octarine in the otherwise natural light made everything take on a cel-shaded appearance. Basically, when ponies (and pony magic) are involved, everything gets just a little bit more cartoony. Of course, when
certain ponies
are involved, that gets ramped up to 11.
I wanted to point that out because I'd honestly like some feedback on how that theme has been handled overall so far (the eyes-in-the-dark scene way back in Chapter, what, two? is the other big example) because part of the finale kind of hinges on this side-effect of Harmony being introduced to the Disc. For
entirely irrelevant
examples of side-effects of a new type of magic being introduced to the Disc, check out either Moving Pictures or Soul Music.
1377625
Ah! See, I knew I should have gone back over it. The answers were there!
1395926
Hail, Caesar!
1396128
Wow, thanks!
Wow, you certainly didn't disappoint with this new chapter!
I'm starting to think you might actually be Terry Pratchett's long-lost twin or something.
1398587
He's roughly twice my age. :P I am not, in fact, related to Mr. Pratchett at all.
Dis 'ere is ah masterpiece.
Da site needs moar Pratchett loik fiks loik dis one.
1505547
I aim to please, or at least to not wound! New chapter should be along in a couple of days!
Thank you soooo much!
1507408
Woundin, pleasin, same fing fer an ork.
But iffen Ah ken be 'onest fer a sec, Ah'd loik tah say dat dis 'ere is one of moy favorite fanfics (not juss tah pony ones eithar) of all tiem.
Ah ahm appahled dat dis ain' got moar views/commentz/favs an wot not.
1507483
I've been hesitant to submit it to Equestria Daily until it's complete, so it doesn't get a boatload of publicity. To date, the only story I've submitted was rejected based on something I can't change (it ties directly in to the premise), so I'm leery of their submission process in general.
1507512
Phle dat whol' site is run loik a bunch ah gits beat each offar ovar dah head fer a few hourz an den dessided them'd make ah websoit.
Ah notessed you' lookin fer some assistence wiff dat TvTropes fing.
Ah use' tah edit a wee smidgin a few years back, but quit aftar dat whole Sitiation while back. Won' make no promises, but i'll hit up sum of me ol' pallies an see iffen dey willen tah 'elp you out.
1507584
Holy carp, you remember The Situation? :D Fun times, that. I shall clue you in as to my troper name:
dl.dropbox.com/u/87357455/Reactions/Cards/FlameMonkeyCard.png
1507686
Fur is indeed flamable, Dis you?
Is noice tah see sumone else dat finks dat "Hellsing" is ah load a rubbish.
1507757
'Tis indeed. I really ought to get back on the forums. It's just not the same since we launched the last IJBM, tho. :(
1375401
I agree with you regarding every single Element you've mentioned except for Nigel and Star Swirl. If I remember right, Rincewind has mentioned that Nigel's too "kind" to be a proper barbarian hero, and since Future Star Swirl apparently contracted a case of the Sillies, which it is heavily implied that Pinkie
suffers fromenjoys... well... Let's just see how things fall into place, hmm? *steeples fingers*1558780
If I'd given it a quick reread before I picked the elements, I would've caught those.
No, you're quite right.
Maybe is hard cold logic stone?
1375401
I thought rinsewind just released the 8th spell of the disc's reality considering how discworld magic works and that spells can feel fear, the fact that the 8th colour which is the disc's colour of magic vanished showing that rinsewind used a discworld spell of an unknown but extremely high level of power makes me think he used the spell that terrified any others he tried to learn