> Quest Online
>  by Sky Trotter
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

**** Quick note to start, I wasn't really happy with this chapter when I posted it.  I have been dealing with a lot of writer's block lately, and at this point, I have just been looking to post something to get the writing juices flowing again.  I've come back at this chapter with a vengeance and hope that it reads a lot better.  Thank you so much for giving this the time of day to go through. 









Chapter 1

The sun peeked over the horizon, bathing the valley below in its warm embrace.  The residents all began their days, children got dressed and made their way to school, parents their way to work, yet still, the occupant of the average size home on Park ave slept.  This house was unassuming, the yard had been replaced with a rock garden.  Weeds were removed as they appeared and the house had its upkeep done.  In the last 25 years, there had never been a single complaint about the occupant.  Nor had there been many sights of them either.  Deliveries were made on a semi-regular basis, so no one considered that the occupant had merely passed away or moved.   Most of the neighbors thought that the man living there was strange, but he never bothered anyone, never filed a complaint, kept his house and yard clean and orderly.  In a sense, he was the perfect neighbor.  

Hours passed and still sign of life made showed on the exterior.  As the sun hit its zenith, the owner of the home finally made a movement to awaken.  Mark Libenson was a professional gamer, now, many who heard the term professional gamer thinks of someone who is on a team, or even streams the games they play online or makes videos.  But this gamer was a bit different. One could say that his self-adopted title was a bit incorrect. To be more accurate, he was a professional level grinder, item hunter, and Info Broker.

Mark spent most of his waking hours playing the same game over and over again.  The DMMORPG (dive mass multiplayer online role-playing game), Quest Online. What he did as a job wasn't necessarily against the rules of the game, but it was frowned on by the players that played the game by themselves. Mark had a similar opinion of that as well, but as long as people were willing to pay him to level grind for them, he wasn't going to complain.  He had also been hired to find rare gear as well. But these two activities, while frowned upon by the general community are what paid the bills.

He still had specific rules that he would never break either. The principal one being, that once a player hit levels 100, the max of the game, he would no longer grind levels of experience for them.  At that stage, he would only hunt down rare gear.  And even then, if he didn’t have the equipment in question, he would grind until collecting at least two of the items in question, and if one was of higher grade or better stats, well that was the one that he kept for himself.  After all, why spend all that time and have nothing to show for it in the end.  His clients knew this, of course, he made sure to tell them up front for the sake of honesty, but in the end, he still did business. It also helped that he didn’t charge them for the time that he spent grinding the first item.

Overall, even with him making his income the way that he did, he was still generally respected in the world of Quest online.  Be it for his prowess in the game, his knowledge of where to get the best drops, or even just because he had been playing since launch.  Quest Online had launched over twenty years ago now, and he had first picked it up shortly after that, back when interactions within the world were limited to haptic feedback equipment.  Nowadays that was eclipsed with full dive technology. But for now, Mark was dead to the world, at least he would be for another thirty seconds before his alarm clock went off.  The loud cry of the little clock ripped him from his slumber as he cracked his eyes open.

Opening his eyes to the low light levels of his room.  He gave himself a smile at the successful programming of his alarm clock to work in sync with his lighting so that after it went off it would start the lights in the house at a dim setting and then slowly increase them to full power after around thirty min, slowly letting his eyes acclimate to the brightness.  He was not a person that spent much time outside of his home, so he had purchased light bulbs that gave off artificial sunlight as a way to combat that, rather than take the initiative to step foot outside. After all, he was a self-identifying basement troll.

Twisting his neck to each side, letting loose a crunching from his neck that you may mistake for a cheap plastic bottle being crumpled, he pulled himself into a sitting position.  After shaking his head and rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Mark ran through his daily routine.  Use the restroom, run on the treadmill for twenty minutes, lift some lighter weights for an hour, eat something, shower then put on his work clothes.  In his case, work clothes were different from what one would expect.  They consisted of a very light shirt and lounge pants.  He didn't care for wearing shoes but did have a pair of compression socks on.  


His meal was a tasteless paste that provided enough caloric value to take him through the next few hours.  Most would look at the grey paste and turn their nose up at it.  He had quite done so quite a bit in the past, but eventually, you got used to choking down the stuff.  Even with its rather unpleasant flavor, Mark could still say that he had been in good health all his life because of it.  If he had wanted to, he could have had something much better than the ration paste, but to a certain degree, he didn’t feel like it was worth doing so.  After all, as long as it provided the calories and nutrients he needed, why should it matter if it tasted good.  Besides, even with the muted input from the game world, the food there was still better than here anyway.

After finishing his daily routine and placing any dishes in the dishwasher/cupboard, he made his way back down to the basement.  There he was greeted with the one object that he used every day of the year without fail, his dive rig.  Upon entering the room, he went through his mental checklist of the room, the chair that had been custom made to fit his body, and the computer tower next to it, his masterpiece of a custom creation.  The internal memory boasted over ten zettabytes of memory, four petabytes of ram, a ten gib/s internet connection as well as other specs that he had never made public.  In truth, it was vastly over the top when it came to what he used it for, but as far as possessions, it was the only thing he splurged on.  


Even after forty years of life, he hadn’t really accumulated much in the way of material possessions.  He was unmarried, with no IRL friends, and no family that he knew of, not to mention his shut-in nature, cultivated with at least 20+ years of self-isolation, only interacting with the online world.  During his youth, he had once had friends and family, but those things were both long gone, and at this point, he wasn’t even sure if he could remember what it was like to have them.  He had been lost in thought more than once wondering what it would feel like to have that again.

He had a few photos that flashed by in a digital frame that sat next to the massive PC.  His family had been taken from him when he was of the young age of fifteen.  His obsession with the online world had led him to forgo the family trip that they had begged him to join them on.  But his response at that time had been that he was working. He had spent the first three years playing Quest Online and getting to max level, but when he had realized that he could use this game to make money and support himself, he had thrown himself into it. Had he known what was going to happen on that trip… well, he wasn’t sure what he would do at this point.  Looking at the frame, the familiar faces flashed by, but at this point, that was all they were. He knew he should feel terrible about it, but all they were to him now, were faces and names.  Little of who they were has remained in the memory. I had taken nearly twenty-five years to do so but time stole those years from him.  Only the vaguest of memories of their voices remained. Only actions and events.

He dragged his eyes away from the flashing images of people long buried and set himself down in his chair. After adjusting himself, he reached over to the plug that sat in its place at the side of his head.  Guiding it through the provided slot, he worked it behind his head where he slid the connector into the input that he had surgically implanted at the base of his skull.  After having slotted the connector into place, Mark placed his hands down in their respective recesses.  After looking over to ensure that the temperature of the room was at the setting he wanted it at, he gave the mental command to startup.

As he did so, his vision began to fade as his neural information was switched from his physical body over to the computer, however unlike every other time he had ever ‘jacked in’ as the term was, a sharp sent of ozone hit his nose, and a light source of heat began to emanate from the base of his neck.  However it was already too late for him to stop the process, not that it troubled him, these systems were built with safety measures programmed in that would auto log you out if your vitals shifted too much or if it sensed that something had gone wrong. With this in mind, he drifted off, ready to join the world of Quest Online once again. 

Opening his eyes in game, he realized that this wasn’t where he was supposed to spawn in. Typically when you log into Quest Online, you generate in the nearest town to where you logged off or in your home depending on your settings. Mark, who now wore the guise of his player character Makarov, was not inside of his in-game home.  To be entirely accurate, however, he was nowhere that he recognized at all.  As someone who had now spent more of his life playing this game than spent not playing it, this was concerning.  He hadn’t heard of any kind of update or patch that would have added a new area to the world.  Something like that would be huge news. The area around him now was a large dead plane.  The dry earth cracked, not a single sign of life existed around him.  Here there were none of the typical desert add-ons that you would expect from the world.  Most games would put some kind of sign of life, a Shrub here or there, a cactus or an insect.  But here, there was nothing but dried cracked land. Not even the sound of the wind.  Complete silence was all that greeted him, complete silence and oppressive heat. His voice lightly cracking from nonuse “I-Is this s-some kind of Isekai bullshit!”

As he was looking around a tickling sensation began to trickle down his neck. Mark reached back and swept his hand across the back of his neck to discover a few things that started to worry him.  ‘This is all too real to be my imagination.  The feedback is way more clear than normal, and I’ve never felt the weight of my gear in-game before.’  Placing his right hand on his chin, something he was imitating from an anime he has seen once.  ‘Now at this point I need to focus on finding out if there are people or whatever around.’


Coming to this realization, he looked himself over again.  He was standing in the middle of this barren wasteland still in the body of his character.  Makarov had been designed to be his ideal version of himself.  Not terribly large as far as muscle structure, a trimmed beard that covered the entirety of his lower face, it's auburn color dark and vibrant.  His robes were made of high-level materials.  In Quest, there were various levels of items and magic, and their rarities were classified in tiers. Common, Uncommon low, Uncommon high, Rare, Ultra rare, Legendary, Chosen, and Creator class.  His robes were of the Chosen level, mostly because he didn’t wear his Creator class items unless he was actively grinding due to the issue of them being a clown suit*.  


Taking stock of what he was wearing, he looked at his robes with a bit of wonder in his eyes.  They had never looked this awesome before.  They had an air of mystery about them,  the dark robe seemed to shine with every color conceivable depending on the light and time of day you saw them.  At times they were a dark green, other times black, if you saw him under the direct sun at precisely noon, they glowed white, the borders were highlighted with gold, their sleeves drooped down almost touching the ground. His gloves were a dark leather with gold scrolling work on them to match the robes, the boots mirroring them. 

Upon his head, he wore an enormous brimmed hat.  Something that he had copied from an ancient game that he was a fan of, and to top it all off he wore rings on each finger with a necklace that was made of a platinum wire wound with white, rose and classic gold. A blood-red ruby the size of a chicken egg placed in the setting.  His staff was made of dark wood with runes and images carved across it’s every surface, and a bright crystal sat at its peak. 

After taking stock to ensure that he still had all of his items on his person he waved his hand in front of himself out of habit to open a menu, not really sure if anything would happen.  Something similar to the list he was used to came up, but there was no hint of a way to leave, smirking he thought to himself ‘cliche numero uno’ chuckling, he noted his inventory still heald everything he had left in it.  All of his currency, scrolls, potions, gems, mob drops, weapons, clothes, and keys. Nothing was out of place but himself.  Deciding that he needed to move forward, closing the ethereal menu, he looked ahead and raising his right hand and spoke {Point}.  A glowing arrow now sat atop of his staff pointing to what he expected to be the west and shrugged before beginning to walk.  Again he had done this out of habit and jumped by a bit after seeing the magic pop up. “Weird? I didn’t have to really focus at all with that.  I figured Magic would be harder than that.  Though I guess I am a max level magic user, and that is one of the preload spells.”  Shrugging he moved forward, following the glowing arrow. 

{Point} was a simple spell of the common class, but also known as a preload spell.  The first spells of Quest Online.  Its use was merely to point to the nearest settlement.  It was unable to determine if the said settlement would be friendly, but at the bare minimum, it gave him a direction to move toward. As he walked, he noticed in the upper right hand of his vision that there were three bars visible.  As he moved his head the bars stayed in place, so he figured they would only be visible to himself. As he was looking at them, he noticed a fourth bar that spread across the top of his vision, none of the bars were causing any kind of obstruction to his vision, so he focused on them as he seemed to switch to autopilot and continued to walk forward.  The gold bar extended across the top of his view and was about three quarters of the way filled, to the right of the bar there was a number that was held in a pair of brackets [25], the bar to the right of that as well as the two beneath that were red, blue and green.  

Giving a moment to think he came to the logical conclusion based on what he knew, the gold bar was XP and showed that he still had twenty-five levels of available XP to spend on spellcraft or a few skills that required XP expenditure, the red, blue and green bars were likely his HP, MP, and Stamina. Watching the green bar, it would start to fall and every ten seconds would jump back up, completely negating any Stamina usage.  He knew that before this happened his stamina regain was such that it would recover fifty points of stamina every ten seconds, and it appeared that he was using just about five points of stamina every ten seconds to walk. That was different from how it had been before.   In the world of Quest, travel didn’t cost stamina points, only actions would cost them. ‘Well, that is an observable difference’ he thought to himself.

His MP and HP were maxed out, so he didn’t give much thought to them.  After a few hours of walking in silence, every so often sipping from a water skin he had in his inventory.  He began to notice a bit of a change in the environment, the dry, cracked ground began to be replaced with sand, and in the distance, he began to notice small bits of plant life crop up.  As it got later and later, he started to notice his hunger increasing as well.  Deciding to stop for the day, Mark opened his inventory again and found his house key.  The brass key seemed to fall from nothingness into his outstretched hand.

Thinking back to the game, he recalled that the animation (at least when he didn’t skip it, which was almost every time) showed his character slashing the key through the air to produce a door — copying that move, a door formed in the air.  Looking at it now made him raise his eyes in curiosity, in the game, this was something mundane and boring, but here.  This was a real magic door.  That lead to his in-game house, would it still be the same, was his lab intact? All were questions that burned in his mind. 

Tentatively Mark pushed the door open.  Just as it always had, the door pressed into a tear in reality that leads to his front room. Everything was as he left it.  For many players, their in-game houses were opulent homes covered in precious metals and stones. Tapestries would be hung from the walls, and many looked like castle keeps, their highest value items held in a treasury that placed them on display for any who might enter to see. Mark’s in-game house was an exception to that norm.  Had he actually ever invited anyone into his sanctuary they would have had to do a double take to make sure that they didn’t suddenly log out of the world. 

Anyone would look around and think that this was a door that leads to a modest home in suburban America.  The door opened to a simple entryway, a pile of shoes stat next to the door, the owners nowhere in sight.  The small area was tiled with common tiles that extended just a few feet forward of the door before becoming a dark carpet.  Mark initially went to de-equip his shoes, but then quickly realized that he didn’t need to do it that way anymore.  Crouching down, he removed his boots just like he would have in the real world. 

Upon removing his shoes, he moved deeper into the home. The living room held two couches, and a recliner all positioned in a way to have a coffee table take center stage with a fireplace on the far wall.  Above the fireplace was mounted a large television panel that currently showed an outdoor scene, the mountains had a snow cap, and the valley below was filled with evergreen trees.  This had been the view that he had grown up with before his family had passed.  The kitchen was an offshoot from the living room was a full range of appliances stood.  Double oven with a gas range, the large double door fridge, and dishwasher.  All done in Stainless Steel. 

The master bedroom, as well as an office, shared this floor.  The basement held an additional two bedrooms, the family room, and a sewing room.  He had crafted this place to be a representation of his childhood home, complete with photos of his family. After looking around to verify that everything was in its proper place, Makarov descended to the basement level.  Opening the door to his room, he crossed the threshold into the sparsely furnished bedroom. Even though he had access to seemingly endless funds and vast power, he still had designed this place to remind him of a time when he had a family, the one thing that no amount of time would change. He would never be able to get them back. 

Shaking his head, he crossed the room to the closet, upon opening it, he looked at the back wall.  It was completely unadorned.  No hint that something might lie behind it was exposed. Placing a hand on the back wall, runes began to glow as the wall melted away into a hallway that dug into the earth.  
The walls were cobblestone and now very much looked like something you would find in the basement of a castle.  Descending further into the ground, Mark set an even pace until making his way down to the lab.  The pathway was longer than one might expect or think was necessary, but it was designed that way for a reason. In the world of ‘Quest’ players could have a home that was inaccessible to the rest of the world without an invite, but items of Chosen class or higher, as well as all spell crafting equipment,  was not able to be left in these places for fairness reasons.  


Vaults, and or labs in his case needed to be placed somewhere in the game world, where it could potentially be raided. Provided that someone would be able to find it. It acted as a balancing feature by making it possible to have your stuff stolen or stealing things for yourself.  Many would question as to why being able to be robbed would be fair. But in a world where magic could be custom made, having that information be accessible in such a way made players that had it smarter.  The only people that complained about it were the ones that sucked at hiding their stuff. 

Mark had gotten around this by sinking his lab deep beneath the level of the world in one of the most dangerous caves in the game.  The only “easy entrance” left was located in the basement of his in-game home, technically you would be able to dig to it, but no one knew where he had placed it to start with, and because of how he had always entered it, no one would have been able to follow him in. Casting his eyes around the large room, he noted that every book of research sat in its place, undisturbed.  For this he was thankful.  There were those that would look at this and find a life that had been wasted, Thousands upon thousands of hours of time and effort existed here.  

He smiled thinking about how he was likely one of the only people that had ever built something like this.  In the realm of ‘Quest,’ most people ended up taking classes and jobs that had physical requirements, mostly due to the issues of magic.  All of the worlds magic at the time was available from the start.  The spells available to the starting players were never higher than common class.  Namely, they sucked the big one.  There had never been a set class system set up within the game, it was done in that way to give the maximum freedom for players to do as they liked. So every player had access to the lowest tier of magic from the get-go.  Common class spells. They were simple spells that used next to no MP but still had a bit of utility.  Spells like {Point} or {Light}, effectively utility spells that had a single use, but for someone that wanted to use higher level spells, well that took considerable work. 

To use higher level magic, one had to first craft the spell.  To access the Magic Craft skill, you had to hit max level first. The biggest issue with that was that to use high-level spells, you needed a high MP and INT stat score, which most players didn’t with at max level because they never needed it. Of course, once you hit max level you couldn’t reset your stats, you were stuck with what you had.  That was the main reason that most players never got into magic, but for the remaining few who took the time and made an effort to spec their PCs to be a mage, ran into the next problem. To craft spells, you had to know how to code, and not just any coding language either. 


This was the coding language of Quest Online, something that the developers had actually invented just for this world.  Imagine if you will, that Java, SQL, JavaScript, C++, and Python all got together and had some kind of a bastardization of a baby that used a completely different physical alphabet that had never existed before in the history of the world.  This was the Coding language used to craft magic.  That and there was a cost of XP to make spells as well.  Each new spell that you craft could be upgraded up to ten times.  Many people thought that the devs had been a bunch of lunatics for doing something like that.  Inventing an entirely new coding language for an MMO.  Then giving the incredibly complex code to a bunch of shut-in players with nothing better to do than learn a coding language on their own.

When they had been asked what kind of sense this made in a live interview, the dev team responded with a text answer “What fun is there in making sense.  What we did was for the betterment of the game world.  We give our players what they asked for, complete freedom, and we can’t wait to see what they do with it.”

The base level spells had to be made as Common class spells.  The initial creation of the spell would cost the equivalent XP to go from level 99 to level 100.  The biggest kicker was that the coding language that was used for spellcraft contained a kill code within the language itself that would prevent you from being able to use the coding language outside of the game world. The intent was that you had to craft the spell perfectly for it to work.  If even a single character were out of place in your coding, the spell would fail, and you would lose the XP invested into its creation.  There was no debugging program available to prevent this.  He personally had lost more than a thousand levels worth of XP to this mechanic, but it kept things balanced, and rewarded players that were smart enough, with vast power. 

After verifying that everything was where it was supposed to be, Mark turned and left the room to return to his bed.  As he walked down the hall, his stomach reminded him why he had come in here in the first place.

Making his destination the kitchen instead of the bed, he rose to the main floor of the house.  Crossing over to the kitchen he opened the fridge to see what he had placed in its inventory.  Looking down the list of items he noticed that he had a rare class meat item and some rare class vegetables as well.   Taking the Items over to the kitchen area he moved through the process of cooking a meal in game, after tossing the items into the pot, he tapped the lid.  A smile lit his face as the smell in the air began to change.  

He could hardly believe what he was smelling, it was terrific.  He patted himself on the back for splurging for the enchanted kitchen edition that gave anyone using it the ability to cook without having to have the cooking skill. You could make great food items that would give you a buff spell with the cooking skill, but he had never wanted to waste time or XP working on it before he maxed out. A light chime sounded through the room, signaling that the spell was finished.  Sitting down, He began to eat his meal, and for the first time in his recent memory, the food had real flavor.  He could barely remember the last time that he had eaten something like this IRL. Quickly finishing his meal, he stretched and returned to his room.  

He wasn’t physically tired, but he was mentally exhausted.  As he sat on the bed, a thought crossed his mind about what had happened so far and he realized that he was a massive idiot. “I have teleportation magic, and I just spent an entire day walking.”  Slapping his head, he fell back onto the bed.  “I will have to remember to use that tomorrow.”  After failing to naturally go to sleep after three hours, he cast {Sleep} on himself and drifted off to the land of slumber, his dreams filled with the uncertainty of the world around him as well as the nagging feeling that maybe, just maybe he didn’t want to go back.  After all, here he was in a peak condition body with access to the vast reaches of magic.  Here he may be able to find happiness again.  But for now, he slept.































* Clown Suite - the term for having mismatched equip items that are built to maximize the status effects of the user. Can be remedied using cash shop items to change physical appearance.
> Chapter 2
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 2

Mark woke from a better sleep that he could remember.  Giving himself a good stretch as he climbed out of bed, he grabbed his robes and made his way to the bathroom. In the game, this had been nothing but cosmetic, but he held hope that it would function.  Walking over to the sink, he was pleasantly surprised to find that the water was running and even better it was capable of both hot and cold.  Taking the time to shower off the grime of the day before, he relished the fact that this was his body now.

He had never been what you would call fat, but nor was he particularly fit either. He had become used to the pudge that he had carried for years. His complexion had always been blemished as well.  Ever since the misery that was puberty.  But now he was in a body that was quite fit if he said so himself.  Not quite to the level of a warrior build, but for a mage, he didn’t look half bad.  The traces of baby fat were gone, replaced with taut muscle.  Nothing bulged with muscle, but no one would be able to say that he was weak.  Wiry would be a good description of his build now.  He was also covered in Tattoos as well.  Most of them were runic that had magic woven into them. Simple charms that added buffs.  Things like iron skin, fire protection, and feather fall.  Spells that he had designed to assist him in-game without having to cast the spell in question.  Admittedly he had stolen a most of his ideas from DnD and various games that had been released in the last two centuries. But when you have that kind of pool to draw from, why not. 

It was still better to cast the spell himself, but this worked quite well in the case of a surprise attack.  His back, however, held a distinctive tattoo, the only one of its kind within the realms of Quest.  An intricate compass rose, gilded and embellished, it would have looked right at home in an illuminated book from the 15th century, the Q and O that wrapped intricately together gave it a majesty of its own.  The game logo, this tattoo had a rather interesting origin as well.  Years ago, back when Quest Online was a new MMO and people were still figuring it out, in a time before the knowledge of high-level magic, the devs had hidden a contest.  Out in the world, it was possible for find scraps of lore, history of the world and how it worked. For many, that was all these little scraps of paper were.  They gave a bit of story and not much else. Back in those days, most players would skim through them without giving them much thought. 

Mark found one of those scraps of paper off of a monster drop.  The story that it contained spoke of a high-level spell, a Creator class spell, something of a legend.  He became obsessed with the concept of the spell.  The next three years were filled with him researching and experimenting with spellcraft to make his own.  Three years of research and the consumption of over three thousand levels worth of XP resulted in his first Creator class spell, and upon completion, he was contacted by the Devs with congratulations as well as a custom cosmetic.  His tattoo.  He was the only one with it.  Mark understood that he was likely not the first one to find the information on Creator class spells, he doubted that he was the first one to begin crafting one, but he had been the first to get one to work.  The proof of which was not permanently etched into this body, now his body.  And the best part of it was that It gave him a customer cast animation, given it was kind of a dual-edged blade due to it making him stand out even more, but hey, custom effects were the glory of MMOs.

Finishing his daily routine, he stepped out of the magic house back into the desert. Looking toward the horizon, he cast the {point} spell once more and began his trek, this time using {lesser teleportation} as a mid-range teleport to increase his speed.  He knew not where he was going, just that he might find his first evidence of intelligent life. 

His speed had done much better now that he was using the spell, and he facepalmed for likely the fiftieth time that day as he once again moved at a significantly higher speed than the day before.  After spending the entire morning teleporting a thousand meters at a time, midday hit and ne noticed a dark line that spread across the entire horizon. This piqued his interest, so he decided to try going a bit further.  After all, at this point, he had realized that the desert, or at least the part he was on, was raised up a bit. And he could see quite a bit farther. 

Sitting down for a bit he refreshed himself with some water and pulled an apple out of his inventory. After taking a bite he tried to speak “Da-fhfdsjhfds”  almost immediacy starting to choke, he realized that he hadn’t spoken to anyone in a long time.  Clearing his throat, he tried again “Damn, can’t believe that I forgot how to talk there for a second. Not that it matters seeing as I’m talking to myself.  But guess It’s better I got this out of the way now rather than after I found somewhere with people.”  Chuckling to himself he finished off the apple and watched as it dissolved into nothingness and left behind a few seeds. “Neat, stuff still behaves like that.”

Smirking he deposited them into a cloth pouch on his hip.  Looking out to the distant dark like that had made itself known as a vast forest, He charged up a larger spell {Greater Teleportation}

____________________________________________________________________________

The small town on the outskirts of the Great Forest was a place for Adventurers to gather.  Everypony from warriors to mages would come here looking for work.  The locals enjoyed the attention because it insured an excellent trade route, in addition to being protected in the situation that something tried to attack the town.  In this town, it was a common sight to see an adventure approach from down the road.  But even if it was a place for adventurers, nopony dared enter the dark forest.  It was well known to be the darkest and most terrifying forest in the entire world.  Expeditions in the past had been lead deep into that cursed forest in an attempt trying to map it out and conquer it, but none had returned successfully in their endeavors.  It was a death trap that only got more dangerous the deeper in you got.  Most Adventures didn’t even risk it regardless if there were great treasures hidden within.  It was just too dangerous. 

It was from this dark canopy that a sound was heard.‘tonk, tonk, tonk, tonk.’ It was a steady rhythm, something that indicated that it was done with little to no struggle, just the smooth sound of staff hitting the moist earth. It carried across the air in an almost unnatural way given how clearly it sounded through the bustling town. The eyes of every pony in town turned to look at the forest, and when they did, their eyes were greeted by a tall bipedal being Its wide-brimmed hat and long staff distracted onlookers from seeing his face, but no one seemed to want to make a move toward the figure.  Casting his gaze over the small city, Mark took a deep breath. “Well, at least I know that there are people now, sort of I guess.  Must be a high fantasy type world with beast races.”  Continuing forward, he ignored the suspicious looked on the faces of the ponies, his eyes drawn to the walls and the buildings around him. 

Not even the main road through the town was paved, given the middle ages looking construction with the thatched roofs on most of the homes, it still had a slightly more modern look as well.  First, you could see storefronts that could have been around in the early 2000s albeit a little more colorful, but right next door you would have a house that had what appeared to be made of clay brick and a thatched roof. All of this cumulated to the look of a quaint little town that was overall quite pleasant. Deciding that he would like to remember this location he opened his inventory and pulled out his map to make sure to mark down this location, another handy little item from the old game world that for some reason worked here.  The more he had explored, the more of the map he had uncovered.  The brief glow of his hand from pulling the map out would normally have gone unnoticed by most around him, but there was at least one Unicorn that had been watching him intently as soon as he entered the town. 

The violet-eyed Unicorn had been watching him as soon as he entered the town, and he had noticed.  He recognized her gaze in a moment, it was a gaze that spoke of hunger.  He had seen similar gazes on other players that he had come across in the past.  The look that said, ‘I see all your cool stuff, I want it.’  Figuring that he didn’t want to risk getting into a fight, he made sure to mark her location and make sure that he didn’t leave himself in a situation where she would be able to get him alone.  Continuing down the street, he realized that he didn’t understand what the local people were saying, but they had begun to point to him.  It also appeared that a pair of armed Stallions were walking up to him.

Making a snap decision, Mark gently set his staff on the ground at his feet and placed his hands in the air with his fingers splayed to show that he had nothing in them.  As he rose his hands to the air around his head, he quickly activated an ability {Gift of tongues}, it was a utility ability from the game was made to add subtitles to whatever was spoken to the player, the devs had gone hardcore and written at least five spoken languages for Quest Online that could legitimately be learned and used. The {Gift of Tongues} ability was meant to be a shortcut for players that didn’t have the attention span to learn five new languages to play a game.

He had hoped that it would help here as well but was genuinely shocked when he began to hear English coming from the mouths of the apparent guards.  Approaching they addressed him “you can lower your hands and pick up your staff, we are just checking out the new arrival, I would guess you haven't stopped by the guard house to check in.”

Mark shrugged “Didn’t know I needed to.  If you are willing to guide me, I would be more than happy to make my way there now.”  He smiled to punctuate his statement, though it may have come off a bit creepy, due to the brim of his hat hanging low enough to cover all but the lower half of his face.

The guard returned his smile, though with a bit of apprehension at Mark’s unusual appearance.  “Glad to hear, follow me.”  

Picking his staff back up, Mark walked over to the guards and allowed them to escort him to the guard house to do his check-in.  After walking for a few minutes, the shorter of the two asked “So, What brings you to Ponyvillie?  Seeing that you didn’t know about the check-in, you have never been here before.  Never seen anything like you neither.”

Mark’s eyebrow curled up at the name of the town, thinking in his head with sarcasm ‘Ponyvillie? What kind of stupid nonsense name is that, next thing you are going to tell me there is a pun name for every major US city and the castle of Camelot.’  Hiding his grimace at the odd name he nodded “That is true, I have never been here before.  I just finished crossing the Forest and the badlands beyond that.  This was the first settlement I have found.”

He had said it as a matter of fact that he had just casually crossed that vast desert, with no real understanding of how unbelievable that was.  The taller guard looked at him incredibly “I can understand not wanting to say where you came from, but making up something like that is rather far fetched, No one has ever crossed that place and lived to tell about it. And what do you mean by badlands beyond the Everfree?  That place continues on beyond the end of the world for all we know.”

Mark internally started to freak out ‘Shit!! Why did you have to say that!  If I take it back, everyone will just think I’m just some lier that is looking to cause trouble. What should I do?!’  Giving himself a few moments to straighten out his thoughts, he decided to go for the persona of being a wise wizard, taking a leaf from a certain white wizard, he fixed his face and gave the guard a cold look “Are you accusing me of being a lier?”  His tone could chill the bones, and his gaze ripped into the guard, “I do not appreciate liers, and I will not be called one. Take this into consideration, just because it hasn’t happened before, does not mean that it can’t happen. I crossed that plane of nothingness and traversed the depths of that forest, that is not a boast, but a fact.”  It took all he had in him to hold back how nervous he was as he spoke the same line repeating in his head ‘don’t call me out, don’t call me out, don’t call me out.’

The guard gulped and looked away as he continued to lead the group towards the guard post, not bothering to dig further into the strange stallion's business.  The remainder of the trip was spent in silence, for the guards, this was awkward, for Mark, this was normal.  From his years of self-isolation, he was used to going days without speaking and in some cases weeks or even a few months, when you can type everything that you ever wanted to say, why bother.  All of the jobs that he took for level grinding or finding rare equipment was conducted via text chat only.  He had always had issues with saying things before thinking them through and because of this, he had made a genuine effort to only speak via text as to make sure that he could edit what he was saying.

The meeting at the guard post was fast, he just had to sign some papers that said that he had arrived and what his expected time in the city would be.  The governing ruler of the area had placed these practices in place to help reduce crime from the outside. Staring down at the parchment, he realized two things. First, this paper was written in English, second, should he still go by his old name.  In his mind began a new fight ‘I have no idea if going back will be possible, or even if I want to.  All that waits for me there is an empty house.  I’m just a nobody, but here I am a master wizard.’  At that moment he made his decision, Mark Libenson was dead, and the Great Wizard Makarov took his first real breath.  Makarov signed his name and said that he would likely stay for a week or so, but maybe back to update the amount of time he was staying depending on what he could find in the town. The guards didn’t ask any more questions, but as he left he missed the light flash of green flame that lit up behind him as a message flew off to the north.

After finishing up the tedious paperwork, Makarov began to stroll around the marketplace, keeping his head down and his ears open. As he made his way around, he took in how the locals were bartering with the shopkeepers, and watched as they traded coins around. It looked like the same currency that you would see in most games.  Copper, Silver and the rare Gold.  As he walked around, he learned that there was 100 Copper to a Silver and 10 Silver to a Gold. From the look of it, Coppers were the most common currency, and few things were of a higher cost than 50 or 60.  Smaller items could cost anywhere from 1 to 2 a piece. Given that it was for things like apples and cherries. After getting a grasp on the local currency, he walked by a rather unique store.  

From the look of it, they sold Stationary and… Sofas?  Why in the nine hells would a store sell stationary and sofas?  That has to be the stupidest idea he had ever heard of.  But at least the stationary would be useful.  Walking in he looked over the stallion’s stock.  Thirty minutes later he walked out of the store with his purchases made, though not visible as he had placed them in his inventory. He knew that at least one goal of his would be to make sure that he was still able to craft magic in this world, and that would take mountains of paper.  So buying it whenever he could be important. 

Makarov continued to explore the town to imprint the area in his mind.  He found some useful locations, Weaponsmith, armorsmith, guild hall, general goods store, and apothecary.  There was also a small number of stores that sold various items.  But for this moment in time, the library was the biggest fascination that held his attention.  Here it stood in the middle of the city, its greatest bastion of knowledge, and it was built into a living tree.  Looking with a dumbfounded gaze in his eyes, he pressed forward to enter.  After passing through the threshold, the overpowering odor of old books hit his nose.  Taking a deep breath, he sighed.

This was a sent that Mark was happy to call familiar. His grandfather had been quite the bibliophile, something his father had not inherited but had been something that Makarov and his Grandfather shared.  In the current world, books were no longer printed on paper, only on the web.  The feel of a book in your hands was something that many had no experience with, but it was one of the last treasures that he had of his family.  After his parents and siblings had been killed in that accident, his grandparents had looked after him until he hit 18, at which point he inherited everything from his parents as the sole survivor of the family.  His grandparents had only died a few years later in their sleep holding each other.  

He was thankful that they had gone peacefully rather than the violent death that his parents and siblings had dealt with.  After their deaths, he had locked himself away from the world.  All connections that he had with any friends were severed and he began his life as an introvert.  As he looked around the library, a shuffling noise made him look over to his left, where he saw what seemed to be a young dragon, albeit more anthropomorphic than he had expected, but still a dragon.  One thing that had always been a constant in any game that he had played was that you don’t piss off dragons “Good day to you good drake, I hope that I have not intruded upon your hoard. I had no idea that this was the lair of a dragon.” Sweat began to bead on Makarov’s forehead ‘Don’t be a jerk please’ flashed through his mind.

For a moment, that bead of sweat dripped down his neck before the dragons head pulled back and he started laughing “Ohh boy, where are you from dude?  I’m just Spike, you don’t need to be super formal with me.  I’m not even 60 years old yet.”

It was at this moment that Makarov noticed he had been followed into the library as a woman spoke. “60? Spike, you’re only 17.”  Makarov turned around, and his vision was filled with purple. “Now you are somepony that I have been interested in meeting.” Looking down at her he took in her appearance. She stood at around five feet six inches, six feet tall if you counted the horn. Her dark purple mane was broken by a stripe of slightly lighter purple and a second of dark pink.  She wore a button up shirt with a purple argyle sweater vest and a modest skirt.  Her legs ended in hooves as did ass of the other Pony people he had encountered so far.

That bead of sweat began to roll down his neck again, this was the...mare?... yes this was the mare that had the eyes of hunger.  Though he now realized that they hungered for knowledge, and that could be worse than the desire for items. Taking a deep breath, Makarov steadied himself “Well I can’t imagine why?  After all, I’m just a traveling wizard.  I’m sure you get my type a lot around here.” He began an internal chant ‘please let her buy it, please let her buy it, please let her buy it.’

She narrowed her eyes “That is true, but we don’t normally get any that claim to have traversed the Everfree, or go by the name Makarov. I have to say, that is a rather bold claim.  There can be only one Makarov, and Princess Celestia is the current holder of that title, and has been for the last two thousand years.” She stated matter of factly. A smirk on her face “I won’t call you a liar, but that makes me think you have some impressive magic.”

He was taken aback at that news. ‘WTF, Makarov is a title here?’  Shaking his head, he replied “Maybe I do, and maybe I don’t, I fail to see why that should matter to you.  My knowledge is my own as are my spells. And I have no idea who this ‘Princess Celestia’ is but I am Makarov, always have been, always will be.”  As the words left his mouth, he realized his mistake. He had said ‘my spells.’

The purple Mare’s eyes widened “Your spells! There hasn’t been a spell crafter for over 500 years!”

The look in her eyes had turned predatory, sighing, Makarov stepped around her and made to leave the library before he was stopped by her shutting the door before he could, turning to look at her, he spoke with annoyance in his voice “So what are you going to do? Hold me against my will and force me to give you what I know?”  She at least had the decency to look ashamed “So tell me… you haven't even given me your name, nor asked me for mine, why should I give you my knowledge?  Something that I have worked for all my life?  What right do you have to it?!”

She looked taken aback at his outburst, and the purple glow left her horn and the door.  Turning to leave, he was stopped again by a timid voice “T-Twilight Sparkle… My name is Twilight Sparkle, I apologize for acting like that, my friends have told me that I can be a bit… well a bit obsessive when it comes to magic. You see, I was the personal student of Princess Celestia in magic.  It’s my special talent, so I have always tried to learn all I could about the subject.”

Looking back at her was a mistake, she looked like a kicked puppy. Grumbling he responded “Fine, I guess I can forgive you.  But try to remember that you are not owed anything in this world.  Things can be given or paid for.  But nothing is owed.”  He had come to that thought over a lifetime of experience.  If things could be owed, then he was owed a better life, after all, that had been taken from him.  If the universe could owe you things, then it owed him a lot.  “So, Twilight Sparkle, that is a …unique name.”  

She seemed to perk up “Thank you, I’m named after my mother.  It’s an old Unicorn tradition.”  She smiled at me with a strange innocence. As if she had never had to deal with anything truly terrible before.  It reminded him of characters that he had seen in various games and shows.  The chipper character that enjoyed an ideal childhood. Filled with happiness and support.  The kind of person that Makarov didn’t really care for in general.  Most of the time, if you backed them into a corner, they would shatter under pressure.  But for some reason, when he looked at her, she seemed… stronger than that.  He couldn’t put his finger on it, but there was something about her.

Deciding to take a shot in the dark he asked. “So what did you mean by ‘there can only be one Makarov?”

She smiled and launched into her explanation. “Just as I said, the title of Makarov is given to only one being on the planet.  The one that holds the title of strongest magic user.  The title is a holdover from ancient times.  It was said to be the name of the greatest Magic user to exist in the time of the Precursors.  The grand civilization of beings that existed before the cataclysm that put the world into its current state.  It is also a title that is given by the church of the Precursors.”  She smiled as she spoke, clearly loving that she knew this information offhand.  The Information broker in  Makarov cringed at how easily she was giving this information, but the opportunist in him jumped for joy.

Lifting his eyebrow, he asked “So what? She is like the pope or something of the church?”

Twilight looked at him with confusion but answered “I’m not sure what you mean by ‘Pope,’ but she is a very important pony in the faith, beyond being the ruler of the entire country.  Well her and her little sister Princess Luna.  Where have you been that you didn’t know all this?  It’s relatively common knowledge.”

Makarov began to sweat again, when one of his auto wards went off.  Casting his eyes around the room to figure out what was happening, he noticed a light shimmer in the space just above Twilights right shoulder.  Thinking fast, he made up his mind, ‘might as well play it up and enjoy myself while I can. Worst case, I run away.’ Clearing his throat, he responded “As I said, I was crossing the badlands that lie beyond the Everfree.  Before that… well, I have been working for a very long time.”

Her eyes lit up with wonder, and he continued “I have decided, I think I will show you something of my magic. If you would follow me outside for a moment, this is no place to sling magic around.”  Walking out of the front door, he stopped in front of the library tree, Twilight close behind him.  Looking back over at her he muttered {Mystic Trace} at the shimmer over her shoulder.  In his mind’s eye, he zipped over the land, across a vast plane of space, broken only with more dirt roads and interestingly enough a train track.  After a few miles, it began to ascend up the side of a mountain to an impossible city sitting on the side of the peak.  Drifting over the city, the image pulled him to the grand palace, glistening in its majestic white.  All ending up in a throne room where a large mare sat in a gilded throne.  Her white coat shining with brilliance, hiding his light pink tones.  Her regalia sat on her with an elegance that to see her without it would seem wrong. She watched what appeared to be a mirror with a scene of Makarov and Twilight leaving the Library. Her eyes looked on with great interest. 

Next to her sat a smaller mare, her coat black as night, the sky painted across her mane.  Her eyes also looked upon the scene with interest. But what also seemed to be a faint bit of recognition. Cutting the magic from himself, Makarov looked at a small clearing behind the Library. “Perfect.” He muttered to himself before turning around and looking at the Purple mare “This should do well for the first demonstration. But first.” His eyes locked on the shimmer that sat just above her shoulder “I believe it would be better if all of you watching right now came to introduce yourselves.”  Raising his arm, the gem at the top of his staff began to glow as he commanded {Mythic Gate}. The ground started to rumble, and over the next ten seconds, it seemed to flow together to form an Archway in the clearing.

After around ten seconds the empty space that once occupied the middle of the arch was filled with the view of the inside of the throne room.  Two shocked princesses starred out, the mirror having been forgotten. Keeping up the act of the wise wizard Makarov spoke once more “Eavesdropping is so unbecoming of royalty don’t you think?  It’s easier to just come and say hello.”
> Chapter 3
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 3

The princesses looked through the gate with an unfiltered look of shock. The guards in the throne room, however, took aggressive stances. Makarov pales slightly as his thoughts went rampant ‘Fuck!!!! Fuck, Fuck Fuck! Shit, what did I just fucking do!  I’m dead.  Why don’t I ever think before I do shit like this… Wait, just take a deep breath.’  Makarov took a deep, steadying breath and spoke “You can call off the guards, I just figured that you would prefer to watch up close, rather than through a small hand mirror. He put a gentle smile on his face, but the inner turmoil continued. He prayed to a god he didn’t believe in ‘For the love of all things good, let my bluff skill work here.’

The white mare held her hand up and spoke “It is fine my little ponies.  I think I will take him up on his offer to watch closer. I will be fine.  Would you like to join me, Luna?”  She looked at the mare to her right, slightly shorter, but just as regal. She looked me over and shrugged. “Why not?  It shall amuse us to see one such as this who claims the title of Makarov, flounder at the sight of true power.”

Makarov’s eyes narrowed, if there was one thing that he really didn’t care for, it was people that insulted his hard work.  And when it came to hard work, his skill with magic was second to none. Bowing slightly he spoke again “Very well your majesties, feel free to pass through the gate, it is quite safe I assure you.”  The princesses stood and walked toward the gate that had opened in the middle of their throne room. They approached, at first with mild apprehension.  Princess Celestia was the first one to pass through.  As she arrived unharmed on the opposite side, Luna moved as well. 

Once they had both arrived, Makarov dropped the spell and the arch dissolved away leaving no indication that it had been there moments before. Thinking to himself for a moment, he recalled that in a lot of the stories and games that he had read, played, and watched.  The protagonist in the stories hid their power until they had to use it. Is some kind of ill-fated attempt at living a normal life, but more often than not, it came back to bite them in the ass.  He figured that he might as well start things off with a bang. Thinking that if it really got to be that bad, he could always teleport away and find somewhere else to live. And best case scenario, this was an incredibly peaceful place where he would be able to study. 

Taking the risk, he turned to the three women. Bowing before them with a bit of a flourish he spoke “I welcome you to this demonstration. However, I find this location to be ill-suited to what I wish to show you.  If you wait for just a moment, I can relocate us to somewhere more appropriate for the true demonstration.”  Turning around, the gem on the staff again lit as a new gateway began to form {Mythic Gate}.   As it took form, the scene through the gate was that of an arid badland, the same badland that Makarov found himself in when he first arrived.  Casually stepping through, he beckoned them to follow him. 

The small group followed behind and looked out with wonder at the environment around them.  Twilight spoke first “Where is this place?  The southern badlands are hundreds of kilometers away.”

Celestia spoke with a hushed tone “These are not the southern Badlands my student.  This place is far older.  Her eyes turned to the mysterious man as she watched him prepare for whatever he was going to do. She had the strangest feeling that he was familiar to her. Very familiar. Twilight walked up to her and placed her hand on her arm “What do you mean Princess?  Older than the badlands?”  

Looking down at the young mare, Princess Celestia smiled “This was once a Precursor city my student.  It has been a very long time since I was here last.  Since before the Cataclysm.”

Makarov had been preparing his spell but had managed to overhear what had been said. As he got together the material components for the spell, he thought to himself ‘well then, some kind of precursor group. That sounds interesting.  Oh well, let’s get his show running.’  turning back to the group he spread his arms and smiled.  “This is going to take a bit to get going, but please stay back.”  Turning to face the vast plane, Makarov pulled his arms from the sleeves of his robes and allowed them to fall off his upper body, exposing his back and chest.  Holding his staff horizontally in the air over a large bag of seeds he had placed at his feet, he put his opposite hand on top and began the spell. 

The princesses and student jumped back as a giant glowing ring formed beneath the strange man. The air began to charge with magic, small sparks starting to peel off of the mage as he worked through the spell.  The intricate designs glowed with power, Twilight’s eyes had been glued to the circle since its appearance, the magic being used here was almost nothing like the magic she had been using her entire life. It pulsed with the energy of life itself.  The magical matrices and fractals compressing in on each other, every one compounding on the one prior and expanding and directing its power to specific focal points.  Not even in the history books and diagrams left by Starswirl the Bearded, the Mage who had been said to have been the closest possible to the glory of the Precursors had come close to this. Finally managing to tear her eyes away from the circle on the ground, she beheld the one that hovered behind his back. But even that pales in comparison to the mark on his back.  The mark of pure magic, the symbol of the Precursors themselves the Compass Rose.  Tears began to fall as she looked at the magic he held.

The princesses were likewise silent, the very planet shook to its core at this magic.  Celestia looked down at Luna, who returned her gaze. “T-Tia, w-we know this Magic…”  Her gaze returned to the strange Stallion.  Her eyes lingered on the Compass Rose that was etched into his flesh.  A wave of magic washed over her as the entire thing began to change.

Makarov smirked, This was the first Creator class spell that he had ever created.  It was the spell that had earned him his mark. And of course, it was considered a healing spell.  After all, when experimenting with highly dangerous magic, the first thing any smart wizard should think about is fixing any injuries they may cause themselves. Time seemed to move in slow motion as each ring of magic fired in order before him. Creator class magic was not something that many had ever been granted access to.  Even after spending thousands of hours on getting it right, on actually being capable of using it in battle was a feat in and of itself.  There were specific requirements to getting one of these spells off. First, the caster was unable to move during the entire cast, second, creator class spells all had cast times above fifteen seconds, third, they cost XP to use This specific spell cost one-quarter of a level's worth, and fourth, they took material components as well. 

In this case, he had a large bag of various seeds, all of which he had gathered from his time playing the game. Once he hit the twenty-second mark, he set his gaze and spoke {Cry of Artemis: Bloom} rotating his staff to a vertical position, he rammed it down, the butt connecting with the ground as a bright flash of light exploded out.  The air behind him shimmered as a gargantuan woman clad in armor, a golden bow held in her hands, rose to stand over him.  Looking up she pulled back the bow, the creaking filling the air as a massive amount of pressure built before being let loose.  As the dart sped into the air, the gigantic woman let loose a war cry, something that lit a fire in the breasts of the mare that stood with him, as if they could fight an unending horde of enemies with nothing but their bare fists.  But it was not over, the dart seemed to have reached its apex, before bursting in the air.  

A golden mist fell around them, and where it hit the packed, dead earth, fertile soil was left behind.  The field of that once held nothing but the dry sent of death, now gave way to the sent of good hearty land that had been cultivated, for one thing, growth.  The bag at Makarov’s feet burst as the little seeds exploded with life.  A wave of green exploded from his feet.  Each new plant bursting and throwing seeds further out and causing more to burst forth. They all remained silent as the spread of life shot out from where they stood.  

Looking out over the once dead plane, they now observed a paradise, untouched by development, pure.  Hills, once nothing more than mounds of dirt, now stood with grown trees, covered in grass, creeks that had been dry for centuries now filled with water as it rushed to fill lakes long empty.  And in the center of it all, stood a wizard. The shock of what had happened would have been too much for some, Even the princesses’ knees had gone a week.  Twilight had lost the battle and now lie next to her mentor, completely knocked out by what she had seen.

Makarov just stood there with a blank look on his face, serene as he looked out over what he had done.   His face a picture of calmness, it was, however, a mask. The only hint were the eyes that had spread wide ‘What the fuck was that!!!!!!!  I don’t remember that spell having effects like that before!  It never had a range like that before! And since when did it bring back water?!’  He was freaking out inside.  The magic here was far beyond what he had been used to before. Steeling himself, he took a deep breath and turned to look at the mares, only to find something that made him even more nervous.

Twilight had passed out, and the two princesses were on their knees, tears running down their faces. “Um… Ta. Da! Hehe.”  His mind had ground to a stop. He had no idea what was going to happen next, but he never expected what did. 

“Master!!!!! You have returned!”  He was hit by both princesses and knocked flat on his back.  Now being crushed under the weight of two grown women, who for some strange reason had just called him master? 

After fighting with them for a few moments, he managed to pull them off.  They both sat back in a familiar seiza, which he found strange, thinking again he tried to rack his brains as to why they thought he was their master. Deciding to go for it he asked “I’m not sure what you mean when you say, Master.  Do I know you two?”

The two of them looked at each other and dropped their heads, the dark princess spoke first “We are sorry master, we forgot ourselves, after all, it has been over seven thousand years since last we saw each other.”  This really threw him for a loop.  Realizing that he still wasn’t getting it, she continued. “We also look quite different from when you last saw us.  Back then Celestia was only a Unicorn, and I a pegasus.  We met here, in Citadel.  Just over seven thousand years ago, before the great cataclysm.  You trained us with a few others in the arts of the adventurer.”

That made Makarov freeze, Citadel was the central hub city in Quest Online, and he had spent quite a few times helping out at the Sacred Church of the sun and moon.  This was the first spawn point for new players.  He would often hang out here and help out the locals.  Occasionally he would run into players that were really into the whole roleplay thing, so he just followed along with them.   Being a high fantasy game world, it was common for players to choose to play a different race.  Thinking back to a group that he had helped about six months ago.  They had only spent two months playing as a group.  They were good kids, and he was a sucker for helping out when new players were involved. 

But what stood out to him, was the two girls that had been part of that group.  One played as a light pink unicorn, and the other was a dark blue pegasus. They had been really into the RPG thing, even acting confused whenever he talking about downloading a movie or ordering food.  But it was impossible that these two were the same people right.  Besides, those had been players, so why would they call him Master?  It didn’t make any kind of sense.  Looking down at them he asked a crucial question while at the same time opening his menu to look at his friends list. “So did you go by different names then?”

The two of them blushed and nodded, Celestia answered for the both of them “I went by name Helios, Luna used to go by Selene”  Makarov was stunned, there in his friends list, were the two grey names of Helios and Selene, but as they reviled their past names, they began to glow, indicating that they were online.  Because name changes tended to be rather pricey, they came with an extra feature where unless you told people that you were changing your name, it would just appear that you never logged in again, but if you notify someone of the name change, your name will show up as online, under the old entry. That could have been the explanation as to why the names were greyed out.  But what shook him more, was that he very seldom added friends.  And it was rarer still that he kept the names in his lists.  

Generally, he would add them during the time they were working together but then delete them afterward.  But with these two it had been different, they had just been so vibrant and happy, he couldn’t bring himself to remove their names. He never worked up the courage to contact them, but seeing them online every day made him smile. Knowing they were okay and enjoying themselves. Looking over the Princesses, he was still hesitant, they knew the names, the menu had updated, but them being here, and showing no indication that they had been players was still suspicious. It was just too convenient “You claim to know me.  And you know the names of two of my… students.  But how can I know that you are telling me the truth? For all my knowledge, I have never been here before.  I am curious to know why you seem to know these things.”  Makarov took a steadying breath, attempting to calm his pulse down. 

Thinking to himself again ‘As far as I can tell, this world is real.  It has too many details to be a digital reconstruction.  The way that everyone moves and speaks is too accurate, the citizens in the town were too densely packed to have all been rendered to that level.  But if that is true, then how did these two end up here.’  He managed to pay enough attention to notice that Princess Luna had begun to speak “That is not surprising, the world you once knew has changed completely from what it was.  There was a great Cataclysm that shook the very foundations of this realm.  The ground split, the oceans boiled, and Chocolate Milk rained from the heavens.”

She had me right up to the last point, looking at her with confusion he asked “Chocolate Milk?  Really? That just sounds stupid.”

It was at that point that a voice Makarov recognized spoke from behind him.  “How rude.  I never criticized your work, Marko.”

Quickly turning, Makarov turned to look and what he expected to be the head developer of Quest Online, Johnnie Laced.  That was not who he saw.  The twisted form that stood behind him held nothing of the chill looking older man that was the head developer of the largest DMMORPG on the planet, sans the goatee. Temporarily losing his ability to string together a coherent sentence, Makarov vomited “You. Strange. Snake noodle. Goatee?”

Discord looked over Makarov’s shoulder at the princesses behind him.  “I think I might have broken the great Makarov.  Love what he did with the place though, the whole badlands vibe was wearing thin after a few thousand years.”

Celestia looked at Discord with exasperation “Could you please abstain from breaking the mind of our mentor.  We haven’t seen him in over seven thousand years.  Must you ruin this.”  She pouted, knowing that Discord had grown a weakness for it since the influence of Fluttershy. 

Discord broke under the gaze “Fine, I’ll behave, besides this is a good time to leave anyway.  Arrivederci.”  Ripping his paw through the air, a plaid tear, in reality, opened up next to the strange thing.  After bowing to the princesses as if he had given a grand performance, he was yanked through the rip by a shepherd’s crook.

After allowing his brain to do a full reboot, Makarov shouted out just as he left “Wait! Johnnie Laced, get back here you.”  The strange thing turned to him at the name and grinned just as he was pulled into the rift.  Realizing that it was no use, he dropped his hand and looked back at the Princesses. “What the nine hells was that thing?”

Princess Celestia grimaced. “That was Discord, Master. The god of chaos. He was the one that caused the great Cataclysm.  We managed to reform him… somewhat, and now he keeps his chaos to minor pranks and helping to encourage forward movement.”

Makarov looked at her with a mild concern, “He caused an earth-shattering Cataclysm, potentially killed countless people… And you just let him run around? And stop calling me Master, It’s creeping me out.  Just call me Makarov, please.”

Celestia smiled “Do not worry about it Makarov, Fluttershy has a good lockdown on him.  He’s completely harmless for the most part. The worst you have to worry from him is a prank.”

Makarov stood there, completely still for a moment before sighing with his reply “That is the stupids idea I have ever heard of.  And who in the nine hells is ‘Fluttershy?’”
> Dungeon Crawl
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Several weeks passed by with little change.  Guards made their rounds through the palace and the grounds without consequence. The princesses sudden disappearance was still talked about, and the captain of the guard had pleaded with them to never do something like that again. He was met with a chuckle and an assurance that there was little that would be able to hurt them, but they would make sure to bring at least two guards next time they decided to suddenly leave the palace, for his personal peace of mind.

To date, the only thing that had changed was that there was a new route for the guards to take, as well as a new post.  In the center of the maze, stood a simple wooden door.  It stood on its own without support and for the guards remained a curiosity.  Not once in the three weeks that the rotation had been added, had there been anypony that had passed through the maze, though rumor had it that Twilight Sparkle has been looking to get a meeting with the princesses.  They have been unavailable due to their sudden disappearance, causing a lot of questions and complaints that took far too long to work out.  

It was on this day that Celestia sat in Day court as usual. The noble standing before her was prattling on about some kind of ‘injustice’ that had been committed against them. From what she was about to glean from his pontification, he was furious that his favorite bakery had placed only two strawberries on his tart, instead of the usual three. The baker, who stood next to the irate noble was tired and upset at having to be there instead of at her shop.  The noble had been crying out that the shop should have to pay him restitution for the ‘mental anguish’ that this ordeal had caused him.

Right before Celestia was about to pass a verdict, a gate spell opened in the middle of the courtroom. “Hel...Celestia! I’m bored, let's go for a dungeon crawl or something.”  The room had gone silent at his sudden appearance, and the complaining noble grew red in the face at being interrupted. 

“How dare you address the princess like that you… hairless monkey!  And do you have any idea who I am?!” He seethed, all the while glaring with daggers in his eyes at the intruder. 

Looking at the annoying little Stallion, Makarov shrugged “no, I have no idea who you are.  Why should I?”

Before the noble was able to respond, Celestia spoke up, “I’m afraid that I am unable to join you until this matter is settled.  Baron Jetset and Berry Tart here, are having a bit of a situation. They have asked me for my help to settle the issue.”

Makarov turned back to the two of them and took a moment to look them over.  Berry Tart had large bags under her eyes, flower on her face and a strand of her hair had fallen out of her bun. Whereas the stallion looked to be the picture of refined.  His nails glistened with a fresh shine. Hair that didn’t have even a single piece out of place. And, from what he could tell, an ego the size of the mountain that they stood on. Looking back at the princess, he asked: “So what is the issue?”

She sighed and gave him a brief description of the issue. He face took a look of shock.  Turning back to the two of them, he spoke loudly for the room to hear “I have to agree, this is a travesty of injustice!” the mare's eyes fell “This pompous, self-center, idiotic,” Jetset’s eyes gleamed with triumph as he heard Makarov list of insults “arse hole, has taken valuable time away from a small business owner!”  The room could almost hear the record scratch, and Jetset’s eyes began to bug out. “You stupid piece of shit should be fined for taking time out of her day to be dragged down here.  If you love strawberries so much, try living as one for a while.”  Reaching into the air, a staff materialized in his hand {Transmute Lifeform}.  There was a bright flash in the courtroom, and where Jetset once stood, a large strawberry that had a rather unpleasant greenish hue sat.

After a moment, Makarov looked at the rotten fruit and scoffed, “Just as rotten as a fruit as he was as a pony.”  Looking over at the mare, who stood rooted to the spot in shock. “I am sorry that he stole so much time from you today.  Here, catch.”

He flicked a small green object over to her.  Being snapped from her stupor by the item flying towards her, she just barely managed to catch it.  As she turned it over in her hand, she looked up at him with curiosity in her eyes, “Um… I’m not sure what this is, and is he… is he going to be okay?”

Makarov smiled at her “Even though the pile of trash tried to ruin you life, you still care.  Damn, wish I knew more people like you back where I came from.  And to answer you question as to what the is.  Or at least what it was.  It is a Rupee.  A long time ago it was worth 10 platinum.”  Looking back over to the princess, “are they still valid?”

She smiled with warmth and a hint of mischievousness “Yes Makarov,” at the mention of his name, whispers began to abound in the room “Rupees are still very much valid currency, though most common folk do not even know about them.  Miss Tart, if you take that to your bank, they will know what it is. If they give you any trouble with it, tell them that I can vouch for its authenticity and the fact that it was given to you.”  Turning to the clerk that stood next to her, “make sure to take a note that her taxes should not be affected by the sudden balance in her accounts. After all, I would hate to take any of the gift she was given.”

The mare’s eyes had shot open at the mention of it being worth 10 platinum pieces. “Sir… A-are you s-sure you can give this to me?  I mean, this is more than I can bring into the shop in over six months!”

Makarov smirked “Don’t worry about it, I don’t exactly have a shortage of funds for myself, besides, what good is money if you don’t use it.  And if I can bring some joy by doing so. All the better.  Now go ahead and get out of here. As I said, I’m rather bored and Helios… Pardon, Celestia here said that she could leave after she was done with this little situation.  Don’t worry about the arse hole there, he should be back to his terrible self in around an hour or so.  I nerfed the spell quite a bit.”

Berry Tart bowed deeply to the Princess and rushed from the room as Makarov watched her go.  “Nice lady, definitely looks like she overworks herself though.”

Celestia giggled lightly “Yes, she does.  But she does produce some of the best desserts in Canterlot.  And just because you can turn ponies into fruit, I would appreciate it if you didn’t.  He is going to be quite a headache when he turns back.  You will likely have to appear in court tomorrow to address the situation.”

He eyebrow curled up with confusion “I thought you said that the Makarov was allowed to do whatever they wanted?  Without repercussion.”

She smiled “They do, but It has yet to be announced to the general public that you have returned.  I was holding that off until the Grand Galloping Gala next week.  It’s much easier when all of the ambassadors from the other nations will be there. They can then carry the news back to their respective nations for us.  Rather than waste time and effort to send couriers.”

Nodding with understanding, Makarov responded, “Well, in any event, as I had said before, I’m bored.  Where could we find a dungeon to crawl?  And where is Selene… I mean, Luna.”  Muttering under his breath, “Gonna take fucking forever to remember that.”

Celestia smirked, “I would expect her to be asleep at this hour, she is quite nocturnal thees days.”

Frowning, he responded, “Well that sucks, a two-person party isn’t as effective, or as fun.”

She smiled, having quickly come up with a solution. “I have an idea as to whom we could invite. As for the Dungeon, there is actually one located at the base of the Catterhorn.  To date, no one has explored the deepest parts of it.  I think the last report I heard was somewhere around the 25th level.”

Nodding “Sounds good, also, who do you have in mind?”

_________________scene shift to Ponyville Library___________________

“So, Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, Apple Jack, Lady Rarity, Pinkie Pie, And Fluttershy, we would like to invite you to go with us for a dungeon crawl.  It has been quite some time for me, and I would love for you to get to know Makarov here.” Celestia stood before the group of Mares as she discussed what it was that they were being invited to.

Makarov had stood behind her, scanning over the girls with a spell to figure out what levels they were currently sitting at and what kind of classes they would fit.  From what he could tell, they all hovered around lvl 6, though Twilight was sitting at lvl 9 with Rainbow and Applejack the second-highest lvl at 7.  Looking over there builds, he started figuring out what kind of gear they would work the best with.  Twilight was a mage, no doubt in his mind about that, Applejack looked like a monk style fighter, her biceps and legs had visible muscle beneath her fur.  Rainbow was lithe and wiry, Perfect for a rouge, quick strafing runs would be her forte.  Pinkie’s bubbly personality made her seem to fit the role of a bard quite easily.  Rarity looked to have an almost stuck up air about her, but Makarov could tell by the way that she carried herself that she was likely trained in using a rapier. Turning back to the timidest of the group, Fluttershy, who had been hiding behind her hair the entire time. 

As he looked at her, Makarov could smell the nature magic leaking from her.  It was one of the first branches that he had worked with, and the one that he was most familiar with as well. Unlike Arcane magic, which took personal mana into account to use it.  Nature magic was far more subtle.  It took a connection to nature and all the things that live in it.  Smiling at her, she eeped and shrunk back behind her bangs. “Looks like we have a mixed bag here Heil...I mean, Celestia.”  I have some equipment I can lend them for a while to help keep them safe.  Not that they are really going to need much of it.  By the way, what lvl of monsters are on floor 25 anyway?”

The girls looked at him like he was nuts before Celestia answered: “I believe they have been measured at an average lvl of 25 or so.”

Nodding, he looked back at them “Good, that should be a good lvl gap to do some power lvling.  But before we go, I need to ask Fluttershy something.”  Looking over at her, she eeped again and hid behind Applejack, “I’m not going to bite, you know.  Hehe, unless you like that kind of thing.”  It was the wrong thing to say, as her face lit up with a blush as she tried to disappear behind her friend. “Ahem.  Well, what I needed to ask is if you have an animal familiar or not.  If you don’t, I have one you can borrow.  I expect that you would do quite well with one.”

She had perked up at the mention of animals as she muttered her answer behind Applejack “Um… well, I have my pet Angel Bunny.”

Applejack was about to tell her to speak up so that Makarov could properly hear her before being cut off “Angel Bunny?  Interesting name, I assume they are a rabbit, yes?”  she nodded.  Well then, before I hand out equipment, let’s go meet Angel Bunny first.  I will ask if they would be willing to go on an adventure with us.  Can you guide me to your home?”

She nodded and walked out of the library, and Makarov followed behind her, completely ignoring the rest of the girls as they left. Twilight looked over at Celestia and asked, “Um… Princess Celestia, he does realize that we weren’t following him, right?”

She smiled as she watched him walk out of the room.  “Yes, he is completely aware.  It is heartwarming to know that time has not changed him.  He was the same way back then.” As she lost herself to memories for a moment, Rainbow spoke up.

“Forget that dude is crazy.  How are we supposed to deal with going down to the 25th lvl of the dungeon?!  Only high lvl adventures go down that deep, and some of them never come back.  He was talking like this was just another day or something!”

Applejack nodded in agreeance before Celestia spoke up again “I realize that for you, that the idea of this is quite harrowing. But rest assured, no harm will come to you down there.  I have complete confidence that he will not allow anything to hurt you. Besides, lvl 25 monsters don’t offer much of a challenge to him.  The only reason that he wouldn’t go even deeper is that you all will be joining us.  He will likely be treating this as a training mission.  For noobs as he puts it.”  She smiled back at the girls, who were all instead put off at the comment. 

Rainbow was not happy at being considered a noob and spoke out against it. “Hey!  We are not Noobs.  We fought off Nightmare moon and took care of Discord. No noob could do that.  I bet I could take him in a one on one fight if I wanted to.”

Celestia sighed at her brash reaction before merely stating, “You may wish to retract that statement Rainbow, Makarov stands at the pinnacle of what can be achieved by anyone.  After all, what would you expect from a lvl 100?”

The girls all shut up when she said that, just as a portal opened up behind them all.  Out of it walked Fluttershy and Makarov, but what shocked them all, was that Angel Bunny, a rabbit that had been well known to hate everyone but Fluttershy, was happily riding on his shoulder. “So! What did I miss?”

______Just after leaving the library after having arrived at Fluttershy’s cottage_____

“So Fluttershy, where is the little one?”

She replied in near silence, but still loud enough for Makarov to hear with his listening skill “Um… well, he... He is likely inside.”

Nodding, he motioned at the door as if to ask if he might be allowed to enter.  She nodded in agreeance, and he pressed forward.  As they came, he looked around the room before noticing the white rabbit lounging on a chair in the living room.  After looking at the rabbit for a moment, he came to a realization, “You didn’t tell me that he was an albino Almiraj.”  

Both her and Angel’s ears perked up at the name. She spoke up, “Um, I’m not sure what that is.  I just thought he was a cute white rabbit.”

Chuckling, he looked back over at the rabbit and crouched down to look at him eye to eye. He then spoke in a chitter voice that only Fluttershy and Angel would be able to understand, “Hello there little one.  I am Makarov, I have invited young Fluttershy there to join me in the dungeon today.  I was wondering if you would be interested in forming a contract with her to be her familiar.”

The rabbit sat there, complete confusion on his face. In his entire life, the only one of the bipeds that could talk to him was Fluttershy.  She was a timid thing, and he had been trying to force her to grow a backbone for years.  Many thought of his methods as just being mean to her.  But he didn’t really have any other ideas of how to accomplish it. Responding, “Well… I dunno.  I mean, I don’t really know how to form a contract.  She is just fine as a caretaker, but I don’t think she has it in her to be an adventure. I’m still baffled at how she managed to face down that Moon mare and the dragon.”  putting his paw on his chin, he thought for a moment before adding “I guess she did manage to put a leash on that weird noodle guy.  Fine, if you can help her grow a spine, I’ll form a contract with her.  No problem.”

Clapping his hands together with cheer “Excellent, let’s head back to the Library, I have equipment and weapons for everyone.  Feel free to hop on up, going by a gate will be faster than walking back.”  He held out his arm, and the little rabbit clambered up to sit on his shoulder.  Turning back to Fluttershy, he smiled as he switched back to speaking plain Equish. “Now that that is settled let’s head on back.  I have some gear to give you all before we begin.”  She nodded with confusion before stepping up next to him.  Waving his hand in the air, a portal to the library opened.  As the stepped though, Makarov announced “So! What did I miss?”
> Preparations and Entry
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“So, what did I miss?”  Looking around the room, Makarov was a little confused at the looks he was getting from the girls. As his eyes came to rest on Celestia, he continued “Um… not sure what is going on here, but we have Angel Bunny here, and Fluttershy is ready to form a familiar contract.  Do you need any equipment Hel… Celestia?”

Smiling at him, “If you wouldn’t mind Makarov.  It’s been a long time since I went on an adventure, I don’t have any adequately leveled items anymore.”

Nodding he responded “No problem, what lvl are you now anyway, I didn’t bother to check.  But I expect that you likely maxed out a long time ago.”

Blushing a bit, she answered, “Well, you see… Life kind of got in the way and.  Well, I’m lvl 75.”

Looking at her with confusion, “Really?  How in the nine hells have you not ground out the last 25 lvls in the last five millennia?”  She looked down at her hoofs and didn’t respond. Scratching the back of his head, he sighed, “Whatever I guess, you are still overlevled for the 25th floor anyway.  But you better believe that we are going to work on those last few levels. How was someone that wasn’t at least maxed out considered the best magic user in the world anyway?  Is there no one that took the time to max out?”

Shaking her head, Celestia responded, “No, I’m afraid that after the cataclysm, and when the precursors all left, most were just concerned with surviving.  There weren’t many that had the time to worry about maxing out.  They just wanted to survive.”

Shrugging he looked back at the group “Well I guess that makes sense.  In any event, I have equips for everyone.  Let's start with Twilight here.”  Stepping over, he looked down at her; “You are a mage, are you not?”  She nodded up at him. “Good good, well for you I have this robe, staff, hat, rings, belt, necklace, and boots.” As he named off each item, they formed in the air next to him.  The robe was a low lvl item that he had kept in storage out of his hoarding tendencies. They were all sitting in just at lvl 9, but they were still considered rare class gear. Funny enough, the Robe was a deep purple that had stars woven into it. Giving a general status bost and a mana boost as well.  The two rings held enchantments that shortened cast time and had a hp boost. The Necklace added a last resort shield spell. The belt likewise added a hp boost and the boots gave an agility boost. 

The hat, like the rings, shortened cast time, and last but not least, the staff had a fire magic enhancement on it to boost flame spells.

Twilight looked at the items with wonder in her eyes.  “These!!! These are extremely rare pieces of equipment!  I don’t think I have seen anything like them before.  How do you have these?!”

Shrugging “I dunno, it’s just some old gear of mine.  It was helpful back when the total number of spells available was under the 100 mark. Firebolt is one of the weakest spells there are, and that stuff kept me alive. Kinda just held onto it, to be honest.  I’m a bit of a hoarder.”  Smiling, he stepped away from the baffled unicorn and walked up to Rarity. 

Looking her over, he asked, “Now correct me if I’m wrong, but I expect that you have some formal training with a rapier. Am I right?”

She took a step back, “How!  Ahem, why would you say such a thing, darling?”  Her eyes shifted around the room.  Lingering on Applejack for a moment.  

Makarov Smirked as he noticed her gaze “Call it a hunch, but the way you carry yourself, says that you have the training, and as far the weapon is concerned.  I just couldn’t imagine you wielding any kind of standard sword. The rapier is a far more elegant weapon.  Something that I feel you would do well with.”

Blushing, she nodded, “Yes.  I am trained with the rapier.  As well as a whip.  I had a rather nasty encounter with some Diamond Dogs a few years ago and took it upon myself to take up a weapon to prevent something like that from happening again.”

Makarov rose his eyebrow in confusion at the mention of Diamond Dogs “I’m afraid I’m not familiar with Dimond Dogs.  What kind of creature is that?”  He turned to Celestia with confusion.

“I apologize Makarov.  They are a subspecies of Gnolls.  Brutes that crave jewels more than anything.  They have taken up the rather disappointing act of slavery to obtain more.”

The moment that Celestia mentioned the word slavery, the temperature in the room drooped around 15 degrees, frost began to form on the windows as steep rose from each of their mouths.  In a voice so even that it sent shivers down the mares backs, he responded, “Slavery?  Hmmm.”  cracking his neck “I guess after this, I have some hunting to do.  I have to admit, this world got a little boring after I cleared filth like that from its face the first time.  I missed their screams.”

With a nervous look in her eyes, Twilight slid up next to Celestia and quietly muttered to her, "Does he know about the Griffon nation?"

Celestia shook her head, "Not yet, but he will likely find out soon.  I was just trying to distract him for a bit before he discovers that they fell back into the practice. May Foust have mercy on their souls."

Twilight looked up at her mentor with concern in her eyes "Isn't there something that you can do about that?  He sounds like...' hunting' slavers is some kind of game to him."

Celestia looked at her student and in a motherly tone, responded, "For him it very much is.  The vile act of slavery was once very rampant in this world, thousands of years ago.  Makarov made it one of his goals to hunt down everyone that he could find.  His crusade is still one of the legends among the Griffons today, though they look at him as some kind of boogeyman now.  The only reason that I didn't do it myself was that I had to look after my nation.  The world is about to change my student."  With resolve in her eyes, she finished her statement, "For the better."

After a moment, he shook his head, and the room was brought back up to average temperature, “Sorry to get sidetracked like that, Back to business.”  Thinking for a moment, Makarov summoned another set of gear.  A collection of Studded leather armor that held purple and gold highlights, a white hat with a large purple plum, elegant leather gloves, Thigh high boots, a beautiful belt, another Necklace, and to finish it off.  A silver blade and a black whip that had thorns along the end. “The armor, gloves, and boots are made of wivern hide. Nasty buggers, but they make great armor. If you ever run into one, lookout.  They have little to no intelligence, but they love to kill things for sport. As for the blade, it is forged from Mithril, the guard as I am sure you noticed is forged to look like a rose with its vines curling around to form the sweepings and the knuckle guard.  The Mithril helps to reinforce the Debole while keeping weight down. The Whip is again made form wivern hide, though the rose theme carries over. The but of the wipe is a rose with the image of the rest of it being the stem.”

Rarity was running her hands of the leather, it’s smooth surface held a surprising softness to it that she hadn’t expected. “This is exquisite. I had no idea that something as crass as battle armor could be so elegant.  Thank you.”

Smirking, he shot back, “Thank me after it has saved your life.”  Stepping away, he turned to the bouncy pink mare.  Something told him that she knew more than she should “Bard?”  she nodded “Already know how to use the equips?” she nodded again. “Cool”  Dropping a load of equipment in her arms she flashed away leaving a pink mist where she had been standing a moment before.  Less than a minute later, she was back, fully kitted, and ready to go.  The Lute on her back was a rich mahogany color, and her hat was plopped on her head at a rakish angel. 

Looking at him with a randy smile “These fit just fine Macky.  They press all the right things together.”  As she said this, she pressed her rather impressive chest up.

Blushing, he turned away “Bloody bards.” he muttered under his breath “Now for the fast one.”  Looking over at Rainbow, he nodded to himself, “I take you for a hit and run artist.  Take this gear.”  He dropped a pile of equipment into her arms that was very similar to 
Rarities though instead of a plumed hat, she didn’t get one.  She also received two daggers.  One longer than the other. “Let me know if you need any help in learning how to use that.”  She just looked at him with a grumpy look in her eyes. Makarov couldn’t help but think to himself, ‘she acts like I just insulted her.  Meh, whatever.  If she wants to be like that, may as well have a little fun once we get there.’

Applejack was up next.  “For you, I have something a little different. From the looks of you, you wouldn’t do well with a weapon.  At least with a weapon that wasn’t your fists or legs, am I right?”  She looked at him with suspicion but nodded all the same. “That’s what I thought.  Guessing you could take heavier armor as well, but to be honest, keeping you light would be a better move.  Not sure if anyone knows what they are anymore, but I suspect you could be a great monk.  Try this stuff on.”  He passed her another load of equipment.  This time the armor was replaced with a light cloth garment.  Its orange hue had red highlights, and it appeared that it would fit her quite well. Loose enough to not impede her movement, but tight enough to not get in the way.  It was magically hardened to the point that one could mistake it for a set of heavy armor. To go with it, she also had a pair of red greaves to go on each leg and some hand wrappings. “That should work well for you, I think.

Then turning to Fluttershy, he smiled with warmth “For you my little druid, I have something extra special. He pulled yet another set of equipment from his storage.  The robe was dark green in color with a complex vine pattern woven in.  Scattered over it were various birds and small animals.  A crown made of dark wood woven together into an intricate pattern, interlaced with leaves that somehow were still alive.  Sturdy boots as well as a rope belt.  Three rings as well as a knarled staff that held a large amber gem.  Her hat was similar to Twilight’s in that it was a cone, but the brim was far wider.  Her necklace had a pendant of a complex root system that seemed to be tangling in on itself endlessly. Not finished he looked at the small bunny “Now for you, I noticed that you do not have your horn little one. I am to fix that.”  Pulling what appeared, at first glance to be a unicorn horn, which of course shocked both Rarity and Twilight, he smiled, and he crouched down next to the rabbit who had jumped fro his shoulder after he had started to hand out equipment. “It is regrettable to see a rare Almiraj without its horn.  This is one that picked up a long time ago, but it would do better to be used by you.”

In a quick motion, he slapped the horn down on Angel’s head.  Fluttershy cried out for a moment until Angel Bunny grew three times his size.  Now larger than Winona, Angel looked at his paws with wonder. “Now that I fixed that little issue, its time for form your pact. Fluttershy if you would come here please.”  Still intimidated at what he had just done, she shuffled forward “Hold out your paw and hand, and pay attention.  You can use this to form pacts with other animals in the future to give Angel here more support. He placed Fluttershy’s hand against Angel's paw and placed the blade of a dagger between them.  Loosely wrapping a cloth around there hands, he spoke. “Many look down on those that use the magic of nature.  They fail to see its power and utility.  But those of use that have glimpsed into the wildlands understand its power, its terror, and its kindness.”

Looking into her eyes, he continued, “Repeat after me as you hold onto the grip of the dagger.”  Her free hand shook as she reached up to grasp it. “Now repeat after me. We swear, By peace and love to stand.  Heart to Heart and Hand in Hand.  Mark O Spirit, and hear us Now, Confirming this, our Sacred vow.  This, I swear.  Once you are finished, you will need to slide the blade so that it cuts both your hand and Angel's paw.  This will seal the pact and bind him to you and you to him, do you understand?

She nodded though she was shaking as she did so.  “Remember, be clear and firm in your conviction as you do this.  It is a sacred vow to the druids, it is the deepest connection that one can make with a familiar.  As much as you bind Angel to do your bidding, you also bind yourself to ensure that you never force him to do something that he doesn’t want to.  The druidic path is one that demands sacrifice, to put what is just and good first, to protect the wilds against those that might destroy them with impurity. Remember, not all destruction is bad, it is part of nature, the eternal cycle, and in some cases, destruction is needed for new growth.  In the land that I come from, there are trees whose seeds can only grow after their parent trees have been burned down.  Remember this, some times, the old must be cleansed for the new to begin.”

Gripping the dagger with resolve, Fluttershy spoke the words.  As she did so, a green mist began to form beneath her and Angel.  As she finished her oath, she looked right at Angel bunny and slid the dagger between their respective paw and hand. As their blood mixed, a bright flash issued forth.  And just as quickly as it started, it ended.  Blinking the flash from her eyes, she felt Makarov’s hands slowly remove the binding cloth.  Expecting to have to deal with her cut hand, she was shocked to find that it was without injury.  As was Angel’s paw.  Makarov smiled at her “Congratulations, you have taken the first step down a long path, but at its end, glory awaits.”

Now finished with the girls, he stood back up and turned to Celestia “So then that leaves you.  Considering that you held my title up to this point, does that mean that you changed your fighting style then?”

She shook her head “No, I still prefer my old fighting style, but when the world needed a Makarov, I stepped up to take the position.  In the long run, it prevented a lot of wars. So if it were not too much trouble, I would love similar equipment to what I once had.”

Smirking, he shook his head “Darn, I had hoped that you had taken a bit after you sister and started to seriously study magic. Oh well, beggars can’t be choosers.”  He waved his hand and dropped a new set of equipment on the ground in front of her.  A full set of heavy golden armor, thick plates that would cover her entirely as well as a massive halberd.  Each piece looked like it would weigh over forty pounds each.  No average person could ever hope to put it on. 

Celestia smiled “You even remembered that I love golden armor.  You have always spoiled us.”

He chuckled, “As if I would ever forget you spending a week begging me to go on that quest to get the materials to make your first set.  It was strange to see such a young girl so happy to get a set of full plate.”

Twilight who had been silent as each of her friends had been given. Frankly, a treasure trove in equipment that seemed to be tailor-made for them spoke up, thoroughly confused. “How is it that all of this equipment is a perfect fit for us?! What kind of ceremony did you do with Fluttershy, Why is Angel so big now.  And Why is Princess Celestia asking for Full Plate?!  I thought you were a magic-user?!”

Celestia grimaced “Well, to be honest with you, dear Twilight, I only started to rely on magic after I was appointed to the position of the Makarov. To be entirely upfront with you.  Luna is a far better magic user that I ever was.  But she insisted that I was the better public face for the title.  I have always been more partial to using a halberd and full plate mail.”  Snapping her fingers, the armor disappeared from the group and reappeared on her body. Makarov smiled as it came to rest on her. Something that he had loved about Quest Online was that the difference between male and female armor was in the fit. But not in the aesthetic. This armor was made to be used, none of that bullshit boob cup nonsense. It did have a bit of a larger cavity to compensate for her rather impressive chest, but that was it.  If she ever took a hit to the chest, it would absorb the impact and deflect it away, rather than potentially crush inward and cause breathing issues.   

Responding to her other questions, “And to answer your other questions, Twilight.  The armor fits because it is magic.  It would fit you just as well as it fits Celestia, though depending on your abilities, you wouldn’t be able to use it as effectively. The ceremony that I helped Fluttershy and Angel complete was a druidic binding.  It is something that druids use to bind familiars to themselves.  And as to why Angel is so large now, well he should have been that large, to begin with.  The issue was that he was for whatever reason a hornless Almiraj.  Not sure how it happened, but I just gave him a horn again. As for what an Almiraj is, well, they are a type of magic animal that can be used as a familiar.  As for his abilities, they will have to figure that out for themselves. In any event, shall we go now?  I’m getting excited.  It’s been a long time since my last Dungeon crawl.”

Celestia nodded, “Yes, let us be off.  I can teleport us to the base came if you like Makarov.  It will be faster, and then you can go whenever you like later.  Besides we will have to register with the guild before they will let us enter.”

Smiling, he nodded.  In a flash, the library around them was replaced by clearing that stood before a massive building at the base of the mountain. As the fully-equipped group walked up to the front door, various adventures looked at the party with awe.  Many stared at the Princess, resplendent in her golden armor, the famous Elements of harmony each wearing a different set of unique equipment, followed closely by a large horned rabbit. But what stood out the most, was the large being with his beard and long hair.  His robes shimmered in the light and the magnificent staff connected with the groud at each step.  They didn’t stop to speak or address any of the other adventures before entering the office.

The clerk and the desk had been looking over her notes for the day when he noticed that the room that was typically filled with boisterous laughter and music had suddenly grown silent. Looking up, his face grew pale as he saw that Princess Celestia was standing with a group at his counter.  Dropping his work, he made to bow to her before she stopped him with her words, “Hello there, we are looking to register with the guild and enter the dungeon. Would you be able to help us with that?”

The clerk was shocked, the princess was standing in his guild office and had asked to register as an adventure. “Y-your m-majesty.  Y-you mean to s-say that y-you are going into the dungeon? I-I guess I c-can help w-with that.”

Rolling his eyes at the pitiful display, Makarov rose one hand and pointed it at the clerk {Lion’s heart}.  A wave of confidence washed over the clerk as his nervousness and fear were swept aside. Not sure what happened, but glad that he had gotten himself under control.  “Of course, you are, after all the Makarov.  I don’t think there would be an issue with letting you in.  Um... I have the paperwork right here.  Now normally any first-timers would have to rake up from bronze, but.”

He was cut off by Makarov who had leaned in next to him “Don’t worry about that son.  We are just fine raking up like everyone else. We don’t need any special treatment.  And keep this under your hat, but she isn’t the Makarov anymore.  I am.  Or at least I came back for my title.”

His face dropped again at hearing this.  Looking over at Princess Celestia, she smiled and nodded at him.  He was back to being intimidated, but the effects of {Lion’s Heart} was still in effect, so he managed to keep his composure.  After finishing the paperwork, they walked out of the guildhall wearing copper plates on their chests. 

“Well that took longer than I had hoped, but now we can get to it.  So is anyone as excited as I am to jump right in?” Makarov beamed as he looked at his party.

They looked a little less than confident, so deciding to give them a bit of a boost he responded “Well then, time for final preparations, come on over here.  I have some buffs to cast on us before we get moving.  Better to do them here rather than worry about it later.  And if needs be, I can reapply them later once we are down there.”

Celestia calmly walked up to stand next to him.  The mane Six looked at each other before nodding and joining her.  “Alright, here we go.”  Taking his staff in hand, Makarova began to speak, “Because we are only doing PVE, we shouldn’t need to worry about things like false life info or teleportation delay or redirection. So I will just go with the basic boosts for now and see what comes up later.”  Closing his eyes, he began to cast. {Lion’s heart}{Greater Magic Sheild}{Greater Ability Boost}{Luck Boost}{Greater Protection Negative Engery}{Greater Protection Evil}{Greater Agility Boost}{Greater Health Boost}.  As each spell was announced, a different shade of light draped over the group. Whispers had started up once they came out of the guildhall, but they were once again silenced as he rambled off the various buff spells.

As he finished, the girls couldn’t help but notice that they felt amazing.  Applejack could feel that her arms and legs had become stronger and was itching to try it out.  Walking over to a large rock, she wondered what would happen if she were to try punching it. Figuring that she wanted to test it out, Makarov spoke up “Go ahead, you shouldn’t have to worry about it hurting.  The buff spells effectively doubled your base lvl.  Nodding, she took a stance and slammed her fist into the stone.

As her wrapped fist hit the rock, a resounding crack echoed across the staging area as it was blasted to dust. Applejack stood there, looking at her fist in awe, unable to speak after what she had just managed to do.  As she was doing this, Makarov noticed that a light rosy color had shown itself on Rarity’s cheeks.  Smirking to himself, he smiled as he muttered “I totally ship it.”  After shaking his head, he announced. “Well then, are we ready?”  The group nodded with awe still evident on their faces, eager to test out the new power they had been granted.  Fluttershy looked more confident then they have ever seen her before, Rainbow had lost her look of annoyance, and Celtia beamed, thinking to herself that Luna was going to be rather upset that she missed this. 

Smirking, Makarov Announced, “Well then, as a wise man once said ‘Allons-y.’”
> Down down to Dungon Town.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As they entered the dungeon through the main entrance, the girls were a little thrown off by how much it looked like a lobby to a classy hotel. Speaking up, Makarov addressed the surroundings "Looks like some things never change, impressive that even though most stopped maxing out that they managed to keep facilities up and running."

Celestia spoke from the back, her voice lightly echoing from inside her helm. "Yes, well, they did fall into disrepair after the Cataclysm, quite a lot of work went into bringing them back to what they once were. It has taken the better part of two hundred years to bring it back to the same level it once was." Makarov could hear the tone of her voice falling as she spoke. "Much changed when you left, we have been working to fix it. Like it used to be."

Inside his own mind, Makarov was panicking  'SHIT!!! She sounds like she is about to cry, what am I supposed to do here. I'm just a shut-in neet that never talks to people outside of games!!! Okay just calm down, you need to think this through, you have read more light novels than any one man should have, what would the main protagonist do in this situation that doesn't lead to more trouble down the line.' 

Thinking for a moment, he came to his conclusion. Steeling himself, he turned around to the warrior clad in gold, the veritable powerhouse of metal and strength, and hugged her. The girls looked on with abject horror in their eyes, this weird thing, who had been turning their heads all morning, had just witnessed him walk up to the Princess' THE PRINCESS' and casually hug her. What shocked them more was when she dropped the massive halberd and wrapped her arms around him in return to hug him back.  

She seemed to be crying and saying something, but they couldn't hear it. After a few moments, Makarov pulled back and lifted the visor of her helm. The crowd suddenly found that they couldn't focus on what was happening in the corner anymore. Like the more they tried to look at the pair, the more they were unable to. Celestia realizing what was going on chuckled, unheard by any but Makarov. "You really do spoil us, you know that. Saving me the embarrassment of being seen crying in public, I haven't broken down like that in a thousand years. Not since…"

Placing a finger on her lip to quiet her Makarov, hoping that his protagonist plan was still going to work continued, "That is a shame that you have had to hold yourself back for that long. Everyone needs a moment. You have done well for what you had access to. Don't worry about it, at the very least I have returned, I don't know if others have as well, or if it was just me, but don't worry, I will always come back. Trust me." He gave her a bright smile that was quickly cracked as she kissed the tip of his finger, a spark in her eyes.

"I will have to hold you to that. Luna and I lost you once, we won't let it happen again. I finally got her back and then you returned, Twilight has been everything I had hoped for and more. Everything is falling into place again." Still being a little thrown off by the kiss to the tip of her finger, she pushed away from him and dropped her visor. "Now then shall we be off, I do believe it is time to shake off some rust!"

Finally, shaking himself back to function, Makarov spoke, "Y-yes then. Follow me to the warp gates, I can get us down to a deeper level faster that way. Figure I would start us off at Lvl ten and see how it goes from there." Not only the girls were confused by what he had said, as it appeared that the entire room was now listening in on their conversation. Seeing their confusion, Makarov Looked at Celestia with a questioning look, "Do… do they not know about the warp gates? That's like dungeon diving 101."


Celestia grimaced beneath her helm and spoke in her vibrating voice. "I figured it would build character if they found them on their own. Apparently, nopony has."  


Makarov could feel her grin through the visor as he rubbed his eyes. Walking over to a group of rooms at the side of the main hall, they entered to find quite a bit of trash. Almost like it was a staging area before it was hauled off. At least that was the impression, given it was all rather fresh. Looking at the room with disdain, Makarov pointed his staff into the room for a moment before uttering {Incinerate}. An orange glow surrounded the bags of trash before they burst into flames. The intense heat caused all present rather than Makarov and Celestia to flinch back. Once the light died down, the congregation looked into the room to find it spotless. Not even ash was left behind. Walking into the room, Makarov made his way to the pedestal. Looking down as he was filled with confusion as to why such a thing would be so hard to figure out.

Placing his hand on the center of the panel, he waited for a moment before giving it a kick as the entire room lit up with a magical humming. Whispers began in earnest as he did this, many of the adventures were amazed as to what had just happened. Twilight ran into the room and started off with questions, "How did you do that?!"


Makarov just shrugged and pointed at the pedestal "There is clearly a handprint on that thing."

Before he could continue, she shot back "Of course there is, we aren't stupid you would have to be blind to miss that part, but we still have never seen this kind of activity before!"

Rolling his eyes, he looked at Celestia, "Does she always interrupt people when they are speaking, or it is just me that she does that too?" Celestia just ignored him, giving the impression that she was grinning beneath her helm. Sighing he looked back at a sheepish looking Twilight "Before I was so rudely interrupted." she kind of flinched at that and Makarov had to admit that he felt a little bad at lashing out at her continued "There is also a kick plate at the bottom with instructions on it. Never understood why they printed them there but whatever. Let's get a move on, shall we."

Walking over to the panel, he scrolled down just a bit until he hit lvl ten. Seeing the option for Teleport party, he flicked it as the entire group winked out of existence, leaving the room empty as the rest of the Adventures looked on with wonder.

The party found themselves deep within the dungeon, faint light emanates from gems on the wall. Makarov looked over at Celestia to confirm something. "If I remember right, lvl ten normally can have anything from above up to anything from Bebilith to Brachiosaurus correct?" Celestia nodded, attempting to keep the noise down. Nodding to himself, Makarov summarized that the dungeon was still functioning the same way that he thought it would. Again, not only that, the layout might have been the same as well.

Figuring that he would just go with that for now, he directed them forward down the hall until they got to an opening into a larger room, just before entering, Makarov held up his hand signaling to stop. Speaking up, he addressed the group, "I will take this first room as an example. I will stick to using basic moves to show you the utility that you can utilize."

Rainbow scoffed at him "Yeah right, you're an egghead like Twilight. How are you going to show me anything that I can use."

Makarov felt a vein pulse in his forehead as he took a deep breath. "She sure is cocky for a newbie." He muttered to himself. Taking another breath, he calms down before getting an Idea, looking over at Celestia, he asks, "Thrasher or Anthem?"

He saw her jump for a moment when he asked but heard the mischievousness in her voice as she answered, "Thrasher."

Nodding, he stands in front of them as he lifts his staff in front of himself. {Sound Sphear}, {Bridge the gap, perfect rogue}. As the spells resolved, a white sphere of light appeared just above Makarov's right shoulder, a rainbow effect began to splash across its face as strange and aggressive beat began to play. As it began, Makarov began to glow as his equipment changed.



Grabbing two daggers that had appeared in the air, Makarov sped into the room as the beat dropped. The girls rushed forward to look into the room and were shocked into silence at what they saw. Makarov was running around like a madman as he screamed the lyrics to the dark song. Spinning through the air as he slashed through the thick necks of massive Fire Giants, their screams as they chased him around the room. They marveled at the size and were filled with terror at the sight of the gigantic monsters. Fluttershy passed out once the Bebilith made an appearance, and Rarity was close behind her as the massive spiders began to climb down from the walls. The girls felt for sure that they were going to be overrun when they heard another spell go off as the music changed. {Bridge the Gap, Perfect Monk}



They watched as he burst through the back of the massive spider that had begun to make its way toward them, his light leather armor now replaced with robes similar in function to Applejacks, thought of considerably better quality. His fists clad in similar wraps but shrouded with what looked like dragon heads made of flame. As the spider died, Makarov jumped back into the room to take care of more spiders while his spell lasted.

In his mind, Makarov couldn't have been happier. He had never been entirely out of shape in his old life, but he was never at peak condition before this happened. He felt so light, and with the menu aiding him, he felt like he couldn't lose. The current monsters looked scary, but any MMO gamer worth their salt knew that monsters at this level of the dungeon, were all designed to look super intimidating, but weren't really that bad. He recognized that this wasn't a game anymore. Still, after going with some tested tactics, he realized even the power scaling was the same as it was before. Honestly, he figured that the only reason they were also attacking him right now was that he was instigating the combat.

Every hit was a kill, even with swings that didn't utilize abilities or combos, the lvl difference was just too significant to be any kind of fair, but at this point, he was just making one for himself. He had grown fond of teaching new players in the past, but every now and then, a newb would join that needed to be shown how out of their league he was, to prove that he knew what he was talking about. 

He may or may not have a folder on his desktop with reaction vids. It was a guilty pleasure when he did this, making them go stupid and start to stutter was his favorite. As the second spell wore off, the room had grown quiet. The mobs had been slain, and their bodies had begun to shimmer as they wisped away into light motes. Leaving behind drops and money. 

Makarov stretched as he walked back to them, now clad in his mage robes once more. "Whoo, that was great. Good to let off a little stress, not bad for an egghead, right miss Dash?"

He grinned with an evil glint in his eye as she shuttered, "I-it was a-all r-right."

Makarov lasted all of three seconds before he burst out laughing, "HAHAHA! The look on your face was priceless. Looked like you were about to pass out. HAHAHA!" Wiping a tear from his eye, he looked over at Celestia "It reminds me a little of your reaction when I showed you the first time. If I remember right, it was in this cavern too?"

The glow from under her helm was bright enough that it shone through the slits in the visor as an extremely embarrassed Celestia began to stutter out "I-i h-have n-no i-idea what it is t-that you are talking a-about!"

Smirking, he just laughed "I remember it clearly, in fact, I have a recording of it if you all would like to see it." The girls raised their hands all at once to show their support, even Twilight and Fluttershy timidly raised their hands.


Celestia looked at her pupil, betrayal in her eyes, "Et too Twilight?"

Twilight's reaction was priceless, her face broke as she broke down in tears, crying "Nononononononononononononono! Princess, please don't be disappointed with me! I'm sorry I didn't mean it!"

Before she could get any worse, Celestia booped her nose as she stuck her tongue out, saying, "Got ya!" Her gentle laughter rolling over the purple mare as she pulled her close for a hug to override the mild trauma that she had just endured. "Do not worry about it. My dearest pupil. I know that you were just caught up in the moment. To be completely honest, I have no recollection of what my reaction was. It was over six thousand years ago. Though I imagine it was embarrassing enough that I chose not to remember it."

Speaking up to snap them out of their little world, Makarov offered, "Then let's take a look as see what it was, shall we?!" Twilight looked up at Celestia, and she smiled down at her, this time managing to hide the sadness in her eyes. She realized that she had taken the joke too far with Twilight, and was at the same time mad that she had been unable to see it for what it was. 

Makarov waived them over to the hallway next to the room after they collected the drops from the monsters so that they could be a safe distance away from monster spawn areas. As they sat in a semicircle with Makarov at the center with Fluttershy to his right and Princess Celestia is flanking his left. Twilight sat next to Celestia with Applejack next to her and Rarity on the outside. Rainbow sat next to Fluttershy with Pinkie on the outside as well. They all looked at the wall as another spell that Makarov used to project the memory.

In reality, it was a menu option so that guilds and parties could share information easier while keeping the immersion up. Players could purchase an in-game hard drive to store clips of things that were important. Most players never changed from the ones that were given from the discovery quest. They let you store up to six one-hour-long sequences, plenty of time if you are just using it to help you get past a specific area of the world. It let you watch back on what you had done so that you could figure out what happened and how to avoid it. It was possible to purchase through the cash shop an upgrade to the storage, with the most expensive option being unlimited storage. It turned out that it had been a glitch that had caused it to be unlimited, and the store had changed it to limit it to 1000 hour long vids. Still, for the few people that had purchased it before the patch, they had been legally obligated to either refund the item or let the players keep the thing.  

Considering that only around nine hundred people in the entire world had been wealthy enough to drop money on an item like that, most of them decided that they would rather keep the thing. The condition was that they were labeled as unique items and were perma bound to your character. To the point that the item was permanently equipped to your character in an individual slot. Again, none of the players minded having this. It didn't take up any available equip slots; it was always available because it was actively equipped, and it didn't show up visually, so it didn't mess with your aesthetic if you cared about that kind of thing. Makarov was one of those people that had purchased it.  

The scene before them looked like it was taken not from Makarovs perspective, but from right in front of a young Light pink Mare, her mane cropped short and close to her ears. She wore a tunic and pants that had been smeared with mud. A spear was gripped in the hand that was not holding her sister, a dark blue Mare whose long hair cascaded down her back with elegance. Her robes were patchwork but managed to cover her. A tattered spellbook lay next to her as they watched. Looking out at a scene that was likely close to what the girls had just witnessed. Their eyes glowing with wonder as they watched what was going on before them. The young Celestia clasped her sister's arm as they watched, her eyes wide as she watched Makarov fight. Her lips quivered as her eyes shone with interest. Makarov didn't look to his left, or he would have noticed that Celestia had begun to fidget as she watched a younger version of herself witness the strength of her then teacher. 

She grew restless as the memories of something that had happened so long ago began to flow back to her. She was pondering this for a moment before it slammed into her just an instant before it happened. As her horror took her over, her younger self spoke in a hushed whisper, that thanks to the projected image were boosted loud enough to be heard by all, "Selene, sister It feels as if I am in heat, this stallion must sire my foals." Her sister nodded and spoke up, "as well as mine Helios, as well as mine."

To be honest, Makarov had forgotten what their reaction had been. He had been a little creeped out by it the first time he had seen it but choked it up to them being super into the whole roleplay thing. But looking at it now, he realized what that sentence meant. They had never been into roleplay in the game. They had been themselves. That would mean. 

His head slowly turned to his left to see Celestia reaching out with her arm, her entire head had lit bright pink as her mane had burst into chromatic flame. Words had failed her at what had just happened. Looking down at Twilight, he was shocked to see her bright red as well and easily as silent, a look that said her brain had shut down, steam pouring from her ears. Applejack had hidden her face beneath her hat, and Rarity had her hand over her mouth.

Turning to his right, he found that Fluttershy had hidden deep into her hair. Under her new hat, Rainbow looked like she was trying to force herself to not laugh for fear of retribution, and Pinkie looked close to exploding.  

Deciding to try to act fast to defuse the situation, Makarov spoke up, "Well, that happened a long time ago right. You can't be held accountable for something that happened that long ago. We have all done embarrassing things, right? But that's what you do, you learn from them and laugh at them."

That seemed to be the thing that was needed to burst the dam as Pinkie began to gigglesnort, and Dash lost all composure as she broke out laughing and rolling on the ground. The sound snapped Twilight out of her stupor long enough to look at Rainbow and Pinkie with abject horror that they would be laughing right now until Celestia began to chuckle as well. 

It started small but grew as she allowed herself to laugh at such a young version of her. Her full belly laugh was music to the ears of the friends as she smiled at her own expense. "C-can you b-believe how s-short my mane was back then?! I looked like a colt. Hahahaha"

Glad that he hadn't ruined everything, Makarov joked as they all got up. "Yep, have to say it was interesting that you changed from the sporty tomboy to the Hot mom look." Not sure why it had come out of his mouth, he realized what he said as it left his lips, looking back at the Princess he swore the look she gave him was predatory "W-well then, let's keep going." Clearing his throat to sound more confident, he continued, "Ahem, that was just a little example of what you can do someday, and you could go further still if you work for it. The Next room is for you. Allons-y!"