"Lord Argon!"

"Yes?"

"I have just received word from one of our spies! She thinks she has found the Crystal Deity!"

"Hmmmm... Good. Contact Chrysallis at once! And prepare the Southern Army!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Finally... After all these years of searching... I shall finally become a god!"

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

"Then pray tell me why she is still an Earth Pony!" Celestia roared at her sister.

Wait... What? Ruby asked herself as she felt where her horn should be.

No horn... She thought as she touched her head. Turning around she looked at her back. And no wings...

"How... Can this be?" Ruby inquired as she looked at Luna.

"No matter..." Celestia growled as she strode between Ruby and Luna.

"I will do this myself." She declared as she laid her horn upon Ruby.

Once again Ruby felt the magic lift her off the ground as it attempted to enter her. Only this time she felt her body reject all the magic Celestia was trying to put into her.

"Everypony look out!" Ruby screamed as her body rejected the final bit of magic, yet her warning was to late. The magical energy exploded out of Ruby, hitting everypony in the audience, all the guards, Prince Shining Armour and all the other princesses, knocking them all to the ground.

"Sorry..." Ruby muttered as she bowed her head in shame,

"It wasn't your fault, Ruby." Celestia said as she got up.

"I don't understand." Twilight said as she picked herself up off the ground. "Has she ascended?"

"I know of a spell that will tell us." Cadence piped up as she walked over to where Ruby stood and rested her horn against her.

After a few minutes, Cadence took her horn off Ruby with a surprised look on her face.

"She is an alicorn..." Cadence said staring at Ruby. "But something is denying her of her horn and wings."

"Hmmm..." Twilight said as she looked over at her daughter. A few moments later her eyes widened.

"I'm going to the library." She said as she rushed into her castle.

After a few seconds of staring at the door Luna turned to the audience.

"You can all go back to your homes now, there's nothing more to see." She called to the audience. However she stopped five ponies.

"Applejack! Pinkie Pie! Fluttershy! Rarity! Rainbow Dash! Come with us!"

The five mares walked up the steps with confused expressions.

"Yes, Princess?" Applejack asked. "Why do ya want us here?"

"As you may have noticed, Ruby still doesn't have her horn and wings." Luna replied. "I feel it would be wise to have the elements of harmony with us."

"I think Twilight went to do some research." Celestia interjected. "Let's go help her."

The other nine nodded as they opened the doors to Twilight's castle.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

"Where is it?" Twilight asked herself as she poured through the mountains of books in her library.

"I could swear I had it- Ah!" She cried in triumph as she found the book she was looking for.

"Scale Of Magic! Perfect!" She exclaimed as she opened to the first page.

Scale Of Magic:
Chapter one: Mana Level

The Mana Level is the Mana Force of one particular enchantment, pony, alchemical brew, ect. When one object or pony exerts a higher grade of mana then an enchantment, spell, or brew then the enchantment, spell, or brew can be negated, undone, reversed, or streangthened.

"Good... Good..." Twilight muttered to herself as she scanned the pages. "But where is- Ah!"

The Grade of Mana Force:

Deities
Nature
Alocorns
Other ponies
Other creatures

While this order cannot be broken there are a few exceptions. For instance an alicorn may turn another pony into an alicorn, however an alicorn cannot turn an Earth Pony into a Unicorn or visa verse.
See ascension: page 39

"Okay..." Twilight muttered as she flipped to page thirty nine.

Ascension:

While an alicorn can turn other ponies into alicorns there can be certain exceptions. If an alicorn attempts to ascend a vessel the vessel will remain as an Earth Pony even though the alicorn Magic will run through the vessel.
See vessel: page 67

"Earth Pony?!" Twilight shrieked as she turned to page sixty seven. "Could Ruby possibly be..."

Vessel:

A vessel is the soul of a deity in the body of a pony. The pony has to be an Earth Pony and if the pony were to be born a Unicorn or a Pegasus or to ascend to become an Alicorn the vessel will remain an Earth Pony. There is absolutely no way around this. Vessels generally pass unnoticed as they have no knowledge of what they really are, however if one were to ascend their physical appearance would remain as an Earth Pony. However their deity Magic would combine with the alicorn Magic, giving the vessels access to their full power. The fusion of magic is not an instantaneous process. Depending on the age of the vessel. If the vessel is still young the magic fusion may take a few hours at the very least. If the vessel is old the fusion could last for weeks. During this fusion period the vessel may expirence pain or nausea.

See symptoms list: page 116

"Mom?"

Twilight turned around. There standing in the doorway of the library was Ruby, Cadence, Shining Armour, Celestia, Luna, Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Rainbow Dash.

"Oh! Hi, Ruby!" Twilight said as she caught her daughters confused look.

"Hey, Ruby?" Twilight asked.

"Yes, mom?"

"Could you... Maybe... Go out into the hall for now?" Twilight begged.

"Why?" Ruby asked as she raised an eyebrow.

"Oh... Reasons." Twilight smiled sheepishly at Ruby as she said this. "Rainbow... Could you accompany her? Just so she isn't alone?"

"Uhhhh... Sure, Twilight." Rainbow said, feeling just as confused as Ruby probably felt.

"C'mon, Ruby." Rainbow said as she made for the door, stopping to look back at Ruby. "Let's go."

"Uhhhh... Okay, then." Ruby said as followed Rainbow out the door.

After the door closed and Rainbow's and Ruby's hoof steps faded, Twilight looked back to the other ponies in the room.

"Okay, everypony." Twilight said, taking a deep breath. "I think I know why the ascension spell supposedly didn't work on Ruby."

. . .

By the time Twilight had finished explaining to everypony what she had discovered their jaws were all having open in shock.

"So... What yer sayin' is..." Applejack began as she took a step forward. "That our Ruby's a vessel for some sort of god?"

"To put it bluntly... Yes." Twilight replied.

"An' tha's why she's still an Earth Pony?"

"No, Applejack." Twilight replied. "She may look like an Earth Pony, but she's an alicorn."

At that moment the doors busted open as Rainbow burst through the room.

"TWILIGHT!!!" Rainbow screamed, fear in her voice. "Ruby just collapsed!"

"What?!" Everypony else screamed as they looked at Rainbow.

"The symptoms... I suppose it's begun." Twilight muttered.

"What are you talking about, Twilight?" Rainbow asked, confused.

"We'll have to explain everything from the beginning." Twilight said hurriedly as she dashed to the book and picked it up.

"Come on. Let's go to Ruby." She said as she galloped off.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Where am I? Ruby asked as she woke up.

She appeared to be in a white void. However there was somepony else there with her, but they were to far away to look at clearly.

As Runy galloped closer to the figure she noticed that the other pony was walking closer to her.

"Hello?" Ruby called as she approached the other pony. "Who are y-?" She cut herself short as she took a good look at the other pony. "But... You're me!

Her doppelgänger giggled slightly.

"No, child. I am not you." It replied. "I am your soul."

"Oh really?" Ruby asked as she raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, yes." Her soul replied.

"Well then..." Ruby began, pointing at her soul. "If you are my soul than what the hay is up with your wings? And while we're on the subject why do you even have wings?!"

Her soul looked almost exactly like her. However her normally sky blue iris' were glowing red on her soul. Her soul also sported a pair of crystal wings, similar to those ones she might find on a Pegasus, yet unlike a pegasus' wings these crystal wings looked like three crystals originating from the same spot.

"I am as you will be." Came the reply.

"Wait... What?" Ruby inquired.

Instead of a reply, her soul simply spread her wings and flapped them in Ruby's direction, sending out a blast of red energy.

As the energy washed over Ruby she felt herself loosing conciousness. Before she fell back to sleep she heard her soul speak one final sentence.

"Awaken to your destiny... Ruby."

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Ruby groggily opened her eyes as she woke up. Looking around she made out the blurry outline of her mother.

"Hi mom." Ruby said, shocked at how weak her voice sounded.

"Shhh... Don't talk, Ruby." Twilight said as she embraced her daughter. "You've been through a lot."

"But mom, I'm f-" Ruby was cut short as a wave of nausea gripped her. "Ugh!" She cried as she grabbed her head.

"Ruby!" Twilight yelled as her daughter began squirming in discomfort.

"Rrgh!" Ruby shouted as she slowly stopped squirming.

When Ruby opened her eyes once again Twilight let out a gasp.

Ruby's once sky blue iris' we're now glowing red.

"Mom?" Ruby asked, concerned.

"What is it?"

"N-nothing!" Twilight stuttered. "Let me get everypony else!" She said as she ran out of the room.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Shining Armour, Cadence, Celestia, Luna, Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Rainbow Dash were all in the throne room, pouring over Scale of Magic. When they saw Twilight running over to them at full tilt they promptly stood up.

"Is she okay?" Rainbow asked with a concerned look in her eyes.

Twilight shook her head. "I don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know?" Cadence inquired.

"I mean she had a bad wave of nausea and after that her iris' were glowing red. I don't know if those are just the symptoms or not."

To Twilight's surprise, everypony else looked relieved.

"Why are you all relieved?" Twilight asked sharply.

"It means that the magical fusion is going smoothly without any complications at all." Celestia responded as she stepped forward.

"Oh." Twilight said, simply.

"Y'know... Something's been bugging me..." Rainbow said, concern in her voice. "How does this pony know so much about all of this? They couldn't have possibly went to other vessels and asked them questions!"

"True, Rainbow." Twilight replied.

"Well... He might have been a vessel..." Fluttershy interjected. "If that helps."

"He might have been." Celestia said as she flipped to the very back of the book. "Let's check."

At the back of the book was a note.

To my beloved,

I'm sorry that I left. I wish I could have stayed to be with you and your sister.
And yes, I know you ask this now, but everything that I have stated here has happened to me.

Always yours,
Swirly

As they read this Celestia and Luna let out a gasp.

"Swirly? Who's that?" Pinkie inquired.

"Starswirl the Bearded." Celestia responded.

"What?!" Twilight shrieked at the top of her voice.

"We... That's is to say Luna and I... Were very close to Starswirl." Celestia replied.

"But Starswirl was a UNICORN!!!" Twilight screamed.

"Twilight..." Luna said as she shook her head. "You must remember that while Ruby's soul harbors a deity it is not the only deity. Starswirl's soul harbored a deity as well. The deity of Magic."

"But that would mean that Starswirl was born an Earth Pony." Twilight insisted.

"He was." Celestia said, her head hanging low. "But the day I ascended I took Starswirl somewhere private and cast the spell on him, too."

"You did WHAT?!" Everypony else cried out as they looked at Celestia in shock.

"I know... It was beyond stupid." Celestia mumbled. "But anyways once I had tried the spell didn't seem to work. The next day I went to see him and there he was. A Unicorn."

"That... Makes no sense." Twilight said as she shook her head.

"I know, Twilight." Celestia said as she walked over to Twilight. "But apparently there were reports of seeing Starswirl as an Earth Pony even after he was turned into a Unicorn. Which leads me to believe two things, one is that the deity of Magic allowed him to become a unicorn, and two is that deity Magic is like Unicorn magic. It's a little out of control at first. But after time it becomes easier to manage. So Ruby will need our help."

At the mention of Ruby, Twilight promptly facehoofed.

"Aargh!" Twilight yelled. "I just remembered that I promised Ruby that I would take you all to her."

"Then let's not waste time!" Luna said as she ran towards Ruby's room.

On the way there Twilight asked Celestia a question.

"Princess Celestia?" Twilight began.

"Yes?" Celestia replied.

"I'm just curious... Why did you tell the story about Starswirl?"

"Well, Twilight." Celestia said giggling. "I figured that you would want to know about deities. On top of that I thought it a good time for you to learn something about your favorite unicorn."

"Oh." Was all Twilight said.

As they got to the door to Ruby's room Twilight opened the door allowing everypony in.

"Mom?" Ruby asked, her voice shaking with fear.

Hearing a collective gasp from everypony else Twilight promptly rushed in.

"What is it, Ru-?" Twilight cut herself short and, like the others gasped at what she saw.

There was Ruby with a pair of wings that seemed to be crafted from rubies. Her face wore an expression of complete terror.

"What's happening to me?"

Author's Note

Aaaannnnnnddd.... It's out! Yay! I'm sorry if this chapter was awful. Which is why this story is going on hiatus until I get it organized. In any case I hope you all have a great day/night! And once again. Sorry if this chapter was dreadful.