The Wizard. Book One: The New World

Wizard Encyclopedia (Cut Edition):

Page One, History.

Magic. It appeared out of nowhere, carrying wast amount of knowledge and wisdom. Only a few had such power, even less could control it. Many young wizards died because of magical surges, bringing a lot of destruction with it. People started wiping out wizards and anyone who could use magic of any sort. People feared for their lives, feared that the magical apocalypse will come, destroying the whole world.

People burned books so that no one will ever try to use magic, they killed wizards, destroyed their houses, executed anyone who dared to help wizards. Fear ruled them all.

Page Two, Hierarchy.

There were Black, Brown, White and Gray wizards.

The Black wizards are archmages, their skill of magic and level of control is the greatest among wizards. They are able to cast powerful magic without wands or crystals, concentrating their magical energy through their hands. Only the best wizards earn the title of Black.
The Black wizards wear red and black clothes. They also bear a symbol of magic - six-pointed star with a round hole in its centre and a vertical line which cut through the material of the star. The symbol was often made of metal and attached to the left shoulder's protection.

The Brown wizards are common wizards. They do not need wands or crystals to perform simple and/or average magic, however they must use those items to cast powerful magic.
They wear brown robes similar to priests' ones.

The White wizards are students. They can use only basic spells. They study under the supervision of an archmage who teaches them how to control their magic and benefit from it.
They wear white clothes. There is also a piece of paper with a spell written that is attached to their left shoulder. The spell protects the student from hurting him- or herself, and tells the archmage of whereabouts of the student.

The Gray wizards are outcasts. They use their magic only to satisfy themselves, to gain power. They are not allowed to appear near any village. The punishment is death.

Page Three, Spells.

There are many spells that a wizard can use. Neutral spells, good spells, and evil spells.

Neutral spells can be performed by any wizard and require only some of wizard's strength to be performed.

Good spells can be used when you are filled with good emotions, such as happiness, love. Such spells can even bring dead ones back to life. They are mainly used to heal, to revive, to bring happiness and joy.

Evil spells can be used when you are filled with bad emotions, such as hatred, anger. Such spells are powerful but hard to control, and often drives their users insane. They are mainly used to hurt, to kill, to control minds, to bring destruction and pain.

Spells are cast pretty simply. Most of them require special hand gestures and verbal action, words in Latin. Some spells require only gestures or words, others don't need any action at all.

Written by Michael the Wise.

Five years after the purge started, most of magicians were gone forever. Only a few remained and hid well. One of them, Nikolay the Black, was on the run. His latest hideout was discovered.

Nikolay was a tall man, his height was at least one meter and ninety centimeters.
Nikolay had short black hair and no beard. His eyes were icy blue and glowed slightly.
He wore clothes of red and black, and brown leather boots. There was a symbol made of metal attached to his left shoulder. It represented a six-pointed star with a hole in its centre and vertical line cutting in the metal.

There was an organization that hunted down wizards and executed them for "Sins against God". All members of said organization wore white robes and carried crosses and weapons, such as swords, knives and crossbows.

Nikolay ran down the street. He prepared the teleportation spell as the last attempt to escape, his eyes were glowing solid blue. When he was about to release magic, cast a spell and teleport to his secret hideout, sharp pain shot in his right shoulder as a crossbow bolt hit it. A moment later Nikolay disappeared in a bright flash of purple light.

He felt down on his knees and hissed in pain. He turned his head and saw a crossbow bolt stuck in his right shoulder. Using his left hand, he pulled out the bolt, threw it away and applied healing magic to the wound. While it still hurt, the man didn't show any sings of being in pain. When the wound closed, Nikolay exhaled in relief.

Nikolay stood up and looked around. He was in a pretty dark forest. Strangely shaped trees stood all around him, their leaves covered almost all the sunlight.

Suddenly, the man heard a low growl behind him. He turned around and saw a timberwolf.

He has never seen such a creature before, and considered it as a creation of another wizard. However, he couldn't sense any familiar magic applied to the wolf in question. There was something entirely different to what the man remembered. Unfamiliar, untamed magic. Magic of Wild.

Growls sounded from all around him. The man looked around and saw green glowing eyes everywhere.

The man felt that the creatures were hungry. Yet, they approached him with caution. He guessed that the wolves have never seen humans before.

The man folded his index and middle fingers and thumb and pointed his hand at the biggest wolf.

"Uro." the man whispered. The wolf caught fire all of sudden. High pitched whining sounded from the wolf as he collapsed. Other wolves escaped such terrible fate and retreated back into the forest depths. The fire was soon extinguished by itself.

'Where am I?' the man asked himself in his thoughts. He looked around and saw a path that led deeper into the forest.

He walked along the path and felt that the forest itself was watching him. He often turned around but all he could see was darkness behind the trees. After the little incident with flammable wolves, other inhabitants of the forest didn't dare to attack the lone man. However, he was ready for another encounter, having a few battle spells ready to be cast upon foul beasts of the dark forest.

He walked along the path for about five minutes, and then he saw ruins of a castle just ahead of him. All he should do was to cross an old wooden bridge. However, the man didn't continue moving.

'Hm...' Nikolay thought. 'I feel something... A source of very powerful magic...

He looked down and saw a fain glow from a cave. Nikolay also saw a stairway to the bottom.

Soon enough, he stood in front of the Tree of Harmony. The majestic crystal tree was glowing and shining, its beauty stunned Nikolay. He had never seen such kind of trees.

He closed his eyes. He felt a very powerful magic which quickly overpowered his senses. He opened his eyes and exhaled, his hands were shaking and his eyes were glowing solid white.

Nikolay stepped closer to examine the tree. He noticed strangely shaped gems in them. He recognized shapes of a purple diamond, orange apple, red thunderbolt, lavender star, pink butterfly. What he didn't recognize was a cyan gem's shape.

The man walked closer and touched the lavender star. He felt the strong magic within it.

"Tell me your secrets." he whispered. But the tree pushed him away with a small gust of what seemed to be a wind. Nikolay understood that more attempts won't succeed either. He decided to head to the ruins he'd seen previously.

He exited the cave and made his way upstairs. He carefully crossed the wooden bridge, then headed to the castle.

Suddenly, a crack of thunder sounded and the pouring rain started. The man quickly ran to the old castle and entered it through the half-opened door. He had to crouch a little as the door was a little lower than the man.
He saw a strange monument with a stone ball on top. He walked to it and examined it. The monument had a faint trail of magic.

'How interesting...' the man thought. 'It has the same trail as that tree. Had those gems been stored on this monument before?'

He touched the monument. Cold, lifeless stone. And what Nikolay felt stunned him. He felt that the monument stored emotions. Desperation, regret, and sorrow. The monument was used as the last resort.

The man walked around the monument and moved further inside the castle. He opened big wooden doors and appeared in the large hall. The first thing he saw was two tapestries which pictured two alicorns.

'What are these?' Nikolay thought, moving closer to the tapestries. 'Symbol of some House? I have seen unicorns and pegasus, but I have never seen anything like these depicted creatures. A mix of both they are. Pegacorns?'

Suddenly, he heard clattering behind him. The man quickly hid in a dark passage to the left.

"Twilight, remind me, why do we have to come here, again?" a feminine, boyish voice sounded from the entrance. "I'm wet from all this rain!"

"You know as well as I do that the weather in the Everfree Forest is unpredictable." other feminine voice replied. "And we came here for the books. You could just not go with me, Rainbow."

"And leave one of my friends to this creepy old castle? No way!"

"Why are you complaining, then?"

A groan was heard.

Two ponies entered the atrium, cyan pegasus with rainbow mane and lavender alicorn with dark blue mane which had purple and pink streaks in it.

Nikolay watched the two, his mouth agape. He assumed that they were some kind of sentient tiny horses. Their heads shapes was different, they had big eyes. They were horses and at the same time they were not. Nikolay watched them from the shadow he hid himself in.

Two ponies slowly made their way to the passage where Nikolay was hiding. They passed by, not noticing him. Suddenly, something cracked under his foot. He fought the urge to curse.
Two mares turned around. However, Nikolay was still, not moving an inch. He stopped his breath and magically slowed down his heartbeat.

"Rainbow, did you hear that?"

"Scary? Nah, you said that this castle is falling apart yourself, remember?" Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. "There is nothing scary here."

"Better safe than sorry." Twilight Sparkle replied, her eyes fixed on a shadow. She slowly walked to it. She saw nothing but a strangely shaped pillar of dust. She touched it with her hoof and felt magic within the dust. She quickly pulled away.

"There is somepony here, I am sure. And it is a unicorn, possibly." Twilight turned her head to Rainbow Dash. "I can feel magic in this... Thing. Somepony is following us."

Unbeknownst to the two, Nikolay was already in library.

Nikolay walked among the bookshelves. Books were a little smaller than he expected, as well as the reading tables inside the library itself. He figured out that they were designed to be used by those ponies.

'This place has great knowledge, far greater than any library does.' Nikolay thought, picking up random book and looking at its cover.

'Magic for Beginners. History, Theory and Practice. Author - Star Swirl the Bearded. Hmm, I don't think I need this book, but something about it says that I should give it a chance. And I don't recognize author's name... Where did I wound up? I doubt it is the same world I've been before.'

Nikolay magically made the book smaller and put it in a pocket. He roamed around the bookshelves, randomly picking up books, reading their titles, then putting most of them in the pocket, reducing their size to one of a nail.

Then he heard familiar clatter of hooves behind him. He turned around and faced two ponies which were scared but ready to fight. He noticed that he towered above the two ponies, none of them could reach higher than his abdomen.

"Well, mister, who are you and what are you doing here?" Rainbow Dash asked.

Nikolay raised his hand, folded his index finger and thumb.
"Ego sum umbra." he said and disappeared. Two ponies just stared, not noticing that the shadow of the human remained in place.

"What was it saying and where did it go?" Rainbow Dash asked, dumbfounded. The same expression was on Twilight's muzzle as well.

"I have no idea, but he said 'umbra'. It rings a bell." Twilight replied, rubbing her forehead. "And he said... Ego sum umbra. It seems it is old Equish, even older than Early Modern Equish. Maybe I will be able to translate once I get back home."

"And what does it mean?"

"That creature is, at least, three thousand years old. Not so many ponies even know that old Equish even exist! Or maybe that creature is educated really good."

'Old Equish? So... Latin is called Old Equish here. And what is Early Modern Equish? And, how can I possibly understand these ponies? It doesn't make any sense to me.' Nikolay thought while he tried to find exit, being in his shadow form. His shadow moved across the floor and to the large hole in the window at the far end of the library

"What is fun in making sense?" a sinister voice appeared in Nikolay's head, causing him to shiver. Nikolay shook off the strange feeling and, unbeknownst to the two ponies, went through the hole in the window to the outside. He quickly made his way to the wooden bridge, only there he became whole again.

'Well, to sum it up, I messed my teleportation spell and got to the odd world of colorful talking tiny horses which can be unicorns, pegasus and pegacorns. Or maybe it's just a dream? Wait, no, it's impossible, I could feel the pain. Oh, and how much knowledge I have already seen with my own eyes! I just can't leave this world without studying it. Maybe I'll find something interesting or powerful or both. Oh, so many possibilities!'