The indefinitive properties of magic

Books, they contain all things that ponies have learned, if somepony thought it they wrote it in a book. This is the philosophy of a one Twilight Sparkle. If its worth writing about its worth reading. And so this day as most was spent in the library looking through the antiquated tomes of ponies whose names have long since faded from the memories of the world. Their only legacy living on in the pages of the books and other such documents they left behind. In fact, one could even say that in these pages they live on eternally. Their thoughts and dreams carried through time to be picked up by another who than passes the proverbial torch to the next and so on until eventually it is realized. For better or worse. And there she sat, the mare who currently held the torch of many a magus, snoring.

"Twilight!" Called a voice from afar jarring the mare from her sleep.

"Matter is made of several key elements that....." She sat up with a start. "Oh, its morning. Guess I fell asleep reading again." A small dragon rounded the shelf nearest to the purple mare.

"Twilight, you need to start setting a cut off time for reading." Spike said gathering papers from the floor and stacking them in a stack on the desk carefully avoiding the puddle of drool.

"Its not like I have a problem, I can stop reading anytime I want.... Okay maybe you have a point. Anyhow what time is it."

"Noon, I only came back to let you know I'm heading out for a few days. I'm taking a trip with the girls to go camping, they said something about cutie mark crusader lumberjacks? Don't worry I'll keep an eye on them."

"Oh." Twilight said wiping the edge of her mouth with her sleeve. "Do you want me to tag along?"

"Nah," Spike said dismissively "figure I could use some time away, anyhow I cant imagine you being any good at camping."

"Hey! I know a few things about camping." She said defensively.

Spike smiled smugly, "Let me guess, you read it in a book."

"Hmpf, I'll have you know I had several camping trips with Cadence as a foal."

"Realy? Where?"

"..... the royal garden." she said with a defeated look before perking back up, "Anyhow I hope you guys have a great time."

"Sure thing twilight." Spike said smiling. "Don't burn the place down while I'm away ok?" he said walking away.

"Hey! I'm an adult!" She called after him.

"Whatever you say Twilight, whatever you say."

Twilight humphed as he walked away, "Stupid spike, I put that fire out... eventually. Anyway, what was I doing? Ah right! I was looking through these old books Celestia asked me to catalog for her." She said picking up a box she had beside her. The cardboard holding the books however decided it was done and in an instant the entirety of the box spilled out onto the ground sending stray papers everywhere. "Ah shit." She said kneeling down and began gathering the papers together. As she stacked the books according to size she spotted in the corner of her eye a small leather bound journal. Normally this wouldn't be anything special, however this journals age seemed to far exceed the age of the other books and documents she was sifting through.

"Hmm, how did you get in here little one?" she said picking up the small tome turning over in her hands. The leather seemed to lack any moisture and was nearly brittle to the touch, any text imprinted on it was long gone. The journal was sealed by a long continuous ribbon fixed in place with a wax seal. The crest upon the wax was a sun and moon orbiting each other, the symbol of the princess. "And the plot thickens." Twilight said sitting back in the chair. Quickly casting a small cleaning spell she removed all traces of her spontaneous nap before placing the book upon the desk. Carefully she examined the seal and ribbon, upon immediate inspection the seal was far more recent than the book itself. Quickly she cast a detection spell upon the unassuming tome. She didn't think that the princess would be so careless as to send her a cursed book without alerting her but after years as the student to one of the most powerful beings in existence she tended to stray on the safe side. Her search came up empty however that left the question, why was it sealed? Now even though she did tend to favor caution, she was still a scholar. Careful she broke the seal careful to keep the wax in tact if it came to pass that it had some magical property she was yet unaware of. The book stayed just as it was, no monster or dark force leaped from it and devoured her soul. "Well, so far so good." Careful she peeled back the cover to find a plain white sheet of paper obviously inserted sitting on top of the first page, it read as such.

My dearest Twilight, I happened to find this old book among, of all things, some old census records. It is written in what I presume to be Latin of which I am shamefully rusty. As I have little time to devote to such things I figured that you would be best suited to handle this. Your Loving teacher, Celestia.

"Huh, I guess I'd better get started than the princess is counting on me." She said cracking her neck before putting the note to the side and leaning in to read the text. To her surprise the text seemed to be almost printed with only the occasional slip up, in fact she had seen some printed material that had less legible text than was written here. Sure enough however it was written in Latin which only further peaked her interest. And so for the next few hours she sat there pen in hand scribbling notes onto a piece of paper reading the small journal. The first part of the book listed the thoughts of a mage that was referenced only as 'O'. It listed his research into the fundamental laws of magic, the person narrating the book was obviously obsessed with something referred to as 'the prime magic'. Apparently it was a source of magic so ancient that it was said to have shaped magic as it is known today. It went on to list several theories as to how it could exists and to what extent it influenced the governing laws of magic. However as the journal continued on the once neat handwriting started to become more difficult to understand eventually reaching a point about two thirds into the book where the author simply scribbled random lines. The text also began to drift from the realm of reality becoming more and more vague. On one page a single word was repeated, 'reborn'. After the page where the author began to scribble illegibly it simply stopped. All pages that came after that were blank, save for one. On it was written in the original neat handwriting.

I can no longer stay here, my mind is breaking. I fear that if i stay amongst civilization I will do something horrid. Whilst I am still lucid I will leave this place and seal myself away, I will throw this journal into a magical rift. You who are reading this, if you seek my knowledge come to this place with this journal. It will guide you.

After the text ended there was written a series of numbers in a fashion that seemed like coordinates. Twilight sat back in her chair stupefied, she had come across her fair share of ancient tomes, but none had ever had such content. The most impactful thing that she had ever found was a book listing the accomplishments of a long dead monarch, all of which turned out to be romanticized nonsense written by someone obviously trying to cover up the failures of the monarch. She sat there for a good few minutes contemplating the implications of what she had just found. After a good seven minutes she stood up with fire in her heart. She had made probably the greatest discovery of her life, elements of harmony aside. She would be damned if she let this chance slip through her grasp. She quickly acquired a geographic map of both modern Equestria and Equestria from a time she estimated to be close to the age of the book. After a few calculations to factor in geographic shifts she eventually came to rest upon a part of what was known as the Equestrian badlands. Her resolve firm she quickly gathered the necessary gear for the region which included a cloth to cover her face arms and hands as well as a pair of goggles to shield her eyes, after suiting up and gathering a set of reagents for a long range teleportation spell she readied herself book in hand an muttered a short phrase. A familiar shifting feeling gathered in her stomach as she released the energy building up within her. For a few seconds the world around her devolved into shifting colors as her feet left the ground before reforming in a new pattern. The landscape before her shifted into view, like a camera focusing. It came forth as a sea of sand, golden and pure with the frequent jagged rock formation jutting from the ground like spires, looking around she found herself in a circle of the stones. Wind stung at her face as she pulled the shawl she was wearing closer as she chanted a small spell. A purple haze clouded her vision for a moment as she focused her mana into her eyes, as she did slowly the world began to change. The rock formations began to glow a faint blue before revealing arcane scribbles upon their surface. Each one had hundreds of thousands of spells woven into them with precision she recognized. Quickly she erected a barrier to shut out the wind so she could work in peace. As the barrier snapped into place the wind that had previously battered her ceased. Removing the improvised turban from her face she removed her goggles hanging them around her neck, as she looked around a thought occurred to her.

"Perhaps I should have informed Celestia of what I found before teleporting out here. Oh well, Spike was out and her castle has a barrier to prevent teleportation spells from working within Canterlot. I'm sure she'll understand, after all something this monumental isn't exactly back-burner material now is it?" She said reassuring herself. "Actually I'll bet she'll be glad of me for taking the initiative on this. Oh well we best not be to hasty, now where is that journal?" She concluded as she rummaged around through her satchel, after a few seconds her hand brushed against the familiar leather surface and she quickly pulled it out. "There you ar..." But before she could finish he sentence the obelisks suddenly began to hum in a deem baritone that shook her to her core. She felt her barrier fall but strangely the wind did not resume, instead blue sparks began to leap from the obelisks to the book which immediately burst into flame. Letting out a yelp she dropped the book, however the blue flame consuming the book gave off no heat. As the book smoldered away the obelisks began to send out more sparks, this time to each other. As more and more sparks flew the hum grew louder, to the point she had to cover her ears. A wind picked up again, but this time it swirled around the mare turning up the sand she was standing on revealing a stone dais covered in the same arcane symbols as the obelisks. Closing her eyes she crouched down trying to cover her face as she was pelted with granules of flying sand. Than just as suddenly as it started it ceased. Slowly Twilight stood up opening her eyes, the first thing she saw was that she was no longer in the circle of obelisks. Instead she stood in a large dome shaped circular room. The room was barren of anything save for a stone coffin that stood in the center of the room. Looking around she saw that there were no spiderwebs, in fact there was no dust at all. Hell the place looked cleaner than her house. The glow from before had left, in fact there were no inscribed magics in the room. Slowly she inspected the room finding naught but a small arch of stone that led looked more for decoration than use.

"Great." Twilight said, "Now I'm trapped in a tomb. Wait... I can teleport..... what in Taurus am I worried about?"

"Yes what are you worried about?" a voice from behind her said.

Jumping what must have been nearly three feet into the air she spun around with a shriek. Behind her stood a terrified stallion his eyes wide and hands in front of his face.

"Ahhhhh!" he screamed as he cowered from her. Blinking she looked at him more closely, his coat was a smokey color with small tufts sticking up here and there, his mane was an unkempt mess of brown curly hair matted into knots. He was wearing a long black robe that hung down to his feet where the ends were but tatters, evidence of dry rot.

"Who are you?" she asked pointedly. taking a step back from the disheveled stallion. As she did he ceased his cowering and looked up, realizing she wasn't trying to hurt him he corrected his posture standing to an unimpressive height that just barely exceeded her own.

"Me? Who are you? And why are you here?"

"Oh, sorry. My name is Twilight Sparkle, I followed a journal to a circle of obelisks and was transported here. Sorry if I startled you but this was a bit unexpected for me as well."  She said with an apologetic smile. For a moment the stallion starred at her with a puzzled look before suddenly smiling.

"Ahhh! My journal! I forgot I even made that thing!!! Welcome my name is Oroberos Et'luxa Bel'Avici, and this is my prison." he said holding his arms our spinning in place with a look of utter glee on his face.

"Wait, prison!?! And wait, you wrote that? It looked old enough to bee at least a hundred years old and you barely look a day over twenty!" She said. And it was true, the stallion looked to be as if not younger that Twilight herself. The stallion paused and turned back to her.

"A Hundred? No no no no no, I've been here far longer than that! I lost count around five thousand six hundred and eighty four. In fact I dare to say its been twice that amount of time." he said nonchalantly. Twilight's jaw nearly hit the floor.

" Five thousand! H-how! What, who are you?!?" she sputtered. He looked at her  with a puzzled expression.

"I told you my name is Orob.."

"Yes I heard you but... ok hold on. You are 'O' from the journal?"

"Yes, that was the name I used. Actually now that I think about it please use that name instead of my real one. Much easier to pronounce... and remember. I had to write it down when I first came here so I didn't forget it." Twilight stared at him in disbelief for a moment before letting out a breath.

"Whatever," she said. "I've seen weirder. But going back to what you said, this is a prison?"

"Yup." he said.

"Great." Twilight sighed. "Now how do we get out of here."

"That's easy! You go out the door!" He said smiling as he pointed to the archway to nowhere. As he did the stone behind it shimmered. "Simply walk up to it and think of a door and it will make it appear! The prison is only meant to keep me in, I didn't want anypony eltce to get caught inside! See before I left for here I destroyed all the doors I knew of! So I cant leave here without somepony's help!"

Twilight looked at him dumbfounded. "So you imprisoned yourself here? OK, I read the journal but to be fair toward the end it got a little... mixed up. All I got from it was that you felt unsafe and decided to come here."

The stallion's smile faded a bit at this. "Ah, well you see. In my time I was a potent magi. During that time I sought what I thought to be the origin of magic. What I found nearly consumed me, as so I locked myself here as to keep myself from becoming something terrible."

Twilight looked at him and patted him on the shoulder with a smile. "Well it seems your worries weren't needed. You seem sane enough to me!"

At this his smile vanished completely. "No, not entirely. This is what is left of me, I am not the same pony I once was. In fact aside from that information and my name I remember nothing about who or what I was. In fact I barely remember my time in here. Now that I think about it the only real concrete memory I have is when you popped into the room." The two of them stood there for a moment in silence, unsure of what to say. However after a bit he broke the silence, "Oh well, anyhow I'm sorry that you came here for naught but at least it was fun! Now lets get you home!" He said taking her by the hand and dragging her to the arch, as they approached the wall shifted and shimmered before settling upon a wooden door. Her door!

"Wow!" she said approaching it. "I never thought of using translocation magic like this. It's incredible!"

"Relay?" he said. "Well thanks than, coming from a mage like you that means a lot!"

Now it was her turn to look at him. "How did you know I was a mage?"

"Oh, I sent my journal through a rift to find the strongest and most stable magic source it could find. That journal was old when I tossed it in! Anyhow I guess this is goodbye, the teleport was a one time deal. Once you leave you can never return sadly. But what is life but a series of random encounters. It was a pleasure to meet you miss Sparkle!" he said with a bow that looked doubly ridiculous given his stat of attire.

After a chuckle at his expense she stopped, "Wait aren't you coming with me?"

He looked at her surprised, "Well, I don't know! The thought never occurred to me. I guess it might be nice to see the world again... Only if you want me to of course. I don't want to be any bother. I locked myself in here for a reason."

Twilight was take aback, this stallion had consigned himself to a life of imprisonment to keep from becoming a monster. Even long after his madness had faded he still remained strong in his conviction to stay. No pony who would go to such lengths to keep the world safe could be truly bad. If the god of chaos could be reformed than why should somepony like him stay locked away for a crime he never committed. Firmly she grabbed his hand, a look of determination in her eyes as she turned and opened the door pushing it open and dragging him with her into her living room.