Afterlife Prime

Chapters

Birth
Adventurer
Ponyville
Contest

Birth

Hello! First off I would like to say that this is a fairly experimental fic, which to be honest I am not entirely sure even qualifies as fanfiction; though as it is fiction written by a fan, with ponies in it I figured it was worth posting in the hopes that it wouldn't be removed for its lack of being in Equestria. (This experiment should be telling as to whether or not I should post the adventures of the Pathfinder Pony Party I am currently DMing as well; though that does take place in Equestria, or at least Pre-Equestria.) If it turns out that it ISN'T supposed to be here, could you please advise me as to where I should post it.

This is my first attempt at writing something here, and unlike most of the things I write I am making an honest commitment to some day finishing it. I hope someponies find it to be enjoyable and original. Please feel free to criticize as you will.

~Dreamshadow

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I closed my eyes, excited to begin. I can’t believe I got invited! Most of my friends had given up; saying you either had to be rich or talented to get in; but I figured if tens of thousands of people were playing every night it couldn’t be that hard. Besides, I would never be able to live with the idea of failing at something like this.

It had taken some effort, but it would certainly be worth it. As my ordinary consciousness faded and my body went to sleep a felt an unfamiliar buzzing. Suddenly I found myself standing in a perfectly circular blue room. Actually I had a second thought, looking down I saw that I was doing nothing that could properly be described as standing, rather I was floating, and I seemed to have no body. This was certainly new, I appeared to be a perfectly round white ball. Nobody had told me about THIS part of the game.

There were four doors leading out. Two were nondescript, one red, and the other blue. One was a large iron door that seemed to scream “KEEP OUT”. The last was the one I had heard of: The grand gothic arch behind which the world of Afterlife Prime lay. Between me and it was a blue table. It had a strange machine with a lever on it. The table lit up.

“Welcome to Afterlife Prime! What form of avatar will you be taking. Keep in mind that you are free to create a new avatar at a later time.” A friendly sounding feminine voice said. The table glowed in rhythm with the voice as it spoke. This was exciting, I heard most people went with what they knew and were humanoids of some sort, going for small changes like a tail and cat ears, or elven features, or robotic limbs. That sounded boring to me, in a game where you could be anything, why bother with something so close to what you already were.

I considered all of the options I had gone over in my head: I had considered being a Dragon, but I would likely end up being slow and having a hard time moving as one. A bat would certainly be maneuverable, but unless I made myself unnaturally huge I would have a hard time manipulating objects. Pegasus? Oh yeah, flying: check; nerd appeal: check; maneuverable: check.

Yeah I’m a brony, sue me. “Pegasus, Equestrian; Green with a yellow and purple mane” I said.

“Equestrian Pegasus recognized; A popular option today. What gender will you be? Genderless pegasi are available.”

No thanks! I thought. So pegasi are popular eh? I guess I’m far from the only Brony playing this game. Trying out a female body was a little tempting, but I wanted this to be my MAIN avatar for the game, not just some experiment. “Male” I said.

“Visualize the model, The Afterlife program will assist in generating a body matching your desires.” This was the part in which some people were booted, even after being invited. People who could not visualize a body for themselves well enough for the game to create simply couldn’t play. At first the game tried to put people in preconstructed, template bodies; but every last one of them suffered from rejection syndrome. In the game they had had limited muscular control, inconsistent movements, and worst of all dangerous feedback. Out of the game things were even worse.

It had been a disaster that had almost ended the game entirely. People in the real world began to suffer from temporary paralysis, chronic pain, and even mental instability. Thousands worldwide ended up needing medical care in a space of only two days for rejection syndrome. Governments worldwide had tried to illegalize Afterlife, and the company had suffered extreme economic losses.

But an idea this good, and this developed, wouldn’t die so easily. Now people needed to go through screening to get in. And they did. I had been training for the past two months. Beforehand I had already been good at visualization. I closed my vision; like closing my eyes, but as a shapeless blob I didn’t have those; and imagined the pegasus I wanted to be in vivid detail.

I wanted to be lithe, tall, and have a large wingspan. More so than most of the ponies on the show. I would be green and have a messy mane, kinda like how Vinyl Scratch keeps her mane. My cutie mark obviously wouldn’t magically appear to recognize a talent in the game, so I had thought of something cool to put on my flank, something that represented me as well. I put a silver runic D20 sprouting wings. Let gamers behold and beware, I was a real nerd.

“Model accepted” the friendly voice said. “Congratulations, and again welcome to Afterlife prime.” As it said this I heard two loud clicks from behind me, and a rumbling in front of me. More importantly I FELT the rumbling through my HOOVES. “What will you name your Avatar?” I was too excited to answer the program.

I opened my new purple eyes with excitement, feeling the air moving around the chamber as the stone doors leading into Afterlife slowly grinded open. The game certainly had a sense of drama, but I could not mind less. What would ordinarily be cheesy and slow to me had me excited. Almost as much as my body. I could FEEL my wings, I had a whole new set of limbs and I could feel them all as naturally as if I was born a pegasus.

I flared them outwards and just looked at them. OmigoshOmigoshOmigosh I have WINGS and feathers. I looked at where the wings met my coat, the strange transition from feather to fur looking perfectly natural. Then I looked between my legs. Everything was in order. I jumped around gleefully, the strange feeling of the metal floor on my hooves one of the most exciting things I had ever felt.

Then I flapped my wings a few times; no takeoff. I frowned, then ran a little and jumped, flapping my wings then. I got off the ground and began to glide, gleefully excited; then immediately attempted to brake to no avail, crashing into the wall. Note to self, flying takes space. That HURT, not as much as one would expect from crashing into a wall, but it hurt nonetheless, the game did give a perception of pain. I knew that, but still had to feel it firsthand.

I realized that the voice had asked me for a name, and I should probably reply. “Fractal Cloudfront” I replied. It wasn’t much of a pony name. It didn’t represent any talent of mine; it just sounded cool. I had made a lot of characters in my day, and at first I had always been worried about naming them. A name was, after all, something that would stick with you throughout a game. But as time went on I had learned that worrying about it too much was more likely to land you with a name you didn’t like than if you just went with your gut.

“You have 1 class level to assign” The voice informed me, “I personally recommend a class that comes with the possibility of magically assisted hovering.” Holy shit, the introduction program comes with a personality. I laughed a little, “You watching me crash bro?” I asked.

“Oh yes” it responded, “I always watch the enthusiastic ones” It’s voice took on a slightly creepy tone as it said that.

“If you don’t mind me asking, what exactly are you?” I asked.

“Oh energetic and curious! Well, I am a program constructed by the grand dreamer himself for the express purpose of being able to communicate in a friendly manner with absolutely anyone and everyone! I am currently holding over 487 conversations with players. But this one just became the most interesting of them.”

“You get interested?” I asked.

“Oh yes, the master doesn’t tend to make emotionless programs.”

I thought about this for a moment. I knew that the only computers that had managed to pass Turing tests had imprints that used to be living people in them. But this was different. I hope! I had a scary vision of a black robed man calling himself the grand master imprinting peoples minds into a giant machine trying to find the perfect greeter for the game, leaving behind streets full of soulless husks.

“I believe you should get back to choosing a class for yourself.” The not-computer program stated. I got myself back on task, adding her/it to my list of mysteries to solve.

I had thought this through, there were over 40 classes in Afterlife, some had magical powers, others came with unreasonable physical abilities, others came with the ability to create and use unrealistically cool technologies. Some were suited for the combat aspect of the game, others were entirely dedicated to exploration, crafting, racing; or almost any other leisure activity you could imagine. There were even classes that specifically specialized in sex.

I wanted something that gave me a balanced experience. Since this was going to be my main character I wouldn’t want to be fragile or limited as far as where it could go or what it could do. But I didn’t require some god of destruction as my avatar either. If it came to combat I would win through skill and cleverness, not powerbuilding.

“Monk of the Inner Circle” I stated.

“Level applied, please assign your two ability points”

A glowing chart appeared in the air before me. I brought my hooves together, intending to crack my knuckles... Oh right, no fingers. I settled for popping my right foreleg to the side. The feeling of my avatar’s shoulder popping was infinitely satisfying. Walking up to the chart I saw an array of abilities related to boosting physical abilities, or restricting physical laws. The first kind were called the Soul tree, the second Universe. Each tree further split into five categories.I looked at some of the higher level abilities of the second kind: “Weight mastery” , and “Phasewalk” catching my eye. Having studied the class I quickly settled on two. “Regenerative Burst” A reliable use of my Ki, and “Hover” a passive ability. which recent experience suggested I might need.

I turned around “So where do those doors go?” I asked the program. “The blue door exits into natural dreamspace, going through it will put you into a normal REM sleep, it is the recommended exit from the game. The red door will immediately awaken your body. It is a more uncomfortable option, and will sometimes lead to waking with fatigue. The steel door leads to the outside, access to this door is forbidden without a key from the Grand Master Dreamer. Okay, that just got added to my extreme curiousity list.

“What about that machine?” The strange device with a lever on it hadn’t moved throughout my character creation. “The machine is a dispenser of complementary chocolate cookies, Enjoy!” I curiously reached a hoof out and pushed down on the lever, sure enough, a blob of chocolate paste came out of a tap and settled into perfect cookie form. I took a bite. It was very, very good.

“The Grandmaster Dreamer is kind and fond of chocolate” The voice explained. Okay anyone cool enough to program that in is cool in my books. Even if he also programs his introducer bots to be cultists. I would have to learn more about this ‘Grand Master’ later, right now I had the whole of Afterlife prime to explore. I smiled, walking through the grand stone arch; and into a new world.

My new world was bright. And I don’t mean that figuratively. Note to self, get shades. The room I was in was boring, worked stone pillars and a worked stone floor, the kinda room DMs barely bother to describe. The area however was far from inactive enough to be considered boring. There was a crowd of... People might be a generous word, while most of them were more or less humanoid I saw three dragons, something that looked like a Dalek, a towering demon with mouth tentacles and a pincer for a right hand, and a giant three tailed cat. And that was just at first glance.

My avatar was not attracting much attention. I heard someone to my side complement an angel on her avatar, then immediately begin flirting with her. Elsewhere a catlike hominoid and a fairy were dueling with rapiers while bystanders placed bets. Holy hell they are fast! My eyes stood no chance whatsoever of tracing their blades, and I had to focus pretty hard to keep track of the cat’s feet. Whenever the fairy tried to fly out of reach, the cat jumped over her to keep her from getting a height advantage. I looked away.

I saw a hooded character with a comically large backpack and six robotic arms quickly setting up an item shop. He sold everything from beverages to landmines it seemed. And as comically large as the pack was, I was beginning to suspect that it was even bigger on the inside.

I walked over and looked at the beverages he was setting out.

“Welcome valued customer, to my humble shop.” He began in an autotuned robotic voice, “I am Shazad the shopkeep, and have all that true adventurers of any cloth need. I sense the spirit of adventure in you.” His glowing yellow orbs gave me what I was sure was supposed to be a meaningful look. “Have you need of magicks to keep you safe, or perhaps drinks to thrill the tongue?”

I looked again at the various bottles lined up to the left of his stall. I found to my surprise that I was rather thirsty, and trying out my new sense of taste would be nice. I sniffed the air. It smelled like downtown Vancouver. The smell of various nationalities gathering by a dock to sell varied foodstuffs. I regretfully looked at the various bottles and, I was now noticing rations. Shrugging my wings I said “I don’t really have anything to pay with.”

Shazad tilted his head, “I will do business for future favors” he said. I gave him a second look, “That sounds dangerous.”

“But one with a true adventurers spirit would like danger”

“You won’t make me betray anyone, break any laws, or lose my avatar will you?”

“No I can promise that your favor, when I call on it, will be legal, at least by the laws of earth, will not require treachery or dishonesty, and, while it may lead the body you have to death, will not lead it to being banned.”

I considered this, “And how much would this favor be worth in merchandise?”

He considered this, then took two bottles, a small satchel, a pair of sunglasses, and something greasy wrapped in wax paper and placed them in front of me on the counter. “Mead, Cider, lesser bag of holding, cool shades, that I assure you fit ponies, and what might be thought of as Lembas bread. All bottomless, all of the highest quality.” Bottomless food and drink... this place was getting better and better!

“Throw in a waterskin and we have a deal.” As nice as mead is, endlessly drinking it was sure to have some drawbacks, even here.

“A deal we have, I look forward to our next meeting” Shazad said.

I threw the shades on, and put the satchel over my shoulder. I immediately felt cooler. As I walked away from Shazad I saw another customer approach him: this one a Gorilla in a Tuxedo. Looking around , I was still awestruck at the sheer scale of this world. The stone lobby chamber had seven exits. The one nearest to me seemed to exit to a beach of some sort. Across the way I saw an exit that led to some kind of pleasant looking meadow. Skipping past the exit into a volcanic wasteland, and getting a whiff of sulfur I stated towards that gate.

I noticed that I was not the only pony near the area, An Azure blue unicorn with a cutie mark of a notepad and a light green mane was in the room, and she was on the verge of tears.

What the hay? I thought. Then I saw the human talking down at her. I took to the air and rushed over to hear part of the conversation: “What’s wrong, why else would you be a horse if you didn’t want to be my mount; huh? Unless... you don’t want me to MOUNT you in another way do you pervert?” I didn’t bother announcing myself, instead just tackling the jerk to the ground. He fell over, completely surprised, but quickly recovered and threw me off.- hard. I skidded across the ground, a small group of humans backpedalling to get out of my way. Real helpful guys. They continued walking.

I took a look at the guy who had thrown me: Muscular human with sharp shoulder pads jutting out to the sides of a long red and gold cape. Carries a sword that looks like Cloud Strife’s Buster Sword. Stands about 7ft tall, heavily muscled, and has hair like Goku. Fuck the 90's. “Oh look, another one of your horsey friends, maybe he can be a mount for my friend.” He drew his sword. “Or maybe I’ll just kill him.” He gave what I am sure was supposed to be an intimidating scowl.

“Yeah or maybe you’ll realize that this is a no PVP zone and buck off to let people have fun with the game before you make a fool of yourself and get banned.” I replied calmly.

He began laughing in an exaggerated way, slapping his knee and playing it up “Oh BUCK off, that... that is hilarious, the horse actually uses horse puns and expects me to take it seriously. Well, even if I did fight you here, you started it, but... okay fine I’ll just be BUCKING off then.” See you in the real game, pony.” The Jerk, as he would now forever be known to me as, walked away into the crowd. A couple of people had stopped to watch our argument, but apparently it didn’t hold their attention for long.

“Um... thanks.” The mare said, “sorry about that... I’ll get out of your mane now.”

“Wait!” I exclaimed, she jumped. “What is your name?”
“Azure Lily” she responded, “I’m new to the game and that guy threatened me, I’m not a combat class so I got scared, and he kept calling me a pervert and...” She was beginning to get stressed all over again.

“It’s okay, some people are just jerks, This game isn’t any different than the internet in that aspect.” I said. “Besides, I don’t mind, this way I get to meet a cute mare right off of the start of the game and look like a hero!” I pounded my chest as I said this raising into the air in a hover. Hovering was surprisingly easy with the new ability, unlike my first try it seemed it just happen naturally; I was flapping my wings, but I could tell they were doing less than the magic of the ability. Well as a ‘gravity’ ability I should expect as much.

Her eyes widened in alarm, “You mean you are level one? And you made enemies with a fifteenth level Spellsword just for me?” I looked at her in confusion. “Fifteenth level?”

“Yeah, didn’t you look at his character sheet?” I hadn’t. I knew that you could call up a character sheet with a simple mental command, but I hadn’t thought to do it. I looked at her.

Azure Lily First level Pathless Sage, Abilities in short range scanning and dimensional hopping... Wait, she has her abilities public? Non combat for real I guess. “I forgot to look. Not to be rude or anything but... you could have just dimension hopped away from him”

“Um, I forgot” we both laughed a little.

“So, Fractal, um, you seem nice, so....” She began.

“The answer is yes, yes we are going to hang out.”

She smiled “~yay” she said in a Fluttershy voice, we both laughed. She began to trot to one of the lobby exits. Through the exit I saw bright green grass, which despite being just ordinary grass looked prettier than real grass ever had to me. And tastier, I tried eating some, it tasted like grass.

Half of me was saying what did you expect the other half was saying holy hay, even the grass has flavor programming, Afterlife Prime is intense.

My mouth politely swallowed the grass, a stoic expression on my face. Lily was giggling at me. I gave a goofy grin then gestured downwards “Wanna try some?”

Lily just continued giggling. We were on a pristine plain of grass and clover. In the distance to my right there were small hills, surrounded with dense temperate forests rose up. To the left were more fields, these ones filled with strawberries, and in the distance I could see a city of prismicolour spires. As well as a lone spire off to the left, this one taller than the city and made of black stone. Hello high level dungeon! We were on a rough trail, ahead I could see a settlement of some kind. And above us only sky.

“Gimme a minute Lily, I gotta try these wings out.” I said. She nodded and pulled out a notepad. “Sure, meet me by those woods, I’m going to scan around some, and see what kind of useful or awesome plants and animals are around.” She began to trot off at a leisurely pace.

I flew up as quickly as I could to a nearby cloud, dramatically stopping before it to kick at it with a forehoof, and a goofy expression on my face. It poofed around my hoof, splashing me with moisture. I looked to another cloud about 200 feet away. ReadysetGO! I thought before accelerating as fast as I could towards it. My new body didn’t let me down. I felt a wake of air forming around me as I went faster than I would ever be able to in my real body. Faster than any human could go. I was at the cloud faster than I had expected, forget ten seconds flat, that was like- six.

I flew straight through the cloud, soaking my coat on my way through as I felt it’s poofy resistance slow me down. I did a barrel roll, then another, and another until I was dizzy and had lost enough altitude to be at tree height. I slowed to a hover dizzily in front of a tree at the edge of the forest, catching my breath. I floated right up to it until I could touch my hooves to it then kicked off as hard as I could, doing a backflip and landing on all four hooves in front of the tree.

I feel GOOD. I thought. If I had tried anything approaching that much sprinting on the ground with my human body I would be gasping asthmatically for air. And I’m not bad at the whole flying thing either, I guess it’s enough like swimming. Or maybe the body comes with instincts, but that would be weird. Would it, everything else is programmed to the nines. The implications of such a thing for training were crazy.

I took off again, this time angling myself upwards and away from the forest. I was going to see how high I could go. I managed to get well above the cloud cover and was surprised that it was getting cold, really cold. You should stop being surprised at how real this place is. Just accept that this place is utterly real... except spatially. I recalled the lobby, but looking back the way we came all I saw of It was a small gate, past which more fields and forests persisted. There was no Volcanic waste to the right of the gate where a door in the lobby would have led.

I drifted above the clouds, the cool thin air refreshing me as I got a look at the surroundings. After a few minutes I decided to get back down to earth. I took a steep thrilling dive. Leveling out I far overshot the edge of the forest, and had to work to make it back to the edge. On my way I saw that the forest was inhabited by goblins. They seemed angry at me, judging by the way they shook spears at my flying form. But I was well out of their range, and moving quickly.

I landed between two trees near the edge and began to skip a little on my new hooves. I was enjoying the look of the trees, a strangely intelligent looking squirrel chittered at me. I wonder if he’s a player? Hell, I wonder if the TREES are players. I thought for a moment about trying to make a tree avatar in the future. If I did I think I would be honour bound to make it yellow and pink. But how would I get out of the lobby?

It didn’t take me long to find Lily. After all, I had had a fairly quick flying session. She was closely examining a blue flower... A very familiar looking blue flower.

“LILY WAIT!” I yelled as she picked it up with her telekinesis. She was about to get poison joked! She looked at me, and then at the flower floating in front of her. She smiled and floated it closer to me “Take a sniff Fractal!” She said. I yelled and backed away, “This isn’t funny Lily, I just got my wings, I don’t want them to turn into cabbages!”

She telekinetically tossed the blue flower at me as I hurriedly tried to evade. But it was no use “AHHH” I yelled as the evil blue thing touched me. “What is it doing to me?!” I felt an uncomfortable itching in my wings and started rubbing them furiously with my front hooves.

She just stood there giggling lightly. Then took the flower and put it in her mane. “Are you CRAZY!” I asked.

“You do know we aren’t in Equestria don’t you?” She asked me. I stopped scratching my wings. “And you do know that one of the abilities I took with my very first level is specifically for scanning to properties of simple items?”

I gave her a glare. She shrank a little “oh, I’m sorry, you were really scared there weren’t you?” She asked. GAHHHH. Now I officially feel like a jerk. I let up on the glare and gave her my best friendly smile and a chuckle, “No, I admit, that was funny as hell.” She immediately relaxed.

And was hit in the side of the head by a lightning bolt. Her eyes opened up in shock as the singed flower blew out of her mane. Mine opened wide in fear as she dropped to the ground, bleeding. And as I looked to my left I heard a laugh.

First Level- Monk of the Inner Circle- abilities learned: Regenerative Burst, Hover
Title: Neophyte. Location : Elyrem Wilds
Party members: Azure Lily

Adventurer

I exploded off of the ground towards him with a feral roar. Putting all of my newfound speed into a charge. He casually took his blade, still arcing with lightning and slapped me aside like I was made of rags. I hit a nearby tree with a variety of cracking sounds. And from how it felt only one of them came from the tree. My wings hurt, my ribs hurt, and if I was thinking that this was a game I would have been astonished that this much pain had been programmed in.

But right now I wasn’t thinking of it as a game, I was thinking of my new friend being hurt. I poured a Ki point into regeneration and had the eerie experience of feeling my wings begin to reknit. The jerk looked at me casually and shook his head, “I’m disappointed bro- here I was expecting you to love and tolerate the shit out of me.” His blade began to glow with light just as my wings felt whole again.

As I took off his casual swing severed the tree where an indent marked my recent position. “Oh-ho, pretty spry for a first level character. You some kinda veteran toying with a play character? Is that why you and your little girlfriend are too proud to get mounted like real little ponies?” He looked up at my position above him, and taking his massive blade in one hand, raised his left hand and snapped his fingers.

A chain series of explosions erupted upwards, creating an ascending wall of pain. I felt one clip me. If I were higher level, that amount of damage would only be a deterant, but as I am... If I got hit head on I was dead.

He casually aimed his sword up at me, glowing explosions from his previous spell still erupting around me. “BANG” he said as lightning shot straight from his sword. I dodged the main bolt again, but getting clipped was enough to drop me from my flight. I crashed to the ground, then poured the rest of my Ki into regeneration. This is rediculous!

He scowled, “Well fine, if I can’t ice you I guess I’ll just...” I saw him turn around, to where Lily had fallen. This time I didn’t charge right in. Instead I picked up the biggest rock I could find, then, with my body repairing itself rapidly rose as high into the air as I could, while I hugged it to my body with my hooves. It was easily the size of my head. It should leave a nice one in his. I flew out of his sword reach over his head and dropped it, he tried to swat it aside with his sword, but it landed on his wrist with a satisfying cracking noise.

I flew over him and quickly dropped between him and-- A scorched tree with nopony lying next to it. Turning around I saw that he was good and angry now. “A ROCK, I GET HIT BY SOME AMATEUR PONY WITH A ROCK!” He ignored whatever damage his wrist had taken and took his sword overhead in both hands, then slammed it into the ground.

Which promptly exploded upwards around him, uprooting trees and throwing me backwards while pelting me with a random assortment of rocks and pieces of tree. I felt my new ribs break for the second time in the last couple of minutes. Okay, so it doesn’t hurt as much as real broken ribs, but still OW. At least Lily had managed to get to safety.

The ground glowed blue beneath me and I fell straight down THROUGH the earth. Okay, getting away from the ego case... good, but seriously weird. I landed with a thump on a stone surface, nothing but earth above me. To my right a man in a purple and green pinstripe suit with a matching pinstripe top hat lounged lazily against the wall, only visable by the light of a blue glowing necklace shaped like a drill. He was smoking a pipe.

“Yo” he said, “I heard you needed a rescue” I noticed that his eyes were yellow where they should be white, and had blood red irises. His teeth were sharp.

“Um, thanks I guess.” I reached into my satchel, still miraculously on my side and tried to pull out the mead I had bought earlier. Injured and using hooves it was a difficult task. “It is good to see that some players have a sense of benevolence.” I said this in a sincere tone, but honestly expected him to want a favor.

“Oh less a sense of benevolence, and more a sense of fun! It is no fun losing your first character to an overbearing player killer. I can think of far BETTER ways to get your first character killed!” I finally managed to get my hooves around the mead bottle and took a deep drink. The sweet flavor washed the taste of stress and adrenaline out on my mouth, I found I enjoyed it quite a bit.

I offered him a swig, which he gladly took, leaning over to retrieve the bottle from my hooves. He passed me a glowing blue bottle in return. I looked up at him questioningly. “Healing potion” He stated. I gladly took it. The feeling of muscles and bones squirming back into place quickly following. It is a little unsettling how quickly I’m getting used to that feeling.

“So let me guess, You saved my life, and in return you want me to go deliver a message or fetch an item and the process of doing so will get me involved in a world of intrigue and politics that leads to countless more quests and culminates with the downfall of a great enemy of yours and depending on your style either you or I becoming famous.”

“You catch on quick!” He said with a toothy grin. He pointed to my flank with a very unsettlingly pointy finger, “I assume by your emblem that you have done this many a time. I am quite pleased to be in the presence of a truly experienced adventurer.” Why do I suddenly get the feeling Shazad ‘sensing’ my love of adventure consisted of him looking at my ass. This mark is going to be trouble.

“Well, I am gaming, so no reason not to get involved in some schemes while I’m at it!” I agreed cheerfully. Of course I was thinking that any player who made an avatar like THAT was likely to be letting me take a fall somewhere along his plans. But two could play that game. “But first I would like to know how you knew I was in trouble. And what kind of task you want me for”

“Oh your friend Azure told me, she is ever so kind isn’t she? As to your task I want you to get me something very, very valuable. It is called a Genesis Orb. They spawn here and there every now and then. But the game keeps them very, very well guarded. The next one will be spawning in this zone.”

“And what does this Genesis Orb do, how much help will I have getting it, where is Azure Lily, and why do you need me?” I asked. Knowing better than to involve myself with magical items blindly.

“Hmm, all the smart questions, first to last. It creates new game areas of the users design, I will drop hints and lifelines but not travel with you, Azure Lily is just outside, and I need you because both the game and players judge threats by their level, not their skill. Your skill is high, you are smart, but unlike me you won’t be seen as a threat. At least not if you avoid people like him in the future, and refrain from talking about high level things like the genesis orb.”

I brought up his character sheet with a mental command. Level 30 Eldritch Alchemist, he must have been playing for a while. Level 30 was the highest level in the game, and given that levels were granted by the game system for notable accomplishments, not just grinding, he must be formidable indeed.

“Besides which, given the genesis of my intel, and the lead I have on this, I have a feeling somepony like you will enjoy this job.”

“What do you mean, did a brony tell you about the orb?”

“Nope, a PONY did. I presume you have heard of Pinkie Pie?”

Okay THIS is interesting. “Pinkie Pie... as in the pony from the show?”

“Well, as far as I can tell yes. Some players made an in game replica of Ponyville, and she showed up one day and began to act as if she had always lived there. If she is a player, then she has some way of hiding her character sheet, meaning that she would have to be an admin, if she is she is certainly an odd one. Most people there seem to think she is an NPC, they do exist. Apparently someone in Admin likes ponies.”

Everything he said made sense, and if I had an opportunity to meet Pinkie, or even just a really well made NPC of her, and visit a life size duplicate of Ponyville! “Okay I’m in, but Lily doesn’t need to come if she doesn’t want to.” He smirked as if I had said something rather silly, then gestured to a wall, where an opening appeared. We walked through the newly formed tunnel, myself in the lead with only his odd necklace for lighting.

“So what were you doing talking to Pinkie anyway?” I asked looking over my shoulder at him.

“Long story.” He answered simply.

“If I do get the orb, are you going to be the one to use it?”

“Yes, but you will be most welcome to a nice portion of the land I design with it.”

He is getting the best out of this deal... but in a way so are we, I wouldn’t be very good at area designing anyway. And this sounds like a fun quest.

As we walked through the dark tunnel I found my wings twitching. Some of those pegasi instincts I apparently had didn’t like being underground. Better get used to it body, we are adventurers now.

The tunnel was coming to an end. I opened my mouth to ask where I could find Ponyville only to find that the mysterious man had disappeared as suddenly as he had shown up. Typical.

I turned back toward the tunnel entrance only to find myself being furiously hugged by Lily.

“You’re alive! I was so worried. What happened, you are perfectly fine! You saved my life!”

She said all of this in about 5 seconds while crying on my wing. I awkwardly hugged her back. “The red eyed dude saved me.” She blinked. “The one who told me you had asked him to help me then asked me to quest for him.”

“I actually just dimension hopped away then ran through the woods yelling that a madman was trying to murder my only friend. I guess someone must have heard me.” She scratched her head with her forehoof. Her only friend.

The tunnel closed behind us as we made our way into the forest. “Anyway, I learned some interesting things. Did you know that this world has a Ponyville?” Her eyes lit up with excitement “It DOES, does this mean I can meet Twilight Sparkle?”

“I don’t actually know... but we CAN meet Pinkie” She looked a little less excited about this.

“Hey for all I know everypony is there; the guy only mentioned Pinkie though.”

“What kind of guy was this anyway?” She asked. “He must be nice to save you and tell you about Ponyville; is he a big Pinkie fan? Did he shoot the swordjerk with a party cannon?”

“Well actually he was a bit of a creep.”

“FRACTAL, you shouldn’t talk about people who save you that way, I’m sure he was just enthusiastic!”

I decided to forgo explaining myself and just shrugged. “Anyway, I’m about to start questing for powerful magical items. It’s gonna be pretty risky, wanna come?”

“Well as long as I don’t get in the way; I mean you are totally awesome, and you are going to Ponyville. As long as I’m welcome to I’ll travel with you.” She likes me.

“I’m not that awesome, all I’ve done today is get beat up and invoke favors with yellow eyed people.” I said, trying to look modest.

She put a hoof on my shoulder, “You are DEFINITELY awesome! You stood up for me! Only awesome people and heroes stand up for strangers like that!”

Well what do you know, I got called a hero by a real person. Right out of the gates too. Typically my D&D characters got a lot more praise than I did. I guess if you thought of Fractal as a character, that was still true.

“Well if we are ever going to get to Ponyville, we should leave the forest first.”

She nodded and we began to walk. The woods were pleasant, if unusual. I wasn’t an expert on trees, but I still felt that the bark and leaves of these were as often alien as not. The kind of thing you wouldn’t notice in most games, but in a fully immersive one, there is enough detail to stand out.

I had the nagging feeling that I was forgetting something. We had been wandering peacefully enough. But we are adventurers now, it almost feels like time for a random encounter. I felt something odd under my foot. Right- Goblins, When I was flying overhead I saw some... I just stepped on a trap didn’t I?

Lily jumped back and yelped as the shoddy net lifted me off the ground towards the tree branch above, pressing my wings tightly to my sides. Yep. I heard a series of unpleasant high pitched voices begin yelling in triumph around us and a dozen goblins jumped out of nearby areas. Oh my, they are much harder to see from the ground.

This worlds goblins were about two feet tall, with an earspan almost that large. Their oversized ears attached to wide flat heads. Ordinarily their appearance would have been amusing.Like little footballs with arms! As it was the main feature I was noticing was their sharp teeth. Those and the dull looking rock spears. Dull=pain.

I struggled with my bonds. Making the branch above me creak. Okay I can work with this... but not fast enough. The goblins were just approaching stabbing range, which is to say directly below me. They were holding their spears near the ends. One jumped its own height twice over and poked at me. My struggles, combined with luck made the dull thing simply scratch across my side. But I wasn’t any closer to escape. Until a familiar blue form landed on the branch above me and the whole thing cracked.

The goblins tried to scurry back, but me and Lily landed right on three of them. I immediately began scrambling to get out of the net and on my hooves. Five spears poked out at Lily, only for her to disappear and appear behind the crowd of goblins. This impressed them quite a bit as about half of them notices and began chattering excitedly in their high pitched tongue. The two who decided to keep paying attention to me in all the excitement took this opportunity to stab me on their own.

I ducked one spear as the other sank into my shoulder. The second one I broke off with my other hoof, pouring a recovered point of Ki into regeneration. Unfortunately, as I just learned, regeneration repairs flesh, but it doesn’t push objects out of it. The pain was an enormous shock to me, my regeneration hadn’t made things better, it had made things worse.

At least from my perspective. From the goblin’s perspective the strange winged pony that they had just stabbed had broken their spear then healed the wound from it in seconds. The goblins jibbered in terror and ran, ponies who healed instantly or disappeared when attacked were not valid prey. Wow, goblins can run away really quickly can’t they Part of my mind thought. The other part thought: THERE IS A JAGGED PIECE OF ROCK IN MY SHOULDER; GETITOUT!

I took a discarded spearhead from the ground and immediately began trying to cut at my shoulder where the spearhead was stuck. This is way too real, why is this so real! I liked to think of myself as a rather tough person, not easily shocked. But my own blood was seriously freaking me out here. It was everywhere, and made a shocking contrast on my fur. It’s like Christmas! a small part of me exclaimed.

I felt a hoof on my shoulder. “Stay still!” Lily told me. I obeyed. “You are making a mess of it, if you keep cutting like that you’ll pass out before you get the spearhead out.” She pulled the waterskin from my satchel, poured it over the wound, then handed it to me to drink. Luckily it had a strap that allowed for easy use with one hoof, seeing as my other was out of commission.

Regeneration is a bogus ability.

Lily expertly cut a small slit into my flesh, then grabbed hold of the spear with her telekinesis. “Okay, this is going to hurt, but I’ve seen you take worse, so grit yo...” She interrupted herself by pulling the whole spearhead out at once. “AAAHHHHHHHHH!” I yelled, “What the h...”.

“Mom always says the anticipation makes the pain worse, so you should get things over quickly and unexpectedly.” Lily said. “Sorry.”

I put a point into regeneration, quickly closing the wound. Note to self, never break something off inside myself EVER EVER again.

“So this game doesn’t pull any stops for sensory feedback does it.” I said, a little mad that I would get hurt that badly by a system meant for entertaining escapism.

“Actually when I was electrocuted earlier it wasn’t so bad.” Lily said, looking at me in surprise. “I don’t think the game is causing you the pain. I hear pain is odd like that, very easily modified by expectation. Perhaps you just created your avatar to be more sensitive than most players.”

I thought about this. The number one thing I was thinking about experiencing when I made this character was the sensation of flight, a largely tactile sensation. So we get to feel more pain because we are more imaginative in tactile matters is basically what she is saying. Well damn.

I sighed and stretched out a little bit. This night was way more stressful than I had thought it would be, way more real. But we are hooked. I looked at Azure Lily. She was looking at me expectantly. She wants us to lead. Too bad we don’t even have a map. Well everything ends up somewhere. I headed in the direction I remember the small town being in from my flyover.

The rest of our walk together was blissfully uneventful. Every once in a while Azure would stop to scan a flower or animal we came across. It turned out that biological diversity wasn’t something this world slacked on either. Lily taught me more flower names than I had ever thought to know, and there were some that she didn’t even know. We also found some interesting wildlife.

A blue chipmunk had started following us around at some point. I had hovered up to get a closer look at it just to see it jump right into the tree it was in, and not into a hole or anything of the sort. Straight through the bark.

We made it to the town and were greeted with a wave from a man in a green suit and a bowler hat.

“Welcome to our fine community, I am Edward Hutchins, the owner of the hotel in this here township. Any needs you might have we can see to!”

“Actually, I was hoping to find Ponyville.” I stated.

He kept up his cheerful demeanor, “Of course good sir, as should be expected of you, I can arrange transport in my hotel. As a new player this service will be given to you pro-bono!”

Finally a turn of good luck! I walked into the hotel, A few patrons, most of whom were humans packing impressive weaponry of one kind or another I think I see Iron Man playing chess with He-man in the corner there. The owner led us over to a cute Catgirl sitting at the bar, she seemed to be the only unarmed person in the bar other than Hutchins.

“Welcome! I’m Chen, and I’m here to take you to wherever in the zone you want to be! I notice you forgot to pick up your transport ticket in the Lobby zone! Here!” She said, passing a small card to me. On it were the words. -Nearest Discovered Settlement (Harwood), -Interzone Lobby, -Saved location (none).

“Just touch the word you need and it’ll take you right to where you need to be. One for your friend as well!” Well this would have been useful. It was good to know that at least the NPC’s were friendly.

“So I hear you are going to Ponyville! I’ve never been there, it will be good to visit a new location.” I nodded, “You ready Lily.” Lily looked back at me in excitement “Oh yeah!” She said.

“Well it is getting late.” Chen said. “Are you okay waiting for tomorrow?”

I noticed that I was a little tired. Lily looked a little disappointed, but nodded “I suppose getting some actual sleep would make me less of a basket case in class tomorrow.”

That settled it. Hutchins informed us that rooms were free here. I made my way up the stairs, where there was only two doors. The one on the left was closed, the one on the right read 234. Lily opened it and walked through. The number became 235. Three seconds later she popped her head out of the door on the left, looked at me with confusion.

“Good night Fractal, am... am I going to see you again tomorrow?” I thought over everything I had involved myself in here. Smiled and told her, “Count on it!” She closed her door, I walked through mine. Planted myself firmly on the bed, and ordered my body to log out.

I was back in the Blue Room.

“Welcome back, you appear to have blood on you, I trust that means you enjoyed yourself?” The friendly voice of the greeter stated.

“Well I enjoyed the less bloody parts more to be honest. But yeah, I made a friend and learned some cool stuff. The body is great too.”

“Well then I have some good news for you! You have leveled up for surviving an encounter far beyond your level!” That really IS good news, I never expected to level up so soon, but after what I went through; fair enough.

The leveling chart appeared. Well I’ve proven that I am good enough at dodging today, I need to play to that strength. And to be able to pick things up with my hooves. I smiled, and selected my abilities.

Then I turned and walked through the blue door. Allowing my mind some peaceful oblivion.

Second Level- Monk of the Inner Circle- abilities learned: Friction Grip, Sprint
Title: Neophyte. Location : Harwood Hotel
Party members: Azure Lily

Ponyville

I got up, glad to be back in my better body. Amazing how changing bodies can just remove all of your exhaustion like that. I felt perfectly energized, even after a long day of being a human.

I quickly got up and looked around the room. It was completely empty save for the bed. I guess nothing else is really needed. This body could eat, but didn’t have to evacuate waste. It got dirty, but cleaning could be found elsewhere. As far as a place to sleep went, a bed was all that was needed.

I amused myself by stretching my various equine muscles. I would have seriously played this game JUST to feel what it was like to flex pegasus wings. I hovered in the small room, unable to glide anywhere, but appreciating the feeling of being off the ground.

Landing and taking a quick drink of water, I walked out the door to see Azure Lily mumbling to herself discontentedly while staring at one of the flowers she had collected in her hair the other day.

“Hey Lily” I said. She immediately looked up and was suddenly right in front of me, smiling. She hesitated for a moment, as if considering whether it would be socially acceptable or not, then pulled me into a tight hug. I get the feeling that she thought I wasn’t coming back. I should probably take this opportunity to say something to convince her that she is a cool pony, that I wouldn’t ditch a friend like that, or the like.

But I’m not very good at that kind of thing so instead I just said. “So, time to go to Ponyville!” While disengaging myself from her excessively tight hugging. She nodded excitedly. “I leveled up! So now I can take you with me for short ranged Teleportation!” She informed me. “That should make it way easier to avoid trouble.”

I grinned, then reached into my backpack and took a drink from my waterskin with one hoof. “Look ma, no horn!”

She didn’t seem all that impressed. Unicorns!

We headed down the short stairway together. I got about three steps down before I started hovering my way down. I’m not sure if you’ve ever walked down a stairway on all fours, but it felt awkward. For me stairs would be forevermore a human thing.

Chen was sitting at her place in front of the bar. “Hey!” She said, still as cheerful as before. “Ready to go to Ponyville?”

“Eeyup” I responded in my best Big Macintosh voice.

“Hokay then, ikimashou!” she said, pointing a hand at a point in the empty air.

Why is she speaking Japanese. A glowing blue door opened in the air immediately in front of her palm. I looked through and saw a small purple dragon in front of a series of bookshelves. We’re in Twilight’s Library. Holy crap, it’s Spike! Taking a second look this guy didn’t exactly look like Spike, though if spike grew up healthy he might look like this guy.

Lily ran ahead of me into the library, hopping around like pinkie and examining everything as if it were simultaniously an advance release of her favorite book and a national treasure. I walked through with a smile alongside Chen.

“Yo Chen, how are things in Harwood.” Spike asked.

“Can’t complain, there was an awesome rooftop battle the other day. Oh, and a guy who looks like Cthulhu set up a gift shop with some hilarious items in it. We should swap for a week, hows Ponyville.”

“Well Iron Hoof hasn’t given up, Pinkie has started rumourmongering about magical artifacts, and somepony made ANOTHER copy of Rainbow Dash’s cloud house.” Spike explained, “Yesterday there was another contest down at the Acres, and for once nopony broke the ‘no-magic’ rule.”

I don’t think these are AI’s. I thought. Bringing up their character sheets I saw that surely enough they were both Level 7 Pathless Sages. On their character sheet was a seal that read Meadow Zone Transporters Guild. I noted that Spike was actually named Skip.

Skip approached Lily. “Hello! Have you considered joining the Transport guild? We’ll level you quickly if you take the right talents, you’ll get to see people and places all over the zone, and we’ll make sure nobody gives you a hard time,”

Lily stopped her in depth analysis of one of the house’s teacups and immediately began asking questions. “Is Twilight here? Are you a Brony? Did you make that character knowing you could hang out here? Have you ever had trouble about copyrights in Ponyville? How many ponies live here?”

Skip, to his credit stayed cool throughout the barrage of questions. “No Twilight isn’t here. Yes I am a brony. Yeah my old pony avatar died right after Ponyville was formed. No Hasbro is okay with it and lawsuits on Afterlife Prime are difficult. About 300 but usually under 100 at any given time.” He answered as quickly as she had asked. “Anyway, I’m going to go check in on Harwood. Have fun, don’t torment Iron Hoof too much, and consider my offer, the guild is good people, and I’m sure we’d find something for your friend to do as well if he joined.” Skip waved and walked through the portal.

Chen smiled. “Well if what I’ve heard about this place is true we’ve all got a busy few days ahead!” She announced. I wondered what she meant by that. I should have known better.

“OMIGOSH, I just knew there was somepony new in town because my kidney was tremble-y, but there are THREE new someponies all at once, which means triple the party! But what do catpeople eat? Probably fish like griffons, AND MILK. But sorry My name is Pinkie Pie and I know EVERYPONY in town and...” she gasped sharply. “I ALMOST FORGOT.”

She pulled out her welcome wagon.

Awesome

“Welcome welcome welcome/A fine welcome to you”

We get to go to a Pinkie Party!

“Welcome welcome welcome/I say how do you do?”

Quite well, I think this is what we’re gonna be busy with.

“Welcome welcome welcome/I say hip hip hurray”

She pulled out a trumpet and blew it directly behind my head. That pain in your head is telling you that this is the real Pinkie, which gives you an obligation to get sugar high, give her a massive hug, engage in random baking with her, and prank all of the ponies with faux Rainbow Dash cloudhouses with her.

“Welcome welcome welcome to Ponyville today!”

A batch of cake batter was launched at me at high speed. I jumped to dodge, but was far too slow. So I went for the next best thing and tackle hugged Pinkie while covered in cake batter.

She giggled. “Aww thanks, I bet you knew I liked cake batter! Which means that you are a really nice pony because you gave me a hug AND cake batter and...” She picked me up off of her. “Since you are covered in cake batter and not acting all flustered that must mean you are used to being covered in cake batter which makes you.” I tried to resist laughing at Pinkie’s cake batter covered face but failed as she loudly announced “A BAKER!”

I found myself in the back of sugarcube corner before I had quite noticed what had happened. On my way being dragged through town I had seen Quills and Sofa’s, Rarity’s fashion shop, the town hall, and several ponies. Most had waved in a friendly manner to me. One dark blue Pegasus had pointed a hoof to himself then me and smirked. I wasn’t quite sure what he was trying to get across.

I felt a chef hat placed on top of my head. Lily was standing next to me looking a little confused.

“So what are we gonna make?” Pinkie asked me. I considered asking her how to make cupcakes, but to be honest I felt more like making muffins.

“Lemon Poppyseed Muffins!” I announced with zeal. “I LOVE Lemon Poppyseed Muffins!” She said, “I’ll give Derpy one too.” She said, surprising me.

“Wait Derpy lives here?” I asked. Pinkie giggled, “Well Duh, this IS Ponyville!”

I put that on the backburner as I began listing off ingredients. Another reason I chose muffins is because they are something I make for myself on a regular basis.

I was unsurprised, but duely impressed by Pinkie’s ability to gather ingredients as quick as I could list them off. I was likewise surprised but impressed by the quantities she was taking out. “Um Pinkie, are you sure we’ll need FIVE bags of sugar?”

“Of course silly! We should bake a whole bunch of Muffins, so that we can serve them at the party! And party muffins need lots and lots of sugar!” Pinkie looked thoughtful for a moment. “OH YEAH, I forgot to give you your invitation! I’m so sorry, it’s your party and everything and I forgot to invite you. Silly me, can you forgive me?” Her eyes seemed to grow two sizes as she asked. She looked rediculously guilty.

“Um Pinkie, I don’t even know what to forgive you for, when and where is the party anyway?”

She cheered up, “Twilight’s Library, at sunset.” As she said this she passed out mixing bowls to each of us and began absentmindedly putting ingredients into hers.

I pondered a moment, I didn’t actually know how time worked in Afterlife. Back home the sun had set several hours ago. But the other day I had been in this zone for hours of daylight. I wasn’t even sure if time moved at the same speed here.

“So you are coming right? I’d hate to have you not come, being the new ponies in town, because then it would have to be a new ponies in town party with no new ponies.” We had each taken a large mixing bowl and begun mixing our own batches of batter, I ground lemon rind into mine. “Of course, we wouldn’t miss one of your parties for the world!” She looked happy enough to explode.

Well we have her alone, might as well talk some business. “So Pinkie, have you heard of a genesis orb?”

“Oooh yes, it’s that shiny magical snowglobe right? The one that weird pony with the discord eyes wanted. He was creepy, but he was happy as well, and not in the meanie pants evil laugh way..” She looked worried. “Maybe I shouldn’t call him creepy, he might not like that, and just because he isn’t a pony and reminds me of discord, and is after magical artifacts of great power and keeps secrets doesn’t mean I should make fun of him. Do you think he’s mad I made fun of him?”

I thought about it for a moment. His eyes really did look like Discords eyes.

Her face is constantly moving, isn’t it? “No I’m pretty sure it’s fine.” I responded, hoping she wasn’t really worried. He is one of the creepiest people I’ve ever seen. “I think he would take it as a compliment actually. She had already begun filling a multitude of muffin tins with her batter. I was still grinding lemon rind into mine. She took a pan and began making lemon glaze that smelled like extremely sour candy.

Lily was looking at me strangely as she began spooning batter into muffin trays. I suppose I didn’t really talk to her much about the genesis orb.

“So where can we find the genesis orb?” I asked.

“Ohhh thats easy, the same place we always find magical artifacts and stuff. The Everfree Forest! For some reason when I told that to the discord dude, he just frowned and muttered and stuff.” Maybe he doesn’t know what the Everfree Forest is. Or it was also possible that it was just one of those areas that scaled to level, and he felt a couple of lower level characters with knowledge from the show would have a better chance than him.

We finished cooking. Pinkie talked the entire time, mostly about funny ponies in town. It was strange though. Half of her stories were about ponies from the show, and the other half were about ponies who I thought were players.

I dreaded what I was about to say, but felt I had to say it anyhow. “Pinkie, do you know that you are in a game right now?”

“You mean the muffin making game! Yup.” Lily gave me a concerned look. As if to tell me I shouldn’t existentially challenge the reality of the happy pink pony in front of me. I wasn’t good at listening to those kind of hints.

“No I mean this whole thing. The body I’m in isn’t my real body, it is an avatar that I play a game with.”

Pinkie looked concerned, she put on her thinking face, then quickly poked me. “Ow” I said. “Hehe, you are a silly filly, of course that is your real body, I can touch you can cover you in cake batter and hug you and everything!”

“My real body is an upright ape and you are a cartoon character!” I informed her. It sounded perfectly reasonable in my head. She giggled “There are a lot of silly ponies in Ponyville lately. Don’t worry, sometimes I like to be a monkey too, I eat lots and lots of banannas and climb trees and everything!”

Lily started to laugh at me. I thought of a way to prove my point. “You and spike flew in a Balloon to announce for the running of the leaves the first year Twilight was in town!”

“Yup, did you like my announcing?” She asked

I suppose I should think of a less public example. “Er yes, yes I did, it was really witty.” I thought of something I couldn’t know “You forgot your own birthday and thought all of your friends didn’t like you anymore and went crazy one time!” After it had left my mouth I realized how utterly rude it was. Lily facepalmed and looked at me like I was an idiot.

I am an idiot. Pinkie laughed, “Yup, that sure was silly of me!”

“Er, I’m sorry I brought it up, but you have to admit, it’s weird that I know that.”

“Well it’s weird that I know that your name is Fractal Cloudfront, or that you are 24 years old, or that your cutie mark is a dodecahedron even though you are a baker, but I know all of those things anyway.” She happily told me. “What does your cutie mark mean anyway?”

I give up. “It means that I’m good at er...” How to explain D&D. “Make believe games and writing fantasy characters.” I ventured. Pinkie giggled a little “I knew THAT from the upright monkey thing. Anyway, thanks for helping me bake! We should totally bake together again sometime. But right now I have a PARTY to prepare.”

We left sugarcube corner. “What was THAT about?” Lily asked me as we left.

“Well... she kept talking about her friends from the show, and it sounded like she was living two lives, on programmed into her memory and one that her avatar experienced. That can’t be healthy.”

Lily looked at me with a frustrated glare. “Okay, well as many things as there are wrong with THAT assessment, I was TALKING about this ‘genesis orb’. I thought we had decided to travel together and be PARTNERS, which means I expected to know what we were doing. ‘visiting Ponyville’ is all well and good, but maybe you should clear your motives with me.”

She looked something between angry and sad now. “You trust me don’t you?” I had backed away and was suddenly aware that many ponies had stopped and were watching our altercation.

“It wasn’t that I didn’t trust you at all. I was going to tell you all of this, and all about the person who saved me. But yesterday I was tired, and right now I’m still just getting information myself.” I scratched the back of my head with a forehoof nervously with that awkward nervous smile I get whenever I am embarassed.

Some of the ponies around me had expressions that definitely fell into the ‘disapproving’ category. The nervous smile met a nervous chuckle as Lily suddenly realized that we were in public. She blushed red then loudly announced “We should be going to Sweet Apple Acres to get some of that cider which we love. I am certainly quite angry at you, for not telling me your evil plans to forgo getting cider, but now we will get cider and all will be well!”

I get the feeling that Lily had experience in her past acting for mandatory school plays.

We began hurriedly walking towards Sweet Apple Acres, but only made it a block or so before a red blur dropped out of the sky yelling “STOP!”

A Red Pegasus with a Yellow Mane was standing in front of me holding out a hoof.

“Um, Hello” I tried.

“Greetings, I am Ruby Pride, Pegasus Racer extraordinaire.” She lowered herself to the ground as if she was about to pounce. “And when two Pegasi of our Calibre meet there can only be one outcome!”

Okay so all the ponies in this town ARE crazy. She pounced on me, knocking me flat on my back. I spread my wings and brought my hooves up to guard as she brought her face in as close to mine as my intervening limbs would allow and whispered “A contest!” In the kind of tone most people would reserve for talking about their secret lovers.

Another Pegasus landed. “Hah! So Ruby is trying to sink her fangs into the new kid. The only thing that can mean is a race. And NOPONY races without Staggershock!”

All of them. A small gathering of Pegasi was building up around me as the word ‘race’ started being thrown around. A couple of Unicorns taking out what looked like stopwatches. Pinkie showed up; she had popcorn, and streamers in her mane.

I guess it was a good thing that I took sprint then! “Okay!” I announced, “Pegasi of Ponyville, get ready to be left in the dust!” I am starting to get excited about this race. I really had enjoyed the flying I had done, and the over the top competitive atmosphere

Within minutes I was in front of a scary valley to the left of town that looked like Ghastly Gorge. Lily, Chen, and Pinkie were all hanging out on the edge of the gorge together eating popcorn and chatting like old friends. Yay!

A Pegasus wearing sunglasses and holding a microphone floated up above us on a cloud. “Listen up Ponies! Today you put your pride on the line for the taste of victory! Leave nothing behind, use the utmost of your abilities and reach for victory! On your mark, get set, GO!”

We all exploded away from the starting rock, about ten pegasi in total. Remembering what I knew about racing I hang out in the middle of the pack, riding the wake of the racers in front of me. We came up on a tunnel with wind blowing us backward. I saw Ruby enter high, then tilt into the cavern in a semi-dive. She accelerated into that dive way too quickly. Must be an ability.
I took that as my cue to pour Ki into sprint. I took the tunnel head on and barrelled through like a madpony. On my way through I passed Staggershock and another pony. But as I came out of the tunnel my lungs were feeling the burn. I was likely to wind myself out before reaching the end of the valley if I had to do things like that at every obstacle.

I followed Ruby’s Lead to where a massive and unreasonable number of thorny bushes blocked my path. A saw a flash of light as Staggershock flared up behind me, and a bolt of lightning whizzed its way past me into the maze of thorns, passing me, and likely catching up to Ruby wherever she was in the tangle. As for myself, I had to slow down a little to avoid all the thorns, but I was good enough at dodging to avoid hurting myself, and I don’t think anypony passed me in there.

A couple passed me on the way out though. I was seriously flagging, my lungs and wings both felt on fire. I poured a point of Ki into regeneration, blindly hoping it would help. It turns out it did, but there was still no chance that I could win this.

I got to the area of the valley in which the moray eels lived and poured my last store of Ki into sprint, accelerating past them before they could react and banking around the right turn going strong. The straight stretch to the finish was fairly easy. But I saw both Ruby and Staggershock had finish well before me.

I landed at the finish line gasping for breath and coated in sweat. Staggershock patted me on the back “Awesome flight there bro, No newbies have tackled the course that well since yours truly.”

He tapped himself on the chest as he said this. “And seeing as I won here today, winning the Rainbow Ribbon, I think that means you’ll do pretty well in a while.” Rainbow Ribbon, heh. I’m going to need to win one of those soon. The amount of ego the pegasi here displayed would have been irritating if they were humans, but somehow it just seemed natural here. The hammy announcer pegasus gave me a white ribbon.

I met up with Lily, Pinkie, and Chen just past the finish line. They all cheered happily. “That was AWESOME, you are one of those super-duper fast pegasi. I really like super-duper fast pegasi. you went through the moray eels all like ZOOM, and WHIZZ” Pinkie was running around in circles. “I mean, I’ve seen better, but Dash would approve. You should race her someday, when you are faster.” Chen gave me a thumbs up.

“How did you all follow me?” I asked, “I was going pretty fast there.” Lily and Chen both rolled their eyes and teleported directly behind me. duh. Pinkie was still running around in circles, But I don’t think I need to ask HER how she was watching me.

“... but enough about Rainbow Dash! She announced, we have a PARTY to go to.” At this she immediately grabbed me with a hoof and began dragging me off towards the library. I think they have some law against allowing ponies to catch their breath in Ponyville.

Soon I found myself in front of the library. Pinkie stopped pulling me and quickly disappeared. I took a step forward, intending to walk in, when a grey stallion declared “Halt!”

He was wearing heavy looking metal armor that looked somewhere between the royal guard outfits worn in Canterlot, and the Iron Man armor.

“I have heard interesting things about you newcomer. I wish to inquire as to your business with the Element of Laughter.” He informed me.

I was still checking out his armor. It was totally boss. “You mean aside from parties?”

“I hear you have inquired about the Everfree Forest, the whereabouts of the other elements and their friends, and a powerful magical artifact. I wish to confirm that your cause is just, harmonious, and not a threat to the princesses or equestria as a whole!”

I narrowed my gaze a little, “you hear all that do you? Because all of that is Pinkie’s business and not yours. I don’t take well to ponies spying on me.” I tried to move past him, “I think we both know that while the Element of Laughter is a hero, she is not a suspicious pony. My instinct says to trust you, but the involvement of powerful magical artifacts makes this an issue of national security. Expect me to follow through on it.”

We both walked into the library. I’m not going to allow any amount of nosiness to prevent me from enjoying a Pinkie Party.

It really is indescribable how fun parties with Pinkie are. It isn’t so much the drinks, or the games, or the way that everypony dances with everypony. It was Pinkie herself. She seemed to be everywhere at once, always contributing a happy word to a conversation, or dancing in a silly way that made everypony else loosen up, or bringing baked goods or drinks to somepony. And most important of all, always smiling. Her smile went beyond being a social contagion, it got into your very soul and made you happy.

I honestly think we could be on fire in the middle of the everfree forest, and with Pinkie there it would still feel like a party. Element of Laughter indeed. I the party, still a little giddy from a combination of high-sugar chocolate cake and high-quality hard apple cider. I decided I should go check out the everfree forest before I left. I walked to Fluttershy’s cottage, Ponyville was small enough that it was a short walk. There was the familar tree her house was made of. the familiar menagerie of excessively cute animals, and behind her house... NOTHING.

Where the Everfree forest was most definitely supposed to be there was a completely, creepily empty field of perfectly even grass. None of the animals approached it, the wind didn’t even seem to extend into it.

I began rushing back to the party when I saw Iron Hoof standing in the middle of the road watching me. I angrily approached him. “WHAT THE HELL! WHy are you watching me, and more importantly, where is the everfree forest?”

He calmly regarded me, “You know exactly why I am watching you; and the Everfree Forest is, quite simply, not of this world.” I blinked, “You mean that there is no Everfree forest? Well then what the hay was Pinkie saying there was an orb in there for?”

He appeared as confused by my comments as he was by mine. “You mean to say that your goal in this does not include an invasion of Equestria? What you look for is of this world?”

“Of course I’m looking for something in Afterlife.” I considered this for a moment. I mean if I thought it was possible to travel to Equestria, I might want that too, but that is impossible” Utterly and completely impossible, I mean unless I meet Discord or something and he sends me there. But I’m not Echo, and I don’t think I’m in that kind of fanfic.

He actually looked relieved. There had to be some reason for him acting this way. “So you thought I was going to travel to Equestria, as in the pony filled, cartoon Equestria, with Twilight Sparkle and Princess Celestia, grab an ancient artifact, and attempt to conquer it?”

“Well it was a possibility that I could not ignore as a sworn servant of their majesties.”

I blinked. “Soo.... have you been to Equestria to swear some kind of fealty?”

He blushed a little, “no, but nonetheless I serve the royal pony sisters!”

I figured he was just RPing and keeping character. I guess it would be fun to set up a separate persona here.

“Okay, whatever. The point is even if I somehow ended up in Equestria, I would only want to help ponies. I love Equestria, I’m a pegasus, and the royal sisters are great in my books.” I saluted with a hoof.

He nodded at me, “It is wonderful to see such loyalty in our ponies today! I ask that I be allowed to come with you on whatever quest the Element of Laughter has sent you on, and appologize for monitoring you without necessity.” At this he bowed his head.

Oh why not. I was still fairly happy from Pinkies party, and really shouldn’t have gotten so annoyed at him for following me in the first place. “Very well soldier, but know that I am in charge of this operation.”

He smiled happily. I guess he’s just been getting the adventurers itch recently.

“Did your following me have anything to do with my cutie mark?” I asked him.

He broke my gaze. “No sir, I was just doing my duty to the princesses.” he said.

What an awful liar.

I made my way back towards Sugarcube corner, no longer having sleep in mind. I approached Pinkie at the party. Joining her in an erratic, and surprisingly difficult dance.

I found that dancing with Pinkie put all of my hard earned dodging skills to the test. She didn’t make small movements, and several times I found her hoof or rump came disturbingly close to hitting me. “So you said the orb was in the Everfree Forest, right Pinkie.”

“Nope.” She happily said, still dancing.

“Uh Pinkie, actually you did.”

“Nopey dopey, I said you could find it there! I got an itchy kidney, that means weird magical stuff is GOING to be happening in the everfree forest. Or at least I think thats what it means.”

I was very unimpressed right now. “And what does this have to do with the genesis orb?” I asked her evenly, still dodging her crazy dance moves as she stood up on one forehoof and spun around twice.

“Oh the crazy not pony that keeps asking me questions had the genesis orb. Its name is admin, and it doesn’t like my parties.” Okay something seriously weird is up with Pinkie, and trying to understand how or why she knows things is a pointless task. I had an amusing picture in my head of a pacman like administrator chasing Pinkie Pie around inside a computer.

I decided that I would go dance with Lily a little bit. She was happy to dance with me. “Where did you go? Everfree?” She asked me.

I frowned, “There is no Everfree.” I told her. “We’re probably going to have to go wandering around the place, find some other sources of information, should be fun.”

She didn’t look nearly as surprised as I had been. After a little more dancing, we began to yawn. “Looks like bed-time, see you in the morning.”

I went to the bed and logged out, finding myself again in the lobby chamber.

“Hello Fractal Cloudfront, did you enjoy Ponyville?” the AI asked.

“Yes I did.” A thought crossed my mind. “If you don’t mind me asking, what should I call you. I suppose Greeter would work, but since you claim sentience, I figure I might as well ask.”
“Greeter would be a wonderful name!” she said “very ponylike too. I won’t say you are the first to call me by a name, but it is a wonderful gesture.”

I smiled, “Well, goodnight then Greeter.”

“The magic of friendship indeed!” she replied.

I again chose the blue door, and went again to the waking world.

Second Level- Monk of the Inner Circle
Title: Newbie Racer. Location: Ponyville Library
Party members: Azure Lily, Pinkie Pie, Iron Hoof, Chen

Contest

“So we basically have no plan and a whole zone to explore.” Lily stated as she ate an interesting leafy salsa wrap.

She was smiling as she said it. This basically put me with my questing on exactly the same page as her with her exploring around scanning things. I couldn’t say I felt much different.

You must gather your party before venturing forth.

“So Chen, you feel like some adventure?” I asked. The catgirl was doing a handstand while eating cereal with a spoon held in her tail. “Sorta, but I have guild business to deal with; so unless you have the credits to rent me out for extraction duty, imma have to decline.”

“Well as soon as we start picking credit up, we’ll know exactly who to request.” I told her, giving her my most charming smile. I guessed that extraction duty had to do with getting people out of dungeons.

I finished my own breakfast, which consisted of cupcakes. What, Pinkie makes delicious cupcakes. And got up, walking out of the library.

“I think Iron Hoof is going to be coming with us.” I told her. “I think he is excited to get some adventure.”

“Oh, thats nice I guess.” she said in the way you might say that a surprise dentist appointment is nice.

“Isn’t that the crazy RP dude?” Chen asked.

“Yeah” I responded. “Don’t worry, he should be cool, even if he does take things a little bit seriously.”

Why is Lily so mad?

We finished our breakfast and began heading out of town. “So where to first?” Lily asked.

“I figure we’ll head out to the strawberry fields.” I started singing.

“Let me take you down, cus I’m going to-”

she continued for me “-Strawberry Fields, nothing is real.”

We were still singing when we got to the edge of town. Iron Hoof was waiting for us and fell in step without even commenting on the song.

I decided I should get to know our new member. “So, do you just hang around Ponyville?” I asked.

Iron Hoof looked at me “Every day I go into one of the nearby areas for training, but I don’t tend to stray far.”

“Why would you train in a game with a merit based levelling system?” I asked. I supposed that seeking fights would increase the chances at gaining merit, but only slightly if it was simply going forth into a dangerous area and waiting for something to happen.

“Combat takes practice, I need not fight enemies simply for upgrades, I also do it to keep myself sharp, and to remind the nearby hostiles that ponies are not prey.” He explained.

We made our way into the immense strawberry patch. I took the time to sample a few berries on my way in. They were utterly delicious. I looked around the patch, hoping to chart a path through the strawberries to some landmark. I figured the Spire city would be a good place to start if I wanted to gather information.

I led us in the direction of the spire city, eating strawberries as I went. Iron hoof was being quiet as expected. Lily’s silence was less characteristic. We didn’t appear to be getting any closer to the Spires.

I took off, hoping to get a look at what lay ahead. All I got for my efforts was a dizzying sense of scale. The fields didn’t continue forever, but they might as well have for all the progress we were making at our current pace. I did a flip for fun then landed.

“We’re going nowhere fast.” I said, “as nice as the strawberries here are, I would rather not spend hours walking through them.”

Iron Hoof considered this, “I can travel very quickly if I power up my armor, but it would be exhaustive of abilities and quite possibly attract attention.”

“Attention from what? You’ve been around here, what are the threats?” I asked

“Well” he began, “The main threats are players, the fields are a popular places for duels and banditry alike. But this area also has its annoyances. Sometimes the annoyances work with the threats” I really didn’t like where this was going. “The annoyances would be the fairies, they make mirages, pull pranks, sabotage gear, and occasionally decide to give presents. Pinkie Pie loves them.” from his tone of voice I could tell that Iron hoof was far less enamoured of the creatures than the premier Pink Party producer of Ponyville.

Having dealt with my share of fae in D&D I shared his sentiments. I also came to terms with th e fact that I probably couldn’t make any plans to avoid them that would amount to more than teasing from their perspective.

“Well, if you don’t want to attract attention, I could simply do medium range dimension skipping.” Lily provided.

I shrugged “Sure, save some ability uses for emergencies later, but if I fly on ahead, you can jump to where I am every few minutes. Pick some berries for me while you’re here!”

I began to fly. I felt a little guilty for ditching the two of them with eachother, knowing as I did that they didn’t much like eachother. But they hadn’t exactly been the most fascinating of company for me yet today, and hopefully some time together would let them get to know eachother better. Besides, I like flying. A lot. I’m sure most humans given a whole new body with the ability to fly would feel the same. Goodbye to the not flying ways of the past. Any situation in which flying is a legitimate option, I think I will choose to do it.

Now, flying is, as I just described, a wonderful, sensational, amazing thing which I feel amazingly lucky to be able to do, no matter the body or world I do it in. It does not however, come without its drawbacks. Like any ability especially regeneration flying can hurt you. Flying is not supposed to hurt you, if you do it right it won’t hurt you. One form of doing it wrong is crashing. Normally not crashing isn’t hard to do; when there is an invisible cliff in front of you however, it is pretty much impossible not to do unless you expect it.

I made a mental checklist of signs that the Dungeon Master, or in this case world programmer likes to watch you squirm. Unexpected but intuitive side effects of ability use: check. Little to no starting wealth or connections: check. A pervasive favor based economy: check. Next thing I knew I would have an overblown bounty on my head, get one of those curses that other people mistake for a blessing, and wake up to petitioners who wanted me to save their kittens from trees.

I pounded my hoof against the invisible barrier and heard exactly what an adventurer dreads and expects in this situation: giggling. Turning my head I saw a tiny winged fairy. The fairy didn’t look so much like a little woman with wings as it did like a little blob of sunlight with wings. Looking at it directly hurt my eyes, even from a distance of over 100 feet.

It gave me a rude gesture. I pulled my sunglasses out of my saddlebags and calmly put them on. Then I did the most foolish thing possible under the circumstances. I chased the annoying little sprite down.

Now I know you are likely thinking what a dope, how obvious can baiting get? And were this to be an ordinary game in which I get some time to make such a decision and am not high on adrenaline and the annoying pain of having just crashed full speed into a wall, I am sure I wouldn’t have rated it too high either.

I poured a Ki point into sprint, and the chase was on. I dived toward the field, catching up with her in seconds. I smirked, but just as I was about to grab her she turned on a dime.The maneuver caught me by surprise. By the time I had banked to follow she had already gained almost 50 feet on me, and was still giggling in that annoying pitch only obtained by small children who think they have gotten the better of you with a prank or behavior.

More intent than ever on catching the silly thing, I raced after it. I felt some odd currents on the wind and felt the sensation of thing moving past my head as I chased the fairy down. I had it pinned down, I was flying directly above it. It tried to dart off to one side, but I brought my grippy hoof down towards it and.....

What I was grabbing didn’t feel like a fairy. No fairies are not that large, or that scaly. Nor are they tails. Maybe the sense of touch of a hoof is just too weird for me, because the thing I was grabbing definitely felt like a scaled tail.

I let go as my vision and hearing both wrenched sideways. I felt an awful sense of vertigo grab me as what I was seeing changed from being a fairy and a field of strawberries, into being a dragon and a rocky trail.

Oh and did I mention the dragon? Yup, DM liked watching me squirm.

The Dragon was about a pony and a half in size. While one could certainly do worse for a dragon, that still made it a whole pony larger than something I wanted to fight unarmed. It was red, sleek, shiny, and had very healthily sized wings and claws, with a long tail that ended in a chitinous looking black blade. It was the kinda design that I would ordinarily be able to admire for several minutes. A healthy majestic looking feral dragon, whose design leaves no doubt as to the predatory nature of its species.

So yeah, predatory, real, no time to admire.

I tried to jump back from the dragon, only to have it catch my wing with the tip of it’s tail. Magic or no magic, the loss of lift and control from my wing sent me tumbling backwards across the rocks.

The dragon pounced, trying to pin my hooves with its talons. But I had no intention of being that easy a meal. I deflected its left talon as it came down and kicked it as hard as I could in what would be the armpit, were it not a quadruped.

It turns out that knowing the name of a nerve cluster isn’t necessary to hit it. Any spot with a flexable limb coming out of it needs to be soft and full of nerves; no matter what kind of animal you are.

The dragon faceplanted to the right of my head, as the leg it expected to use for support went numb. I rolled out from under it and raised myself to all fours, preparing to block any swipe it took with a hoof.

Instead of taking a swipe, it chuckled. “Hey, you’re pretty quick.” He rose to a bipedal posture. “Am I to take it that means you meant for some sparring when you grabbed my tail? Or do you just like it rough?” Whoa...I’m pretty liberal when it comes to sex but. With a male dragon, in a random rocky trail on our first meeting? To be fair I had been thinking he would be sexy were he not trying to eat me. But...

He saw the confusion on my face and started laughing an enthusiastic, slightly mocking laugh. “Hahah, slow down there stallion. I was only joking, that kinda thing is more Argos’ gig than mine. I was actually hoping you’d be more into the sparring thing.”

Right, learning to take people less seriously. I had always been a person who took what people said at face value. I had to know a person for a while to understand that they were joking when they said things like that.

Rather than give in to the urge to collapse in embarrassment about my misunderstanding, I ignored it, held a hoof out to my new, totally not sexy at all dragon friend. “Fractal Cloudfront” I introduced. He held out a claw “Sparks.” He introduced in return.

“Actually I’ve got some friends around here somewhere, we were headed for the spire city when some fairy started messing with me. I actually grabbed your tail thinking it was the fairy.” I explained

“Ohhh, yeah good luck with that. You need luck, guile, or overwhelming magic to catch a fairy. When I start thinking I’m being messed with by their illusions I just close my eyes and blast randomly. They usually decide I’m boring and dangerous and leave.”

I think I like this guy.

“What happens when you aren’t seeing an illusion and do that?” I inquired.

“Oh a fight usually; I actually did it at the amber spire once! And lived to tell the tale!” He cleared his throat. “Beset on all sides by magi, the Draconic Adventurer Sparks spit fire and vengeanc........”

His tirade was interrupted by a crash as a rock behind Sparks exploded. I should have been surprised when Iron hoof came crashing through it as a small humanoid reptile landed from what was evidently an immense jump with a roll backwards. But somehow, I really wasn’t.

I was surprised when a purple miniature gundam suit flew by and started launching can lids at me. Not too surprised to duck mind you.

I tried to yell at everypony to calm down. But no noise came out of my mouth. Sparks launched himself at Iron hoof, while breathing fire. Iron hoof’s armor started glowing red as he brought his weight up and swung a forehoof to meet the charge. I watched Sparks shout as he was slugged, but no sound came out.

I stood on two legs and started waving to get everyones attention, hoping I could signal a ceasefire in charades.

For my effort I got tackled by an impossibly quick reptile with a sword. Buck it. I decided, this fight was going to happen whether I wanted it to or not, and in all likelihood we were going to get our flanks handed to us. But I might as well make a good showing of myself.

I hugged the kobold just as he had been about to stab me, catching him off guard, and robbing him of any room to manuever his blade. Then I took off. My body has a few advantages when it comes to taking off, as well as a few when it comes to grabbing things. As it turned out, I could use friction grip with a great deal more of my body than just my hooves, and I didn’t need my legs to be in any particular place in order to fly; especially given my freaky hovering powers.

The pink armor girl was aiming at me, but hesitated to shoot while I held the kobold who was so obviously her companion. This hesitation allowed for Lily to teleport onto her back. I didn’t plan for that! The sudden extra body dragged pinksuit down quickly, and lily disappeared just before she hit the ground.

Trusting my companions to keep their quarries busy, I focused on the kobold. He dropped his sword, caught it in his tail, then swiped at one of my hind legs. I let go of the leg, and he kicked me with it. Before he could rip into me more I dropped him. He landed on his feet, seemingly unfazed by the 20ft drop onto solid stone. Then jumped immediately back up to cut at me.

The fact that a three and a half foot tall lizard could jump that high just didn’t seem fair.

I dodged the swipe, only for the kobold to draw a set of weapons and begin throwing them. The first two missed, but the third sunk into my thigh, dangerously close to sensitive territory. It was obvious that I would have to either wait for him to run out of knives, run away, or go on the offensive.

The first was an uncertain occurance in a magical world. The second left him to mess with my non-flying friends.

I dived suddenly, watching the lizard redraw his sword, then spiralled to the left with a roll, poured a point into sprinting, dived just left of the lizard, then leveled out to strike with both forehooves.

The whole manuever took about a second, and managed to catch the kobold off guard enough that I clipped him with a hoof. I could tell from his reaction that this was better than most melee attacks would do against him.

I looped around for another pass, but this time he was ready for me. The sword sunk into my shoulder painfully as he ducked and sliced. I passed right over him, thrown off course by the pain and loss of wingpower.

Eating dirt sucks.

He gestured to his throat then mouthed

‘Why can’t I talk? Get whoever is silencing us to quit it’

I shrugged ‘Fairies!’ I mouthed back. He chuckled a little. Then pointed to himself and the armor girl chasing Lily around, then at me and Iron Hoof and Sparks ripping into eachother.

I smiled and got up. Walking with two injured legs sucked. I pulled the knife out of my thigh, then regenerated myself, and made my way towards the ongoing brawl.

Both Sparks and Iron Hoof were messed up. They were silently panting for breath, each had only one operational eye, and looked like hell. Iron Hoofs armor looked like it was burned into his skin, blood was running out of his left shoulder, and he had a latticework of clawmarks on his face. Sparks meanwhile had one wing bent out of shape, his face looked like it had been put through a meat tenderizer, and a nasty looking gash on his chest was leaking blood like a tap.

I really hoped miss mecha suit was a medic.

Wasting no time I jumped between the two and shook my head at them in turn. I pantomimed a fairy, then zipping my lips, then pulled them both into a very gentle hug with my wings. I hoped they got the message.

They did. The lot of us gathered around. The girl in the mecha suit started applying some kind of gel to Sparks’ wounds, and upon some non-vocal persuasion on the kobolds part, began doing so to Iron Hoof as well, before gesturing that she was running low.

The kobold made the peace sign, then gestured to us, then pointed to the spires in the distance. I nodded.

Iron Hoof approached Sparks and offered a hoof. The two shook while smiling at eachother like best friends. I wasn’t about to complain, but it seemed I was travelling with two people for whom beating the snot out of each other was a preferred method of introduction.

Lily was watching them like they were absolutely insane. I was meanwhile watching their wounds close unnaturally quickly. Apparently mecha girl had medi-gel.

We began walking, and I immediately learned that the kobold didn’t require words to attempt to hit to hit on people. He spent pretty much the entire walk to the city smiling at Lily, making dramatic gestures and jumping around playfully, and making certain to brush her legs with his tail as often as possible.

I was completely uncertain whether to be annoyed at his lack of subtlety, or impressed at how effortless everything he did looked.

Given that he had just handed my flank to me in a fight. My relief over him being my friend instead of my enemy prevented me from involving myself. Instead I hung with Sparks and Iron Hoof. Sparks spent the entire trip switching between sizing us up, and blowing fire rings into the air. Iron Hoof spent the entire trip doing perimeter checks.

We were in a rocky valley, the strawberry fields behind us, the road to the spires ahead of us. Apparently the road we were on was a less popular one, because we only ran into one other person headed to the city. It was a hooded man riding an electric cart. I paid him no mind, other than to wave.

A few minutes out of the city we got our voices back.

“What say we make camp?” the kobold said. “The city is an eventful place, we have comfy tents, and I’ve been playing for a while tonight. We can get to know eachother a bit in the morning.”

The party quickly agreed. Sparks and group pulled out tents from their respective inventories which quickly set themselves up. “Would the lovely lady like to share my tent.” The kobold asked Lily with a bow.

“...um” Lily responded uncertainly.

“Actually I’ll share with you.” I put in, knowing Lily’s shyness.

“Okay, I suppose I’d love to get to know you too” The kobold said, in the absolute most suggestive way possible. “After all, we do seem to be the respective party diplomats. I have many exciting diplomatic topics to share with you in the morning.” I eyed the kobold appraisingly. He was half my size, had a truly obscene number of weapons strapped to him in various places. His scales were a dark green, that faded to lighter green on his stomach. Looking down from there I realized that I had no actual way of determining that the kobold was male. The voice was androgynous enough, and being a reptile, it didn’t have any external reproductive equipment.

I shrugged and said “We’ll see about that in the morning.” Then walked into the tent.

It was bigger on the inside. I suppose I should have expected that, this world being what it is, but it really caught me by surprise. There was a king sized bed in the room. There was also a fully stocked bar. What does one of these tents cost I wonder?

The kobold walked in behind me, closed the tent door, then walked over to the bar and poured an amber coloured drink. “Argos, by the way.” he said. “Since you were wondering.”

So I got the gender right.

“Goodnight Argos, I’ll see you in the morning.”

I appeared back in the lobby. “Congratulations, you have leveled up! Reason: not being beaten, swept up, or used by a higher level party.” The lobby entity announced. Pink Streamers launched from the walls. “I thought you would like some streamers and balloons to celebrate; like the pink one would have done!”

I think the Greeter is stalking us!

“Have you been watching me play?” I asked.

“Oh yes, you are fairly enjoyable to watch. Are you going to have sex with Argos?”

Creepy! “Um, no, no I am not; but on the off chance that I am having sex with anyone, could you... yaknow, not watch.”

The lobby entity sighed, “For you, I could not watch. Argos will be ever so disappointed that he can’t cross pony off his list.”

“He has a list?” I asked.

“Yup.” she responded.

We get all the cool friends don’t we.

“Yup, you’re even friends with Meridan and Pinkie Pie. You rebel you!” The entity responded.

“Greeter, did you just read my mind.” I asked, seriously beginning to get creeped out.

“Would you believe it if I told you that I simply guessed the most logical course of thought to match your facial expression and line of questioning? Speaking of which, I’m a disembodied greeting program, watching people is perfectly natural for me, and shouldn’t disturb you.” She said.

She is reading my mind.

That would officially be stowed away in my mental baggage for later use, alongside the fact that liking Pinkie somehow made me a rebel. I looked at the floating level chart. I need offensive ability. I chose an ability. Then, to mix things up, walked through the red door.

Third Level- Monk of the Inner Circle- abilities learned: Gravity Strike
Title: Pony Adventurer. Location: Spire Rock
Party members: Azure Lily, Iron Hoof - Argos, Jenna, Sparks