Swirling colors, voices and images filled my mind, burning their presence into my memory. It was almost too much, the knowledge of so many being crammed into my skull! Everything there was to know about the greater forces of the æther, magic. It was surreal just how long it felt, even though I've been assured it was only a few brief moments.

Then, in a flash of blue and a very bright light, it was done.

Soon, I felt wind rushing past me, and a flickering heat all around me. A massive expanse of desert stretched beneath me, and a cloudless, blue morning sky soared above me. There was also the massive ball of flames that licked the air around me. Oddly enough, I couldn't feel them burning me, only a slight warmth emanating from them.

As I fell, something would also, on occasion, hit my outer left leg. I looked down (or up, rather) and saw that same sword from before, sheathed in a scabbard. It was a simple black leather thing, with a steel cap protecting the mouth and point, both of which seemed to be covered in that same filigree that adorned the blade.

By far, though, the most striking thing was the sudden power I felt. It was like being submerged in room temperature water that was being vibrated by an earthquake (an interesting experience, I assure you). I could feel it in everything, from my eyes to every strand of hair. It was almost overwhelming.

'So this is what magic feels like, huh?' It was certainly impressive, if I said so myself. With a wave of my hand, the flames disappeared, leaving only a ghost of their warmth behind. Not that I knew it would work, but I just knew it would (you know?). I began to wonder just what I could do with these new powers, all of this magic to myself.

I felt like a little schoolgirl, this magic making me feel unnaturally giddy. It was even enough to make me giggle.

Before I could rouse the Guard Captain, I heard a manic laugh echo across the great hall. A magically enhanced voice that carried on the wind, and one that would probably force several hours more from my schedule. Before I could lament my loss of sleep further, a nearby guard began to quiver in fear.

“Y-your majesty! W-what was that!?”

I will tell you, it was very seldomly that anything would make me seriously entertain a sabbatical.

I had no idea what that was, but I knew I couldn’t go around announcing my presence (at least, if the gods were to be believed). Before I could try any silly arm waving or incantation muttering, though, I felt... something in my mind.

The sound of banging pots, breaking wood and a yowling cat echoed in my head. ‘Jeez! This place is a mess!’

It was that other voice! Discord, I think it was. ‘Yes, yes. It’s me, the master himself! Now before we do anything else, we should probably get you to the ground safely.’

And with that, my freefall from a few kilometers stopped, and eventually turned into a gentle, almost lazy drift downward.

As I gently floated down, I could now focus on something that wasn’t the overwhelming feeling of magic, but the ground. Specifically, I saw a small village quite a few kilometers away.

To be entirely honest, it seemed like a western frontier town, save for the tiny size and massive orchard to the east (seriously, how would so few people maintain an orchard in a desert). Though that wasn't the weirdest aspect of the town, by far. Roaming around the streets were technicolor ponies, dressed in childish caricatures of western stereotypes.

‘Yes, a small Equestrian town, Appleoosa, if I remember correctly. I would stay at a distance, if I were you. You’d probably cause a stampede.’

I absentmindedly nodded, wondering just what the fuck was going on. A few moments later, I was gently deposited on the ground, where a tiny dust-devil formed a translucent… well, I didn’t know what it was. Though it was almost exactly my height, and looked at me like we were old buddies from the army.

He gently extended his hand, “Why hello there, pal! Name’s Discord.”

I appraised him suspiciously while reaching for his hand— only to phase right through it.

“Ah well,” he said, shrugging, “It’s the thought that counts.”

I think I might just lose it. “Okay, thanks for not letting me go splat, but would you kindly explain what the flying fuck is going on?”

He chuckled, “Yes, I suppose I can take the time. What would you like to know?”

“Well, for starters, where am I?” I said, begrudgingly accepting my fate.

“Why, weren’t you paying attention? You’re in Mythas, specifically on the border of a country called Equestria.”

I sighed a little, “Alright, alright. What is it that I’m supposed to do then?”

He scratched his scruffy goatee, humming in apparent thought. “Well, I suppose you could realistically do just about whatever you want.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well,” he said, reclining on the air, “Your job is to help me spread some chaos, but we have to do it in a controlled way.”

“And how am I supposed to do something which is contradictory by nature?” I said, slowly getting frustrated by his laissez-faire attitude.

His impish grin was quite similar to that jaguar’s. “Well, it’s difficult, but that isn’t your job. You just need to cause the chaos, I’ll be the one making sure it’s controlled.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose, slowly rubbing my closed eyes. “Alright... okay. Do you have something concrete for me, then? Maybe not a “do this,” but at least a “don’t do that”?” I begged.

He seemed to think that over for a moment, idly floating in circles around me. “Well, for starters, I would recommend against starting an ethnic cleansing, or other similar things. That would be a bit too much.”

I was dumbfounded, “Uh... yeah. No shit.”

“And changing a biome would probably end the world, too,” he continued, “So would a new invasive species, come to think of it.”

I was starting to get a scosche upset. “Yeah! No shit!”

“Hyper advanced tech might be okay. And a new philosophical or political outlook should be alright. Just don’t go with Nazis or Communisim and you should be able to squeak out fine.”

I let out a frustrated sigh.

“Anything else and you should be okay— I trust your judgement.”

“So essentially you want me to do some bad shit, but not get up to Hitler levels? Is that it?”

“Well, not exactly. This world needs some instability on occasion. If you do a Thanos and wipe out half the planet, everybody else would benefit, but at this point, it would cause a massive cascade of the balance. You’d probably end up killing everything then. Not that you even have enough power to do something like that.

“No,” he said, looking me in the eyes, “I am a force of nature here, and you are my helper. Nature does not care about feelings, it is not good or evil. It simply is. I do not delight in death, but it is a tool of balance in my arsenal, and it is sometimes necessary. This may be one of those times, and if it is, then you’ll just need to suck it up, buttercup.”

He returned to lazily floating around, but his words hung in the air like a headsman’s axe. “Okay,” I said, suddenly feeling very small next to him.

“But fret not!” he said, his cheery tune returning jarringly, “I know how mortals feel about killing things, so I will defer to your judgement on the frequency of its necessity.”

I slowly nodded, unsure of how to deal with the god-like being near me. “Will there be anything else?” he asked, folding a sheet of paper into a tesseract.

“Uh, yes, actually. I should probably ask you about how to use my magic.”

“Ah! Yes, that’s the tricky part. For now, you’re still in the divine envelope that brought you here. All you’ll have to do is imagine it and it’ll happen. After about a day, though, your ability will taper off as the hole in the æther connected to you closes. Once it’s shut, you’ll have to learn magic like the rest of the mortals do. And I’m sorry to say, I don’t have the time or desire to teach you.”

I sighed, realizing that I had a lot of work ahead of me. “Alright, thanks, I guess.”

His impish grin returned in full force, “I’ll be back in a few months for a progress report. Ta ta!” his form disappeared, leaving nothing but a rapidly dissipating dust-devil behind.

As he disappeared, I let loose a sigh of relief. ‘Now, what to do?’

After a few moments, I decided that I needed a disguise. I figured a human would stick out like a sore thumb in a land of myths and legend, and sticking out that much would probably be a detriment. The only question was; what should I disguise myself as?

Eventually, I decided on a Roman satyr, allowing me to keep most of my body the same, with a bipedal stance. I did just as Discord said, picturing myself as a satyr. I could feel the energy surrounding me, willing my body to change.

Slowly, my flesh began to bubble and shift, and I could hear bones snapping and shifting beneath my disturbing flesh. Thankfully the transfiguration was far more pleasant than it sounded; it felt like being dipped in a pleasantly warm bath.

My blue jeans fell from my newly changed body, exposing the most stunning of the changes. My goat legs were covered in a curly, raven black coat of fur, and I sported an impressive set of new horns stretching back and up in a gentle tilde shape, much like a Tiefling's would. A simple van dyke classed the look up quite nicely; I always had a particular fondness for this style of beard.

The only problems now were my clothes, as my pants still held my belt— and by extension my sword. My simple “Shadiversity” (and no, it had nothing to do with… him. Look it up on youtube, trust me) t-shirt seemed quite at odds with what I expected the local population wore. But while my shirt could be explained away, denim would likely be far beyond my ability to explain (assuming they didn’t have it). It’s not like I even needed pants now, anyway.

I decided to transform all my belongings, starting with my pants. I decided to shape it into an old-fashioned stove top hat. The items in my pockets now lay strewn across the ground, and a new hat rested safely atop my horns.

Next was my shirt, which was transformed into a silk/cotton blend black vest, buttoned with three anodized titanium buttons, gleaming with a rainbowy finish. I did decide to keep the logo, but as a small pin on the lapel instead.

Next, my phone was morphed into a sterling silver pocket watch, with a short chain. Its simple roman numeral face read the time of 0930. Its plain finish was slipped into my vest and clipped onto the middle button.

My belt was rather thin, so I made it into a passably thick and wide strip of braided leather, which was promptly fastened around my waist, with a shiny new silver buckle. I morphed my shoes into a rough pair of leather gloves, which were shoved into the pocket on the other side of the vest.

Finally, my wallet was changed to a simple coin purse, filled with a modest amount of blank gold and silver disks fashioned from my various business cards, credit cards, and actual money. I could always change the blanks to actual coinage when I knew what the local currency looked like. The only thing I kept was the picture of my late uncle, which I lovingly placed in an inside pocket.

With that settled, I decided to flex my magical muscles, stretching my magical perception as far as I could. I spread my net far and wide, searching for any signs of life and significant power. Countless details of my distant surroundings filled my mind, stretching it far beyond its capacity. If I focused on an area for more than a second I would simultaneously see down to quantum and macro scales, learning far more than what I was meant to.

As soon as I started I wanted to stop. I couldn't even comprehend what I was seeing, and every second was agony. Just before I stopped, though, I sensed multiple powerful presences.

One lay to the Southeast, around 800 kilometers from here. I couldn’t tell much about it, as I was getting bombarded with every single speck of information on it; the only thing I could make sense of was the smell of freshly-cut grass.

Three lay clustered to the Northwest, between 800 and 1000 kilometers from here. The closest was odd, as it made me feel purple. I’m not entirely sure what that means, but then again I could see through time and space into the beyond!

The final two were clustered very closely together. If it weren't for their night and day differences, it would almost seem like they were one being from so far away. The first, weaker one looked like the sound of a car horn, and smelled like turducken.

The second had a strong, smokey sound, and tasted like sadness.

After I ended my horrible experience, I wept miserably for a minute before I forgot why I was crying. Having decided to never do that again, I tried a more conventional approach.

I pulled out a blank silver disk and decided to do the opposite of what it told me; Heads for the grassy smell, and tails for the three things I couldn’t understand. I used my magic to scratch an “H” and a “T” on the disk before tossing it into the air.

I watched it spin in the air for a moment before I caught it in my open palm. Tails.

With my path decided, I turned south— floating off towards my unknown destiny.

A small black figure clad in a sickly-green chitinous armor quickly trotted down ornate, grey limestone halls carved deep beneath the earth. The massive catacomb’s ceiling rose forty meters high, and stretched on farther than any light illuminated in all directions. Great pillars supported the ceiling, and the dank smell of stale air was omnipresent.

Every fifty meters there were large bronze braziers mounted ten meters above the floor. They held bright, mesmerizing emerald flames, though they did little to pierce the oppressive darkness. Every one hundred meters or so, there were more black creatures which carried lanterns to further combat the darkness in the underground hall.

As it passed others dressed in similar barding, it nodded or raised a hoof in an outstretched salute. It paid them little heed, however, as it had an important mission.

Its pace was swift, and soon it arrived at a set of large doors, made entirely of bronze, polished to a brilliant sheen. It was lavishly decorated with flowers and flowing poems in dead languages, and at eye level were mirrors made of the same bronze. The only ones in the entire complex.

Flanking the door on either side were more braziers, though the flames they held were an icy blue, and seemed to whisk away the heat. They produced a very bright, white light, and seemed to combat the darkness far more effectively.

Before he had even a moment to ponder the poems on the doors, they were opened from within.

The room beyond was comparatively small, though the vaulted ceiling was still twenty meters above the small figure’s head. A small foyer opened into a rotunda that was at least fifty meters across. The room was lit by the same blue flames by the door, though they sat in large stone basins.

On the domed ceiling of the rotunda were carvings depicting creatures similar to the black figure, though unlike him, their faces were all joyous or contented. They appeared to weave in-between trees in a grove. None aside from those called Changelings had ever seen those carvings, sadly.

At the end of the rotunda, opposite the door, was a throne of stone, decorated with plush, velveteen cushions and pink doilies. A regal black figure lazed atop the throne, with a pair of green tortoise-shell reading glasses perched atop her muzzle. She was reading countless reports of the goings on in her kingdom.

"My Queen!" rasped a deep, gravelly voice.

"Yes, my son?" replied the feminine figure. As she turned her gaze to the smaller child, she smiled at his bowing form.

"It is the oddity you had asked us to observe, Your Majesty," he said, rising, "It has turned out to be an incredibly powerful being. It's since taken a different form, though of what, I couldn't say."

"Could you describe it then?"

"Well, it's upper half was similar to that of a Minotaur, while its lower half resembles a goat. But it's head was wrong, Your Grace."

"Hmm, a faun hasn't been seen for almost a thousand years," she mumbled, pensively.

"Beg pardon, Your Majesty?"

"A Faun, or Satyr— ancient creatures that were thought to be extinct," she said. "The Blight one thousand years ago killed them all, or so it was thought."

"It was last seen flying this way."

"Hmm..."

"What should we do, Your Grace?"

"Bring him to me, unharmed and untouched."

"As you wish, Your Beauty," he said, bowing. He stood up and began to trot out of the room, leaving the Queen to her thoughts.

Author's Note

Edited! (finally)