Bastian sat in a chair, wired up to several machines in a room in Twilight's castle. Said alicorn was currently looking over a bunch of notes she'd taken during Bastian's interview by the town.

"So, you want me to use Nen, and these machines will record its output and whatnot?" He asked, jiggling the many wires he was hooked into out of boredom.

"Yes, exactly!" She said, checking the current readings of one of the machines.

She was fascinated by this 'Nen' that he'd mentioned; ponies used ambient magic in the environment to use spells, fly, or do other things, but according to Bastian, his people had developed a way to use their own life energy as a source of power! Dangerous if overused, but otherwise a nigh-inexhaustible source of power! She couldn't help but wonder if ponies could use this 'Nen' as well; if so, it could be a whole new field of magic research!

"Alright, everything looks good here..."

"So... how much power can these things read?" Bastian asked, looking at all the wires hooked to his arm.

"All the way up to 100,000 MU!" Twilight stated proudly. At Bastian's confused expression, she elaborated. "Mana Units, the measurement used to measure how much magic a single being can produce. The princesses themselves have been able to reach up to that level, which is why it was set so high. I, meanwhile, have a much larger mana pool, but because of magic constraints to avoid using too much power, the most I can produce at a time is 98,000."

"And, how does that measure up to a normal pony?"

"An average unicorn usually scores about 25,000 to 40,000. Unicorns with plenty of experience score an average of 75,000."

"You're really something, then." Bastian chuckled. Twilight smiled a bit at the compliment, but continued checking the machines.

"Alright, looks like everything's in order!" She said, turning to the Blacklist Hunter. "Ready when you are!"

"Alright, here goes." Bastian said, surrounding his arm with Nen. Instantly, the needle inside the gauge shot up to 85,000, much to Twilight's surprise.

"Wow... so Nen holds that much power..." She murmured, staring at the results in shock.

"I can put a lot more in, if you like - I'm not using a lot, here."

"Wait, what?!"

"What your machines are measuring is a rather light coating of Nen; if I wanted to, I could focus my entire aura into my arm. But, I'm also afraid doing so might damage your machinery..."

"Hmmm..." Twilight considered the offer. On one hand, it would certainly be a sight to see, and she might be able to get a good reading off of it... but at the same time, this 'light coating' of his was almost topping out the scales already! If he put too much in, it could short-circuit the machinery...

"No, that's enough for now." She decided, shutting the machine down. "Though, I'm going to see what I can do about modifying the machine to take higher ratings... Keep in mind, though, I'd like to ask you some more questions in the future, if that's alright."

"Nah, it's fine." Bastian replied, beginning to remove the wires and clamps. "Anyway, if you need me, you know where to find me."

It had been decided amongst the six ponies and one human that he would stay at Applejack's farm - plenty of room for him to stretch and walk about. And, between the ponies, if he was actually evil and plotting against them... this way, they could keep an eye on him.

Twilight's thoughts returned to the machinery as Bastian strolled out of the room, heading for the front door.

Bastian placed the baskets around the tree and signaled to Applejack that everything was ready. She promptly bucked the tree, sending every last apple down into the buckets below.

This was part of the agreement - in exchange for food and shelter, he'd have to help out around the farm. Bastian was happy to agree - his old mentor, a grouchy old geezer named Geehan, had used farmwork as a means of both physical training, and to raise money for food. In other words, Bastian was no stranger to physical labor - far from it.

"Well, I reckon' that's about all of 'em." Applejack said, glancing at the surrounding trees. "Good work there, sugarcube! I thought it'd take a lot longer than it did to clear out this end of the orchard."

"Well, like I said when we started - I'm intimately acquainted with hard work." Bastian replied with a chuckle, lifting two large buckets full of apples and beginning to walk them over to the cart they'd brought.

"I can see that!" Applejack replied with a smile as she pushed another basket towards the cart. "Now we've just got to load these up, and bring 'em into the barn."

"Hmm..." Bastian mumbled to himself as he glanced around at the numerous other baskets. "Shouldn't take too long." He said, more to himself than to the apple farmer.

To Applejack's amazement, Bastian's form seemed to blur out of existence; seconds later, the cart was loaded with apple-filled buckets, Bastian carefully placing the last one on the very back.

"What in tarnation was that?!"

"What was what?" Bastian asked, glancing over at her as he lifted the farmer's bucket and placed it next to the last one.

"How in tarnation did you get that done so quickly?" Applejack demanded.

"I ran." Bastian replied simply. "When you train your whole life to do something, you'd better be able to do it well - you of all people should know that."

"R-ran?" Applejack asked, astonished. "What sort of work did you have to do to run that fast?"

"AJ, I captured extremely dangerous criminals for a living back home." Bastian replied, not even sparing her a glance. "Most of them didn't want to go down without a fight, so I trained and trained until I was faster than them, then trained some more."

"You captured criminals?!"

"What, didn't I mention that during the interview?" Bastian asked, giving her a confused look. She slowly shook her head.

"Huh; could have sworn that I did..." He mumbled to himself before shrugging. "Anyway, now you know. It's not much of a secret, anyway."

As they brought the cart back to the barn, Applejack couldn't help but glance over at the human every now and then. Weird magic, extreme speed, captures criminals for a living...

She could only wonder what else he hadn't mentioned.

Author's Note

Hello everyone! hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

By the way, can anyone guess Bastian's Nen category? If someone can figure it out, I'll hurry up on creating the next chapter!

For hints, check the first chapter.