Aurelic startles awake, falling off of his bed. Thankfully, without bumping his head. He dons his disguise, walking over to the window and pulling the curtains back. What he sees outside petrifies him to the core for a brief moment, as if a wave of cold rippled through his body. The sight itself consisting of three particular fillies fighting near a VERY particular statue.

"Fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh FUCK! That's TODAY!? RIGHT FUCKING NOW!? Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit shit SHIT!" Forge's mind races, panic and anxiety taking a firm hold over him.

He quickly bolts out of his room, dashing like mad through the halls of Canterlot Castle.

-<>~--*--~<>-<

Forge teleports frantically down to Ponyville, only to see the landscape start changing. Every white cloud suddenly turning a shade of pink, flitting all around the sky and generally being a nuisance to the weather managing pegasi.

"There's still time, there MUST BE!" Forge thinks, galloping while teleporting towards the library.

That is, it's what SHOULD be happening. Instead, each teleport seems to put him back at the same point. Realizing that it's not getting him anywhere, he opts for a simple gallop sans the teleportation. Unfortunately, he still seems to warp back to the same starting point when he gets a certain distance away. Forge decides to just sit down out of spite, as a particular laugh echoes from nowhere. Then, the one responsible for it appears.

"What do you want, Q?" Forge grumbles.

Discord furrows his brow at that. "Q... that's a name I haven't heard since forever into the future."

Now it's Forge's turn to raise an eyebrow. "Wait... Oh, I see how it is then... You still didn't answer my question."

"Well, seems that you're impatient. Let me give it to you straight." Discord says, reappearing by Forge's side in a suit that looks suspiciously like it came right from The Godfather. Discord speaks in a matching Boston accent. "You see, I can't have you ruining my game so early. I mean, I never interfered with yours. I even gave you a week of preparation time."

Both of Forge's brows raise at that point, eyes widening to match. "What. There's no way, I don't even remember-"

"That was the point. And may I say, you shifted the events of this world quite admirably. If they make greeting cards for helping with evil plans, I owe you one." Discord interrupts with a grin that elicits a feeling of discomfort in Forge. "Now then, run along, but know that you won't be going near that library. In fact, you won't be able to talk about it either anymore. Don't even try to circumvent the rules, I've already changed them for you. And the best part is, you don't even know what they are now! Toodaloo." Discord vanishes in a flash of white light, leaving Forge to his devices.

The second Forge opens his mouth, a barking noise exits. "Awww shitballs."

-<>~--*--~<>-<

All Forge can do at this point is sit and watch things unfold around him and sulk. Every time he moves, every time he thinks the warping has stopped, he's planted right back on his butt, no matter which direction he walks. Even worse, every time he opens his mouth in an attempt to swear, a random animal noise comes out instead. Bored, he levitates a nearby chess board over to himself for a game. He seems to be losing to the board, and once he's lost, he subsequently loses his temper and flips the board wile bellowing a loud whale noise.

Suddenly, he has an idea. "If I can't move from this spot, then it'll have to move with me!"

Forge proceeds to tear up the chunk of ground he's sitting on, floating out back towards Canterlot. The journey takes weeks, which is actually around forty actual minutes since the sun and moon are moving through the sky like a couple of Walmart crackheads. He arrives at his destination, the hedge labyrinth of Canterlot Castle. Seems like there's a lot of places surrounding the outside of the actual building itself. The second Forge tries to enter the maze, he's pushed right back out, sliding through the air like he's on ice physics.

"Ah ah ah." Discord says, appearing in front of Forge. "No magic or wings in the maze, remember? And since you can't exactly move from that spot of ground... you'd get caught in a terrible state of being unable to move anymore. That wouldn't be any fun now, would it?"

Forge gives Discord the most dead of deadpan looks. "Now I get why your rule was miserable for everyone but yourself. There was a time I wouldn't have minded the chaos."

Discord rolls his eyes. "Whatever. You say tomato I say camaro." With that, Discord leaves. By turning into a bunch of leaves that blow in the wind.

"Fuck this piece of ground. I wonder... if it doesn't exist anymore, then it can't hold me back." Forge flips the ground he's on upside down.

Every time Forge falls, he maintains his velocity as he loops from the warping point. Next, he shapeshifts a large iron spike that covers him like a shell, subsequently increasing his velocity. Finally, he quickly rotates the ground back to the upright position, the next warp sending him and the spike crashing right through the chunk of ground, obliterating it. The spike continues driving him through the real ground, until he teleports back up to the surface. He quickly reverts to his normal disguise, unbound and teleporting as fast as he can to the library.

"Now THAT was thinking with portals."

-<>~--*--~<>-<

Forge arrives at the library, only to see the destruction caused by Tom already present. The faint cries of a dragon constantly barfing up scrolls can be heard inside.

"Damnit, I missed out on too much. Might as well try to find a workaround on the animal noises thing. Now... if I were Discord, and made a pony make animal noises instead of speaking... I've got it." Forge transforms into a seal, clearing his throat and talking in a surprisingly distinguished voice.

"Well then, looks like I can finally speak again. But now I'm a seal... ugh." The Aurelic seal says, as a ball falls from the sky and balances itself on his nose.

Seal Aurelic proceeds to slide over to the library on a path of soapy ground, undulating his way across the floor, and looking up the one thing he hadn't considered. Stairs. Thinking about it for a moment, he repositions himself, and proceeds to somehow fall up the stairs.

"Thank you seal blubber, softened my fall." Seal Aurelic thinks as he undulates his way over to see the sick dragon spew out another scroll.

"Twilight, it's me! Aurelic! Yes, I'm a seal right now, don't question it or the ball on my nose. I can barely see past this thing without craning my neck up. Anyway, listen. We need to round up the others and help them remember who they are. I recommend Applejack first, since we'll need her to help wrangle up the rest of them." Seal Aurelic is now panting, having said all of that as fast as he could while still going slow enough to be understood.

The recently not grey anymore Twilight nods. "Good call. Where were you anyway?" She asks as they descend the stairs.

"Long story, I'll tell you later." Seal Aurelic says, Twilight hopping onto his back as he slides along the soapy paths at a surprisingly fast pace.

-<>~--*--~<>-<

Once the last of the mane six has finally been caught, Twilight proceeds to cast the memory spell. Rainbow Dash turns back to normal, shaking her head. Then, she stares right at the proverbial elephant in the room, or literal seal in the open.

"Okay, sixth time. I'll elaborate on being a seal later." Seal Aurelic says.

"Did... that seal just talk?" Rainbow says, unblinking.

"It's Aurelic. He's uh... just a seal for right now. Hasn't said why yet, but once we defeat Discord, he'll talk about it." Twilight informs Rainbow.

"Ohhhhhkay then... Let's uh, go do that before this day gets any weirder." Rainbow says, only to see a group of buffalo dancing along in leotards.

"Riiiiiiiiiiight." Twilight says, in an equally weirded out state.

-<>~--*--~<>-<

The mane six and Seal Aurelic all approach Discord, who is casually sitting on his throne drinking a glass of chocolate milk incorrectly.

"Oh, I almost forgot." Discord says, plucking a card from outside everyone else's field of view, then handing it to Seal Aurelic, balancing it atop the ball on his nose. "I found one. I must say, thank you again for facilitating my escape." Discord smiles.

This causes the rest of the present sane ponies to look at Seal Aurelic, as Pinkie snatches the card from him.

"Thank you for helping me with my evil plan, you truly are an excellent pawn. Signed Discord. Made by Dimentio's Evil Greeting Cards Inc. Huh, I've never heard of that card company before." Pinkie says, setting the card back on the ball still present on Seal Aurelic's nose.

"Aurelic. You have some SERIOUS explaining to do." Applejack says with an intense glare.

"I don't even know myself, honest!" Aurelic half whines, genuinely scared of what he'd unknowingly done.

"Allow me." Discord says with a bow. "You see, another version of me from an alternate universe saw what was to become of the universe we're in, specifically, Nightmare Moon's reign, and myself remaining encased in stone until she has me thrown into a volcano. So, I decided before I was going to be turned into stone, I'd need to set up a plan. So I found someone from another dimension who could help keep Nightmare Moon from winning during that crucial Summer Sun Celebration. Without him setting things on what he thought to be the proper course, he'd inevitably set the stage for my return. Of course, I couldn't just plop him here without any magic of his own, otherwise he'd die. So I infused a minute amount of my own chaos magic into his new body. Of course, it can only manifest so much, so without any real reality warping abilities, he'd just end up having unexplained illusion abilities."

Aurelic proceeds to use said illusory powers to tell the mane six to activate their elements while Discord is distracted, by making auditory illusions in their ears, to which they nod. Despite them agreeing with the plan, he can feel their wariness of him.

"Something he'd brushed off without ever thinking about it too deeply. I also needed to make sure he'd have enough time to prepare for the Summer Sun Celebration, so I gave him a full week to settle in. He was the perfect, unwitting underling to enable my plans. So, a card was warranted." Discord finishes.

Discord turns his full attention back to the ponies and seal present, only to see the elements already glowing.

"You sly dog, you caught me monologuing!" Discord says in mock aghast.

"A word of advice. Close your mouth." Seal Aurelic says, staring Discord right in the eye as the stone begins to travel up his body amidst the rainbow friendship laser.

A shockwave of harmonic energy bursts from the elements soon after, undoing the chaos Discord had unleashed. Surprisingly enough, Aurelic is completely untouched, so he reverts from being a seal back into his Forge disguise.

Twilight approaches him cautiously, as do the others following her lead. "Aurelic, or Forge. We need to talk about this."

Author's Note

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand there you have it folks. The mystery of the unexplained illusion powers, finally revealed! I did actually plan that way back before I started writing the first version of this fic, and I still have other things planned waaaaay in advance. I have an in-universe explanation for every little thing in the story, because I'm a lore junkie.