“How come you, Luna, and Cadence are all immortal, but not me?”
Celestia looked up from her cup of tea at Twilight, who was sitting across the table from her. She took a small sip from the boiling hot liquid, something only she could possibly do, and smiled at her former student. “What do you mean?”
Twilight had pulled out a notebook and quill from… somewhere, and proceeded to read off several things. “Well, since you and Luna are naturally born alicorns, I assumed that your immortality was because of that. But then I found out that Cadence is also immortal, but wasn’t she born a pegasus? And Flurry Heart isn’t immortal, even though she was born an alicorn. So, why are you three immortal, and Flurry and I aren’t?”
Celestia took another sip. “Well, my dear Twilight, I suppose now would be the time to tell you that Luna and I weren’t born alicorns.”
“What?!” Twilight exclaimed, her jaw dropping. “But- but- but that would mean all my theories and- and- it’s now all useless and-”
“Now, now, Twilight,” the older alicorn said, chuckling. “That’s no reason to overreact.”
“But-”
“Just let me explain everything.” Celestia went to take sip of her tea, then frowned when she saw her teacup was empty. She refilled it and used her magic to bring the liquid to a boil, before taking another sip. “Yes, believe it or not, my sister and I were not born alicorns. In fact, I myself used to only be a mere earth pony.” Seeing Twilight’s wide eyes, she smiled and continued. “Luna was a unicorn, and therefore much more experience in magic than me. She still is. That’s how she so easily defeated me as Nightmare Moon.” Her expression became saddened by the memory, before brightening up once again. “But that’s not what I’m telling you about. Our parents were both alicorns, of the sun and moon respectively.”
“Wait, how is that possible?” asked Twilight. “There are no more known alicorns other than the current five.”
“The answer is in your question, Twilight,” replied Celestia. “No ‘known’ alicorns. Luna and I came from an ancient alicorn civilization that nopony knows of. To answer the question that I’m sure you’re about to ask, the reason nopony knows of it is because we alicorns tend to keep to ourselves. We don’t want all the attention that comes with being an alicorn. Tell me, Twilight, what would happen, if everypony knew of the civilization and its location?” Celestia looked at her inquisitively as she sipped her tea.
Twilight put a hoof to her chin. “Well, I assume that ponies would always be travelling there, expecting some kind of ‘royal help’ from the alicorns, and the alicorns themselves would probably have no privacy whatsoever.”
“Exactly. And, another thing about alicorns, the ‘natural born’ ones at least, is that we don’t give birth to alicorn children. Instead, we give birth to normal ponies, who then earn their wings or horns, or both in my case, usually along with their cutie marks.”
“But then how come Flurry was born an alicorn?”
“I think is has something to do with Cadence not being born an alicorn. See, when she became an alicorn, you would assume she would be just like us, but in reality, he genetics and inner magic is quite different. While natural alicorns are genetically ‘coded’ to have non-alicorn children that will in time become alicorns, Cadence’s genetic code hasn’t been altered like that. All that transformation did was give her unicorn and earth pony magic, therefore making her as powerful as an alicorn should be. She now has that magic in her genes, which would explain how she passed on that magic to Flurry Heart. She did not, however, receive the gene that natural alicorns innately have.”
Twilight was furiously scribbling notes into her notebook, completely immersed in the lecture Celestia was giving her. The older princess chuckled behind her hoof, then continued. “As for your earlier question about immortality, I am immortal because of my connection to the sun.”
“What?” Twilight looked up from her notes. “What do you mean?”
“Well, it’s simple, really. To become immortal, one must have a magical connection with a magical long-lasting object. I became immortal simply by weaving my magical flow together with the sun’s magical flow. The sun and I are magically connected, and we are one.” She paused to think about it. “Well, actually, now that I think about it, I’m not actually immortal since the sun will die out one day, but I will have lived for millions of years, if I’m not killed before then.”
“Wait,” Twilight interrupted, “so you can be killed?”
“Well, yes, but it’s extremely hard,” Celestia explained. “So far, I only know of two ways to kill an immortal alicorn. One, is to destroy the object they are connected to, if they are old enough, and the other is to pierce our hearts or brains, like any other pony. It has to be a one-hit kill, though, because immortal alicorns heal ridiculously fast.”
Twilight, although, slightly disturbed by Celestia’s nonchalant manner when talking about such a topic, took thorough notes nonetheless. Then she noticed something. “Wait, how come Cadence didn’t die when the Crystal Heart was shattered by Flurry? I assume that’s what she connected to, right?”
“You are correct, Twilight.” Sip. “Cadence is indeed connected to the Crystal Heart. The reason she didn’t die was because destroying the object doesn’t actually kill its host. It just severs their connection. Cadence is still the age of a normal pony, as opposed to me, if somehow, somepony destroyed the sun, I would become a pile of dust because normal ponies simply do not live to be two thousand five hundred forty one years old.”
“Oh, okay.”
“Luna’s connection to the moon is quite similar to mine, and so is Cadence’s to the Crystal Heart. My parents before me were the rulers of our civilization, and were connected to the sun and moon just as Luna and I are. They are long gone now, since they had to relinquish their control over the celestial bodies when my sister and I came of age. I visit there sometimes, and as far as I can tell, my previous kingdom is in good hooves.” Celestia smiled as she remembered her first home.
“Celestia?”
“Hmm?”
“How do I make a connection? Is it possible to connect my friends, also?”
“Oh, no, you can’t connect a pony to an object for them, they have to do it themselves. And as far as I can tell, only alicorns are capable of performing the ritual.”
“Oh.” Twilight’s ears dropped as she realised she would eventually outlive her friends. Then she had an idea-
“No, you can’t turn your friends into alicorns, Twilight, it’ll mess up the balance of Harmony.”
Twilight crossed her forelegs and pouted.
“As for your second question, yes, you can perform the ritual, since you are an alicorn. The first part would be picking out an object to bind yourself to, then the ritual itself. In alicorn terms, it’s quite simple, but if you were trying to do this as a normal unicorn, your head would literally implode from the immense magical pressure.”
“What about-”
“I doubt Starlight Glimmer could do it, despite her incredible magical wellspring.”
“Oh. Huh.”
The two sat in silence for a while, contemplating the strange conversation they just had.
