Diaries of a Madman

Chapter Two Hundred and Five

When I fell asleep, I entered the world of dreams and started poking around. It was still relatively early, but Fleur was already waiting for me. She was even having a nightmare, so I finally got to do her a solid in one of her dreams.

When I peeled back the black smoke surrounding her dream, I witnessed Fleur standing in a ballroom surrounded by fancifully dressed ponies. Nothing out of the ordinary seemed to be happening, so I’m not really sure what made it a nightmare. Standing around and waiting wouldn’t help, so I just jumped on in, appearing next to the mare of the hour.

“Hello, Fleur,” I said, booping her. She blinked a few times before looking around. “Yep, it’s a dream.”

“Hm. While I won’t call into question the effectiveness of this method of communication, I will say it’s… jarring. Welcome to a day in my old life, Nav.”

“It looks like a normal Canterlot party,” I said. “But the color of the dream indicated it was a nightmare.”

“Oh, of course. As I said, welcome to a day in my old life. Anyway, how can I help you tonight? Does this perhaps pertain to the mysterious visitor you sent me? Who, by the way, was looking for you?”

“That’s part of it, yes. I wasn’t expecting him to show up at my doorstep, so I passed the hot potato off to you. And while I’m dreading the answer, how did you know he was looking for me?”

“Uh… You talked about it in front of me in Rarity’s boutique? It didn’t take me long to figure out that the griffin who really likes a pony maid and is also really interested in manga was the same one you were complaining to Rarity about.”

Maybe I should start being more discreet? “What did you tell him?”

“I gave him the general run-around, basically saying I would check a few sources and ask some questions but promising nothing concrete. You and I are going to meet tomorrow to see the deer, so I was just going to ask you for more details then.”

“I’ll give you the short version of the story, then.” And so I explained how the griffin Darkplume bought me at an auction because pony maids are his fetish. I also included some details of how I originally parted ways with him. “And so, he stalked me all the way back to Canterlot. Obviously, telling the truth isn’t an option. I punted him your way to buy time, but we need a plan to deal with him.”

“Why not just turn you back into a pony so you can turn him down properly?” Fleur asked.

“Because that sounds super annoying, if I’m being honest. Doppel suggested we just tell him that Rosie was a married noblemare in disguise.”

“You think lying to him is better than just turning him down? Or are you worried he’ll try something drastic?”

“I’m worried he’ll do something. I want to deal with him as little as possible and have him out of Canterlot as quickly as possible.”

One of her eyebrows lifted. “That bad? Really? He looked like a sweetheart, if maybe a bit possessive.”

“He had wanted posters put up for me in Gryphus,” I said.

“That’s because he saw you foalnapped by magic before his very eyes. I was actually wondering something, too. How did you teleport away like that? Was Twilight helping you?”

“Sorta. She has a spell that lets me register a trigger word that’ll teleport me when it’s spoken. When he asked me to marry him, I replied with the trigger word and got teleported back to our inn.”

“Ooh, harsh. But then, so is asking a mare to marry you after sloppily making love to her a single time… Still, though, I really don’t want to lie to this griffin, even after that. If you were his Rosie, that would mean Twilight was playing the part of Lady Ivory?”

“Yep.”

“You should get her to lie for you instead. After all, wasn’t the whole trip her idea? I’m sure getting sold at an auction was, too.”

“I thought lying was something you did as easily as breathing. Why the hangup when doing so would actually be convenient for me? I can probably get Twilight to do it, but the more people we involve in this, the more off the rails it’s going to go. I want that griffin off my tail as quickly as possible. I don’t want him digging into things he doesn’t need to find. If the goal is to tell him that Rosie is a married noblemare in disguise, I don’t see why it would matter who he hears it from.”

“You’re more worried about him than I thought. So be it, then. I’ll lie to him, though I might make up a better story.”

Well, there’s one fewer consequence from that vacation. “Thank you. What time are you planning on coming by tomorrow?”

“I’ve arranged for a deer guide to meet us at a nearby animal sanctuary around ten. I plan to arrive at your home by chariot half an hour before then. We’ll fly out shortly after I arrive.”

“Cool beans. And just so I’m sure, my job will be to guard you, correct?”

“Not solely, but that will be your primary task. I don’t expect anything to happen, but I’m not going to visit an unknown society by myself. I would also like you to help me convince the deer to join us at the competition.”

“I can make no guarantees. I don’t know anything about their society, so I don’t know what might make them interested in competing. If they’re completely isolationist and want nothing to do with other races, I’d probably be inclined to just leave them be.”

“Doesn’t that run counter to all your other efforts so far?” she asked. “You’ve been opening the world up more and more with all your travels!”

“Not on purpose, though. Celestia’s the one who’s been following up behind me and taking advantage of the things I discover. She reached out to Atlantis and the monkeys in South America. And the water elementals dragged the kobolds by the ear.”

“So you’re saying the treaty between the changelings and ponies that you instigated was an accident? And the treaty between the griffins and the changelings that you instigated was also an accident? And the nearly complete eradication of criminals in Europe at your hands was an accident? Let’s see… You also ensured the Crystal Empire could continue to exist as a free nation. You held the first ever open marriage between a changeling and a pony.”

“Fine, I get it. Then I’ll tell you the truth. I’ve heard nothing but bad rumors about the deer. This is from several sources, including Blossom and Celestia. If the deer truly are mostly arrogant assholes, I want nothing to do with them. And if that is the case, I also wouldn’t want more of them in Canterlot. I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, because I’ve never met one. That’s why I’m willing to meet them. But I’m going there fully expecting to be disappointed.”

“...Even you would so quickly condemn an entire race?” she quietly asked.

“No, of course not. Every terrible race has at least a few exceptions. One of the only dragons who isn’t an asshole is Spike, for example. And one of the only spiders who isn’t an evil monster is Spider. Even if the race of deer in general is bad, there would probably still be a few that might be worth meeting. That’s why I don’t intend to actively destroy any non-hostile race, even if they’re pricks.”

“So you don’t even believe in spreading the message of friendship across the world?”

“Of course I do,” I said. “I want there to be fewer races of assholes out there and spreading Celestia’s religion of friendship is a good way of doing it. But if a race is going to be racist to the point of complete isolationism, you’re not going to change that with a beauty pageant. The idea for that was mainly a stepping stone to help important figures in the major races start coordinating with each other. Any races that are stuck up to the point where they won’t participate in something like that will have to be broken with different methods. My main goal while I’m there will be to find out what they produce and what they might buy.”

“You intend to spend this important diplomatic visit shopping instead of convincing them to open their hearts?”

“The strings on their coin purses will probably be looser than the bindings around their hearts. As someone who’s planning to build a village near the Everfree very soon, knowing what my neighbors are interested in acquiring is important. The first step in opening up a civilization is trade. All societies have things they need. If we show them that we can provide things they require, that’ll be another step in showing them that opening their hearts to us might be beneficial.”

“...You’re founding a village?”

“It’s a mandate from Princess Celestia. It’s part of my promotion to countess.” Her eyes widened and the sky outside turned straight to gold. “She isn’t officially announcing it until the ship arrives, though. That will be after the pageant, because it’ll be kinda awkward for me to be there as a symbol of peace between races when everyone knows I’ll be leading a war.”

“I would like to visit it when things get going,” she said with a nod. “I’m sure any village made by you will be well worth seeing.”

“You’ll be welcome. Celestia has asked that I focus on the economy. I have several ideas that a village will make possible. All the colonists have been picked, the land is being readied, and Celestia will help with everything I need in terms of construction. Moonbeam will also probably lend a helping hand.”

“Will the university be a part of that? If so, we could announce your village along with the university at the competition. Just knowing that you’re founding a village wouldn’t be enough to let someone know you’re getting a promotion.”

“Yes, the university will be part of the town. I’ll ask Celestia if we can announce it. Most of the residents will be non-ponies, for what it’s worth. Naga, kobolds, monkeys, changelings, and some mercenaries that are a mixmash.”

“Kobolds, monkeys, and naga? None of them are competing, Nav! You need to tell me these things!”

“I just found out today. I knew about the other races, but I left the kobolds on bad terms and I fled from the monkeys because of an awkward misunderstanding. More to the point, both are hard to get to. The kobolds hail from an island in the middle of the ocean to the west. The monkeys are surrounded by a super hostile race of spiders and about as far from any friendly port as the kobolds. Asking to meet the seaponies from Atlantis would be more reasonable.”

“They can’t even compete!”

“Which shows you how difficult it is to try and get to the other two. I wasn’t expecting them to reach out to me like this. Getting you in touch with the naga would be easy, but they aren’t the kind of people that would find interest in a beauty show. They’re also a very male-dominated society, to the point where the chiefs might not even let the women compete.”

“Oooh… Has that affected your relationship with them?”

“I dunno. I haven’t visited since I got genderbent. The naga I have with me said they’re eager to see me again even though they know I’m female, though. And a separate group of naga elected to move to my new town. I have a feeling that I’ll be tested when I return. When I succeed, they’ll say that my spirit as a warrior survived or something. But Kat’s also going with me, so their tunes might change a little after she thrashes as many of them as are willing to face her. Even then, though, their society is clan-based. A change in one small group wouldn’t affect any others. I only know of three clans, and I’ve only met two in person. The third will soon be living in my village.”

“I see. So they are, as you would call them, a minor race.”

“Right. But they’re a minor race I’m friendly with. My naga dagger guarantees me access to any clan cave I find, as long as I go in with peaceful intentions. They at least have that tradition in common, along with a few others.”

“Hm. Are there any other races you’re failing to mention to me?”

“Well, you know about the spiders. Do you have any interest in inviting them?”

“No. Everyone in your crew shares the consensus that Spider is one of the only spiders that isn’t pure evil. The accounts of those who witnessed Arachne were… utterly chilling. I have no intention of poking that sleeping bear.”

“Do you have sheep, cows, pigs, and all the other various vassal races?”

“Sheep, yes. Princess Celestia allowed us to use a teleportation circle to visit the land of the sheep for recruitment. The other races you mentioned don’t have a centralized power base, so I decided not to invite them this year. I thought about inviting more of the lesser herbivores, but I didn’t want to make the first year’s event too large. I also wanted to bring in as many races that Equestrians don’t know about as possible. I don’t know about you, but I find Princess Gilda and Kat to be more beautiful and elegant than most ponies.”

“I’ll agree that they’re beautiful,” I said. “And Kat can be elegant if she wants, but… I’ve never seen Gilda act that way. She always gets flustered so quickly.”

“That’s because you’re ever-so-gifted at riling her up. Are you sure it was wise to cast her aside so quickly?”

“Yes. Nothing good was going to come from continuing to bang her. It might have been a lot of fun, but getting caught would have been utterly disastrous. And since I may have a chance to become male again, marrying her isn’t really on the table.”

“No, but wouldn’t that be perfect for her?” Fleur asked. “She certainly doesn’t want to marry any male griffin, but she’ll probably eventually be forced to. But you can play with her in her dreams in whatever body the two of you pick for the night. Plus, she could be with the one she’s so utterly infatuated with. And keeping her on the table would have lessened the pressure on you from Moonbeam and Celestia. Neither of them consider me or Twilight to be much competition, but Gilda had a real title to her name. Now that you don’t have the excuse of spending time with her while you’re at home, what do you expect the two of them to do?”

“...Ah hah. That explains a few things. I guess that’s why Celestia showed up to cook me dinner tonight.”

She sighed and hung her head. “I can’t believe you didn’t realize this. Well, now that you’ve rebuilt her, Celestia’s clearly a better choice than Moonbeam. I’m sure she’s thinking the same thing, so she assumes she has it in the bag now.”

“Man, you and Watcher said the same thing. He went on a long tirade about how Moonie’s a monster and that the hero of Equestria shouldn’t even be considering marrying her. I mean, what’s up with that?”

Fleur stared at me in silence for several long seconds. For some reason, her eyes seemed really judgmental. “Are you being serious, or are you joking?”

“I’ll be the first one to admit that Moonie is evil. But I mean, so what? She just saw what happens to those who use their evil against me. Unless she really is compromised by Discord, there’s basically no chance of her turning against us. That is, unless she wants to get reset just like her pal Oldlestia.”

“...I suppose a scythe hanging above one’s neck is a decent way of keeping them loyal.”

“And there’s also the carrot of all the benefits that working with us provides. Like prisoners, trade, and maybe the ability to move above ground. Now that Celestia’s been reset, we know she isn’t a threat. Keeping an eye on Moonie is a higher priority. And marrying her would be a decent way of doing it. As long as I can keep reforming her and don’t get swept up by her, she might not be as evil in a century or two.”

“And she’s much better at sex.”

“Undeniably. She’s a smoking hot evil fae queen. If I’m honest, a part of me has wanted a relationship with her ever since I had the chance to really talk to her a few times. I’m not going to say something dumb like it was love at first sight, but her personality and shapeshifting abilities are things I find attractive. And a part of that probably includes her evilness, unfortunately.”

“I… honestly don’t know what to say to that. You would really prefer Moonbeam to Celestia? Really? Even when counting her personality? No, from what you said, especially counting her personality!”

“One thing I like is her sincerity. She is unabashedly a monster. Never once has she tried to hide it. Celestia covered her darkness with rainbows and deceit. Chrysalis reveled in it with honesty and giggles. At least now, Celestia is beginning to wear her emotions more on her sleeve. But even as it is now, there’s something about her attitude that just… makes me feel uneasy. Moonbeam has made me feel uneasy at times, but she always backs away before crossing too far over any lines. It’s possible I’ll come to prefer the new Celestia, but she’s fighting an uphill battle.”

“And so am I, it seems,” Fleur said. “Especially given that I started as an enemy.”

“So did Moonie. The first time I met her, she attacked me. The second time I met her, I helped Celestia kick her ass. I punched her in the face the third or fourth time. I was definitely wary of her in the beginning, but she’s proven herself to be a valuable friend. At least I didn’t have to physically attack you.”

“You threatened to slit my throat and leave my body to rot in a ditch.”

“And I didn’t do it, did I? Anyway, we shouldn’t really spend all night talking. We have a long day tomorrow and I have more people I need to contact.”

“Hmph. Will you leave a souvenir behind?”

“I certainly can. What kind of stallion would you like tonight?”

“I would like a copy of you. Preferably the male version, the one with bat wings, fangs, and faintly glowing green eyes.”

“I wasn’t aware my eyes glowed.”

“They definitely catch the light. It’s just like the eyes of the batponies!”

“Ah, that.” The me of her dreams appeared in a snap. I also used dream magic to insert a certain toy into a certain place on Fleur. Its remote was firmly in the hands of the other me. “I’ll be doing one more thing before I leave. I’ll make sure you don’t realize it’s a dream. That way, you’ll think you’re being mercilessly teased at a super big party. I made this version of me extra fun, so you’re in for a wild night.”

“W-wait a moment,” Fleur said, her eyes going wide.

“No tears now, only dreams,” I replied, booping her. Her wide eyes hazed over and I stepped out of the dream. When I turned back to look at it, the thing had already turned bright red.

“What did you do to poor Fleur?” Twilight asked from next to me, peeling back the smoke to peer inside.

“She asked me to leave a souvenir behind, so I went the extra mile,” I replied. “How was the rest of your day?”

“Acceptable. I finished the rough draft of the last book about our time at Gryphus. It includes a section about a hotsprings escapade between the maid and a griffin noble, of course.”

“Right, of course. So, I have something fun to show you.”

“Oh? Did you discover another dream technique?”

“Yep. Let’s see if Rarity is asleep.” Sure enough, she was. We both zoomed over her way. “And is Fluttershy also asleep?” I thought about her and found myself looking at another dream close by. Both were golden, so we didn’t need to worry about interfering. “Alright, watch.” With that, I summoned an AI and had it connect the two dreams. “Now their dreams are combined for the night. We can also set their dreams to combine every night.”

“That’s amazing!” Twilight said. “It’s like the dream world Luna built, isn’t it?”

“Sort of, but not quite. Luna built a dream space that was able to maintain itself without any dreamers. She was also able to directly send people in a certain radius to the same place. This method just combines the dreams of two or more people who are already asleep.”

“We’ll need to ask Luna how she created that space,” Twilight said with a nod. “But still, this technique will be useful. I can have a dream-like sleepover with all my friends at once!”

“I was planning to use it for training. The idea was to bring in Kat, Watcher, the naga, and maybe Taya, and train together. Cadance also thought of another use for it. She’s sharing dreams with Shiny, now.”

“Oh, I might need to pay them a visit to see how they’re enjoying it,” she replied with a smile. “This really is interesting. I wonder if it could be used for other kinds of training.”

“Probably, but it would take someone attuned to the artifact to keep the dream focused. You could probably gather a few pupils together and teach them about magic, or any other subject. Oh, you could teach a bunch of noblemares the joy of orgies while advertising your books!”

“That would probably be morally wrong, but it is an interesting idea. I think playing around with this power will be fun. I trust you won’t abuse it too much?”

“Your trust might be misplaced. But don’t worry, it’ll be fine. It’s not like there’s anyone to report us to. And as long as we’re careful, there won’t be any evidence. Besides, I mostly only plan to use it to reward people.”

“...I see. Well, it’s not like I can monitor you at all times. But if I catch you misbehaving, you know it’ll mean punishment.”

“Is that supposed to be a threat? I seem to recall being taught that punishments can be fun.”

She sighed and rolled her eyes. “Anyway, we can also use this for secret meetings. After all, there are only three people capable of using this artifact and all of us are friends. No one will be able to eavesdrop on us.”

“True. We can also use it for combat purposes. If we can find an enemy army that’s sleeping, we can group their dreams together and lock them all down at once. Assuming demons dream, it’ll make invading even easier.”

“That’s insidious,” she said with a wide grin. “I like it. We could use it to take out entire enemy strongholds. As if magic artillery and terrifying golems weren’t enough.”

“There are many ways in this world to deal with an enemy. Why limit yourself to just one? A part of me considered using elementals to stage a sneak attack. They could turn an entire enemy force into hosts before any of them realized anything was happening. If the enemy troops were just going to be slaughtered by artillery anyway, is it morally wrong to use elementals to take them prisoner instead?”

“We might need to host some kind of convention to discuss things like that. Because I mean, it is kind of a good point. If we’re just going to slaughter an enemy column and we have the ability to take them hostage using deplorable methods instead, would it be better to take them hostage or blow them up? And obviously if we told anyone else about our ability to lock people in sleep, we might have them trying to put limits on us. But we’d have to tell them if we wanted to use it in combat, wouldn’t we?”

“Celestia already knows. If anyone asks, we can just tell them that Luna’s using dream magic.”

“What kind of dream magic?” Luna suddenly asked from behind us. Thankfully, I wasn’t the only one who jumped. “Greetings, my lady. That dream over there looks very interesting. What did you do to it?”

“You have the ability to pop up anywhere around us you want, so why did you choose to come up behind us?” I asked. “And how long were you even there?”

“I just got here. And approaching others from behind is a habit. There was once a time when many would quickly find other things that needed attending to should they see me approaching directly. Obviously nobody wants to appear idle around a princess, so they made a clear effort to stay out of my sight. But when I approached them from behind, I could finally talk to them! Though they always seemed nervous, for some reason… I suppose talking to a princess is intimidating.”

“Yeah, I was definitely shocked the first time,” I said.

“Right, that’s why I approached you from behind. So what did you do to that dream, my lady? Or should I say… those dreams?”

“I found a new technique to combine dreams.” The AI already vanished, so I summoned another one and used it to split the dreams apart. “Pretty neat, huh?”

“Indeed. This would make dream interrogation much faster.”

“Dream interrogation?” Twilight asked. “That sounds… intense.”

“It can’t be, unfortunately,” Luna sighed. “Even using magic to put someone to sleep means little in the face of the true nightmares I can bring my victims. Instead, I have to be subtle. Generally, I know what crimes the person was committing. I just build a dream based on that information and let the criminal fill in the details for me. To them, they’re just acting out a vision of what happened in their dreams. They’ll create companions identical to the ones they had, making it easier to find them. They’ll also use real names and sometimes spill other vital information. It’s also quite useful for getting blackmail material. If you know someone’s having an affair, just give them red dreams for a few nights with a generic avatar and they’ll fill in the details of their lover. Once you know both faces, finding proof becomes much easier.”

“All of that is very good information to have, I guess,” Twilight said. “But now I feel dirty.”

“Would it be easier to get information out of someone if they’re completely and totally incapable of waking up?” I asked.

“Obviously,” Luna immediately replied. “I could make them feel anything I wanted for as long as I wanted. Breaking anyone would be a snap.”

“Luna, go bust nightmares for a few minutes. I’d like to talk to Twilight about something.”

“Yes, my lady.” With that, Luna vanished.

“So, should we tell Luna about the ability to lock dreams down?” I asked.

“If we use it for military purposes, she’ll figure it out instantly. She may not understand how we’re doing it, but she’ll know that it’s being done. After all, she was able to instantly tell that something was different with those dreams. That said, I don’t like the idea of her using it to torture people…”

“I feel like I could give her an order not to torture people without permission. Blaze would probably make sure she’d obey. Besides, the old method also seemed pretty reliable. Oh, and did I ever tell you the story of Pointy Hat, the pony guard I may or may not have accidentally brainwashed into becoming a butt slut?”

“...No, you didn’t. I’m not sure I want to hear it, either.”

“One of the day guards was bullying me, so I got revenge in his dreams. Basically, I summoned a few buff diamond dog miners and made the guard enjoy submitting as prey. The next thing I know, he’s thanking me, saying I truly opened his eyes. Then he went to the festival at Gryphus. We bumped into him at the race and the auction, but we didn’t talk much. The point is, did I really unlock a desire that he had hidden away, or did I accidentally brainwash him by making him enjoy it in his dreams?”

“I don’t know how to answer that question, but I will tell you not to do it again. I… might have to meet that guard later. Purely for research purposes, of course.”

“Research for your naughty books or for something else?”

“Um…” She looked away and muttered, “The naughty books…”

“Don’t you have enough material around you?”

“I’m prey dominating a predator. So is Smiles. There really aren’t any other domination relationships around, although what Smiles did with Aurora is super hot. Learning about prey who wants to submit to predators is good, too! Especially… Especially the idea of a hot royal guard getting captured and… and used by his captors… Used until he slowly starts to enjoy it and begs for more…”

“You have problems,” I replied, booping her. Although I really shouldn’t talk. “So, do we tell Luna or not?”

“I don’t think we have a choice. We’ll just have to hope she continues obeying your orders. Of course, we also don’t have to tell her how it’s done, but if we don’t, she’ll know it’s because we don’t trust her.”

“Then we’ll tell her, with the caveat that she can only use it with my permission.”

“Tell me what?” Luna asked from behind us.

“Stop sneaking up from behind me,” I replied. “I give you permission to sneak up behind Twilight, but stop doing it to me!”

“Hold on, now,” Twilight said. “Why are you leaving me out?!”

“I can’t ask Luna to change all at once. That would be too much for her. Anyway, Luna, I’m going to tell you how to achieve your goal. Both of you, take my hands.” I held them out. Twilight took one with a hoof. Luna placed her cheek against the other. That was good enough, so I teleported us over to Bahamut’s dream. “Behold.”

“It’s massive!” Twilight said, gaping up at it. She pulled away from my hand and poked at the white smoke.

“Truly, it’s impressive,” Luna agreed. She hadn’t pulled away from my hand, for some reason. “But it looks strange, does it not? Darker, perhaps?”

“Try to look inside,” I said. She pulled away from my hand with a brief look of regret, but then turned her eyes upon the massive dream.

“This is Bahamut. I thought Pyrite killed him.”

“Pyrite knocked him unconscious,” I said. “I used a dream ability to keep him that way indefinitely. He will only awaken if I remove the restriction.”

“That’s amazing!” Luna shouted. “I can torture him all I want, now!”

“You’re welcome to try,” I said. With that, she tried pushing her way through. Nothing happened. “As you can see, the dream is locked down. When creating the lockdown, it’s possible to allow certain users through. When I made his, I set it so nobody could get through.”

“Hm… This could be used for a lot more than torture. It would allow taking out an enemy’s army with ease. Even if they knew about the ability, they would still eventually have to sleep.”

“Exactly,” I said. “And that’s why you aren’t to use this ability without my permission.”

“Understood. So you will show me how?”

“Yes. Let’s go secure a volunteer.”

“Any thoughts who?” Twilight asked.

“An obvious one comes to mind, yes,” I said. I pulled them both closer and teleported us over to Rainbow Dash’s golden dream. “I can throw in a changeling queen, a vampire, and Spitfire. Things will get steamy enough that she should wake up. But the lockdown will mean she can’t. Isn’t that a perfect test?”

“I see no issue,” Luna replied.

“I see a lot of them, actually,” Twilight said. “First of all, we’re just showing how this works. There’s no need to actually prove that it does work. We don’t have to inform Rainbow Dash it’s happening. She won’t even notice.” And just like that, Miss No Fun Allowed summoned an AI and locked Dash’s dream down. “See there? It’s still gold, even if it’s a little more dull.”

“I was just trying to do Dash a favor. Anyway, as you can see, it’s simple. I was thinking we could group all of the enemy dreams together and lock them all down at once.”

“Let’s try it,” Twilight said. She unlocked Dash’s dream, then combined it with Pinkie’s white dream. The combined dream immediately lit up bright red. After a moment of hesitation, Twilight told the AI to lock it down. Just like that, Rainbow Dash was trapped alone in a dream with Pinkie Pie. “I guess it works.”

“I can’t believe you would cast your friend straight into the depths of hell like that,” I said. “Especially after getting mad that I was just going to give her a few playthings!”

“I’ll admit that I wasn’t expecting the dream to turn red immediately, but I still wanted to complete the test,” Twilight said. “And now we can clearly see that it’s working. They are locked together for as long as I’d like to keep them that way.”

“And how long would you like them to stay that way?” I slowly asked.

“...I’m thinking,” she said, looking the dream over. After a few seconds, she walked up close and peeled the smoke back. I tried peeking over her shoulder, but it all just looked like smoke to me. “I’m thinking I’ll unlock them tomorrow morning,” she finally said, releasing the smoke. “After all… Well, we confirmed that one pony wouldn’t wake up if their dream was locked down… But we don’t know if the same will apply if two ponies are locked up together…” She peeled the smoke back for another peek and giggled. “I might get another book outta this!”

Be careful there Twilight, your true intentions are showing. “Well, you’re the one who locked it down,” I said with a shrug. “Nothing I can do, I guess. I’m sorry, Dash. You’re in the belly of the beast, tonight.”

“I would like permission to use the ability to group dreams together,” Luna said.

“What for?” I asked.

“To host a tea party,” she nervously replied, looking down.

“Who do you intend to invite?” I asked.

“Celestia, Princess Gilda, and Cadance,” Luna said, still not meeting my gaze.

“Oh, I was planning on talking to Celestia about it and possibly using it for important meetings,” I said. “But you’re welcome to discuss it with her as well. Just make sure to get everyone’s permission before you start combining dreams.

“As you command, my lady.”

“I have a question, too,” Twilight said. “Luna, how did you create a dreamspace like the one you used for the Rave?”

“Ah, that! I used the words of power that were passed down from the alicorns of old. Most of the information on the dream machine was lost, but the language of the ancients possesses a power that makes even this human relic move.”

“Well, let’s hear it,” I said. She was starting to get my hopes up, to be honest. It sounded like pretty powerful magic if it was able to interface with a piece of technology. Although it’s also possible that the machine was more magical than technological. With luck, her words of power would point us to an answer.

Luna cleared her throat and stared menacingly off into the distance. “Help!” she called out. Twilight and I blinked. After a few seconds, the dream world around us flickered. “Access. Input. ARS. Command. Code.” There was a clear pause after each word that made it seem like she was saying something mysterious or otherworldly, but… I could understand her clear as day. “3141592. Dash. 0112358.” Everything around us flashed before a small console appeared in front of Luna with rapidly scrolling text. “Create. Dreamspace. Capacity. 512. Log. Off. Confirmed.” The console disappeared and a pale white, partially see-through dream appeared in front of us. “Impressive, right?”

“Indeed,” Twilight said. “Just as impressive as the first time I heard Nav speaking English.”

“So that was English,” I said. “I understood everything you were saying.”

“I didn’t understand it, but I recognized the language,” Twilight said. “Although it shouldn’t matter. I’m able to talk to the dream AI without changing my language.”

“Of course it matters,” Luna said. “That language doesn’t directly correspond to ours. Since it doesn’t translate perfectly, the codes don’t work when translated. Though it is very interesting to find that the language of the ancients is Navarone’s language. So you truly understood what I was saying?”

“Yeah, it looks like you’re accessing a special admin prompt. I bet you can do a whole lot with it aside from just creating a dreamspace. Do you still have the documents with all the known commands?”

“Yes, but there aren’t many more. This device was still being studied by the alicorns of old. Even the information they had was limited. I don’t even know how they came by it.”

“I don’t know what ARS stands for, but one of the numbers you listed was pi. You both know that one. The other was the Fibonacci Sequence, which describes the shape of a spiral that’s commonly found in nature. A little on the nose, but I guess that’s what happens when you let scientists at the end of the world pick all the passwords. Let me try saying that in English.” With that, I repeated all of Luna’s commands, up until the console appeared. Once it was there, I started reading the text. “It’s a log file.”

There were several tabs to choose from. At the moment, I was in the “General” tab, which seemed to list several things. Every time we summoned an AI, it showed who summoned it, what commands they gave it, and how long the AI was active. It showed when dreams were locked down or combined, who gave the order, and how long the change lasted. And as I used my fingers to scroll up in the timeline, I couldn’t help but smile.

“Translation magic doesn’t work here, so I couldn’t read this text at all,” Luna said. “I copied some of it verbatim when I awoke and then cast a translation spell, but it was mostly unreadable.”

“I can read it,” I replied. “There’s definitely some technical jargon in here, but I actually sorta trained for this. My knowledge was a little behind the times, so Darya and Flo are filling in the blanks. This lists things like the commands used, who used them, and when. I can’t see all the logs from here, but I can see enough to learn a few more orders. There are definitely several bogus attempts from people who came after humanity and were just trying to figure things out, but most of the successful attempts are real commands that seem to be from before Luna was born.”

“So we hit paydirt, right?” Twilight asked.

“Sure did,” I said, patting Luna on the head. “Thank you for sharing the ancient words of power with us.”

“...Now it feels embarrassing that I was so proud of it,” she muttered, looking down. “I even had to teach myself the pronunciation…”

“I could understand it perfectly, so you did a really good job,” I said, finally starting to scritch one of her ears. “The words were a little halting, but even that much on your own is impressive.” And that gave her a small grin, so I pulled my hand back. “I’m going to try a command. It’s supposed to place an admin console on all the dreams that allows us to view information about the dream and the dreamer. Let me know if I accidentally say it in the wrong language.” I cleared my throat for dramatic effect, then stared at the console and read the code off. “Enable dream window.” With that, all of the dreams around us flashed and a small console appeared on each of them, facing straight toward me. “It worked.”

“I don’t see anything,” Twilight said.

“Me either,” Luna said, stepping closer to one of the dreams. “Perhaps this command only works on the one who says it?”

“I guess so,” I said, following her over to Lyra’s white dream. “I see a console right here with some information. It calls her a sub-equine mark three and notes that this race spends a larger than average amount of time in REM sleep. The dream type is calm, which I guess corresponds to its color. Her ‘S Type’ is C and stable, whatever that means. It also calls her a partially magical entity, which likely refers to the part of her that’s fae. There’s a tab here that lists when she logged in and when she logged out, which I guess shows every time she went to sleep since the machine was first turned on. Oh, and there’s a few commands that I can run from here. One says terminate session, which hopefully just wakes the person up. One is lock down. One is combine. There aren’t any parameters, so it probably asks for more info once you click it.”

“Click it with what?” Luna asked.

“I guess this is a touchscreen, so I’d just push it instead. I can also change the dream type, so we can probably fix a nightmare without even having to step inside. And the last one is super ominous. It just says ‘Terminate Dreamer’.”

“Does that… do what it sounds like?” Twilight slowly asked.

“I dunno,” I replied.

“Shall we try it on Bahamut?” Luna asked.

“No, he’s my check against Pyrite,” I replied. “I can release him at any time. If I do, the first thing he’ll probably do is go gunning for the big gold dragon himself.”

“Unlikely,” Luna replied. “Bahamut will choose to run, if possible. At this point, he’s been sleeping for months. He’ll be weak, confused, and lacking information. Bahamut is no match for a sane Pyrite unless a sneak attack is involved, and no dragon would bow to a leader who won via an ambush. And once Bahamut learns that Pyrite is firmly in control of the dragons, he’ll realize that revenge against them is impossible. Instead, he will turn to gain revenge upon Celestia. After all, it would be nothing for him to torch a few cities. If we aren’t going to use Bahamut for obtaining information, we might as well just kill him.”

“Think Pyrite would hand the sleeping Bahamut over if we asked? If so, we could kill him and break his body down for parts.”

“That’s really not something a hero should be saying,” Twilight muttered with a sigh.

“The answer is no, regardless,” Luna said. “Pyrite would not give up a prisoner with his value, even if he might never awaken. Especially if he found out that you just wanted to cut Bahamut up for parts. That’s something no dragon would allow.”

“Then I’ll leave him alive as a warning to Pyrite. If I can put Bahamut to sleep forever, I can do the same to him.”

“The fact that Pyrite knows you have this ability means he views you as a target,” Luna said. “Being Pyrite’s target is not a good position to be in.”

“My big brother probably won’t try to kill me,” I said. “You know, maybe. Or at least, hopefully. Anyway, I consider Bahamut a captive. I don’t think killing him is the best option. I’m sure he’ll eventually starve to death, anyway.”

“How long would it take for a dragon that big to starve?” Twilight asked. “Don’t they sometimes hibernate for dozens of years?”

“They can, if they lose motivation or if they’re recluses,” Luna said. “Bahamut could probably last at least three hundred years. You could at least give him nightmares, my lady. Didn’t he torture you?”

“No, that was Pyrite. Bahamut did threaten to turn me into a breeding sow, though. Torturing people for no reason is too much work. I usually only do it to be petty or for cheap laughs. Anyway, now that all three of us know how to group dreams together and lock them down, I feel like we should discuss how to use that information, or if we even should use it. I imagine we could take down entire garrisons, but if everyone on our side knows that we have a power like that, they might be wary.”

“Are you saying they won’t be wary of the indestructible magic golems, the terrifying magic artillery, armies of giant ants being led by a supercomputer, and fleets of airships with radios?” Twilight asked. “Nav, assuming the war on Tartarus goes well, everyone involved in the fight is going to be wary of us. Especially you, the brain behind most of these things. Being able to control people via their dreams is just another card in your deck, as you put it.”

“And as for me, I have many other ways of incapacitating large groups of victims,” Luna said. “Everyone is already wary of me, so giving them one more thing to fear will be no issue. In fact, if you’d like, I can be the only one to ever use the ability. That way, we can explain it’s a skill I alone possess.”

“If we’re going to go that route, shouldn’t we let Twilight do it?” I asked. “That way, she’d finally be everyone’s target, too.”

“Is that supposed to be a good thing?” Twilight asked, tilting her head.

“Of course,” I said. “The more people become targets, the less likely they are to hit me or Luna. It benefits everyone!”

“It doesn’t benefit me!” Twilight shouted.

“It’s time to teach you the trials and tribulations of true democracies,” I said. “There are three people here. Democratically speaking, we should do what benefits the most people.”

“Yeah, but Equestria is a direct theocracy,” Twilight said. “Going by conventional logic, we might as well just let their Satan take the fall for this one, too.” She cast her judgmental eyes toward Luna.

Equestria’s Satan chuckled. “Democratically speaking, two of us are voting to allow me to take sole responsibility. I believe you said that people vote against their own interests all the time, do they not? Consider this another such case. I do not mind being the biggest target of us all.”

“...Well, we have time before we ever need to do something like that,” I said. “Again I ask, though… should we use this power? If we wanted to take a garrison bloodlessly, we could send in elementals or Jonathan.”

“That probably wouldn’t work against anyone who Nestorats has as a host,” Twilight said. “Elementals can keep hosts awake for a while, but not forever. A sleep attack would work against them. In fact, depending on how the map looks, we might be able to rapidly expand and wipe out large groups of enemies who are confused that half their companies are asleep. It’s possible to sweep through and do it with a lot less bloodshed that way.”

“Just as much bloodshed, just not on our side,” Luna said. “There is no point in capturing demons or their subordinates. Well, unless an elemental actually could completely control them. Otherwise, they’re uncontrollable. I doubt love poison would do anything. It would be safer to put them down instantly and salvage their parts, take the sleeping ones for use as research subjects or for soul gems, or unleash them on uncooperative nations and charge concessions for cleaning them up. I see no reason not to use this ability in war. It’ll make things much easier for us. Showing this card would be better than showing off what our artillery and golems are capable of, too.”

“Then I guess the next step will be to find out if demons can dream.”

“We’ll need to move the machine closer to Tartarus,” Luna said. “Its influence is too small to reach. If you’d like, we could enter Celestia’s dream to discuss this with her as well. She knows about this ability, does she not?”

“She does,” I said. “I used it on Oldlestia. I didn’t want to show it off, but I didn’t have many options at the time. That said, I’m not sure I want to visit Celestia’s dreams. I haven’t had many good experiences in them.”

“Perhaps Cutelestia will surprise you,” Twilight said with a smirk. “I’m sure she won’t flatten you this time, though she might force you to spar.”

“If she does, I’ll sic my pet Satan on her,” I said, booping Luna. “Though I still don’t want to visit her, regardless. I just know she’ll turn it into a thing, and probably ask to be added to the dream relic herself. Then she’ll be able to bother me even in my sleep.”

“Are you afraid of her, even now?” Luna asked.

“She’s trying to get a ring on my finger and I have a feeling she’s pretty serious about it.”

“Then I guess it’s time to start working on ways to keep her busy,” Twilight said, rubbing her chin with a hoof. “Although… you could marry her, then I could become your mistress.”

“After all that whining you did when I was a changeling pretending to be Celestia?” I asked.

“W-well… That’s when I realized… Dominating my teacher, the sun princess herself, was… super hot! Getting to play with both of you would be great!”

“You were trying to get me married to Princess Gilda with the offer of being my secret mistress. Why do you want to be a mistress so badly?”

“My position as a minor noble offers nothing for you. Marrying you myself would be nice, but elevating you to royalty would probably be best for the nation. And if I still got to be with you regardless, it wouldn’t matter as much. I’m sure we could talk Celestia into it.”

“What are your thoughts on the matter, Luna?” I asked. She seemed slightly troubled.

“I would prefer if you didn’t marry Celestia,” Luna stiffly replied.

“For what reasons?” I asked. “And would you prefer seeing me wed someone else instead?”

“I don’t want you to marry her because I know you don’t want to marry her.”

“I doubt that’s your only reason,” I said. “There’s no reason to be reserved. You can speak your mind.”

The three of us went silent for a while. Twilight looked like she had something she wanted to say, but decided to keep it to herself. Finally, Luna sighed and hung her head. “I… I don’t want you to marry her. Seeing her obtain what I know I never can would hurt.”

“Wouldn’t that be the same for Nav marrying anyone?” Twilight finally asked. “It’s a little late for jealousy, I think. You should have been ready for this before becoming Nav’s vassal, Luna. You knew you’d be with her for quite some time, possibly long enough for her to be wed.”

“Anyone would be preferable to that mare. Losing to her in obtaining the heart of one of the only people I’ve ever wanted would hurt. I know there is no hope for me, but I’d at least be content if it meant Celestia didn’t win, either.”

“Thank you for being honest,” I said. It’s just a shame the honest answer is exactly what I was expecting. “So, knowing that Celestia might turn this into a thing, do you two still want to visit her tonight?”

“Maybe not,” Twilight said. “With what we learned tonight, we’ll have several more commands to experiment with. We should consult with Celestia once we know more of what we’re capable of.”

“There are more nightmares than usual recently anyway,” Luna said. “Busting them will give me plenty to pass the time.”

“How many more?” I asked. “We had Flo adjust the machine a few months ago. It’s possible it needs another adjustment.”

“It could also be running out of power,” Twilight said. “I mean, you did widely increase the number of races it’s looking at. The thing is already astronomically old. Increasing its burden like that might have damaged it.”

“No, these are normal nightmares,” Luna said. “The griffin kingdom is on the verge of civil war, it seems. The citizens are anxious. I’ve been planting prophecies in their minds to ease their fears.”

“I’m not sure I want to ask, but go ahead and explain what you mean,” I said.

“For those who were dreaming that the war had already started, I showed you jumping in to clean the whole thing up. That cured the nightmare. When it actually happens, they’ll remember the dreams and feel even more relieved.”

“Ah, of course. I don’t have any more messages to deliver, so I plan to combine some dreams and spend part of the night training. Some of those commands I got were interesting, but I think I’ll want to slow down with testing them after seeing the ‘Terminate Dreamer’ option.”

“Can you write them down when you wake up?” Twilight asked. “We can discuss what they probably do later.”

“Flo has already done so,” I replied. “She makes for a pretty good xerox.” Flo slapped the back of my head, making me visibly flinch. “Er, secretary. She’s an excellent secretary.” That left me unslapped, thankfully.

“What are your plans for tomorrow?” Twilight asked.

“I’m visiting the deer with Fleur in the morning,” I said. “Hopefully it won’t take long, but I’m expecting it to turn into an all day affair. She’s trying to get them to the beauty pageant and wants me to go to help convince them.”

“I’ve heard a lot about the deer, so I’ll pass on joining you,” Twilight said. Luna just scoffed. “Besides, I have a horn to reattach. I wasn’t expecting you to just give that mare from the tower a horn.”

“I remembered that we had a few lying around and figured that would be a good use for one. Did she find you and ask already?”

“Yep. We spent the rest of the day drawing up the magic circle necessary. We’ll start the ritual tomorrow morning.”

“Cool. Are you heading to get real sleep, going to bust nightmares, or do you want to join me in training?” I asked.

“I am going to experiment with a few of the dream skills we do know about,” she said. “I might pop in to join you in a bit, though.”

“Don’t forget to release Dash in the morning,” I said.

“Oh, don’t worry,” she said with a small smile. “I’ve been keeping them on my mind.”

That was a little worrying, but it was beyond my control. I bid them both farewell and started visiting some dreams. I began with Kat, then moved to Watcher, then the naga, and finally my filly. Once everyone was informed, I combined them all and let myself inside.

Of course, Kat and Taya instantly teleported to my side. Taya claimed a leg and Kat buried her face into my chest. Since we were going to be training, I was wearing my real body. With Hera’s unwanted buffs, that would normally put Kat at risk of suffocation, but that didn’t matter in a dream.

“Hello, everyone,” I said. “I figured you weren’t bored enough of me yet, so I decided to bother you in your dreams for a bit.”

“You can bother me all you want, mommy,” Taya happily said. With that, she morphed into her human form and hugged me from the side. “Dreams are so fun!”

“You should visit my dreams every night too, my lady,” Kat said, pulling back just enough so I could understand her. “We can play together!”

“I never expected to experience something so surreal,” the naga said, looking around us. At the moment, I made it so we were in a blank meadow, with grass that stretched as far as the eye could see. “The first night I experienced dreams was breathtaking. I awoke with tears in my eyes.”

“Ponies had legends of dreams, but I never thought I’d experience one,” Watcher said. “And I also never thought I’d have someone barging into them every now and then. Especially someone who just spanks my partner.”

“Sentinel is a fine soldier, but she’s also a fine mare,” I said. “There’s nothing wrong with having some fun in a dream, right?”

“Only if she never finds out about it. Anyway, we’re here to train?”

“We sure are,” I said. “I can’t be here all night since this doesn’t count as real sleep for me, but I can give it a few hours. In here, we won’t get tired. You can feel pain, but it won’t last long. And if you die, you’ll just wake up. I figured we could try to practice here, at least.”

“I guess I do need practice walking in heels,” Taya said, pulling away from me. With that, she dolled herself up. Part of that included heels, for whatever reason.

“Combat practice,” I said, using my dream powers to force her back into a pony’s body. “Watcher can teach you how unicorns fight in hoof to hoof combat. Kat and the naga can toy with my body as they please. Although it seems like Kat already has a head start.” She was still hugging me, pressing her head against my chest. Her eyes were staring up at me in adoration.

“So what manner of weapons will we be using?” the naga asked.

“None, preferably. I’d also like to learn more about hand to hand fighting. I can’t have a sword with me everywhere, but it’ll be a pain for someone to remove my arms and legs. Besides, I can definitely put what I learn to use while fighting with weapons.”

“Good,” Kat said. With that, she used the arms she had around me to flip me around and sling me to the ground. Almost before I could realize it, she was sitting on top of me. “Now do you see why you should be able to break that hold?”

“I see nothing wrong with the situation I’m in right now,” I said, looking up at her with a smile.

Unfortunately, my smile didn’t last long. I did, at least, learn how to break that hold. Having Darya and Flo help by guiding my body was nice, too.

When I woke up the next day, I felt like I should have been sore. Thankfully, despite everything Kat put my body through in our dreams, it had no effect on my real body. That was, of course, my true purpose for trying to learn this particular form of combat while dreaming. If I let Kat do all of that to me while I was awake, I’d probably feel it for days.

That said, the position I woke up in was definitely pretty strange. Why exactly was I suspended above my bed in water that was hanging off the ceiling? That one clearly stumped me. It was shockingly comfy, so it didn’t bother me much, but it was still a little surprising.

“Good morning,” Darya said from all around me. “I kept you secure and comfy through the night, my lady.”

“...Thanks,” I said. “Can you set me back down?”

“At once.” She carefully and gently set me down on the bed.

“So, what’s the purpose of the bed, again?”

“Sleepovers and sex,” Darya immediately replied. “Cradling you to sleep feels much more natural.”

“Ah.”

“Flo was quite jealous, of course. But like a proper secretary, she didn’t complain.”

“How generous of her,” I said, rolling my eyes.

“Doppel has been informed that you are awake, my lady. She should be arriving soon to help you prepare for the day.”

A part of me wanted to respond to that with a yawn, but as the first day of spring, I was no longer tired at all. Darya started opening the blinds to let the sun in as I went to brush my teeth. As the sun filled the room, I could see the flowers in my hair growing in the mirror. Soon enough, my head was partially covered in pink flower blossoms. It was far too pretty for comfort and actually seeing it in the mirror made me realize once more how fey I had become.

I got out of the bathroom right as Doppel was letting herself in. She started to greet me, but froze when she saw my hair. “Good morning,” I said with a smile and a wave.

“M-my lady, you look so… so radiant! You’re absolutely gorgeous!”

“I mean, isn’t that normal?” I asked, tilting my head.

“Not like this, no…” Doppel suddenly darted forward to get a closer look at my hair. “The others talked about it, but I never expected them to be so vibrant! They’re positively brimming with emotion! Can I take a taste, my lady?”

“Sure.” I wasn’t positive what she meant by brimming with emotion, but she flew up behind me and started sniffing at the back of my head and giggling.

“She looks sort of like a bee,” Darya said in my head.

“You’re even more delicious than usual, my lady,” Doppel said. “I can’t believe your flowers exude emotions!”

“Yeah, that’s a little curious,” I said. “Tell me more about what you see.”

“Oh yeah, I guess there weren’t any changelings with you before. Well, each flower is leaking some of your emotions. I bet they’ll change in appearance based on how you feel!”

“We can test that later, I guess,” I said. “I didn’t even feel you eating anything, so maybe it’s just ambient energy that’s leaking from me.”

“True, it did feel pretty light. But I definitely think it’s filling. Chrysalis might want you even more now that your hair does stuff like this.”

“Noted. There’s really not any way to hide it, so I’ll just have to deal with it as best I can. Anyway, today I’ll be going with Fleur to visit the deer.”

“Lady Fleur notified us beforehoof, since she doubted you would,” Doppel said. “As much as I want to dress you up like the beautiful flower you are, I’ll be preparing you for a day spent traipsing in the wilds instead.”

“Thank you.” And so she did just that. That said, though… “Is this really the best for hiking?” I certainly wasn’t expecting it to be a skirt, let alone one that was fairly short. It was very ruffly and comfortable, but I don’t know if it was the best thing for an expedition. The blouse was acceptable, at least. And the shoes were relatively normal walking shoes. Having any makeup at all seemed excessive for the woods, but she spent a full ten minutes on it.

“I was being sarcastic. Even I visited the deer a few times back when we lived near Ponyville. There’s a clear trail that leads all the way from the entrance of the woods to their city. It’s impossible to get lost and you won’t need to worry about getting anything caught on bushes or having your legs cut up by brambles. What’s more important is your first impression with the deer. You are a countess of Equestria. You have to be at least partially presentable, even after a walk through the woods.”

If we’re going that far, we might as well just go by airship and fly down. I knew saying something like that would just instigate her to do even worse, so I sighed and left it alone. Besides, she was correct in that I needed to be presentable. If not for my own sake, then for Fleur’s. Wearing armor would be preferable, but it wouldn’t really be the best way to show up to advertise a pageant.

“Being a lady sure is annoying. I was originally planning to take Taya with us in case we needed to teleport out, but would it be wise to take her from her classes?”

“Today is one of her days off,” Doppel said. “My lady, you should at least learn your filly’s schedule. Especially if you’re going to borrow her for a day.”

“Yes, I should. Tell me her schedule.”

“Are you sure you shouldn’t hear it from her? It’ll give you something to talk about on the way to the deer city. You can also learn more about her classes.”

“I suppose so. Do you have any more wisdom for me?”

“Not at the moment. The new maids will be starting tomorrow. You are not to lay a single finger on them, understood?”

“Who’s the lady here, Doppel?” She dared to lift a brow at me. “That said, I have no intention of it. One of them is loopy and the other seems kinda like a downer. Neither would be worth upsetting you over.”

“As long as you understand,” she replied with a nod. “You are also taking a break from Kat, I take it?”

“Yeah, I think so. At least, in bed. She told me yesterday that she enjoyed making me feel uncomfortable.”

“Is that a surprise? You know she’s sadistic. Dolling you up was her way of torturing you. Did it really take her spelling it out to make you understand?”

“I had suspicions, but the fact that she was dumb enough to confirm it was the last straw. You probably also heard that I dropped the griffin princess.”

“Hm. She certainly makes adorable noises, but dropping her was the wise choice. I take it Moonbeam is next on the chopping block?”

“Why does everyone keep asking that? Is she really that bad of a choice?”

“...Duh?”

“Even when looked at objectively? I feel like some people here might have a little too much bias.”

“It’s hard not to be biased against someone who’s literally evil,” she replied, rolling her eyes. “Darya, back me up here. Surely the elementals don’t want Nav marrying Chrysalis!”

“The elementals as a group do not have an interest in Nav’s marriage partner, since it won’t really affect us,” Darya replied. “And as someone who has currently elected to serve Nav, I can safely say that I do not have an interest in the matter, either. That is because, as someone who is also capable of seeing into Nav’s mind, I understand that she truly is torn about the issue. She likes the one she should be wary of and is wary of the one she should like. It’s odd, but acceptable, and not something I need to concern myself over. Unless or until I am asked for advice, of course.”

“How is that acceptable?!” Doppel shouted.

“Because humans are strange,” Darya said with a shrug.

Doppel sighed and hung her head. “I guess so… I still find it hard to believe a non-changeling could even get close enough to the queen to start liking her, let alone… My lady, if you choose to go down that path, you may come to regret it.”

“I haven’t made any decisions yet.” I replied. “I know all choices have drawbacks. Anyway, I am ready to greet the day. Shall we rouse my filly?”

“I checked on her first, since I knew you had Darya,” Doppel said. “Taya is in the shower. I plan to dress her as well, once she’s dry.”

“Would it be bad form to bring a weapon?” I asked.

“You should have considered that before inviting Taya,” Darya replied. Doppel glared at her. “But as you are going in peace to promote an event, I think going unarmed would be wiser.”

“Agreed,” Doppel said, turning her eyes back to me. “Breakfast is being prepared, my lady. You should head downstairs. I’ll check on Taya.”

“Boop her for me.”

“As you command, my lady.”

Darya had already opened the door for us, so all three of us skedaddled. Doppel went to see to my daughter while Darya slid me down the stairs. It was still fairly early in the morning, so there weren’t too many people in the sun room. At the moment, it was just Kat, Silver Quill, and Luna. Kat, of course, glued herself to my side as soon as Darya released me.

“Good morning, my lovely lady,” Kat warmly said, purring just a little. “Your hair smells absolutely divine! You’d make a wonderful perfume.”

“Hello, Kat,” I said, dragging her alongside me to the table where Luna was sitting, sipping at what I assumed was tea. “And hello, Luna.”

“Greetings, my lady,” Luna said with a nod. “You truly are an amazing sight. If you haven’t yet, you should take a step outside. The fresh spring air will do you some good.”

“I’ll wait for Taya,” I said, taking a seat. Kat tried sitting in my lap, but I casually shoved her off. She sat next to me and pouted, instead.

“My lady, have you seen Felix around?” Kat asked. “There is something I require from him. I intended to… discuss it with him after the party last night, but he was nowhere to be found.”

“The party was the last place I saw him,” I replied with a shrug. “Maybe you’ll see him at the bunker today.”

“Hm? Am I not going with you to visit the deer?” Kat asked.

“I didn’t think so, no. Why would you?”

“To… protect you?”

“Our lady doesn’t need to be coddled,” Luna said. “Especially not around the deer. If she isn’t requiring you to go, count yourself lucky. The reception will not be hostile, but it certainly won’t be warm. Bringing too many predators would make them even more wary. It’s possible they’ll sense the nature magic in our lady, but it’s unlikely they’d understand what it means. There is nothing to be concerned about.”

“See there, Kat?” I said, booping her. “Worry not. I’ll be fine. Absolutely nothing will go wrong.” Or at least, nothing will go wrong unless we keep jinxing it. “And if anything does happen, I can just break one of Fleur’s legs to leave her behind as a distraction while Taya and I escape. That means you can look for Felix.” Your sacrifice won’t be in vain, Felix. RIP, I guess.

“...My lady, are you ashamed to be seen with me?” Kat quietly asked.

“Sometimes. Usually when you get super clingy, creepy, or annoying. It’s problematic, since I intended to have you as a hidden guard. And I’m not gonna lie, it’s kinda like your body was meant to be lewd and sexy. Standing next to you obviously makes me feel worse in comparison.”

“Oh.”

“I know there’s nothing you can do about your unreasonably attractive body, but your behavior is one of the things I’d like to have uncoitused. Maybe then I can take you out in public more often.”

“But my lady, if I don’t misbehave, how will I cover for your poor social behaviors?”

Damn, she’s got me there. “It’s probably possible to have the elementals put me in autopilot. If anyone asks why my eyes are blue, we can come up with a lie. There’s no need for you to embarrass yourself or me by acting out.”

“You could hire a trainer,” Luna said. “There are private tutors that exist to teach adult ponies how to act in noble society. My lady, it might be wise to find one for the household. No matter where you end up when this is all over, it will be in a position of power. I know you can act well when you want to, but even acting won’t cut it in some of the super formal events. Knowing behaviors and etiquette might be life-saving.”

Could one of you download that knowledge from a teacher and upload it to my brain? Having manners sounds useful, but it would take me a lifetime to undo all my terrible habits.

“Uploads of knowledge from one person to another are possible, but not advisable,” Flo replied. “You’ll also get a huge upload of emotions from the knowledge donor. It would be better if we had some books about manners that we could upload. Then it would only be a matter of practicing with a teacher. Since you’d have all the technical knowledge, you’d just need to learn how to apply it with your mostly human body.”

“That might be doable,” I said. “But for now, it’s a low priority. I don’t expect to be involved in many overly formal events. Now that I have the excuse of building up a village, I can get out of basically any event that I want. Celestia’s gonna hate that she gave me this task, because I’m damn sure gonna use it to get out of all of her parties.”

A tea set clattered to our table a lot more loudly than it should have. I looked next to me and beheld Celestia in disguise as a normal pony, wearing one of the house’s maid outfits. The look on her face was not one a maid should show off to her lady, that’s for sure. “It’s a good thing the princess is also giving you so much support, my lady,” the maid rudely replied. “So much support that you should have no issues continuing to stay in Canterlot!”

“But the princess herself assigned this task to me,” I said, sipping at the tea the princess herself brought me. “A very important task I can’t afford to fail. She may be giving me help, but I’ll need to personally ensure everything goes smoothly. If some of those inspection dates happen to coincide with events like the Gala or the Europe party, then I’m afraid that’s just a consequence of my loyalty to the princess. After all, I certainly couldn’t fail the task I’ve been assigned. She would be so disappointed in me, after all.”

“All the nobles I’ve ever seen would be more afraid of refusing an invitation from the princess than they would with failing a task she’s given them,” Celestia coldly replied. “Most happily make time to attend the events she hosts!”

“I’m afraid I’m not like most nobles anymore. You see, I’m being made a countess. That means her trust in me is that much higher. There is no room for delays or failure. As the first task my liege lady has given me since promotion, everything must go well or she might deem me incompetent.”

“I’m sure the princess would understand the need to take a day or two off, especially if it’s a day you can spend at a luxurious party.”

“She might, but I’m not sure I could forgive myself for lazing about when I should be fulfilling her will. I’m sure she’ll understand my absence when the time comes. I am, after all, a notoriously hard worker.”

“You’re a piece of shit is what you are,” Celestia said, finally dropping the act and outright glaring at me. “You’re going to be at the Gala if I have to send the entire army to drag you in!”

“It would be much easier and less dramatic to just drag me in yourself,” I said. “After all, look at the state of the Equestrian military. Even if they did somehow succeed, half of Canterlot might get destroyed.”

“I’d only need to send Captain Midnight Blossom. She’d hypnotize you, doll you up, and bring you over in a chariot. After all, she’s too cute for you to order your thugs to attack.”

“Darya would defend my mind. The only reason Blossom was able to succeed before was because Flo allowed it to make me suffer. But Darya elected to serve me, so she won’t allow me to succumb to such tomfoolery. And Luna or Kat would be able to safely detain Blossom without harming her.”

“Isn’t the Gala an important event that basically all nobles use to form connections?” Kat asked. “That definitely sounds like something a new noble who’s forming a village should attend. If other nobles invest, it’ll make building your town that much easier.”

“What? No it won’t. Too many cooks spoil the broth. Why would I need a bunch of investors for a village that I can build entirely for free? I don’t need competing interests in my village, trying to take pieces of my pie. Fuck the other nobles. They would just get in my way and hinder my efforts. Maybe after the town is established with a bunch of things you won’t be able to see or obtain anywhere else in Equestria, I’ll start advertising among the nobles to get them to visit and spend money there. But until it’s finished, I intend to tell most other nobles as little as possible about what I’m doing. To that end, avoiding large parties is for the best.”

“You will be there,” Celestia coldly said one last time. With that, she put on a sickly sweet smile and her entire demeanor seemed to lighten. “Breakfast will be ready soon, my lady! And might I add, those flowers are beautiful! I think you’ll do wonderfully at the pageant!” She didn’t wait for a reply and went back to the kitchen.

“So, what, you guys just let her in this morning?” I asked.

“She was already making breakfast when I woke up,” Kat said.

“You were correct, it seems she is definitely after your hand,” Luna added. “Shall I throw her out for you?”

“There’s no need to go that far,” I said. “She has a job she has to get to eventually, after all. And I also won’t be here all day.”

“Be careful,” Luna said. “She might invite herself along as her lady’s personal maid.”

“That would be a little excessive. Besides, she doesn’t seem interested in meeting the deer, either.”

“Do you prefer the tea she makes, or mine?” Kat asked.

“I dunno. I do prefer the food she cooks, though. She wouldn’t allow you to eat any, but it was quite a bit more than acceptable. What you make isn’t bad, but most of it is spiced oddly.”

“You… don’t know?” Kat said, tilting her head. “How could you not know your own preference?”

“Almost all tea tastes the same to me. My taste buds aren’t fancy. I just know that what’s available in Equestria is nowhere near as good as what I had back in my time.”

“So… I have to try harder! I’ll learn to make tea so good you’ll be forced to admit it’s superior!”

“Have fun with that.” I honestly didn’t care. Water was usually enough for me. But if Kat wanted a hobby that didn’t involve stalking me or being creepy, I was happy.

“I’ve heard there are excellent teas available from China, but getting them here is a nightmare,” Luna said. “The seaponies have set up a small port for trade vessels to restock, but it’s still such a long journey that most ships either don’t try or don’t make it. Those that do tend to trade in things worth more, like spices.”

“That’ll be changing soon,” I said. “When I obtain more airships, I can designate a few to trade back and forth between China. Well, up until I can buy some property in China to put a teleportation pad on. Then I can start transporting goods that way and using the ships for other things.”

“It would take a lot of energy to move large objects between the two countries,” Luna said. “It would be worthwhile to have the ships transporting large cargo while the teleport pads move across smaller things.”

“Good to know. A magic expert will be necessary to teach us stuff like this. Using teleport pads in a business sounds like a good idea, but I’m sure there’s probably a reason it hasn’t been done before.”

“A few,” Luna said. “But those reasons are all things that are fixable with enough knowledge. The biggest issue is that the standard teleport glyph is public and connects to all other standard teleport glyphs. It takes a specialized magic circle to make them private. From there, you can either set it up so that only certain unicorns can use it, so that it only goes to certain places, or a few other things. It wouldn’t be too difficult to set up a transportation business. It would also be possible to send passengers.”

“The inhabitants of my village probably won’t be used to producing much at first, especially not things that Equestrians might be interested in. But anyone with a brain can process boxes. Would it be possible to turn part of our village into a base for handling packages and trade goods brought in via portals and airships? The availability of amenities in Canterlot would basically skyrocket.”

“I think Celestia would approve of such a plan, yes,” Luna said. “She quite likes her luxuries. Better brands of tea and cake would delight her. We can build a large warehouse with a few airship docks and radio towers.”

“We can build the airship drydock somewhere nearby, so any ships that need repairs can easily get them after unloading their cargo. I gotta say, working to finally uncoitus Equestria is going to be nice. I can make this place closer and closer to the home I left behind.”

“And benefit all the ponies at the same time,” Luna said with a nod. “It’s easy to see why Celestia made you a noble. How did she get you to agree with it?”

“By tricking me and using friends against me. Oh, and Flo was there, too.”

Two wet hands on my shoulders put a very ominous feeling in my chest. “Your perfect secretary is here, my lady,” Flo warmly said. For some reason, I still felt oddly threatened. “You mention me like I’m an afterthought, when I was one of the leading causes of you consenting to becoming a lady.”

“Luna asked how Celestia got me to agree. You weren’t part of Celestia’s plans, were you?”

“I wasn’t, but you only came up with that reason just now. You realize that excuses mean nothing against me, right?”

Can’t you just break my neck already? “You shouldn’t slander a noble lady, Flo. That’s rude. It might also be treason, maybe? I’m not really sure, but it’s probably at least frowned upon.”

“I’m pretty sure slander has to be a lie,” Flo said, using her grip on my shoulders to begin massaging them.

“Well, it’s still rude. So, do you have an explanation for Celestia showing up this morning?”

“She wanted to make you breakfast, my lady. Is that truly so bad?”

“It’s creepy. The princess should have more important things to be doing than masquerading as a maid.”

“It’s a way to help calm her mind,” Flo said. “Doing things like this every now and then will help prevent her from going insane again. It’s also a way for her to be close to the sister who has forsaken her. I don’t see why you’re complaining. Her cooking is excellent, as you said. I know her personality isn’t that awful, because I built it myself. So what’s the downside here?”

“Being aggressively pursued isn’t something I’m used to. I don’t want to turn my home into a battlefield for the waifu wars. I’d prefer peace and quiet. Having all the members of my pseudo-herd dropping in at random might complicate things.”

“And so the truth finally comes out,” Flo said, patting me on the head with a third hand. “I’m proud of you, Nav.”

“So as the one holding Celestia’s leash, what are you going to do to help me solve this problem?” I asked.

“Absolutely nothing at all,” Flo said. “Although I might be able to give you advice. The first thing that comes to mind is… If you want her gone, tell her to leave.” I sighed and set my head against the table. “That is not very noble behavior, Nav. You know, Celestia might be happy to act as your teacher for manners. Should I ask?”

“No. I’m sure she’s too busy for something so mundane.”

“The fact that the most up-and-coming noble in Equestria has the manners of a farmhand is actually a constant embarrassment for her. And there’s plenty of ways to make time. Like visiting her dreams, for example. And now that you know how to combine multiple dreams, everyone who needs training in manners can get it all at once! Since you’re learning from the one who made all the manners, you’ll have the best education possible.”

“I would literally rather die.”

“You would rather die than do anything, though,” Kat said.

Fuck, she got me again. “Fleur or Cadance would be more tolerable. I can ask them if they can make a dreamslot available.”

“Is the princess so intolerable?” Celestia asked from behind me, which almost definitely meant she was using magic to mute her hooves.

“I don’t think my learning style jives with Celestia’s teaching style.”

“I wasn’t aware she ever acted as your teacher,” my fake maid said, finally stepping into view. How dare you come back into my presence without bringing breakfast? And you’re glaring again? Worst maid ever. “It sounds to me like you’re trying to avoid her. You won’t attend her parties, you won’t let her teach you, you ban her from your house, you won’t visit her dreams… That seems strange, for such a supposedly loyal vassal.”

“If you’re using that tone and that glare, there’s really no reason to continue pretending. To put it short, I’ve seen more of you than I have my own filly since I woke up from the coma. I don’t know how you can say I’m avoiding you. And of course I don’t want to go to parties. I’ve always hated them. Every time I’ve visited your dreams has been terrible, so I’m not inclined to go back. That means you can’t teach me in your dreams. Finally, I didn’t ban you from my house, I just told you that it won’t really feel like a comfortable home if the princess of the entire nation is just loafing around inside. Since I’m not the only one who lives here, I have to be considerate about things like that. Maybe you have a victim complex or something.”

“If you have a problem with me, it would be much easier for you to just say it. You don’t have to come up with all this nonsense!”

“I don’t hate or dislike you. But I’m wary of you. And constantly forcing your way into my life and eavesdropping on me isn’t making me any less wary. I get that there are a lot of people important to you here, and that’s why I gave up and let you cook every now and then. And what was the one request I had when I agreed to it? That you not be annoying. And yet what are you doing right now? Being annoying. It hasn’t been a day yet and you’ve already broken the only rule I gave you. And now I’m the bad guy, even though all I did was wake up, go downstairs, and start talking to my vassals. My home is supposed to be where I can relax, not where I get subjected to withering glares and interrogations from my employer.”

“So I am supposed to just let myself get talked about?” Celestia asked.

“You’re the princess. People talk about you all the time. I mean, every time I walk through or past the barracks, I hear the guards talking about how sexy you are.”

“Yet you call Kat the unreasonably attractive one…”

“Any woman would feel inferior next to her. Though your human body is also nice and squishy. I just happen to prefer bipeds.”

After several long seconds of silence, Celestia sighed and hung her head. “I have a request, then… Please do not discuss me when I am here. I fear I will be unable to stop myself from joining, especially when Nav is saying something horrible about me again. Like how you couldn’t stand having someone as awful as me as a teacher or how my dreams are so terrifying that you couldn’t handle coming back…”

First you impose on me, and now you’re making demands? The audacity of this temporary maid. “We’ll try. No promises.”

“Why… why do you think I would be a bad teacher?” she quietly asked, her lower lip trembling just a little.

“Because I’m a godawful student. I get impatient, angry, and snarkier than usual. Those are all things I’d rather not make you deal with. That’s also the reason I wanted to just zap it all into my brain. I’ll have Darya upload a manners book into my brain and practice with some people in their dreams. Don’t worry about it.”

“I feel like there’s something I would be perfect for teaching you, actually.”

“Well, don’t worry yourself over it,” I said. “Shouldn’t you be making sure breakfast isn’t burning?”

“I’m a six thousand year old mage, Nav. I can make breakfast from across the continent. A room away is nothing. I could teach you to be the best student you can be!”

“I already said not to worry yourself over it.”

“I’m not worrying about it at all. After all, it’s now a royal decree that I’m sure my loyal vassal would be happy to follow! Your lessons begin tonight. I’ll see you in my dreams, Navi. Now, let’s go check on things!” Apparently all that talk about cooking breakfast a room away was bullshit, because she walked off, giggling to herself.

I sighed and looked at Flo, who was now standing across the table and staring at me. “Flo, I have a task for you. Redo Celestia’s brainwashing. You messed something up the first time.”

“I’m too afraid of following your unilateral order to do such a thing,” Flo said, feigning worry. “After all, you were something created by Discord… Shouldn’t we host a vote before such a tremendous decision?”

“All in favor?” I asked, looking around the table. I lifted my hand immediately, of course. Luna shrugged and lifted a hoof as well. Kat, Darya, and Flo didn’t move. “C’mon, Kat. Do you really want to deal with this?”

“As one of your teachers, I feel you would benefit from lessons on how to be a student,” Kat said. “And seeing that someone still has the ability to manipulate you with ease gives me hope. Having her around means I can learn from her, too!”

“Darya, I have a new task for you,” I said. “Raise your hand for me.”

“No.”

“It seems to be your loss,” Flo said. “Thus, we will settle for inaction.”

“Ugh, fine. Well, the maid asked us to stop talking about her while she was around, so we’ll shelve this for now. Darya, Flo, are you two heading back to the site of the village today?”

“Indeed,” Flo replied. “Would you like to build into the forest, cutting trees as you go, or would you rather build alongside it?”

“We’ll start by building alongside it. I’d rather the village be kept closer to the edge of the Everfree. Once the forest begins getting purified, we’ll start cutting down trees and expanding into the forest itself. I don’t want this town developing too close to Ponyville, after all. If I’m honest, I’d like to build it inside the forest itself. But it seems like Celestia is in a hurry and all my colonists are picked.”

“There will be time for other villages later,” Flo said. “The location you have is ideal for a first settlement. The closest town is nearby enough to use it as a base for all the supplies we’ll need in the beginning. The field you’ll be building on is mostly flat and free of obstructions. There’s already an existing fortified location present to count as a marker. With Jonathan and his bugs to act as builders and all the supplies in Skyhold at your service, you should have the entire place constructed in a manner of weeks. It would be much more difficult if it was inside of a huge forest. You’ll have to wait until the forest is purified and roads are built through it. And without a town to work from, you won’t be able to purify it or build those roads. If you continue developing your land, you can build another town inside the Everfree itself later.”

“Visiting the deer village might actually be helpful, if that is your goal,” Luna said. “They live within nature, using magic to guide things like trees to act as shelters. It’s a shame that they’re so snooty about it, and so secretive of their arts. But if you form a good relationship with them, they might be willing to sell their services. Though since they aren’t interested in gold, there’s no telling what they might ask for.”

“Wait, what’s their economy based on?” I asked.

“Bartering.”

“I’m wasting my time today, aren’t I?”

“Indeed, my lady,” Luna said. “The deer might agree to send a representative to the pageant, if only so the doe can act arrogant and haughty to the other girls. After all, they believe their race is beloved for its beauty and grace.”

“They’re sounding more and more like elves,” I said. “Do deer have long lifespans or something? Or is there any reasonable basis for their arrogance?”

“They’re about on par with ponies. A lot of their arrogance is just fear. They’re a very cowardly race and hide behind their arrogance like it’s a shield. The higher ranking deer have enough combat ability that they might pose a threat, but they’ll probably be so afraid of you that they’d never think to fight. They’d much sooner tell you to leave.”

“Afraid because I’m unknown or afraid because I’m a pseudo-predator?”

“Your reputation. It didn’t concern you, so you weren’t told, but the land we used for the war game you participated in is adjacent to deer territory. Because of that, they used magic to observe it. And they observed you tearing out Shining Armor’s throat with your teeth.”

“They have magic that lets them see through his overpowered shield?”

“From my understanding, the magic they use gives them the ability to see through the eyes of familiars. In this case, the birds who were flying over the battlefield.”

“And you just allow another nation to spy on your training?”

“The yearly war games are called games because it’s meant to be a competition. The results are published and other nations are welcome to send representatives to watch.”

“I wouldn’t want to show that off. The pony military is kinda embarrassing.”

“We’ll need to begin retraining them quickly,” Luna said. “Most of the guards are glorified patrol-ponies.”

“Everyone always refers to the soldiers as guards. Is there a differentiation between the guards that patrol the cities and the army that defends against invasions?”

“No, and that’s the primary issue. In the days of old, the military was split into several groups. A navy that patrolled the seas, a ground army that defended and conquered, guards that patrolled for crimes, and then there were several smaller military factions like the irregulars, the monster hunters, the armies of the nobles, and the office of public relations.”

“Why was the office of public relations a military branch?” I asked.

“It was all propaganda and censorship, which fell under the purview of the military at the time. These days, it’s handled by a team under the princess herself. If we want to begin rebuilding the military, we’ll need to start recruiting and we’ll need to break everything up.”

“I don’t know if we’ll need to go on a recruiting drive yet. Modernized militaries need fewer combat soldiers and more support personnel. And even then, with teleport circles to move troops and supplies, the need for that is heavily reduced. If things go well, there will not be a situation where a column of our soldiers will charge into a column of theirs. We’ll use artillery to bombard them. That’ll thin their numbers and put the survivors into shock. Then we send in elite infantry with runic armor and golems to swiftly wipe out the stunned survivors before they can recover. None of that should require too many troops.”

“We should send the infantry in first, before the artillery starts,” Luna said. “Once the enemy is grouped up to attack us, we can bombard the entire area.”

“And… kill our own soldiers?” I slowly said.

“Hm? No, of course not. If you want to make the artillery rounds shock its targets, we need merely set the runes on our armor to resist it. The shells will be detonating above the combat zone, so there will be no risk of any of us getting hit by a shell. The shock magic would just bounce off our armor. Why would we kill our own soldiers?”

“A misunderstanding. Almost all human artillery just exploded when it hit its target. When I said it would put its targets in shock, I meant they would be confused and disoriented since they’d be very close to the blasts. But if we can really make runic rounds like that, it would be super cool.”

“I can’t believe I never considered something like this before, but it’s such an amazing idea,” Luna said. “Rounds propelled even further by forcing them through a tube. It’s so clever. And adding spin to make it go farther and more accurately! Truly, humans are masters of killing! Your species never ceases to amaze, my lady! Ponies only ever used cannons for things like fireworks or… parties.”

“Humans probably have the highest kill count of all time. Unfortunately, we were our own victims. Those who live by the sword tend to die by it.”

“Indeed, a death in battle would be most honorable! Much better than dying in my sleep.”

“Fighting has its perks,” Kat said with a nod. “Part of my killer body is from all the exercise I got while murdering.”

“Yeah, nothing really gets my blood going like combat,” I said. “Dying in battle wouldn’t be too bad, since it would probably be quick. And since I’d resurrect without remembering it anyway, there wouldn’t be any issues. Anyway, back on topic. So you said the deer watched the war games and know about me?”

“Indeed,” Luna said. “After the games were over, they sent a request for more information about the terrifying monster that partook in the games. We told them… enough.”

“Enough?” I asked, dreading the answer.

“Yes, enough.”

“Do I really need to ask you to elaborate? Tell me what they know.”

“We sent them a report on your physical body at the time. We also included that you served under me as a knight. And of course, we included the highlights of your accomplishments. So they know that you have a history of violence, some of which they got to personally witness, they know that you are more than a match for any quadruped in a fight, with or without weapons, and they know you’re dangerous enough to be sent in as a lone agent to destabilize entire governments.”

“Look, that was one time.”

“Two,” Kat said. “You took out the leadership of Egypt and you took out Pertz.”

“Three,” Luna said. “You were also instrumental in taking out Bahamut.”

“At least five, actually,” Flo said. “The criminal leader Nav took out essentially controlled a nation’s worth of criminals, a colony of which Nav later helped Moonbeam murder. And then there were the kobolds. But at the time, it was considerably fewer. Unless the deer have been keeping up with your exploits, all of their information will be dated. This is a chance to show off the new and improved you, Navi!”

“Why would you say that? Now I just feel dirty. Ugh, I don’t even want to go anymore…”

“Did you want to go to begin with?” Kat asked.

God, she got me a third time! “That’s beside the point. I’m doing a favor for a friend. I have to keep reminding myself of that. It’s just… this favor is sounding less and less pleasant by the moment…”

Thankfully, I finally heard someone coming before they could eavesdrop on us. Some hooffalls made me look over to the entrance, where I discovered that my daughter finally decided to grace us with her presence. Her hair was just as flowery as mine, and done up in braids that emphasized them. She had on a plain pink dress that matched the flowers perfectly. “Good morning, mommy,” she said with a large grin.

“How is your first spring?” I asked.

“I feel so full of energy! Looking back, I realize now I was always so lethargic and just didn’t notice…”

“Winter sucks. If we do conquer Tartarus, we can get a house there. Since the seasons are mirrored, we can stay in spring and summer all year round.”

“That doesn’t seem healthy…”

“We can take trips back if we ever want to sleep for a bit. Breakfast should be ready soon, but there’s time for a walk outside. Want to head to the cliff and back? The sun and wind in your hair will give you even more energy.”

“Let’s do it, mommy!”

Luna could read the room enough to stay behind, but Kat refused to give me some alone time with my filly and latched onto my arm as soon as I started walking to the door. Trying to turn her away would take more time than I was willing to spend, so I just put up with her warm squishiness and followed Taya outside.

Any vestiges of weariness I felt left me the instant I walked through the door. The fresh spring air was wonderful and I could hear faint singing in the wind. I didn’t know if it was pony song magic run amuck or if it was trees, but someone was definitely lively. Taya was currently looking around the world in wonder, hopefully taken by the beauty of it all.

Spring is pretty great for a flower, I gotta say.

“What do you think?” I asked.

“...I’ve never felt like this before,” she whispered, eyes still wide. “Do you hear the singing? And the bells?”

“Yes to the singing, no to the bells. Kat, do you hear singing?”

“No, but I hear the bells. They’re from a fire squad, so something is probably burning.”

“Oh, you’re right,” Taya said. “That makes sense, I guess. The singing is really pretty, though!”

I’m just deaf, then. Man, human senses suck. At least pheromones don’t affect us that much. “And of course, your hair looks super cute,” I said. “According to Doppel, it radiates emotions.” We finally started walking toward the cliff.

“That’s what Doppel told me when she was braiding it,” Taya said. “Apparently it tastes pretty good, too.”

“Be wary, my lady,” Kat said. “This might make the two of you much more valuable to Moonbeam.”

“Noted,” I said. “Taya, are you ready for our trip today?”

“To see the deer? Yeah. I just gotta blow ‘em up if they get uppity, right?”

“No, causing an incident would be unwise. Teleport us out instead.”

“‘Kay, even if it’s boring. Do you think that’ll actually happen?”

“No, because the deer also know that causing an incident would be unwise. They might not know everything about me, but they know I’m powerful in Equestria. Any attack against me might bring retaliation, so they wouldn’t dare.”

“...I really think I should go with you,” Kat said, snuggling closer.

“I won’t need a guard and you have a job that needs doing.”

“You never want to spend time with me anymore…”

“Why would I? Aside from your rockin’ body and combat skills, you don’t have many redeeming qualities. You’re creepy and obsessive, enjoy seeing me suffer, and want to own me. What kind of masochist would actually want you around?”

Kat’s arm around mine got tight, but before she could try to engender sympathy, Taya cut in with, “The view from up here is even better in spring!” We were now at the edge of the cliff and sure enough, we could see the world coming to life almost all around us. The main exception was Ponyville and the land surrounding it, which was still mostly snowy. “It all feels so… vibrant now!”

“It actually does feel slightly different,” I said. “I wonder if this is another evolution on the tree sister path. That potion you took skipped a few steps, if you’re already caught up to me.”

“According to Athena, temperament is an important part of it,” Taya said. “If you detest what’s happening to your body, the changes will be slower. But if you want and welcome it, they’ll be much faster. And I wanted to be just like my mommy, so here I am!”

I really don’t deserve this much love. “You’re my favorite filly daughter, Taya.”

“Of course!” she sweetly replied, jumping up to hug me. Right as she did so, an uncomfortably cold blast of wind shot over the cliff. That made me thankful for the warm filly and warmer kitty snuggling with me.

“I guess winter isn’t entirely gone just yet,” I said with a sigh.

“Why is Ponyville the only town still covered in snow?” Kat asked. “Don’t the ponies use magic to change the seasons the hard way?”

“The earth ponies are too stubborn for that,” I replied. “Instead of doing it the easy and fast way, Ponyville forces its inhabitants into hard labor for the day, making them remove the snow and change the weather by hoof.”

“That’s a very interesting interpretation,” Taya said, letting me go and stepping back. “Applejack just told me it was tradition…”

“Traditions are just old aspects of culture that have stubbornly refused to die,” I said. “So their stubbornness is making them do it the hard way.”

“You have quite a way of looking at things, my lady,” Kat said, sniffling a little.

“I’m looking forward to when the flowers start growing,” I said. “All the fields between us and Ponyville are usually covered in them. Instead of green, we’ll be seeing oceans of gold, pink, and blue. Do you think we could or should carve a kind of viewing station into the cliff? It would be a place like the sun room, but right on the side of the cliff instead.”

“I could probably carve it out in about an hour or two, if you want,” Taya said. “I can’t make the glass, though. Twilight showed me how, but it’s really hard to make it perfectly clear and uniform.”

“Wouldn’t that ruin the feeling of nature?” Kat asked. “The wind is just a part of being on a cliff.”

“True, but it’s hard to have a tea party like this. If I really want to style on the other nobles, something stupidly opulent like a tea party on a cliff would be optimal.”

“A party under the magical cherry blossom trees would be just as viable,” Kat said. “After all, you probably won’t be able to find any trees like those anywhere else in Canterlot. It would also feel more nature-oriented.”

“Just because I’m part-tree doesn’t necessarily mean I care about all that,” I said.

“But you’re the lady of nature, are you not?”

“Yeah, the lady of nature. That lady part means I’m allowed to make nature civilized so it’s more accessible. The view of nature from the cliff is amazing, but the wind ruins it. So civilizing it by adding a viewing area safe from the wind is the best solution. You still have the perfect view, just without the wind.”

“Yes, quite the way of looking at things… You excel at mental gymnastics, my lady.”

“Thank you, I try. Taya, do you feel wide awake?”

“Yep! And I actually feel kinda hungry, too.”

“Let’s head back in, then. Breakfast should be ready soon, if it isn’t already.”

“I’ll go wake Spider up so he can join us,” Kat said, finally releasing me. She walked over to the tree while Taya and I walked back in.

“Should you really say things like that to her?” Taya whispered. “Isn’t it kinda… bullying?”

“Kat has recently made it very difficult to like her. I probably shouldn’t say things as bluntly as I do, though. But I mean, you saw some of the shit she did in the coma. Is that acceptable behavior? Am I wrong for wanting to put a stop to it?”

My filly sighed and didn’t reply. She sighed yet again when we got inside and beheld Celestia setting the table with our breakfast. “Why is that mare back again?”

“Apparently because she wanted to make breakfast,” I replied.

“Where did she even get one of our maid outfits?” When my filly asked that, Celestia just beamed.

“Remember who you’re talking about,” I said, patting my filly’s head. She sighed a third time and gave in, just like I had to. Together, we sat where Celestia put our plates. Luna was silently eating, refusing to acknowledge her ex-sister’s existence.

“So when does Spike usually wake up?” Celestia sweetly asked. “I’d like to make his breakfast too, and maybe help him get to work.”

“You’ll probably be waiting for a bit,” Taya said. “He usually isn’t up by the time I leave for class. Or maybe he’s up and just not leaving his room?”

“Perhaps I should go greet him,” Celestia said, poking at her chin with a hoof.

“He might be with Gilda, so make sure to knock first,” I said. “And thanks for breakfast.”

“Anything for you, my lady!” she sweetly replied. “I’m off to go wake the dragon. Do enjoy!” She left right as Kat and Spider joined us. Of course, Celestia only made food for the people she actually cared about, so they had to wait for the real cook to get finished.

“This was tested by poison-tasters, right?” Taya asked.

“Luna’s eating it right now,” I said. “Also, we’re immune to poison anyway. Besides, poison doesn’t even taste that bad. Arsenic’s a little tingly. It might be good in chili, actually.” Luna snorted. “What?”

“I never thought I’d hear someone talking about purposefully poisoning themselves for the… taste. Truly, life is a wondrous thing.”

“Right? You know, there were humans out there who dosed themselves with small amounts of poison to build up resistances. I personally wouldn’t recommend it, but it might be possible for a pony to do the same thing.”

“It is,” Luna said. “And I also wouldn’t personally recommend it. Get the dosage wrong just once and your stomach might be aching for days. Ugh, and the smell…”

Not what I wanted to hear while eating breakfast, but Celestia’s cooking was good enough that it didn’t detract much. “So did you think Celestia might actually poison us?” I asked.

“Love poison, maybe.”

“I’m immune to that,” I said. “And she knows I’m immune to it, since she forced me to drink it once.”

“She did what?!” Luna shouted. “After she got mad at me for doing it?!”

“...You forced mommy to drink love poison?” Taya coldly asked.

“You’re looking at it the wrong way. I helped your mother discover that she was immune to love poison.”

“No you didn’t,” I said. “I had no idea it was love poison until much later. And Luna didn’t force me to do it, she just tricked me into it. Of course, that’s arguably worse. And Celestia didn’t believe it anyway, because she was just as surprised as everyone else when it didn’t work on me. You have no need to fear poison from her, Taya. Flo wouldn’t let her do that, anyway. Besides, poisoning food is dumb. Poisoning the silverware is the right idea. Or the rim of someone’s glass. That way, if someone fears being poisoned and just mimics eating, they’ll still die. And if there are a lot of enemies and you aren’t sure who is who, put the antidote in the food itself. Thus, you can poison all the silverware and glasses without worrying about hurting your allies.”

“...My lady, where did you learn such dangerous things?” Luna slowly asked, staring at me with stars in her eyes.

“Isn’t that just common sense?” I asked.

“Those are an assassin’s final resorts,” Kat said. “Something not taught to members of the guild that trained me until they were nearing the rank of master. It’s hardly anything I would call common sense, given that it’s so uncommon even in my old order.”

“It’s so rare that my sister and I only ever encountered it once,” Luna said. “It failed because we scanned the entire table for poison, but most unicorns would only think to check the food! It had never even occurred to us until then…”

I guess video games finally taught me something useful after all. I’ll probably never get invited to a game at dinner… “Anyway, let’s eat.” And so Taya and I began eating. It was pretty fantastic, I gotta say.

“Celestia’s a powerful opponent,” Taya whispered when she was done.

“Tell me about it,” I said. “Though I figured she would have found Spike by now. Doesn’t she need to be getting to her job soon?”

“Why?” Flo asked. “There’s a fake in place. She can stay as long as she’d like and it won’t cause any issues.”

“That’s clearly pushing well past the boundaries I set,” I said.

“Not that she has any intention to, I assure you. I was just saying that her work won’t pose any issues.”

“That’s still not very comforting, but I’m sure Spike can distract her while Taya and I slip out. His sacrifice won’t be in vain.”

“You’re quite fast to throw others under the bus,” Flo said.

“I learned from everyone around me all these years,” I replied with a shrug. “As someone who’s perpetually gotten the worst end of the deal, I’ve started learning how to get others to take the fall for me. If anything, you should be praising me for my growth. Aren’t I a better leader now that I know how to use others to their full potential?”

“You have been learning the wrongest possible lessons,” Flo said, shaking her head in what was probably disappointment. “Leaving Spike to his fate is hardly honorable.”

“Since when was I concerned about that? Being honorable can be useful sometimes, but knowing when to cut your losses and escape is a better skill. And Spike is an acceptable loss to escape from the sun goddess herself.”

“Your wisdom is as bountiful as ever,” Luna said. “Sometimes, the only winning move is retreat. In that case, some things will always be lost. Learning to minimize those losses is what differentiates a good leader from a great one.”

“Isn’t this all a little too dramatic?” Taya asked. “I mean, I know it’s Celestia and all, but still.”

“Equestria’s super boring. If I don’t make my own fun, I’ll die of boredom. Why do you think I act the way I do?”

“That explains a lot,” Luna said. “Is this land truly so devoid of joy?”

“Yeah. I read every book in Twilight’s library at least twice and that was before a year was out. Unfortunately, most of those books were worthless. Since then, I’ve probably written about as many books, but those don’t do me any good since I’m the one who wrote them.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Flo said. “Your favorite fax machine did her job.”

“I called you a printer, not a fax machine. But what job did you do?”

“I delivered a few thousand books to your editor while you were in the coma. I also sold enough paintings to fill several museums. And finally, I delivered comics to the same people who were developing manga for Rarity. So now there will be even more sources of entertainment, some of which you haven’t experienced yet. Oh, and you’re richer than ever, though your editor will obviously be paying in installments.”

“Yep, best secretary ever.” That made her light up pink. “With that, there’s finally more fun stuff to do. But there’s still a long way to go. Building up a village will allow me to start putting things in place to get the real projects going. With my influence, the Equestrians will hopefully become less boring.”

“With some help from your favorite princess, of course,” my non-favorite princess replied from her position skulking in the shadows. Apparently Celestia’s journey to find Spike was unsuccessful, as he didn’t join us.

“Yeah, Cadance will probably help here and there,” I said. “But most of my royal support will come from you instead.”

“Ugh, Cadance is still your favorite?” Celestia asked with a groan. “I even got brainwashed for you!”

“No, you got brainwashed because of me. Big difference.”

“I’ve also done a lot for you! Far more than Cadance ever did! After all, I’ve only come over to visit a few times. I’m certainly not living here with a foal!”

“Yeah, but you’ve also done a lot of stuff to me. But if we take what Oldlestia’s done out of the picture, you’re still basically just a blank slate. After all, it isn’t fair to give you the credit for everything good she did while saying you’re off the hook for the bad stuff.”

“I’m making you a countess, aren’t I?”

“That’s just a liege-lady taking advantage of a talented vassal. You certainly aren’t doing me any favors. If anything, you’re inconveniencing me by forcing me to push plans forward.”

“Tch. I made you dinner and breakfast, didn’t I?”

“Cadance cooked almost every day she was staying in my house. I’ve probably eaten more of her home-cooked meals than Shiny has. Now that I say it out loud, it sounds kinda bad… Anyway, you may be a slightly better cook, but two meals hardly counts against what she’s done.”

“I’d rather be a better princess than a better cook!”

“Then why on earth would you pretend to be my maid instead of doing your job as a princess? You’re still using that drone as a replacement, aren’t you?”

“You told me to learn to delegate. So I’m delegating. Sue me!”

Luna angrily sniffed. “As a wise princess once told me, there’s a fine line between shirking and delegating. Putting all of your duties on autopilot while you prance about is the exact definition of shirking, I believe.”

“Forgive me for being new to the whole princess thing,” Celestia said.

“Being a princess is all you’ve ever known,” I said. “You can’t be new at it.”

“Then what’s your recommendation, huh? How should I delegate?”

“There’s a bunch of options, depending on how much of your power you want to keep. Most towns have a mayor of some kind and most regions have a lord of some kind, right?”

“That is correct,” Celestia replied.

“Step one is phasing out the nobility. You gotta get rid of them pronto. Nothing good comes from consolidating power for too long in the hands of too few, especially with no large, obvious external threats. You get a bunch of arrogant do-nothing busy-bodies. Corruption runs rampant, regions start getting run-down, problems stop getting solved. It’s just a big mess, really. Step two is replacing the system of aristocracy with some kind of meritocracy. Equestria’s actually pretty good in that regard because someone’s primary skill is tattooed on their ass. Everyone’s basically guaranteed to be good at whatever their cutie mark is, right? Then once you have competent people who are mostly not corrupt in charge, set up various levels of issues, from things that affect a single person to things that affect the nation. All the useful people under you can handle anything less than a nation-breaking problem. Those are the kinds of things a nation’s leader should be focusing on.”

“How exactly can I phase out the nobility, again?” Celestia asked.

“You just recently conducted a few pretty hefty purges, cutting out a large chunk of the power of the nobles. I’d say that gives you the right to level a few requirements on keeping your title. If you can’t prove that you’re competent enough to be a leader or contribute to society in at least some meaningful way, your family will lose any benefits of nobility. Maybe they can still claim the name, but their land can be seized due to incompetence. The only people who are gonna be upset about you getting rid of a few bad nobles are other bad nobles. The citizens will either rejoice or not care. And what are the nobles gonna do? Personally try to lead a coup? Good, that would save us the time of tracking them down.”

“The nobility may have lost some of their political power, but they’re still financially powerful. Or would you suggest stripping them of their assets as well? And what of any land they legally bought?”

“I get the feeling you’re not really interested in making this happen.”

“I can’t just say yolo while enacting massive, country-changing policies. These things have to be planned to the smallest detail possible.”

“Then you’re asking the wrong person. I’m not very detail-oriented. Flo or Darya can give you several history lessons about human nations that went from monarchies to something different. A lot of times, the royals still ended up holding important positions, but it was mostly ceremonial. If you could teach the Equestrians how to manage the country with only a small amount of input from you, you could make your son all the meals he could ever want.”

“Oh ho, now I see. You’re trying to teach me to delegate so I have more time to spend with you! Now that I understand your motives, I can see why it might be important… Well, guess it’s time to execute all the other nobles!”

“We’ll send Spike to the palace whenever he’s awake,” I said. “Have a nice day!”

“Shouldn’t you be trying to talk me out of it?” Celestia asked.

“I mean, killing them all isn’t the method I would pick, but hey, you’re the princess here. I’m sure you’ve put enough thought into it that you’re not just yoloing your way through.”

“I, for one, don’t think it’s fair,” Luna said. “I suggested killing them all at least a dozen times, but Nav recommends it once and now you’re all for it? That’s exactly why I’d rather spend time with my lady!”

“I never reco—”

“Well, she obviously had better arguments,” Celestia said, cutting me off. “And half the time, you were just saying it after being mildly inconvenienced. You can’t just order heads to roll because you smacked your shin against a table!”

“They snickered at me!”

“You tried ordering three generations of their families to the torture chambers!”

“I would have killed them when I finished, so it still counts!”

“It’s not supposed to count! Counting is a bad thing in this case! Ugh, won’t you come back home to the palace, Luna? You know you’ll be more comfortable there!”

“You just hate it when I have fun! Well guess what! I’m gonna stay with Navi and she’ll let me torture and kill all the nobles I want!”

“Wait a mom—”

“That’s not fair!” Kat shouted. “She gets mad every time I recommend it! Why would you get preferential treatment? I was her vassal first!”

I sighed and patted Taya on the back three times. She nodded and we both teleported up to my bed. The first floor of my house was now an uninhabitable quarantine zone.

“So, what just happened?” Taya asked.

“Man, I don’t even know. I’m glad you remembered what that gesture meant. Maybe we should just go to Fleur’s house instead…”

“She might already be on the way, so it’s probably better to wait. I guess if we’re really at a loss for ways to spend time, you could just rub my belly…”

“You’re so dolled up, I wouldn’t even know where to start.”

“Uh… at my belly?”

“Yeah, but how do I get to it? I refuse to reach up my own daughter’s dress.”

“Oh. Yeah, it would be awkward if anyone walked in on us, huh? Ugh, I guess being a lady is all about inconveniences…”

“No, that’s just what comes from being alive. It’s a road of constant disappointment with an inevitable end in eternal dreary darkness.” Or not so eternal, if you’re dumb enough to bet your soul with what might as well be a god.

“Mommy, would you get mad if I ever turned you into a pony to rub your belly? I really think it would cheer you up a little.”

“Please don’t do that. Receiving belly rubs as a pony has an uncomfortable habit of turning me on. That’s why Twilight tricked Spike into doing it to me in front of some guards.”

“I bet you enjoyed it.”

“Anyway, don’t do that. I think Fleur said she would get here around eight. I hope we can last that long.”

“Do you… do you think they’ll try to retrieve you, mommy?” Sure enough, someone gently knocked on the door, making both of us jump a little. “Should we run?”

“Maybe it’s someone sane. Open it, but be ready to escape.” She gulped and used magic to ease the door open. Thankfully, it was Doppel who presented herself. “Oh, we’re safe…”

“I asked Darya where you were,” Doppel said with a smile. “Is there any reason in particular you fled, my lady?”

“Everyone was cutting me off and ignoring me, so I deemed my presence unnecessary. And since the conversation was dipping into mass murder and torture, I decided not to subject my filly to it. To that end, I decided it would be best to withdraw.”

“I see. Well, I shall inform you when Fleur arrives. Luna and Kat should leave for the bunker by then. Our… temporary maid will be dragging Spike off soon, too.”

“So, what, did you just let her in this morning?”

Doppel sighed and hung her head. “She was already making breakfast when I woke up…”

“I told her it would be fine every now and then and that she had to not be annoying about it. Two meals in a row is more than every now and then and she’s certainly been annoying about it. Does that mean I can safely cut her off completely now?”

“She provided all of her own ingredients,” Doppel said. “And from your reactions, she’s excellent at cooking, as well. I think working on her annoying side would be better than cutting her off completely, personally. After all, it’s likely you’ll end up marrying her.”

“The more people who say that, the less I want to do it. You’re just making me want to pick Moonie even more. Is that really what you want, Doppel?”

“The evil bug who cast me aside and bullies me because I’m loyal to you now? Why would I want that?”

“So I can continue redeeming her? At this point, we’ve successfully fixed Celestia. Moonbeam’s still a work in progress.”

“So you want your wife to be unstable and someone you’re intent upon fixing?” Doppel asked, tilting her head. “That seems unhealthy, my lady.”

“You can make anything sound bad when you spend all day twisting words around, Doppel.”

“It took me two sentences to make it sound bad. That’s hardly all day.”

“Taya, who would you rather I marry?” I asked.

“If I’m honest, I really don’t want to give Celestia the satisfaction. She’d just look so happy and smug that it’d be sickening. I think shocking the world by picking the dark horse option is more fun! Besides, who wants someone mostly perfect like Newlestia? Talk about snoresville, am I right? Plus, I’d probably get turned into a princess by extension, and then I’d have to be super polite and stuff.”

“Wouldn’t that happen with Moonbeam, too?” Doppel asked.

“What, do the changelings care about etiquette?” Taya asked.

“...No, actually. I will grant you that. Until recently, we’ve been more concerned with surviving than we have with manners. You would probably become a princess, though. Technically, it would be one of many, since Moonbeam has several children.”

“All the better, since the limelight wouldn’t be on me. But of course, all of this is assuming the only options are Moonbeam and Celestia. The best answer is obviously founding your own nation with Twilight. The fae king and his sorcerous queen ruling over the land of demons. Doesn’t that sound awesome? Then we could make our own rules about behavior!”

“Would you consider Celestia off the table?” I asked.

“No, but she’s not my first choice. We’d probably have to be accompanied by guards everywhere, too. At least if changelings were guarding us, they could follow as birds or something. Mommy, unless you actually fall in love with Celestia, marrying her would be kinda pointless. She’s willing to listen to reason now. About the only way we could turn her against us is by doing stupid things, like murdering random people or trying to hurt her. What benefits would marrying her really grant you that you don’t already have?”

“That’s definitely a way of looking at it,” I said, nodding. “And it’s actually true. As things stand now, unless I fall in love with her, marrying her would be pointless. It would turn me into even more of a celebrity, which would be annoying. It would basically force us to live in the palace, which has its ups and downs. I would obtain more authority, but right now, I can use elementals to instantly ask for whatever I need from Celestia. Sounds like nothing but downsides, if I’m honest.”

“Just… think about your choices,” Doppel said. “And beware that each has consequences.”

“Of course. Do you know when the airships will be returning?”

“I don’t know the exact time, but both should return within the week. And the large ship will arrive after the pageant begins but before it ends.”

“Wonderful. I think that’s when Celestia said she’d announce my promotion. Should I wear some kind of special outfit to commemorate it?”

“If there’s a big event, I would recommend it,” Doppel said. “However, Rarity is almost definitely going to deliver more outfits for the pageant than you’ll ever need. Plus, you have several gorgeous dresses here that were gifted by your various paramours. You can get away with wearing any of those, as long as Fleur and I deem it acceptable.”

“Good. When do you think it’ll be safe to go downstairs?”

“I’m not sure. Fleur should be here soon. In the meantime, I’ll send tea up.”

“Please don’t. I’m so tired of tea.”

“Then I’ll send hot cocoa up. With extra marshmallows for Taya, of course.”

“Of course,” my filly replied with a nod. I guess I wasn’t allowed to have extra marshmallows, because Doppel let herself back out before I could say anything. “Are we sure she isn’t a double-agent, mommy? What if she’s going to rat us out?”

“I think Doppel can be trusted, but she was pushing Celestia a little hard. I’m pretty sure our hot cocoa will arrive without interference.”

“...She said she would have it sent up, implying someone else would bring it. Right now, there are only two other maids in the house. So we either get the trap or… her.”

Does Aurora really count as a maid? I guess so, huh? “I’m confident we’ll survive whatever may come. Wait, who taught you what a trap was?”

“Rarity, of course.”

“Right, of course. And when did she pollute your mind with this?”

“When she made my dress for the Gala. She had dozens of those manga books scattered around and meticulously designed the dress around them. A few of the characters in the books wearing the outfits were boys, so I asked about it.”

“You can end your explanation there. I don’t want to know the rest. Thank you for letting me know, though. Now I have to punish her.”

“We might have time when we get back from visiting the deer. I really can’t believe you liked traps enough to hire one and force him to be your maid, though… I guess Rarity was right, huh?”

“And now I have to punish you, too. So I’m going to tickle the hell out of you when we get back,” I said. “Prepare yourself, my adorable filly. I’ll soon have you squealing in terror.”

“Mommy, you seem to have forgotten something very important: You can’t wear your ring anymore.”

“Yeah, but I happen to have a Luna. That’s close enough to make it work.”

“...Oh. Hm, that might be a problem. Oh, I bet Celestia would help me tickle you, though! I think the two of us could beat the two of you!”

“Well, there’s another option. Flo enjoys tickling you, too. I can just ask her to turn your laser gun off for a little while.” When her ears flinched and she looked away, I knew I had won. The punishment for my filly was settled. All that was left was to decide just how to deal with Rarity…

As Taya began to dread her upcoming fate and I thought up all sorts of fun things to do with my favorite dressmaker, someone timidly knocked. Moments later, it opened and the trap in question let himself in. “Good morning to you, my ladies,” Aurora warmly said. Sure enough, he had some hot cocoa on a platter. One of the mugs was stuffed full of marshmallows, while the other was disappointingly bereft. “I heard you barely escaped a terrifying situation. Are you feeling well?”

“It was less terrifying and more annoying, if I’m honest,” I said.

“The two strongest mages in the country were arguing about torturing and murdering people while the insane assassin egged them on,” Aurora slowly replied. “Is that not… terrifying to you, my lady?”

“I guess they can throw a few lights around or whatever, but anyone with a laser pointer can do the same. It was just a… Well, I hesitate to say catfight, but that’s basically what it was.”

“A catfight between mares who can blow up mountains seems like something to be feared,” Aurora said, hanging his head. Taya got tired of waiting and used magic to fly our cocoa over. She obviously kept the one with the most marshmallows, because my fate in life is to suffer.

“Power creep’s a thing, man,” I said with a shrug. When I finally took a sip of the delicious cocoa before me, all I could feel was disappointment. They didn’t even give me whipped cream… It was still good, but it could have been so much more. “Sure, they’re strong. But I’ve met people who made Celestia quiver in fear. And after you deal with them as much as I have, you get used to it.”

“Oh yeah, Arachne was a thing, wasn’t she?” Taya said. “Man, she was spooky, huh? Celestia was terrified.”

“We were all terrified. Point is, they’re not just going to start using combat magic for nothing. And if they do, being worried about it won’t change the outcome.”

“Then… why did you flee?”

“Because they were being annoying and I didn’t wanna deal with it. Next time, tell Doppel to give me marshmallows and whipped cream.”

“Oh, she said you would be getting your whipping and cream later, my lady. I’ll be sure to ask her to bring marshmallows for you, too. Would you like me to bring anything else up?”

“No thank you.” He bowed and departed. When the door was shut, I couldn’t help but sigh.

“Disappointed to see your favorite trap leave, mommy?”

“I’d be happy to increase your tickling time.” She gulped her marshmallows down nervously. “I’m disappointed that Doppel is passing off slutty messages for me to her staff. It’s unfair for me to say it, but it seems unprofessional.”

“Yeah, you have no grounds to say that,” Taya replied.

“I’m trying to work on it. But at this point, I already have the reputation. Getting away from that image will take time, no matter how I think about it. It’s just one more thing I need to change.”

“I’ll support you, even if it is boring,” my filly said.

“Good. So, what are you expecting from the deer?”

“A bunch of arrogant and rude cowards.”

“Well, let’s hope we’re disappointed. And I know I may have joked about it, but don’t actually leave Fleur behind if we have to flee.”

“Lame. Fine, I guess. Hm, what if we have to split up?”

“Ideally we won’t, but you and I can communicate via Darya. I’m sure Fleur would be interested in joining the network, so we’ll probably be able to talk to her as well. If we split up, just be wary of surprise attacks. That’s the only thing that could hurt you. Fleur will be on her own. And I’ll be fine no matter what happens. Although I do want to stress, I highly doubt anything bad will happen. I’ve heard the deer are assholes, but not generally violent. As long as we don’t provoke them too hard, it shouldn’t be an issue.”

“...Well, good thing you’re working on that. Do your best, mommy. I’ll be there to pick up the pieces when you buck it all up. Although… if I abandon you, I won’t get tickled!”

“If you rescue me, I’ll reward you by not tickling you.”

“Is withholding a punishment really a reward?”

“Would you rather I tickle you and then rub your belly?”

“Ooh, tough one…”

And so time passed until Fleur finally rescued us from our vassals.