Snowball's pair of royal guard level of patience and etiquette was displayed, though Snowball was too oblivious to notice, when they had to show Snowball the concept of a toilet and how to use it. The two guards' patience were further tested when they had to show what a sink was and the concept of washing your hooves afterwords. To be fair, all of this was new to Snowball, having come from a civilization that wasn't even capable of producing their own metals, instead scavenging or trading for it instead. It was somewhat amusing to the night guard mare, seeing this level of naivety from a fully grown adult pony, but rather vexing to the day guard stallion, who saw the situation as him having to babysit an adult pony. Either way, all of this was an enlightening situation to Snowball, who was amazed by everything the modern world provided. One example being running water, especially hot water, seen as a mystifying concept to the Yakutian.

Snowball was especially grateful for the assistance of the two royal guards, becoming less distrustful of the Equestrians. He still had his misgivings towards the Equestrians though. Once he was finished with the restroom, he had exited the room back to the company of the two royal guards. However, before either of the two royal guards could address them, he walked past them and over to the bed, eying it with awe.

The day guard stallion cleared his throat and directed his attention at Snowball. "Sir, if you would like to retire for the day, we will leave you to your rest," the stallion announced. It was now nighttime and Canterlot was shifting into its night life.

The Yakutians ears flickered around, working like miniature radar dishes in war time through war. After a few seconds, Snowball looked at the stallion. "You not stay?" he asked.

The stallion, with as much decorum as he could display, shook his head. "No sir, if you do not need our assistance, we will take our leave," the stallion answered.

Snowball looked over to the night guard mare with some distrust in his eyes. "You leave too?" he asked.

As much as the night guard wanted to stay with such a strapping specimen of a stallion in this world where so few stallions existed, she had to be professional. "No sir, I will leave with my colleague," the night guard mare answered.

While Snowball's attention was squarely concentrated at the two royal guards, his ears were still actively clearly moving around, concentrated on Celestia-knows-what. It was if his ears had a mind of their own. Finally, Snowball turned to look towards one of the windows. "And her?" he asked, his attention directed at one of the room's large windows that allowed any guest to enjoy the beautiful view of Canterlot. It was a massive bay window that dwarfed every pony and was accompanied by equally large and beautiful drapes to cover the windows.

Both of the royal guards were unsure of what he was talking about. The day guard stallion, thinking as if the Yakutian had the mental capacity of a mere child, thought it was just nervous jitters as if a colt was complaining to his parents about monsters under their bed. Meanwhile, the night guard mare was completely mystified from his questioning.

Before any of the two royal guards could question the stallion's thoughts, a mare stepped out from behind one of the window's drapes, revealing another night guard mare. However, this mare was wearing an entirely different uniform compared to the other present night guard. While the uniform she sported had the same colors and general theme of the night guards, her uniform implied something special, looking custom. This new night guard mare's uniform sported no visible metal and was noticeably less protective than standard night guard uniforms.

Both royal guard escorts recognized the mare as a night-stalker, the night guard's personal retinue of elite soldiers specialized in sneaking around. The night-stalkers were also known amongst the day guard and even the regular night guards as being extra weird/creepy ponies that did not know the concept of personal space or privacy. Both of Snowball's escorts were nonplussed. The regular day guard stallion trotted over to the new mare and grabbed the night-stalker's ear with his telekinesis. "Night-stalker or not, give the poor stallion some breathing room!" the day guard exclaimed while dragging the mare out of the room by her ear.

As the night-stalker voiced her grievances while being extricated from the room, the other mare turned back to the Yakutian and bowed. "I am terribly sorry sir, I will personally deal with this disservice," the normal night guard apologized.

Snowball, still completely oblivious to how being a diplomat worked, tilted his head at the mare. "Ok," he plainly answered.

The door slammed shut from the day guard exiting, causing both Snowball and the night guard to flinch from the loud noise. To any other pony, it was just a loud noise but to them, it was on the verge of being deafening. The mare looked back over to the curtain that the night-stalker that had been hiding behind. "So, uh, how'd you know she was there?" the night guard asked.

Snowball tilted his head, shooting her a look of curiosity. "You not hear her too?" he asked.

The night guard raised an eyebrow. As a batpony, she had excellent hearing, so much so that she had the natural ability of echolocation but she hadn't heard a thing that would have indicated that the night-stalker was there. Having heard the stallion's answer, she wondered if he had a similar ability. "Can Yakutians echolocate?" she asked which only yielded a raised brow from Snowball. "Like, if you close your eyes, can you see where something is, with your hearing?"

Snowball's inquisitive look grew and he shook his head. "No," he answered.

'Maybe I didn't explain it right?', she thought. She closed her eyes and stepped away from the stallion. She focused on just her hearing. Snowball was about to question what she was doing but then she trotted forward. She was about to trot directly into Snowball and he was just about to step out of her way but she then changed direction and trotted around him. She then continued walking and was about to trot into the bed but she then completely stopped. Next, she started trotting backwards and kept going until her flank was about to hit the wall on the other side of the room. Just like with the bed, she stopped trotting right before she hit the wall. During the entire ordeal, her eyes were closed and she used the sound of her hooves bouncing off of the marble floor to use as her "eyes".

When she opened her eyes back up, she was assaulted by the adorable image of Snowball smiling and clapping two hooves together to applaud her. Even as he tapped his two front hooves together, they made no noise. She smirked and trotted back over to the stallion. "Here, why don't you try?" she asked.

Snowball shot her a look of disagreement but closed his eyes nonetheless. Just like she had done, he had started trotting forward and right as he was about to trot into the thestral, he stopped. Then, he started trotted backwards. After some hoofsteps, he was getting really close to the bed but unlike her, he didn't stop and trotted into it, not knowing it had been there. Opening his eyes back up, he looked back at the batpony. "Not good at it," he proclaimed.

She chuckled and trotted closer to the stallion. "How'd you know when you were about to trot into me?" she asked out of suspicion.

"I heared you?" Snowball replied, as if it was the most obvious thing ever. It was the night guard's turn to give a look of questioning so he touched a hoof to her chest. "You breathe loud and your heart beats louder."

The night guard's eyes widened as she looked at him in awe. Was his hearing that sensitive? Was that also how he knew that a night-stalker had been hiding in the room? "Is that why you knew that, that other mare was hiding in the room?" she asked. Snowball nodded and she was even more surprised. The night-stalker had been hiding behind a pretty thick curtain, which should have been a decent sound insulator to hide her presence. "So, uh, you have some pretty sensitive ears, huh?" she asked while looking at his constantly twitching ears.

Snowball tilted his head at her again. "No?" he replied. "I am like other ponies in home tribe." Unbeknownst to Snowball, Yakutians had significantly more sensitive hearing compared to their Equestrian counterparts. They hadn't developed the ability to echolocate like thestrals because their environments didn't allow them too. To explain, a snow covered field absorbs a lot of sound so sound waves that tries to bounce back from a target will usually be absorbed. However, because Yakutians lived in such a sound dampened environment, they had to get used to hearing primary sources of noise instead of secondary ones in such an environment meaning their hearing naturally grew over time to hear the smallest noises from a distance. It was important that this adaptation occurred because the only other artificial noises in the frozen northern wastelands were predators or prey. If it was a prey, it was more food to survive and if it was predator, they'd want to avoid them as much as possible. Therefore, their hearing adapted over time.

The night guard wondered if Snowball was messing with her or if Yakutians truly did have hearing like he did. Either way, she couldn't tell from Snowball's poker face and or possible lack of knowledge. "Well, sir, I will leave you for your rest. Enjoy your sleep," she said. "If you require assistance, there are guards constantly roaming the castle during the entire night so just hail one of them."

Snowball scrunched up his nose. "Mares?" he asked.

The night guard wondered what he was implying but she nodded anyways to reply to said question. "Yes, most of the guards on tonight's patrol are mares," she replied.

Snowball then frowned from dissatisfaction. "Other mare guards crazy like other mares?" he asked.

She knew of what he had gone through so far in Equestria. Most of his only interactions with previous mares in Canterlot were quite negative, to say the least. She found it quite hilarious that this adorable ball of fluff was capable of causing such a streak of chaos, having decked half of Canterlot's mares into unconsciousness in reaction to some rather fast advances and fighting multiple day and night guards, besting them all. She chuckled and shook her head. "No, sir, these guards are normal, uh, like I am," she replied.

Snowball nodded once in acknowledgement, hoping that she wasn't a crazy mare that was lying to him. "I, Snowball," he said.

The mare nodded back to the stallion with a smile. "Nice to meet you Snowball," she greeted back, even though she already knew his name. She had obviously been given his name when she was assigned the task of escorting the Yakutian diplomat but she was trying to be polite. "I am Astral Blade."

Snowball nodded and climbed up onto the bed to lie down. A second later, he stood back up and circled around a few times before settling back down. With him curled up into a adorable ball of fluff, him and his beautifully magnificently thiccc white coat called out to her. 'Oomph', Astral Blade thought, the succulent fur ever so enticing her desires to climb onto the bed and cuddle him, increasing by the second. It took every ounce of her professional guard etiquette to muster up the willpower to pull herself away.

Once Astral Blade left the room, Snowball finally relaxed enough to fall asleep soon afterwards.

Author's Note

Sorry about not having made a chapter in such a long time, I've been dealing with many health complications and what time I have been writing, I've been dedicating it to my other fimfiction. But, here's one after a long hiatus. I haven't abandoned this story and will try to complete it. Anyways, enjoy the chapter and drop a comment, I enjoy reading them and if you have feedback, I'll try to remediate my problems.