Striving for Perfection

POV Princess Luna

The dream of the element of laughter was very interesting. An endless fair made of sweets with all kinds of entertainment, ranging from a pinata that I know to an unknown device with a flashing part, looked very fun. I will have to ask my sister about this device later.

I begin to feel that tension has begun to emanate from one of the doors, and I pull her to me. This door had serious differences from all the others. If the pony doors had equal angles, a bright color and an image of a cutie mark on top, then this one had brightly highlighted pointed corners, a bard color and a small sharp protrusion at the top.

It doesn't look like any of the types of doors to dreams I know. Whatever it is, I have to fulfill my duty as a keeper of dreams.

I opened a strange door and walked into it. And I saw clearly not what I expected. I expected from such a door a dream about an incredible battle comparable in scale to the first battles of the war against the Griffonian Empire. I shuddered at the memory of all the cruelty that I had to see then. "Never again." I thought and decided to focus on the dream I entered.

The dream was very minimalistic. Most of it consisted of a black liquid similar to water through which ripples constantly passed and columns of the same color stretching high into the sky. The source of the ripples was a fight between two identical creatures similar to hairless monkeys.

"I'm tired of you! No one has the right to deny my perfection!" One of these creatures shouted when attacking the second.

"How can you not understand? Even if you become perfection, who will consider you an example, if you achieve your goals by walking on a mountain of corpses? Stop before it's too late, think about what Grandpa would say to that." The second creature replied, dodging the blows of the first, but not striking back.

"Don't bring the old man in here!" The first creature replied, continuing its barrage of blows.

Could it be that a new intelligent species has appeared during my absence? Another question to my sister. In any case, it's obvious that the attacker is part of the nightmare and I need to just knock him out of the dream.

I prepared a spell and shot it into a part of the nightmare. As soon as the spell got into the nightmare, the whole dream just fell apart and I woke up on my throne, where I began to enter into other people's dreams.

Did I disturb someone else's sleep because of my hasty conclusions? I'm not even able to do it right?

I suppressed negative thoughts, got up from the throne and decided to go to my sister to ask my questions. No pony attends the night court anyway. No pony appreciates my night.

When I got to my sister's room, I walked in the door without knocking. My sister was sitting next to the fireplace and reading a book. When I entered the room, she looked at me and smiled.

"Good evening, Sister, what brings you to me today?" She asked, keeping a smile on her face.

"And good evening to you, Tia, I wanted to ask you a few questions, if you're free, of course." I replied answering her smile with my own.

"I am always free for you, Sister. Ask your questions." Tia said, approving my suggestion.

"Do you know what kind of device with a flashing part that I saw in the dreams of the element of laughter?" I asked Tia.

"Judging by your description, you have seen a slot machine. A very popular thing among young ponies." Replied Tia.

"I understand. And one more question: during the time I was away, did new intelligent species appear?" I asked, asking the last question for today.

"No, I haven't heard of anything like that, but why do you ask?" Tia said, finishing her own question.

I explained in detail to Tia what I had seen, starting from the moment I saw the unusual door, and ending with the moment when I came out of the creature's dream. When I finished my story, Tia asked me a question.

"Are you sure this isn't just a rich fantasy of some non-pony?" My sister asked, to my annoyance.

"I am absolutely sure of it. If it was a dragon, the door would be richly decorated. No creature capable of dreaming has such a door shape."

"Then it can only mean . . ." Tia didn't finish the sentence when understanding showed on her face.

"Only mean. . ." I also didn't finish when the realization came to me.

"There is a new intelligent being in Equus," my sister and I said at the same time.

POV Daniel

I woke up abruptly, took a sitting position and began to breathe rapidly. It was just a dream. I'm doing everything right.

Wait, why am I in the library? Exactly, apparently I'm actually on another planet after all. I don't even want to think about what will happen to my psyche as soon as the full weight of the situation falls on me. I think first of all I need to learn about the runes.

I got up from my makeshift bed, picked up my coat from the floor and put it on without buttoning it. After I put on my coat, I picked up the alpha's skull from the floor and decided to try to dress it as a helmet, which, to my surprise, turned out. I was about to start searching for books on the subject of runes, when my stomach rumbled, saying that I hadn't eaten anything for a long time.

Or I can look for some food.

After a few minutes, I was able to find a way out of the library, and then out of the castle. After I went out into the fresh air and saw the dawn, I decided to think about a plan to get food.

If I try to run after small animals, I may lose the castle and no longer find my way to it. I think the best solution would be to look at what berries the animals are eating and eat the same if possible, ttrying to kill animals but not chase. Excellent, I have a plan to get food, now I just need to go ahead.

I crossed the bridge and decided to move left along the canyon, constantly looking for animals or berries. After walking for a while, I heard a chirping above me. Raising my head, I saw a nest with chickens, which the mother bird had just arrived and started feeding. I pulled the knife out of my pocket and started preparing to throw.

Of the many things my grandfather taught me, God rest his soul, throwing a knife is one of the most useful. I just need to stick a knife in the belly of a bird and I'll get some meat and maybe, if I'm lucky, a couple of eggs.

When I finished aiming, I threw the knife at the mother bird in one quick movement, causing her to fall from a tree a couple of feet away from me. While the chicks in the nest were chirping trying to call their mother, I went up to the mother bird that had fallen from the tree, pulled the knife out of her chest and quickly stuck the knife into her head so that she definitely did not survive. After I finished with the mother bird, I climbed up a tree, which was surprising considering my wounds and quickly finished with the chickens, but, alas, there were no eggs in the nest. As a result, I have one adult bird and three chicks as food.

After I gutted the birds. I found branches and after many attempts I was able to light a fire on which I cooked my prey. After I had breakfast, I decided to find some water and some berries.

As I walked to the river, I started to feel guilty for what I had been doing for the last few days. I didn't do anything wrong! I did everything right. After a while I found a small river. After drinking some water from it, removing the alpha's skull from my head and washing my face, I decided to check my wounds. Starting with the left leg, which had the most minor wounds, I was shocked that there was not even a wound in the leg, only one scar remained, but nothing serious. There was a bite mark on his right leg, but it wasn't bleeding anymore. There was the same situation on my forearm as on my leg, a bite, but without bleeding. The knuckles were bleeding slightly and didn't look much better than before.

After examining my wounds, I washed them with water and bandaged everything again, except the wound on my left leg. When I finished dressing the last wound and put on my makeshift helmet, I decided to return to the castle.

On the way to the castle, I had the feeling that someone was watching me. When I approached the castle, I already saw the most hated creature on this planet, namely a wolf made of wood, thank God, only one, but blocking the way to the bridge. He looked like he was looking for someone, constantly sniffing.

As soon as I saw him, I climbed the nearest tree and started watching him, but he didn't go anywhere. He was constantly looking around, trying to find what he was looking for.

What if he's looking for me? What if this wolf and the ones I encountered yesterday are from the same big pack? I have been on this planet for only one day and have already found enemies in the form of a pack of wolves. Great. I have to attack him first.

I jumped from one tree to another and repeated this process several times until I was right above it. As soon as I was above him, I jumped down from the tree and crushed him. Among its fragments, I found the core of this wolf and tore it apart, feeling great pleasure from it.

What the hell is going on today? Why do I feel such mood swings all day? Am I already starting to go crazy? God help me.

Deciding to leave thinking about my mental health for later, I decided to look at the sun to determine the time. Judging by the position of the sun, it's about seven in the morning. Did I wake up early or did I take a short walk? I crossed the bridge, went back to the library and started looking for books about runes. After a couple of minutes, I collected several books that I considered necessary, namely "The basic device of the runes", "A Guide to creating runes" and "Fundamentals of Magic Management for non-horned species". Taking the same place where I slept last time and taking off my makeshift helmet, I decided to start with a book about magic management.

A few hours later.

I quickly read the most necessary information from all three books and learned a few more things about magic.

1. Runes consist of three main parts: The outer circle is the type of action. It is necessary to hold the whole rune and indicate to other parts how to work, that is, if the outer circle gives the command "to itself" and the action is "arrow", then the caster will shoot himself. The Central district-the effect of the action. An important part is necessary for the uniform distribution of magic on the rune and also sets the effect of the action, that is, if the central circle has the effect of "fire" and the action is "ball", then you will get a classic fireball. The symbol in the center of the rune is an action. Action this action is all very simple "Arrow" releases the arrow "Ball" releases the ball and so on. The absence of one of the elements leads to the creation of an unstable rune that risks exploding at any second.

2. The rune is created with the help of pure magic, which the user pulls out of himself and collects into all the necessary parts. This is the main risk of using runes, because pure magic is called all the magic in the body, and without magic there is an instant death of the body. A dangerous toy.

3. Most non-horned species treat magic with contempt, so they don't know how to control it, but if I'm going to become perfection, I need to know and be able to do everything that can be known and be able to. Magic control is achieved through long and deep meditation during which you need to feel your magic.

I just need to meditate until I get a result. Simple enough. Thank God, I've already meditated a couple of times.

I sat down, crossed my legs, closed my eyes and started trying to focus on the feeling of magic inside me. At some point, I began to feel the two energies that were fighting with each other. The first energy had the feeling of a cool liquid, which sought to secure all parts of my body and the space around. Every time the first energy reached my head, I began to feel a wave of calm and. . . feeling guilty? What should I feel guilty about? At the same time, the second energy felt like a warm fire that sought to engulf all parts of my body and incinerate the entire space around me. Every time the second energy reached my head, I began to feel the flames of rage, hatred for all living things and righteousness. So that's what's happening today, I thought. After I understood and got used to these two energies, I started trying to connect them with each other. At first there was no reaction, but after a while they began to slowly move towards each other and eventually merged into one.

I began to concentrate on the combined energy, trying to pull part of it out of my body and form a rune. My magic of constantly changing color from bright blue to completely black began to slowly come out of my fingers and create a rune the size of a palm. The outer circle covered with spikes was formed very simply. The simplified central circle created only for the distribution of energy was more difficult to form than the outer one, but I managed. Already at this stage, I felt the instability of the rune and decided to hurry up. I hastily made the Arrow action symbol and finished transferring the magic to the rune to activate it. As a result, my arrow flew only five feet and disappeared into thin air.

"Not bad for the first time, but I need more practice. " I said when I saw the first result of my work and started trying to make a new rune.

After a couple of minutes during which I created runes, each of which showed the same unsatisfactory result, I decided to change the approach. I tried to focus not on how to draw a rune, but on what I needed from it. While I was creating the rune, I began to imagine how it releases an arrow that flies as far as possible. The rune began to glow brighter, and I felt the energy being actively drawn out of me into the rune. The arrow flew out at a much faster speed than the previous ones, and flew until it crashed into the nearest bookcase.

I went to the cabinet where the arrow had crashed into and checked how effective the arrow was. The arrow pierced through one of the books and almost pierced the cabinet itself, but it was about half an inch short. I'm starting to like it.

What if I create a small rune, but concentrate a lot of magic in it? I have to try.

I started creating a small rune the size of a golf ball and putting a lot of magic into it. When the rune was formed, I released it, but, alas, it flew less than a foot and fell apart in the air.

Although I was disappointed with the result, I realized that I would not be able to become perfection if I did not make every possible effort. After such an active use of magic, I began to feel very exhausted.

I barely made it to the place where I slept the last time. Looking at the street through the window, I realized that it was already night. "It looks like I've been meditating for a very long time," I thought, before lying down in the same place as last night and falling asleep without taking off my coat. My last thought before falling asleep was "I need to deal with the wolves."

POV ???

I walked up to the throne of my caring queen and bowed. After a while, she turned her attention to me.

"What's wrong, my child?" She asked curiously.

"Thank you for your attention, Your Highness. Today I was scouting in the everfree forest and discovered an unknown creature. " I said to my queen.

"And what is it about this creature that should bother me?" The queen asked without any interest.

"That it is obviously intelligent and has enough power to kill the alpha Timberwolves. Therefore, I decided to inform you about it, Your Highness." I replied, giving the Queen a brief account of the creature.

"You made the right choice, my child, and, speaking of this creature, find out everything about him that can be useful to convince him to join us if he refuses, suck the love out of him and finish him off. Do you understand?" My queen ended with a question.

"Don't take it as an insult, Your Highness, but why can't he become a prisoner? " I asked, not understanding why destroy the source of love.

"The fact is that a creature capable of killing an alpha will be very difficult to keep in custody. Are there any other questions?" The Queen asked me.

"There are no questions, Your Highness." I said before going to the everfree forest to follow the creature.