“I was starting to wonder if you were ever going to wake up.” Turning to the left I see a tired looking Luna with messy bed head. Looking around there’s no one else in the room.

“How long was I out?”

“About a week. We had to take turns bathing you…I didn’t know somepony could get so stinky from just sleeping.”

“Rude.” Sitting up I try to determine what time it is, but the curtains are completely shut. “What time is it? Where is everyone else?”

“It’s around 11 in the morning. I saw your bubble disappear from the dreamscape and woke up to greet you, but I’d prefer to go back to sleep if I’m being honest.”

“Wow you really hate having your sleep interrupted so much that’d you rather go back to sleep than hang out in bed with your consort who you’ve seen for a total of maybe two hours in the last week. After he DIED?!”

“You would do well to not guilt trip me, Ignis. It’s been a long week that you’ve decided to just sleep through.” Woah, she sounds legitimately drained right now.

“Sorry. I wasn’t really going to hold it against you… did something happen? Or have the reconstruction efforts just been more demanding than anticipated?” Using the power of hands I try to get back in her good graces. Pushing her head back down onto the pillow I start giving her ear scritches and playing with her hair.

“Mmmm, your bribes won’t work here, fiend. Reconstruction has been beyond a nightmare, but that is not the main problem. The biggest headache has been you.”

“I didn’t ask to sleep for a week, Luna.”

“Not that. Somehow word got out that you can bring ponies back from the dead. They overheard the topic get briefly mentioned when Shining Armor interrupted your fun with Discord. They even have proof. They have an image of Twilight’s corpse before it was recovered. Night Court has been busier than Day Court every night since that article came out. You’re going to have your hooves-, your hands full tonight.”

Oh shit. “Oh shit. Did no one tell them that Harmony has forbidden any further revivals? She stated Nightmare Moon would be the last. I doubt that’s true, she’ll probably be the last until someone important bites the dust. Regardless, I'm metaphorically grounded right now. No miracles for me!”

“I don’t think you mentioned that before.”

“I didn’t mention any of it, I assumed Harmony would have mentioned it when she snitched to Celestia about everything else. Well that’s easy enough I’ll put this all to bed tonight. Anything else I should know before you head off to dreamland?”

“It’s not just Equestria you need to address. There’s whispers that the dragons are ready to declare war. We haven’t heard from them directly, but now that your little secret has gotten out…I suspect they’ll have more allies than before. The minotaurs especially, they’ve already declared you a heretic. You go against the natural law, they say.”

“They’re not wrong. Fuck the natural law. Honestly I wouldn’t even mind spending the rest of my days reviving creatures, but I can only revive like three at most, per day. It’s not sustainable. Alright well, enjoy the rest of your sleep. I’m gunna go find the blacksmith and request a replacement for my armor that got shredded then I’m gunna go find a tailor and get clothes made. I’ve only had one set for far too long and now I don’t even have that. I’d rather not walk around shirtless for the next 2,000 years.”

“You should pay Rarity a visit then. I’m sure she’d be happy to supply your entire wardrobe.”

“Is that really worth a trip to Ponyville?”

Luna is borderline asleep at this point, I don’t know how she’s still replying. “You can’t teleport? You did it back then.”

“Nah, I was able to bend all forms of my magic to my will while I was the Element of Magic, but I can just tell on instinct that I can’t do that anymore.”

“Shame. Tell my other half and that pegasus I said hello.”

“You got it, babe.” Her eyebrows furrow a bit at the new term, but she makes no comment on it. Shrugging I decide to get out of bed and go wander the castle for a bit. Scratch that I am literally starving.

It’s around lunch but no one else is in the Royal Dining Hall. Weird. Am I even allowed to eat here if one of the god horses isn’t with me?

The answer was no, by the way. Now I’m in the mess hall for the guards on duty, and I’m getting a surprisingly high number of stares. No one is saying anything to me though. The look in their eyes isn’t fear this time. It reminds me of the looks I got from the Night Guard back at that camp in the far west. Revere. That’s the word.

“It’s quite uncomfortable to eat with so many staring at me. Do any of you have a question or something? A meal with conversation is much more enjoyable.”

To my surprise one of them actually gets up. It’s a unicorn stallion with red fur, of course it’d be white if he had his helmet on. “Sir, I was just wondering if you’ll be participating in the war games between the Day and Night Guard a couple of weeks from now?”

“I was planning on it, yeah. I suppose it might be a bit unfair though. What do you think? Should I be allowed to participate?”

“I think you should be prohibited from entering the one on one tournament, but everything else seems like fair game. I doubt the Singles Combat Tournament would even be interesting for you.”

“Oh yeah, it wouldn’t even be a warm up. No offense.”

“None taken, I think we’re all well aware you’re closer to the Princesses in power than you are to us.”

“Cool. Alright sorry everyone, this guy used up all the time I had for questions, I got shit to do today. Stay safe.”

There’s a sea of voices that are not in harmony at all, so I have no idea what they said. Now that I’ve got some food in me it’s time to go to the blacksmiths area. Hopefully they’re not out on lunch break as well…

Walking through the familiar armory and into the forge I see a few different ponies at work. None of them seem to notice me, so I just take a few seconds to observe. I was curious which race of ponies would work in a place like this and I ended up thinking it’d be unicorns. That’s apparently not true as only one pony in here is a unicorn. The rest are all earth ponies, and the unicorn isn’t even using telekinesis.

“OI!” I call out as loud as I can hoping to be heard over the hammers and roars of flame. The closest pony to me looks up and now I can see it’s a mare. “I need to put in an order!”

“Then you can go through the proper steps and route up the paperwork to submit it to us like everypony else.”

“Really? I didn’t have to do that last time.”

“Last time you-” Her eyes seem to widen and apparently she was in a state of autopilot before. As soon as her eyes widened she slammed her hammer down and ran up to me. “Sorry about that sir, if I swing my hammer for too long I end up in a trance-like state. What did you need made?”

“Are you sure? I don’t mind doing whatever admin bullshit I gotta do. I don’t want too much special treatment just cause I’m a Knight or whatever.”

“Knight? Oh right I forgot you’re Princess Luna’s Knight! No, no, that’s not why at all. You’re a bucking hero! My master would throw my flank straight into the coals if he found out I turned away somepony like you. What did you want made, sir?”

“Well I had this armor before the whole incident. It was made using my pre-existing armor as a base and had some enchantments added on, but now I got nothing. I desperately need a replacement. It has to cover this whole area, plus my arms, but it’s gotta be light. It can’t affect my flexibility either. The armor before was made of Leather and it was the perfect material, but..”

Her face pales when I mention leather. “Exactly. Don’t worry though it was leather from my home. The cows there were not intelligent, not even a little bit. I need something similar to the qualities of that material though. Preferably studded as well. But, the most important thing is that it’s light and flexible. My agility is what keeps me alive, not the strength of my armor.”

She finishes writing down whatever she was writing for the order then gestured for me to follow her towards the back of the forge. “This should be easy enough, but I gotta measure you. Can you squat down a little bit and hold your arms out straight? Perfect, sorry we don’t have a stool or anything like that.”

The teal mare with a black mane that’s currently tied up into a bun grabs a tape measure from the workbench. She starts measuring my chest and shoulders and I quickly realize the benefits of having a unicorn measure you. She keeps lightly rubbing me as she moves and wraps the measuring tape. Asking me to hold it sometimes so she can take it around to the other side. This probably wouldn’t be a big deal, but I’m surprised at just how light the touch is.

It’s just like when some very very lightly traces their finger up your arm or across your chest, but it's a big finger. It’s giving me goosebumps and I find my face feeling a bit flushed.

“So smooth…and firm. Wow…” Glancing at the mare it seems I’m not the only one having this reaction. Right as I looked at her she bit her bottom lip and then disappeared behind me, dragging her hoof and the measuring tape lightly across my back. She didn’t see me glance down at her thankfully or that might’ve turned awkward. Thanks to that teal fur it’s easy to see she’s got some crimson flushing her face as well.

“When you measure ponies is it always this…intimate?” I decide to playfully ask as she hugs my back tight and touches her forehooves to connect the tape.

“Not usually…it just never occurred to me that this is all muscle when I saw it. It was only when I first brushed against you that I realized it. Sorry if I got a bit too carried away though. I’ve got everything I need.”

“I’m pretty sure you had everything you needed like five minutes ago. You measured the same three spots six times. But, I guess I don’t particularly mind. Luna might kill you though. She already thinks that our herd having three mares is too many, and she gets jealous very~ easily.”

“That’s why that smell was so familiar…OH! Sweet Celestia, how could I forget?! Uh-uhm… Sir, uh..”

“I wouldn’t worry about it too much. I’ll make sure she doesn’t fire you or anything like that. You’ll probably need to apologize though.”

“Sir please! Please don’t tell her!” She looks so genuinely afraid…she must love this job, or she needs it that badly.

“Sorry, but I gotta. I’m telling you though, don’t worry about it~. I was joking about the whole "kill you” thing, she’s not that serious. Anyways, when can I expect to have that armor?”

Her ears pin back and she looks at the ground, dejected. “Probably around a week or two. Assuming I still work here by then…”

If Luna wasn’t asleep right now I’d just hit her up over the sending stone to ease this mare’s worries, but I’m not waking her up for this. It’d probably go worse for the blacksmith if I did that, to be honest. “You’ll still work here. I swear.”

With that I turn and walk out of the forge and through the armory, back out into the hallway. Now I need to go find a pony to make me some clothes. Hmm, maybe I should go to Ponyville. That way I don’t have to get measured again. That’d be a whole two day trip though, ugh. Wait…

After asking around several times I was able to ascertain that Nightmare is in the castle library. Sneaking up behind her I get ready to pounce.

“Out of every alternate universe to exist at every branching point or decision, there is not a single one where you are capable of sneaking up on me, Ignis. I’m glad to see you’re awake though.” She calls out to me right as I crouch down, and all I can do is pout as I sit down across from her.

“That’s no fun. Anyways, what are you up to? I was surprised to only see Luna in bed when I woke up. I know Force is on duty, but I didn’t think you were a daywalker.”

“Luna and I are going through some drama, and since you were asleep 24/7 I decided to just flip my sleep schedule. That way I could still share a bed with you, but without her. It’s much easier for me and Force to share the bed with you than with Luna as well. With me being the same size as Luna now that bed almost isn’t big enough for all four of us at once. Now that you’re awake though this complicates things…”

“What kind of drama?”

“Mare stuff. Nothing for you to worry about. What are you up to?”

“Well I was about to go find a place out in Canterlot to get some new clothes made, but after getting sensually measured by one of the blacksmiths I decided I’d rather go to Ponyville. Rarity already has my measurements, so I don’t need to go through that again.”

“What?”

“What? Which part of that are yo-”

“The blacksmith did what to you?”

“Nothing serious! Relax! She needed my measurements for my replacement armor and, uhm, she was enthralled by the bare muscles. It’s not a big deal though.”

“Hmph. If you say so. Guess I’ll go adjust the order for the new bed and have it made a bit bigger.”

“Oh, shut up. She profusely apologized once she remembered I was in a relationship, I think it was just a genuine slip up.”

“And did you just happen to also forget? Or were you enjoying it too much?” She’s giving me that glare. That glare once frightened me on my first night in this world. Now it still frightens me a fair bit, but it’s also hot. I didn’t realize any of them would actually be upset about this though. I figured with this herding thing they were a bit more loose on things like this.

“I didn’t forget, but I also didn’t think it was a big deal. Are you gunna smite the ponies that end up giving me a massage when I go to the spa? Cause that’ll probably be much more sensual than this whole incident.”

“And that’s their job. This was just a mare that got carried away.”

I can’t help but to sigh. “Alright I get it! Back in my world that would’ve been a problem and I would’ve stopped her, but I figured things weren’t as strict since you all do this herding thing. Cut me some slack until I got this whole culture situation sorted. It won’t happen again.”

“Good. Now, are you here to invite me out with you? I wouldn’t mind helping you order some clothes.”

“Well that, and I was also hoping you could teleport us to Ponyville.” I give her a sheepish grin. “I don’t really wanna take the train.”

She just rolls her eyes. “I suppose I can do that. Are we going now?”

“Yep! Thank you~!”

“Uh huh. You owe me when we get back.” That’s quite a predatory smile she’s giving me right now.

Am I in danger?

Author's Note

Nice short, chill chapter. Dialing back on global threats for a while and writing some petty drama is a nice change of pace for me.

Also managed to finagle my way back into Ponyville for a chapter or two. Just in time for some Lesson Zero shenanigans <.<

Oh I forgot to have Ignis check his quests and XP. Ah well too late now we'll do it next chapter.

Thanks for reading~