Celestia's Weight Gain Experiment

“You know Twilight, I get that the map knows what’s best, but I’m starting to think these ‘observations’ are having a few unintended consequences.”

Starlight Glimmer sat atop the bed in her guest room pinching at her stomach with her magic. The lavender mare looked with consternation as she could squeeze a band of fat that wrapped around her middle and bulged onto the top of her legs as she sat, making her look decidedly well-fed.

“To be fair, Starlight, I don’t think anypony was forcing you to eat breakfast, lunch, AND dinner with the Princesses. Celestia is generous like that. She was always going to offer it as an option.”

“What was I going to do? Turn down an offer to eat the best food in Equestria? Tell Celestia herself I didn’t want her pancakes?”

The small ballerina figurine atop Starlight’s dresser did its best to console and rationalize the situation, but Starlight seemed dead set on her exasperation and confusion. She turned her magic to her flanks and legs, finding the same, cushy layer of chub was there as well.

“And besides, you should really see for yourself just how ‘generous’ Celestia has been getting…”

Meanwhile, in Celestia’s private office, the plumping monarch was engaged in a remarkably similar self-inspection, albeit with a significantly more optimistic attitude. Over the past week, the delightful company of Starlight Glimmer had brought a great deal of revelry to Celestia’s daily stuffings. She found it significantly easier to push the limits of her consumption while distracted by conversation. And while her desserts remained mostly private affairs, she had cranked up the gluttony factor on these meals as well. The hungry alicorn could now manage entire pies, cakes, and souffles all by herself. Sometimes it wasn’t enough just to gorge on pastry either. She supplemented these treats with flavorful ice cream, decadent milkshakes and fruit smoothies, and sugary sodas – all packed into her gut on top of three square meals of ludicrously caloric excess.

“Something has really clicked as of late.”

Princess Celestia leaned forward to examine her chart, the sound of her chair squeaking and groaning filled the room. The line that signified her weight had taken a significantly more dramatic angle, as the rate of her gain had quickened. And the results spoke for themselves. They really did.

Leaning back in her office chair, Celestia noted that pressure on her stomach was relieved. The times of her butt and flanks taking the brunt of the extra weight were well and truly over, and now a significant pot belly rounded out Celestia’s frame. Her hooves were planted firmly atop it, gently stroking up and down.

“It’s remarkable. I used to have to eat like a mare possessed just to see some roundness emerge from my torso. I haven’t even eaten today! This thing is huge!”

She pressed harder against her belly. Her hooves sunk inwards.

“And it’s sooooooooo soft~”

Celestia swooned as she savored the sensation of her own belly fat compressing under the embrace, realizing that she had fundamentally transformed. It was no longer a matter of being stuffed or empty on a given day. The round, sumptuous mass was there to stay. It projected out from her torso no matter the angle, flex, or stretch.

“I play with it constantly. When I’m eating, when I’m at work, when I’m going to bed. It’s like a nervous habit. I can just flick-“

She used a tip of her hoof to quickly shift her chub upwards and watched as it jiggled back in place.

“And squeeze”

She gripped a thin band of flab on her side with a golden, telekinetic aura.

“And jiggle.”

She placed both forehooves on her belly and gently shake it up and down.

“And it’s so bubbly, tantalizing, and comforting. It’s like being hugged on all sides by a warm, soft blanket. And if I don’t stop, if I just keep doing what I’m doing, it gets bigger! There’s even more to play with than before! What a novelty. What a lovely change of pace! It’s like I am my own favorite fidget toy.”

Celestia furiously scribbled this vain diatribe into the journal, her exuberance matched only by her commitment to the task at hoof.

Taking a break, Celestia grunted as she lurched to her hooves and walked across the room to observe herself in the mirror. She blushed at the sight of her body; a silly grin firmly stuck on her face. The bulbous white belly she had been working so hard to grow now hung off her frame in a perfectly symmetrical concave arc between her forelegs and hindlegs. Looking forward, she could see that the round flabbiness also widened her body, expanding its circumference to the left and right of her shoulders. Her back too had swollen into prominent love handles, filling the space between her shoulders and rump. Her face and neck seemed mostly the same, but Celestia could tell as she looked downwards that her jaw and neck were starting to soften into the scandalous hint of a double chin.

Finalizing the inspection, Celestia again returned her gaze to her posterior. Before embarking on this fattening crusade, her butt was already an impressively exaggerated aspect of her physique. And when she started gaining, it had dutifully commanded attention, ballooning to an almost cartoonish scale of thickness. But now, her ass was simply, gloriously fat. Two enormous suns adorned a titanic mass of flank that jiggled and swayed more than her belly did (at least for now). Her tail was almost beginning to look small by comparison, the round, smooth crest of her butt cheeks stretching outwards below it. With these impressive assets, her body formed a magnificent pear-shape. Just then, Celestia was struck by a new thought that needed to be included in her journal.

“While I believe the added weight has slowed my movements and made me a bit lazier than usual, I am certain the most tangible change in my day-to-day life is the increasing inadequacy of chairs. At the dining room, I have to wiggle in between the arm rests, and they sometimes cut into my flanks while I’m trying to eat. My throne is still roomy enough, but I’ve been forced to remove the usual seat cushion and just sit on my pillowy rump. If I don’t, I end up overflowing in that seat as well. I have put in a formal request for more accommodating furniture, but the craftsponies are taking their sweet time with the delivery. Any longer, and I may need to request that they be made even bigger!”

As if to demonstrate the point, Celestia sat down on her office floor in front of the mirror. Her globular flanks flattened atop its surface, oozing outwards in all directions as her heavy frame sunk into their soft expanse. Even marble floors seemed to her like they were covered in clouds.

“I am uncertain what it means for the sake of this experiment that I have opted for larger chairs over the option of stopping or losing the weight I’ve gained so far. I’m certainly looking plump, perhaps on the larger end of chubby, but at the same time, it just feels…inadequate. My curiosity over this whole affair has only intensified as I’ve begun to show obvious signs of gaining. I don’t think I’m big enough to truly experience what it means to be fat. My pot belly needs to be a true barrel. My butt needs to crush chairs, not get stuck in them. My double chin shouldn’t be hidden just by looking upwards. Just a bit more, and then I’m sure I will know. It’s coming. Sure as the sunrise, it’s coming.”

Celestia patted her stomach as if she were comforting a disappointed foal. It rumbled loudly in response, having been left uncharacteristically empty.

“In terms of the impact of my gain on other ponies…well, that’s becoming a serious riddle. Starlight Glimmer is here to identify and resolve a friendship problem. I have no doubts about its origin, and we have spoken often about how best to resolve things with Luna. But…it’s like I cannot help myself. I don’t think I’m even doing it on purpose. Whenever a pony comes into proximity of me and food, I want nothing more than to encourage them to eat. And not just eat! I offer massive portions – more than they could ever need. I know it’s polite to share, and I would be doing so under regular circumstances, but I cannot shake the feeling that I subconsciously try to make them gain as well. Everypony looks too skinny in my eyes, and I don’t know what to do about this. It’s only been a week, and I know for a fact that Starlight has gained weight since she arrived. I know that for a fact because I’ve seen the exact same thing happen to myself. And the worst part? The worst of it? I don’t want her to stop. It suits her: bigger flanks, cute little tummy, so generous and healthy.

But good heavens. That is nothing compared to Raven Inkwell, my lovely, dutiful assistant. She started eating treats as if she were in a competition with me. I thought it was irrelevant or unrelated, but I am not so sure anymore. She is…big. She’s getting bigger. I can say with confidence that Raven was an averagely sized pony. Now her flanks take up a disproportionate portion of the throne’s platform. Her belly seems to grow by the day. I cannot bring myself to mention these escalating changes with her, as I am easily the fatter compatriot, but it is strange nonetheless.”

Celestia took a deep breath before rising to her hooves and approaching the scale. Her heart fluttered and the metal spring creaked as she climbed atop it.

+3 pounds since last measurement; +19 pounds total