The last thing I remember was the feeling of falling and then, pure black.

I don't remember what killed me, all I do know is that I was walking home on a nice day outside. No clouds or wind, at maybe three or four in the afternoon, then nothing. I was walking and just tripped on a small rock, or something like that. Then I fell and now it's just black.

If I'm going to start talking to myself I might as well say my name. It's Kevin, not sure that matters now, after I fell it's just been this darkness. Although maybe void is a better term for this place. I can't feel anything or see, I'm just here. It's weird that I'm not mad or sad, I feel like I should be, but I'm not.

How long have I been here anyway? Is this it? Ok, what do I know? I'm Kevin Leery Forester, and I'm twenty-one. I was born in 2001, in the state of Ohio, specifically Columbus City. No job, as I lost my last one to budget cuts last month, no living family, not many friends, and no pets.

What else? I don't know. My main hobbies are cartoons? Reading bad fanfiction and games, that's it? What else do I say? Well fuck is this really it? Literally just a black void and my own head... And why am I not panicking or sad? Can I even get sad anymore?

What else do I say? Do I repent my sins? Or scream and make a wish? ... Can I move? It kind of feels like I'm moving right now, but nothing has changed.... what is that? ... light?

As my mind comes to awareness, I still see darkness. :Oh, not this again: As I keep looking though, I see it's not all black, there's some very faint light. I try to move closer only I feel different now, I feel warm and very wet. My mind now properly catching up to my body. :Where am I?:

Suddenly I feel whatever I am shift around me, swaying back and forth slightly as it does so. :Wait am I in someone's, womb?: Although now that I think about it that seems right, I did die. And then that void and light, so rebirth? Probably: As whoever I'm in keeps moving I feel them stop after some time, and wherever we are It is much brighter, that's all the difference I see at least.

I can hear some muffled noises from outside, but I can't make anything out, it's all just too muffled. After a few moments I feel my mother move and lay down, I think. Then a quick burst of movement, the water around me flooding away and the walls squeezing me as I'm pushed forward and out. After a while of this, I see bright light as I leave my new mother.

I can't see well for a while, the light around me makes it hazy and blurred, but after a time my new eyes start to adjust to the light. The first thing I can make out is the wall of the room I'm in. Its color is a soft white much like unfired clay bricks. As I get my bearings I look around the room.

As I look \the first thing to catch my eye is a bright pink and magenta color. After focusing for a moment I make out the shapes. :Oh, what the fuck?: In front of me is a pony, a type of pony I recognize. :Well, I know where I am now: As I take in more of my surroundings I see the pony in front of me is a unicorn mare.

She is wearing what looks like a doctor's coat. It stops at her mid back and doesn't seem to cover her belly fully, only the chest and back. Looking around I see another pony, this one not wearing anything, an earth pony mare with dark a brown coat and green mane. They seem to be talking but I don't recognize the language, the sounds don't have any meaning to me.

Continuing to look at the room I'm in, it's pretty sparse only having some cushions, a bed, a small desk, and a cradle that I'm in. Laying on my side I look up as I hear the conversation between the two mares get louder. I don't know the words but neither looks happy and the doctor keeps trying to get the other mare to sign the clipboard she's holding in her magic.

I get distracted by that as I see a light pink field seep from her horn and vanish reappearing near her clipboard. My attention goes back to the conversation as it's now more of a shouting match, before it can continue the brown mare pushes the door to the room open and slams it behind her, leaving only me and the doctor in the room.

She seems to deflate slightly before looking at me, and seeing me staring back at her she grins a bit and approaches me. After a moment she seems to cast a spell on me before finding a piece of paper and casting a spell on it as well. This seems to form words, although I can't read them as I don't think it's English. It is also hard to make the letters out from the light shining through the paper.

After reading the words her mood seems to lift some, now with a big smile. She picks me up and moves me out of the room and down a hallway with several dozen other doors, all with symbols I don't understand. After going through another door we come to a quiet room full of cradles with sleeping foals, she puts me down in one and leaves. After a few moments of nothing I decide to just sleep like the others, and after a few minutes I drift to sleep.

time skip

It's been about a week or so since I was born, and things are interesting so far, it seems I've stayed in what I presume is a hospital. In that time not that much has happened, I've been fed and changed at least twice a day but not much beyond that. Today something new though, as one of the pony nurses picks me up and we move to the front of the hospital, two large double doors leading outside.

At the front desk she hands me off to a group of ponies, mostly mares but some stallions as well, and a few foals they seem to be gathering to go with them. As the nurse passes me to an older unicorn mare, she also gives the mare an envelope, I think my documents. :Well looks like I've found who I'm living with:

After a day or two of not seeing the brown pony, who I think was my mother, it didn't take long to realize that I was given away. I don't know why, nor do I really care. In my past life, I grew up living with uncles and aunts never meeting my birth parents, they died in a car crash from what I was told.

The older-looking mare picked me up in her magic as her group started to leave, and me with them. As the doors closed behind us, I got my first good look outside, it seemed to be midday as I looked around. I see three to six-story buildings around us, it seems like we're in a city, and a fairly big one from the looks of it. Many ponies moved up and down the streets, some with carts and carriages.

As our group moves through the busy city streets I see more ponies. Mostly unicorns, some pegasi and a few earth ponies, all walking and going about their day, some carrying things. After twenty minutes or so we turned off the busy street and down one with less traffic, we saw a few restaurants with ponies eating at tables as we passed by.

After some more time, we reached a large building three stories high with a fairly large front lawn, along with a few gardens growing herbs and small crops. As we enter the main doors we come to a fairly large room with a large staircase going up to the second and third floors. We turn down a hallway and enter a room much like the hospital, around two dozen cradles most empty sitting in the room, and the older mare holding me puts me down in one before leaving.

rapid time skips

It's been a few weeks since I've come to the orphanage, and in that time I've learned quite a lot. A few words, although I'm not sure what they mean, I have a decent idea but I'm not certain. My legs have gained enough strength to walk, a few of my new caretakers looked surprised but not overly so. I learned why soon when one of the other foals that came with me from the hospital started walking a week later, that does make some sense as ponies in my last life could walk soon after birth.

I've decided that I should probably not try speaking, I don't really want too much attention. This world has magic so I don't actually know if they have encountered someone who's reincarnated before, I may try speaking when one of the other foals that came with me does, but not for now.

Another thing that seems to be working in my fever is they don't seem to think it odd that I can walk so well already. I think it's because I'm an earth pony, out of all the ponies that are here I'm the only one, most being unicorn's foals and a few pegasi.

Even though we can't have been born that far apart, maybe a few days at most, I'm already bigger than all of them. And from what I've seen earth ponies seem bigger than the others, pegasi being the smallest, so my walking before the others didn't seem to raise any red flags.

At this point, I've seen several rooms and in one there was even a mirror on the wall. So I finally got a good look at myself, my coat was a deep brown even darker than my mother's, and my mane and tail were green much like hers, but much like my coat it too was a deeper color, a deep forest green. My eyes are a bright light green almost like emeralds.

And I've been outside a few times, although always under close watch. I've even enjoyed playing around as a kid again, without having to stress over work and rent, it has been nice but I'm starting to get bored, I'll have to find a way to entertain myself.

time skip

It's my first birthday today. I was given some small toys and some drawing supplies as gifts. Even better news I was given a name, it's Shade Evergreen, I decided to take that name as it seems fitting with how I look. In other news, I've learned a lot of the language.

I still can't say I'm fluent in it, but I can now hold a conversation, even better is that not a few weeks ago one of the other foals said their first word, so a week ago I started to do the same. Now a lot of my caretakers try to teach me new words, mostly simple words though, but it's still helping a lot in learning the language.

One thing I found out is that the orphanage has a library in it. One of the caretakers took me there to return books while watching me. It's not big but still fairly large, holding a hundred or so books. In the past year, I've been able to learn a few written words, although not many. I think I will try to learn more if I can. Although I shouldn't push my luck too much, in the past year I had a few close calls with the caretakers.

Speaking of the caretakers, I've learned some of their names. The main one is the name of the orphanage head. The older unicorn who took me here. Her name is Margee Limestone, her coat is sandstone in color and her main a dark brown, although not as dark as my coat, and her eyes are a dark blue.

I've learned the names of a few other ponies but mostly I haven't. The orphanage houses around a hundred or so orphans, so they have quite a few staff members. Another interesting thing is eating, after we turned ten months old they started to feed us solid food, mostly soft stuff, some bread, and fruit. A few other plants that humans don't eat often or at all, like daisies and hay, at first I was a bit apprehensive but after trying them they aren't that bad, although I'm definitely starting to miss meat.

time skip

It's my second birthday today, I'm two now and some things have changed. The big one is that I have magic now, a month or so ago I picked something up with only one hoof. A small rock, I'd been trying to do this for a while now, practicing a few times a week since I turned one.

A few of the other foals my age also started doing it but only the unicorns not pegasi so I think my practice has paid off some. I think a unicorn's horn has a lot to do with how they use magic to hold things so early in life, because even when they are only holding something with their hoof their horn still glows a small bit. My best guess is that their horn is compensating for their weak magic at their age.

In the show, most earth ponies are farmers or bakers and stuff like that, something that requires contact with their work but it's pretty obvious that they still have magic, just not a horn. That still doesn't explain why unicorns have more magic than other ponies. My best guess is that unicorns simply use their magic to make a direct effect more often than the other types of ponies.

A good example is that most earth ponies use their bodies more, so their magic probably strengthens them. Whereas a pegasus uses it to fly as their wings are not really big enough for them to fly, yet they still do. On top of that some ponies also seem to have more magic than others. The only reason I can think of for that is simply practice. From what I remember of the show most unicorns that are strong in magic grow up using it more than others.

After deciding to try to train my magic. My best idea to do so is to simply use it to hold something as long as I can. I can only hold something that doesn't weigh much, a few small pebbles and twigs from the yard during playtime. So my current plan is to find the maximum weight I can hold and do that for as long as I can before my magic runs out, and to repeat that process as much as I can.

time skip

I'm five now and in the past two years, I've made a lot of progress. The main changes I've had are preschool, we get taught by a teacher that the orphanage brings in and we have a room for classes. Right now we're mostly learning to read so there is not much for me to do, as I already know how to read. There are some words that I don't know so it is rounding out my knowledge.

Probably the best thing is the small bookshelf, which I've completely read through. Mostly simple kids' books, but some still had some things to learn. By far the best part about growing up more was the alone time. Before I could only do things like practice for short amounts of time, but now we are for the most part left to our own devices for most of the day.

Because of this I've had a lot more time to practice than in the past two years. The length of time and the amount of weight I can hold have been increasing. I've even learned to hold things without touching them, it's only a few inches from my body but after practicing it also seems to be increasing in range as I push my limits further.

After a while, I decided to name this effect simply my Telekinetic Field, or TF for short. With my practice, I can now hold a few pounds without using my own strength, and a few ounces at most when floating them without body contact. Another thing I've noticed is I can hold smaller and lighter things much longer now, it may just be my body growth but even then I don't think It would be this strong. I believe my training is working well.

The last real thing of note is I've taken up running, mostly in games with the other foals to try and stay fit, I don't know if exercise will help with my magic capacity all that much. But it's worth a try and keeping in shape will help me in general, my current plans are to try and get access to the orphanage library and learn more about magic in general.

time skip

It's my eighth birthday today and the past few years have been a lot. Let's start with school, in my past life I lived in America and the grads there went from. Preschool and kindergarten from four to six, elementary schools from seven to eleven, middle school from twelve to fourteen, and high school from fifteen to eighteen.

After we left preschool at six, we started something like middle school which lasted until we were ten, it's pretty similar mostly to tests on spelling and grammar. The biggest difference I found was with numbers. We were only taught basic math at eight earlier this year, and even then only basic addition and subtraction, not even multiplication.

Furthermore many of the other ponies my age are having a hard time doing it. For a human even if a kid struggles with math they would still be better by this age.

I don't think ponies are dumber or something like that, as far as I've seen in all other aspects they are comparable to humans, although physically smaller. So it's really just math that seems to be a difficulty for them, my theory is that a pony's mind is less geared towards math than a human's, although I don't know the reason, I just can't see another possibility.

In other news, I've gotten to explore the city more and finally learned what city I'm in. Which to my shock turned out to be Canterlot, of all places to be born, I'm not really sure if that's lucky or not.

The good news is I think my idea to keep a low profile was a good one mostly because of my proximity to a certain sun pony. Speaking of her I gotta see her raise the sun not long ago during the summer sun celebration. Me and the other foals were taken to see it, and I can tell you right now she's definitely got presentation if nothing else.

Another thing I've learned is dates like my birthday, April fifth. That's another odd thing, the calendar has the same names for months after translating them, and the year is also three hundred and sixty-five days just like Earth. I may have to look into that later but for now, it's only an interesting oddity, I also learned the current in year nine eighty-eight. So I'll be twenty when Cannon starts.

In terms of my own progress, my training continues as normal. I'm now able to lift rocks weighing sixty to seventy pounds and able to float a one to two-pound rock close to me. Although it gets harder the further away it is, I can lift maybe half a pound, roughly eight ounces five or six feet away from me, for things like pebbles and twigs with some effort I can pick them up at almost ten feet away.

I've kept up with my running too, mostly to train my endurance. I also started drawing again, like in my past life, It was a hobby of mine that I stopped doing because I never had enough time. This turned out to be a good choice of hobby because around a year ago I finally got access to the main library.

In the library, most books were about careers and jobs, which does make sense. But two books did catch my interest, both about magic, the first being about what magic is and, the second is about runes and spells.

First, what is magic? Well, it didn't give clear answers like I'd hoped but I did learn that magic is a form of energy that is everywhere in the world, as far as they can tell at least. And that using magic requires two things, will and math.

Will to move and form your magic, and math to give it instructions, unicorns do this by memorizing a spell matrix in their minds and then pushing their magic out of their horns to power the spells. In contrast, earth ponies and pegasi mostly seem to use their magic more passively for strength, to fly, or to hold objects.

The other book went more In-depth about a spell's matrix. The runic spells use the same math formulas to do the same things in the same ways but are different in casting methods. A good example the book gave was the heating spell, a simple spell that only heats something until it's warm, the math basically just tells the spell what the base temperature is and to go higher.

The more complex the spell and the more drastic the effect means that you need to keep the spell matrix and math firmly in your mind, and then you need enough magic to power it. This is part of the reason not many unicorns learn more than the basic spells, and most go to magic schools to learn anything more complex. It's also why only unicorns use this type of magic, if an earth pony or a pegasus did try this method they wouldn't be able to push the spell out of their bodies where it's been formed with a horn.

This is the most widely used type of magic but there's also runic magic, it's not that different from normal spell casting and despite its name, it seems to not use any language, it's only numbers and symbols as far as I can tell. In fact, the two branches of magic are almost identical. A spell matrix and a runic matrix are interchangeable with each other, the big difference being that a spell matrix is formed in the mind and a runic one is formed outside the body using magic to draw it.

What interests me the most about runic magic is that you don't need a horn to draw with magic. You just need to push your magic into the tip of your hoof and draw the matrix out. If you're good enough at it you can even form the matrix all at once outside your body. That's actually the difference between a novice and journeyman runic caster, a master is somepony who can form more than one at a single time.

Now as you can imagine I was pretty excited that I could actually do magic. I read the entire book that day, and the next day I went to my room with a small rock and the book that I was able to borrow, with a promise to be careful with my attempts.

At first, I was surprised they would give an eight-year-old a book on spells, but the only three spells in the book are one for heating, another for cooling, and a weak lifting spell.

On top of that when a spell matrix fails or is done incorrectly the magic will just dissipate into its surroundings. With weak spells, this isn't that dangerous but with more powerful spells the uncontrolled magic can be disastrous. This is one of the many reasons most don't use this type of magic. Why spend your time learning a difficult and sometimes dangerous branch of magic when you can just pay a unicorn to do it for you?

As for why other ponies don't use runes to make enchanted items? It's because the process of making an enchanted item is the same if you're using runic magic vs spell casting. So yet again a unicorn can do the same thing with less risk, so why bother?

After making it to my room, the room itself is rather simple, a bed, two shelves, a desk, and a small chest. I move and sit on my bed to try the most basic step, drawing with magic. As I focus on my left foreleg I try to concentrate my magic in the front tip of my left hoof. My hoof gaining a dim emerald green glow on one end, I keep focus and move my hoof to the left, as I do so a line of deep green magic is left in the air.

I smile at this and attempt to slowly draw out the healing spell. After several failed attempts I draw two rough circles of green light, one inside the other as I keep my concentration. I write the correct numbers inside and as I draw the last number I move the small rock I brought with me and put it into the circles. I feed the Runic Matrix my magic and the matrix flashes slightly as the rock starts to heat up. After a minute or two I've used half my mana and cut my connection to the runes, the matrix dissolving into moats of light before disappearing completely.

As I reach out to touch the rock I feel the warmth coming off it, the stone is hot to the touch. :It worked: As a large smile spreads across my muzzle I see a faint light coming from my side. :Hmmm?: I turn and I see the light coming from my flank. Before there's a flash of white light that blinds me for a moment.

As I blink the spots from my eyes I turn to my flank, excited to see what's on it. I see the form of a stone tablet with a runic matrix on it, the stone is a deep dark color much like lava rock, and the runes don't seem to have any meaning that I can tell, just random numbers and a few symbols. After seeing my new cutie mark I decided to practice more runes before going to bed.

time skip

It's now my eleventh birthday, and it's been three years since I got my cutie mark. As a gift for my birthday, I got a book on more complex spells, along with a small celebration. The head mare told me that I could only practice these spells only with the supervision of a caretaker. I'm very excited to try some more complex spells out.

A few things I've learned that are important. First, ponies consider fifteen to be an adult which seemed a little weird but ponies in my past life were adults at five or six and only lived for twenty-five to thirty years, and I've gotten to meet some ponies here that are way older than that, one in their seventies. Ponies also seem to mature a bit faster than humans.

Another thing is that I was told to start thinking about a career and was given a small book with apprenticeships I could take for a job. There were quite a few mostly crafting and production jobs so I'll have to give it some thought as when I turn fifteen I'll have to leave the orphanage. One thing of particular note is guilds, many of them exist for a specific craft like blacksmithing or tailoring.

As for my training, it's been going well. I can lift almost two hundred pounds with my TK field now, can float ten pounds close to me, and almost a pound around twenty feet away. My magic reserves are still growing along with my control over my magic. At this point, I think my reserves are larger than even most unicorns my age. Most of them do not practice much magic, and some don't even practice spells at all.

I've also gotten better at drawing and practicing more after I learned that the better my spells are drawn the less magic they take. Using spells has also helped me train how fast my magic refills, the Heating spell that I could only keep up for a few minutes two years ago I can now keep going Indefinitely. My body has also kept growing, I'm now almost as tall as some of the adult pegasi and still growing that, and as I've kept up my exercising I'm in good health.

A few weeks after my eleventh birthday I finally decided on an apprenticeship, after looking through the book they gave me I found one for a librarian fob for the city library. The library is the second largest library in Equestria, only behind the royal library, and the job itself isn't anything grand. But its pay is pretty decent as not many younger ponies want to work there, the only real requirements are that I need to start the job before the age of thirteen and that I need to stay until I'm fifteen.

The main reason I chose this job is because it gives me plenty of time to research, as I'm allowed to read on my break and before and after my shift. I also get free access to the library and can check out as many books as I like, as long as I take them back every month. On top of all of that, I also get a rent-free room, nothing fancy but still my own space, and after learning all this I decided to go for this one. It took a week for them to send a letter saying I was accepted, and after all that I started my new job tomorrow.

Author's Note

So, first things first I'm new to writing and criticism is appreciated, second the chapters going forward are going to be 1k or 2k, this first one is more a prologue than anything.

Thanks for reading, and have a good day. :D

PS. "speech" :thoughts:

[Edit, this AN is made as of the 250 chapter. I've come back to redone the first Chapter so others can get a better idea of what my writing is like now. The quality is below preferable until chapter 50 or so, fair warning.]