DEC 15 Saturday.

I exhale slowly and meditate with Entropy doing her best to copy me.

The last week has been a mix of talking with my friends and visiting their homes to set up a shield for each of them. Making them was easy, and even if it took a fair few of my larger gems it was completely worth it, and gems might be much less of a problem soon anyway.

The shields work the same as mine and I also added some instructions like I said I would. It was interesting to see where Stone lived as well, it turns out he has a small plain apartment a few blocks away. I'm not really surprised his home looked like it was empty, he is a guard after all.

Setting up the shield for them all was easy enough and adding whatever else they wanted only took a little extra time. Only two of them asked me to add anything, the first being Daisy with soundproofing. And Maple asked for that as well along with something to keep sound out, which was easily added.

I did also finish Maple's demand of a gift. I had a lot of spare time recently as I've decided to put any spell work to the side for the rest of the year. I'm still learning the spell Celestia sent me and the spells Clear Water wants me to learn, but anything beyond that is put off for the next few weeks.

I need time to relax and after checking in with my last friend I finally can. That friend being Avalon, who is currently not even in Equestria. Turns out much like before he decided to take a lengthy vacation to be with his family, he actually left before any of this happened and I only got his letter about it two days after I talked with my friends.

I'll need to also explain everything to him as I did with the others when he gets back, we might not be as close as my older friends that I see more often but I know I can trust him due to the simple fact that he trusts me. He trusted me with the secret of publishing the prosthetics and I think he'd do the same for me.

He should also be safe for now, nothing out of the ordinary is happening around me and I'm not being spied on. But even if I am being watched in some way, him being at a distance for now might be the safest place there is from this mess. He's taking a fairly long trip this time as well so that's even better, he said he'll be back at the end of January at the latest.

I do wish him luck, he seemed to have some problems with his family but maybe he can work those out. Speaking of family I've talked a bit with Entropy about that and she seemed understandably uncertain. She said we are family, and I agree with that wholeheartedly, but she seems to need time to think.

Not that I disagree, she should think long and hard about it. That and her continued practice with shadow magic is why we are both sitting under the pavilion at Gaia's Eden meditating. "Try to feel the shadows around you, the way they are cast, and the space they take up. Concentrate on them, how they look, how they move." I advise as I do much the same with life magic.

I find meditating on nothing to be rather hard, but meditating on something very intensely to be much easier in contrast. She sits next to me without moving and we both stay silent in the small sounds of the afternoon forest around us. Another reason we are here is to wait for Celestia.

It seems that she's finally found some time to meet up, I can't blame her for taking this long with everything she likely needed to do. It feels like so much more than just two weeks, but I suppose that's how things like this always go, much faster or slower than you'd think.

We sit in silence until a timer goes off and I open my eyes to the small chiming sound. I look over and see her still sitting there concentrating, "You should take breaks and limit your time, but if you want to keep going you can." I give some gentle advice as I stand up and look over the area.

She chirps a little and stays still so I just put on my saddlebags and move away so she has the quiet she needs. Over the past year I've been giving her more choices like that, things I don't recommend doing but am willing to let her do anyway. Much like I did she'll realize it's best to take breaks, but she seems to want to learn that on her own.

I walk over to the Mantle Bloom and put on Wolf's Grace to step into the air and get a better look at the plant. I still haven't grown it any more than when I started, it sticks a few inches out of the lava with a six-inch thick body and many small leaves covering it like a spiked bat.

I have noticed the amount of lava drop a little over time, I think the plant is using it to naturally grow bigger, if true it means it can grow here without my help and should be stable. I have taken the time to add some more boulders slowly and also collected more seeds, but most of my time is learning about the Mantle Bloom's magical flows.

It is completely different from a normal plant and the flows inside move three to four times faster than a normal plant as well. It's made learning its flows hard and time-consuming, I am making progress though, and with me growing seeds to make sure I have backups I've gotten a nice stockpile.

In the back of the seed vault, there is now another Golden Oak box with a few dozen gem seeds all packed inside. I also still have the two I planned to give to Celestia, and it seems I'll actually get to do that soon. After looking over the Mantle Bloom for a few moments I leave it alone and head to the seed vault to check on my other odd addition to my collection.

The magical items I bought in Rain River City have mostly sat inside my shack untouched but the odd red seeds I found have been a source of increasing fascination. I walk into my seed vault and grab the small Golden Oak box they are kept in before opening it and looking them over.

Over time they have continued to change in the same odd way. Their magical flows have kept growing and over time they have increased in complexity. I have no idea what they are doing and by this point, I'm almost tempted to plant one and find out, but I've kept that temptation to the side for now.

They seem to be a highly magical plant from the way they are acting and I don't want to risk them. Still, it's taking so long for them to do anything, and even with them growing stronger their rate of growth has only increased slightly. I feed each of them the right amount of life magic to help them without overwhelming their still weak magical flows before putting them back in the box.

Keeping them in the field of the Vita Tree also seems to have sped things up a small bit, but depending on how complex these seeds get it might be a while before I can try to grow one. I make a few notes and start to walk out again, pausing for a second as I feel the familiar sensation of space warping.

I do the same and in a second I compress and move space, forming a string and stepping through a Spatial Doorway. I formed the string to go through the crack under the door and lead outside. I close my eyes as the visual sensation can be a little messy and I slide a small bit as I reappear outside, now thirty feet away from the seed vault.

I open my eyes and see Celestia standing next to the pavilion with an excited Entropy already standing on her back. I walk over with a smile and hear them as I get closer, "Well aren't you happy, did things go well with your friends?" She asks kindly but I can tell she seems a little tired.

Entropy happily chirps back. "Yes! All good friends and all be nice. Even got to show them- ..." She pauses as she can't seem to think of the right word. She settles for just flashing her wings, "Show them shadows." She makes something up on the spot and I chuckle as I walk closer.

They both turn to me and I nod in greeting while taking out my teapot. "Good to see you, I hope things are still ok, well, as ok as they can be. And yes the meeting went well, there was much surprise and shock, but things are fine." I let my tone carry some relief and happiness, I really am thankful they took it all well, next game night is going to be so bad though.

She smiles back and walks over before lying down on the carpet with me while I start making some tea. "To you both as well, and I am glad to hear that." Her tone is calm and steady, with a hint of something else underneath it. "As for everything that happened?" She trails off a bit and starts to the side.

Her smile gets much wider and she looks excited as she looks over at the pool of lava suspended in the air. "Is that?" She asks excitedly and I nod back. "Hmm, it will have to wait a minute. To be quick, nothing really has happened, we were able to confirm from the Changeling we captured that Cascadia's hive was behind this. We have also not informed Chrysalis of what transpired, but she mostly likely knows something happened. And the investigation is slowly progressing." She gives me a quick update and looks at the lava intently.

She also passes me several papers from under her wing, I glance at them and just put them away for now. She looks like she needs a distraction and it seems there isn't too much to talk about when it comes to this topic. "Here, an early gift, with the condition you give me a copy of any notes you make," I say with a smile as I pass over the box.

She looks at it and barely hesitates before ripping into the brown paper and revealing the nice Gold Oak wood box. She opens it slowly and has a beaming smile as she takes out one of the seeds, "Does this mean you actually got it to grow?" I nod and she places the seed back quickly. "Show me?" She asks hopefully and I stand up wordlessly with her excitedly following my lead.

We walk side by side and as we near the Mantle Bloom, I spend a moment casting a Flame Shield spell on both of us, causing her to raise a brow. "The inside can get pretty uncomfortably warm, not enough to hurt you but not pleasant either," I explain as I cross the first shield. "It also prevents those flaming flowers from landing on you, that's not pleasant either," I grumble a little at that.

She giggles and nods as we walk past the Fire Trees and approach the underside of the inner shield. "Absolutely astounding! A full root structure along with the same combination of gem types." She says in a fascinated tone and I can tell I've done my job of distracting her. "Have you had any problems with the spells so far?" She asks as she takes out some paper to make her own notes.

I shake my head and feel the plant's life magic move in complex patterns. "None, the trees and gems seem to be holding up fine, I do have to be careful not to add too much rock at once. Also, don't be afraid to break those ones, I have a lot more." I added and she carried the box I gave her.

She looks down at it and seems curious. "Hmm, have you tried enchanting them?" I nod and take out some notes on that as I knew she'd want them. She reads over the simple notes for a minute, "I'll need to test them quite a bit to know how good they are compared to normal gems, but even doing this. It's... Beautiful!" She stares up seemingly transfixed. "Have you tried cutting one?"

I tilt my head and shake it. "No, but we can try? I have a few dozen of the things and it only takes some time to grow more. I'll go grab one, here, in case you want to look from the top." I toss her Wolf's Grace and start to trot over to my seed vault again, leaving her and Entropy alone.

It only takes me a minute to grab a seed and trot back over, and at that point, I quickly decide the snow-covered ground is very interesting. I try to not think about it as Celestia walks through the air above me looking over the Mantle Bloom, the angle not working in my favor in the slightest as she stands on very much empty air.

I take a few deep breaths and try to ignore something my body really wants me to think about while waiting for her to come back down. She does after a few moments and takes off the necklace with a smile, "It works well, a good artifact." She says and passes it back, definitely noticing my slight blush but not questioning it.

I ignore my blush as well and move the seed to float in front of us. "I guess just at the halfway point?" she shrugs a bit and I move the seed a good dozen feet away before focusing on my space magic. After a second there is a very soft popping sound, so soft you would question even hearing it.

A second later the gem is cut cleanly into two pieces and I wait a few moments. Celestia looks over to me expectantly, almost impatient to see the inside. I smirk at her improved mood, "I'm waiting to see if it would explode, I'm not taking that chance with my luck." I say deadpan and get a giggle in return. After a few more seconds I move the two pieces of gem over to me slowly and pull them apart fully.

We both look closely as the pieces are moved near as we see the inside, and it's rather odd. The outermost layer is made from the perfectly clear gem and the inside is the same deep ruby red. But below even that there is a core to the gem that is an even deeper red, much like very thick blood or maybe old rose petals.

I pass one half to her and she takes out her glasses from under her wing before putting them on. "Hmm, it is odd how it seems to make layers. Can you cut a slice off on this side please?" She motions to the side where I made the first cut and holds the gem seed still.

I flex my magic and will again and there is another quiet pop as a half-inch thick slab of the seed is cut off giving a nice section to look at. She holds it up to the light and I notice that the sunlight seems to pass through only the clear and lighter red layers, the core blocks the light completely.

"I wonder if the layers have different properties? They likely don't count as separate gems, you can see the small lines where they mesh slightly with each other." She holds in near me and after a little focusing I see what she means. At the points where the different gems meet, it seems like an abrupt shift, but there are actually many tiny crystal growths where the different layers have grown into each other slightly.

I nod and look at the section of gem I have, I think for a moment before cutting off my own piece. The gem seeds are formed in a natural diamond shape with eight sides to them, which also means that the sides are completely flat. With flat sides, it's easy to get the right angle and cut them apart.

I compress space along one flat side of the gem and try my best to cut off a pure piece of only the clear layer. There is another pop and I take the layer off before looking at it for a moment, "Welp, I guess we have to start somewhere, and one test is always the first." I take a moment and look for a small rock nearby in the snow.

The snow is thick so it takes me a moment to find two rocks but once I do I place the clear layer on top of one rock and hit the top of the flat gem with the other. Celestia glances up from her piece of gem just in time to watch the clear piece shatter into many smaller pieces from the blow.

I make a note of the force I used. "Ok, the clear layer is not very durable, seems to be about the same as a ruby from what I can tell," I say and turn to her to see Celestia's eyes narrowed at me. I blink and shift my ears back a bit, "In my defense, it is important we know how tough they are before filling them with magic." I quickly thought of a reason I decided to break something with a rock out of curiosity.

She stares at me for a moment longer and sighs while dropping her expression. "At least warn me next time so I can cast a shield around you when you break something and it goes wrong." She stated flatly and I just nod, although it's clear she's not angry and more annoyed at me breaking a gem. "You might as well test the other layers, and get me samples of each while you are at it."

I'm touched by the concern but just focused on her request so I don't make her more annoyed. I really need to remember she doesn't like me breaking gems. I spend a minute making several small cuts and start to peel back all four sides of the gem piece I have.

I cut off the other three pieces of clear gem and then cut off the ruby-colored layer, leaving the core exposed and pristine. I cut off some of the core and gave it to Celestia along with a piece of the other two layers before proceeding with the perfect test.

She actually watches closely as I place a ruby-colored piece down so it's flat and use about the same force to hit it with the rock. This time though the gem only cracks and chips some, largely staying in one piece, I do what is natural and hit it again, and again.

With each hit the gem breaks more and by the fifth hit the gem completely fails and shatters into several larger pieces and many tiny shards. "Huh, so it is more durable, or maybe just more dense?" I take a moment to hold a piece of clear gem in one hoof and a piece of ruby-colored gem in my other. The red gem feels almost five times heavier and Celestia does the same with the pieces I have her. "Definitely more dense, what about the core then?"

I repeat my test with the core and as I hold it in my hoof to move it I notice it feels like most of the weight of the gem seed must be in the core alone. I take my rocks and use the same force again, but this time there is hard resistance and only a few scratches are made. I hit it several times before stopping and picking it up to closely look over the core.

The rocks have several chips and breaks from the force used but after wiping the gem off it's seemingly unharmed beyond the small scratches. "Ok, this is really tough stuff. And heavy, does a gem's density help with anything?" I ask, not really being sure about the answer and deciding to take advantage of the expert next to me.

She also looks highly intrigued by the lack of damage and inspects the core closely, she seems to be excited in general about all of this. She's constantly making notes and that smile has barely left her face. "A few do I believe, but those are mostly nonstandard magical gems, then again I'm not sure if this is a magical gem." She pauses for a second and her horn light up as she casts a spell on the gems she has.

She takes out some paper and looks over the results of whatever she just cast. "Hmm, the result was indeterminate. If they are magical they aren't a full affinity gem, they are half attuned." I flip through my mind for a moment before remembering that term in the book she wrote.

Attuning is the process gems go through to become an affinity gem, and while I know there are ways to test it I don't know them. To simplify, over time a gem absorbs magic and changes from the type of magic around it. However, not all gems reach the point where they cross the threshold between a regular gem and an affinity gem.

As you can imagine observing something that can take decades at best is hard and the fact that most gems are buried doesn't help so little is known about the process and I haven't really looked into it either. Maybe I should look into that more when I get the chance. "Is it close to becoming one?" She shakes her head. "Unfortunate. Still, the possibility of it even being achievable to grow a gem like that is, absurd."

She nods with that same excited and focused smile. "It is. This is so, fascinating! That gem's durability alone would keep me busy for weeks of study, let alone all of this." She spends a moment wrapping all the gem pieces in some cloth she takes out and adds them to the box I gave her. "Thank you, Shade, I think you've just topped every other gift you've gotten me." She says with a beaming smile, pun intended.

I smile back just as much. "You're the one who helped me so much, so I should really be thanking you. Thank you." She rolls her eyes a little. "If you need more just ask, or just grab a few from the seed vault. You know? I don't think the Mantle Bloom stem I have has any of the really dark red gems. Is it just the seeds?" I ponder as I walk back over to the pavilion for my tea.

She follows along and also thinks it over. "Possibly, maybe the outer layers are just protection? But they are weaker, maybe something like fruit?" She puts up some loose theories as we settle back in and Entropy jumps over to sit on the small table in between us. "I'll try my best to test a few things and look into it, it will be a nice change. Now, how have you been?" She changes the subject bluntly.

I let the mood settle and take a few drinks of tea to relax before taking out my chess set and setting it up twelve pieces at a time. "Well, like I said, things went surprisingly well. Avalon is on a long vacation so I'll have to talk to him when I next can. As for everything that was talked about, it was, a lot." I sag a little and get comfortable.

She shows a more relaxed smile and sips her tea while starting our game. "It is good to have reliable and kind Ponies around. It can make a world of difference." I can't help but feel like she means that as a compliment, but I ignore that thought as it seems off. "Anything interesting happen? It seems the world likes dropping things on you while you are having an... Let's call it an interesting day." She says with some humor.

I huff but she's not wrong that it happens to me a lot. "Thankfully no. Entropy did decide to make her own introductions though." I glance over and see Entropy act a little embarrassed while Celestia giggles softly. "Things went really well, not much else to be said. Although, I do get to be a lot more fun with my gifts. Hmm, I also need to get some bracelets for them." I remind myself of the need. "And I already set up shields on all of their homes, so that's nice to not worry about."

She gives me a knowing look. "You always worry over others so much, I'd say you don't worry over yourself enough, but you can take care of yourself." She remarks and after a moment quickly ends our first game as I make a rather bad starter move. She looks over at Entropy, "And how are you doing? Doing well?" She asks in a kind tone.

Entropy chirps excitedly but goes still after a second. That only lasts a moment as her shadows start to shift into a point forming a ball. Celestia looks surprised and Entropy stops before cawing excitedly, "Shadow magic!"

Author's Note

Thanks for reading. :D
Current year is 996

I know it's been slow but I couldn't get this done in one chapter so you get two.

I have not had ice-cream in months, I'm going to go eat a ice-cream sandwich. That is all.