MAR 23 Sunday.

I walk through the streets as a gentle breeze moves around me in the evening sunlight. It's been two days since my break down and I'm doing better overall from my previous mood. I've tried to keep those thoughts in my mind without breaking down or ignoring them, but trying to accept them.

I'm still in a down mood but not ignoring it seems to help me work through it, at least some. As for my fears, they have lessened very slightly by me actually doing something about those fears. And I also got a little lucky, yesterday in the evening Daisy knocked on my door to invite me to a party night at her place.

She invited all three of us so Maple and Blaz will also be there because Blaz will be leaving tomorrow for his two weeks, he's going to visit his son and grand-foals. I was happy to be invited, hanging out with friends should help my mood improve a little.

So I agreed to attend and she asked me to bring the dessert, so right now I'm out shopping for ingredients to make a pie, Maple should be thrilled. But I need apples and several other ingredients to make it so I'm walking through the markets shopping for everything I'll need.

I bake often enough to find all the ingredients easily and the apples are also easy to find in the market with how often ponies eat them. I look through what stock a few vendors have and buy enough for two pies, one with red apples, and another with green apples.

Once I have everything I need I return home to start prep work. I get home and start going through and organizing everything I'll need while also gathering up a few seasonings I want to use. I start by preheating the oven and then I start working on the dough, mixing flour and salt with some water.

Making the pie dough is easy, just add small amounts of water until you get the right consistency. Once that's done I leave it alone and work on the filling, I peel the red apples and cut them into slices before covering them with a little sugar and cinnamon.

Cinnamon is something that was surprisingly hard to find, it's not the most popular seasoning among ponies for some reason, ponies can eat it just find most simply don't like it. But I very much enjoy it in apple pie so I'm adding it, I hope they don't mind.

I do the same with the green apples and take out two pie pans, I had to buy an extra one today. I roll out the dough and line both pans before adding the filling and covering both of them, I open the preheated oven and place both pies inside before using my bracelet to set a timer.

I sit down and start practicing while I wait for it to bake. I've made significant progress in progressing to the next rank of runic caster. I can form a long enough magic line to form a matrix, but now comes the tedious part. I need to shape and form that line into a matrix while memorizing it.

I'll basically have to relearn all the spells I know and practice until I can cast them whenever I want. This will be both slow and fast, learning a single spell again would only take a day or two, and memorizing it is only a matter of practice. But to relearn all the spells I know will take me a while.

For now, I start with the spell I use the most, the Temporis spell. I write out the simple matrix on a piece of paper and start trying to form the numbers and the rune I'll need for the spell. I focus and shape that magical line into the right shape before cutting it and moving on to the next symbol while trying to keep what I've already made stable.

I started with the matrix's outer and inner lines, another thing I need to keep in mind is to form everything at the correct size. When drawing out matrixes I don't need to worry about making spells too big or small but now that I'm casting without my hooves I need to keep everything near enough to the correct size.

Why? Well, let's take the FireBolt spell as an example. To cast it I draw out the matrix and a small bolt of fire forms at the center of the matrix in the empty area. But if I make the matrix smaller than the bolt it's creating then the magic could destabilize the matrix, and as you'd imagine that's very bad.

This combined with the fact that many spells need to be a certain size to work correctly for one reason or another, is why one of the instructions in casting a spell is how big the matrix needs to be. This mostly applies to runic casting but can be a factor in horn casting as well.

This means I not only need to form the matrix correctly I need to remember each spell's size. I form another part of the spell but am interrupted by my timer going off, I sigh and let the magic dissolve before walking over to my oven.

The pies are done so I take both of them out to cool and go back to practicing. By the time I'm supposed to leave for the get-together I've made some decent progress and have committed most of the Temporis spell to memory, it will take more practice but I should be able to become a Journeypony in runic casting very soon.

Once I memorize the spell fully and cast it instantly I can officially call myself a Journeypony in runic casting. I stand up and stretch before grabbing the pies and walking out of my apartment, I walk over to Daisy's door and knock. Not long later Daisy opens her door and greets me with a smile.

"Shade glad you could make it, ohhh pie, Maple will be thrilled." She says happily while letting me inside before closing the door behind me. I like Daisy's apartment, It's got a comfy feel to it. I leave both pies on a counter and find a comfortable place to lie down and talk.

After a while Blaz and Maple show up together with their own foods, Blaz brings a bowl of mashed potatoes. And Maple brought some fresh-cut greens, cucumber slices, carrot sticks, and a few other things. Daisy made our main course, a casserole, they put their things in the kitchen and we all sat down.

We all sat down at Daisy's table as she brought out a board game, "So what have you got for us?" Blaz asks Daisy while she sets up the game. A flat board with paths along it and a start and end location, reminds me of the Game Of Life from my old world.

I let the emotions of that thought wash over me and try not to ignore them, I feel a little sad but I'm also happy to spend time with friends.

Daisy finishes setting up the board and explains how to play and the rules, it turns out to be very similar to the game I know with a few twists. The game is called Adventure and you have to roll dice to move a certain distance before landing on a part of the path that gives you a choice.

To win you have to collect either gold or artifacts and both are counted as points at the end, whoever has the most at the end wins. "Everypony understand?" She asks when she finishes her explanation, and we all nod before picking out pieces and staring at the game.

I land on a spot and get a card that I keep. Daisy speaks up while Blaz rolls for his turn, "Did you show them yet?" Both me and Maple are confused for a moment before Blaz shows us a piece of paper.

I'm confused by the crude and nonsensical drawing he shows us. "Ya, I got it yesterday, my grand-foal's first drawing." He says with a slightly proud smile. Maple stays silent but I get an idea to have some fun with Blaz, I love messing with him. I pass Blaz the card I got earlier to Blaz, he reads it and looks back at me with a clearly exaggerated annoyance, "Really?"

I just smile and note down the increase in my gold because I just stole half of Blaz's gold from him. "Well you can't blame me, that smile was just asking for it." We both have serious faces for a moment before that facade cracks as we start laughing. "But in all seriousness that's adorable, I'm happy they are doing well," I say with a happy tone.

That's one of the things that helps with the stresses of my life. Blaz is always down to joke around and help me laugh about life. Maple always listens to our problems and offers solutions that are oftentimes practical. Daisy always tries to keep us positive and also offers solutions while trying to cheer us up.

We continue our game while cracking jokes and getting frustrated at each other with various cards and tricks. In the end, it comes down to the wire between me and Daisy for first place, I roll again and get unlucky. I land on an event that takes some of my gold and fall behind Daisy.

I turn to her after learning this and decide to go out with a bang, I use my last turn to give all my gold to Maple letting her win. "We both know that's against the rules." She says with a fake seriousness.

I smile back, "Not if I get Blaz to agree with me." I look over to Blaz and he gives me a deadpan look.

"Colt, drag me into this and I'll give you all my work while I'm on vacation." He says in a blunt tone but keeps his smile showing just how serious he truly is.

"Like you could do that." Daisy doesn't say anything and just smiles at me. "He can't do that, right? Right?" Daisy stays silent and keeps smiling. "Fine, I'll take the loss. Anyway, how about we get to the food? I'm hungry." Everypony agrees and we start setting the table.

The food is all well made and we all enjoy stuffing ourselves, when we are done I go and grab both pies to serve dessert. I place both on the table and to no pony's surprise I now have Maple's full attention. I cut both pies up and fill a few plates before passing them around, I make sure to fill Maple's plate with more than anypony else.

"Thanks" I get a round of thanks from everypony and sit down to enjoy my own plate. We all enjoy the pie and end up eating through all but half of a pie, again to no pony's surprise mostly because of Maple. "Where did you get these pies," Maple asks in her blunt manner.

I raise a brow at her question so she elaborates. "I try all the pies I find, but don't recognize this one ." Of course Maple's is the type to find and try new pies in her spare time, so why am I not surprised? How the hell would she even be able to tell the difference?

"I made them," I answer cautiously and watch as her eyes light up slightly and focus even more on me. I push the last half-finished pie over to her, "You can take this home, just give the pan back to me." I see one of Maple's rare smiles and get a nod and quiet thanks in return.

After we finish eating the night starts to wind down and we all decide to call it there so Blaz and Maple can get home before it gets too late. We all say our goodbyes and I stay a little longer to help Daisy clean up before heading home with some leftovers to share with Entropy.

When I get inside my apartment I'm greeted by an annoyed bird that's been waiting for her dinner, "I know girl, but I brought something new." I say trying to appease her, I fill a bowl with a few things she likes and add some of the food we made before heading into my workroom.

I sit down and start working on the project I've been working on for three days now. The modified Base Frame spell is basically done and just needs some testing and tweaking.

I still need a way to lock the illusions away from others but that can be done later for now I'll just test if it works correctly. I grab a medium ruby and add the spells used to gather and hold magic before adding everything else and starting my tests. First I use the Page spell in the gem and try to draw with the Pen spell, it works well, although I can see a few things that will need to be tweaked.

After several tests I stop and leave my workroom, it's getting late and I have work tomorrow so it's best to get some sleep.

Author's Note

This is a slow chapter but I thought I should add something with Shades friends, maybe I'll have them do this more. I'd like Shade to consider them trusted friends eventually, but that takes time.

Thanks for reading. :3