MAY 1 Friday.

I sit completely still on my floor while I move three small wooden cubes around me, I focus on how the space stretches and moves very slightly as they move. Right now I'm trying to accomplish something I've been working towards for more than two years now, unlocking my space affinity.

I chose to wait a few more weeks and improve a bit more before taking this step, and I think that was a good idea now that I'm actually trying to unlock it. Unlike my life affinity, I don't have much to observe beyond the space around me and what I have seen from Entropy.

I start by meditating and focusing my mind to the best of my abilities, I drank a good amount of Blood Leaf tea just to help with my magical reserves while attempting this. The small amount of space magic already in my natural magic is going to be pushed hard while doing this.

I drop the wooden cubes and just focus on how the world around me moves and how the space flexes at different points. It's honestly really hard to describe the feeling of it all. I keep in mind all I've learned about space from my old world and what I've seen from observing Entropy teleport.

I keep all that knowledge in the forefront of my mind as I start to force my will on my magic, I force my magic to change itself. It's not like my life affinity and takes far more will and focus to even attempt this. I stay like this for an unknown amount of time feeling the physical world around me slip away as I focus completely on only this.

My magic starts to drain more as I keep dumping it into my attempt. It's hard to keep my focus and my magic under control but eventually, I start feeling more space magic take form. I observe the process as best I can while keeping the magical pressure on my single desire.

More and more magic drains from me as I start using the space magic being created to expand my sense of the space around me further to help me get a better feel for the new magical conversion process happening, and I really want to make sure I remember it all.

As my spatial senses expand I start to feel the small movements of the wind on the building and ponies walking around in their apartments. Looking at the world this way is amazing so I try to focus less on small details and just sense as much of the world around me as I can. I start to feel bigger changes like the movement of large crowds of ponies walking through the city.

My head starts to hurt a little but I stubbornly ignore it to sense even more of the world, I'm determined to see more. And I start to feel something bigger that I can't really fully sense. I recklessly push past my new headache, too entranced by what I'm feeling and seeing to think about the danger.

And then for a very small moment, I feel something truly massive. For a single tiny moment, I feel the world move beneath me.

And then everything collapses away as my mind fades from the waking world and is consumed by darkness.

......

......

......

An unknown amount of time later I woke to a splitting headache and extreme tiredness. "OH, what the fuck?" I feel something move and caw right into my ear far too loudly for my liking, I reluctantly open my eyes to see the wooden floor of my apartment and Entropy in my face jumping around seemingly panicked.

Seeing her like that wakes my mind enough for me to pay attention, "Why am I on the floor?" I tiredly lift my head and Entropy seeing me move around seems to calm down and starts pressing against me while cooing. I look down at her and try to lift a hoof to pet her and calm her down.

But everything feels heavy and sluggish. I try to ignore the headache and get my mind in order, but after a little thinking, I don't feel any better when I remember what I was doing. It seems my dumbass decided to ignore my body telling me I was out of magic and do something monumentally stupid.

I reach out a hoof and slowly drag my teapot over, I'm too tired to give a shit so I just stick the nozzle on my mouth and start chugging all of it down. After drinking it I start to feel a little better but that's not saying much, "Remind me to never do that again." I say to Entropy who's finally calmed down and is now preening my mane while fussing over me.

I start inspecting my magic to feel if anything is wrong, something you should always do after pulling shit like this. And as far as I can tell I'm fine just, severally magically drained. Seems I got past forty percent magic left and reaped the consequences, I think I should be fine though as I passed out before hitting the truly dangerous thirty percent.

I stand up slowly and a wave of nausea hits me for a moment, I stumble a little before regaining my footing. I feel out my magic more and see that it's slowly coming back to me. This isn't my first time feeling these side effects, just never this strong, I move over to the kitchen and start tiredly making more tea.

While it boils I check the time with the bracelet Daisy gave me. I don't remember how long I was meditating before passing out but I know I started meditating at six in the afternoon and it's seven-sixteen right now so I couldn't have been out that long.

I spend the next hour drinking tea and reading through notes I have on magical exhaustion. I do a few exercises they recommend to check if I need to find a doctor, and from what I'm reading I should be fine as long as I get some rest. So after feeding myself and Entropy, I head to bed in the middle of the day.

time skip

MAY 3 Sunday.

I move another pot as I reorganize my plants to make sure they are all doing ok. It's been two days since I decided to drain myself and I'm recovered now. The day after I spent my time doing jack shit and resting as much as I can, by the end of that day I felt normal again but decided to not overuse my magic for a while.

I've tested a few things and everything in both my body and magic is working normally and I feel fine again, but I can't really be sure and I'm thinking about going to a doctor. Beyond that I'm still mad at myself for pulling such a fucking stupid stunt, it's unlikely I would have died but this was still a bad decision on my part and something I won't be doing again.

I haven't touched my new affinity and I probably won't until I know I'm fully recovered. But for now, I have something to do today, I have a meeting with Celestia and I'm not sure if I should tell her about what happened because I'm not sure how she'll react.

I finish the report I'm making on the B.L.P spell and get ready to leave my apartment for my meeting, I guess I'll decide when I'm there, that will give me less time to chicken out. Entropy merges into my shadow and I leave my apartment and start walking to the palace once again. When I arrive things happen as they normally do, and from the looks of where the guard is taking me we're meeting in the gardens again.

I'm led to the same area as last time with Celestia sitting at a table like always, and after a short bow, I sit down with her. I'm still trying to decide if I should tell her the stupid thing I did, and honestly, I think I should. I did something really stupid that could have gone much worse.

And while I'm not planning to ever experience that again, a scolding would be a good reminder. And after the last incident, I find myself more willing to trust her. I give her a small smile as she moves a cup of tea over to me. "Hello Celestia, nice to see you again. How did the marriage break up go?"

I add that last part with a joking tone, we both know it didn't go well. She just smiles back, "Not well, it took me several days to get them to come to some sort of agreement and continue trade. I hope you had a better week than me." The first part is said with clearly fake enthusiasm.

Seems I have to show my hand early. I sigh and give her a half smile, "Good and bad, mentally I'm fine but I did something stupid." She drops her joking attitude and puts on the face she used to comfort me last time. I see it and interrupt her before she can say anything.

"I'm ok, and I'm actually pretty happy right now. But I did do something bad, I gave myself some pretty bad magical exhaustion." I see her face shift to something a little more serious and continue. "I'll explain how later, but I ended up blacking out for a while and had to recover over the next two days."

That gets the reaction I was expecting as her face once again shifts this time to one of both worry and stern eyes. After a moment of silence, she locks eyes with me. "Are you ok?" Her tone is stern but a little less so than I expected.

"I'm fine. After I woke up I did nothing but rest and recover and I'm still taking it lightly right now, no new spells or experiments, only reading and spell design. I'm no expert on the subject but I had enough notes to help me recover. Do you think I should see a doctor?" I ask that last part as she will definitely know more about this than me.

She looks less stern at my explanation of what I did afterward. "Good, you at least took proper steps. And that depends, do you feel any pain or discomfort?" I shake my head. "Then you should be fine, but I'd like to cast a spell or two on you to check."

"Please by all means." She nods and after a few seconds, two or three spells shoot out of her horn and connect with me. They all come so fast that I'm not even sure about the exact number of them and what they could do, although if I had to guess I'd say several scanning spells.

She brings a few pieces of paper out from under her wing, I should ask how she does that sometimes, and casts another spell on the pages as words appear on them. I wait as she reads through them before looking back at me with a more neutral but still stern look.

"Well as far as I can tell you're fine, but you should keep resting for a few more days just to be safe. But I do want to know what caused you to do this to yourself? And a promise that you will never do it again." The last part is said in what I'm now calling dam Celestia, a stern and no-nonsense tone.

I nod immediately. "I promise to never do that again. Honestly, the headache from it alone is more than enough to make me never want to do that again." She stares at me for a few moments before nodding and giving me a small motion to continue.

"Well, that takes a little explanation. When I unlocked my life affinity I did it without using a magical construct, I just learned to will the magic to convert by observing the life magic around me and my knowledge about it." I've told her this before but bring it up as an example.

"And as I've told you I've been meditating on my space affinity and space magic for a long time now. And a while back I felt I was ready to unlock it but decided to practice more just to be safe." She gives an approving nod at that and seems to become less stern as I explain more. "Two days ago I attempted to unlock my space affinity, and succeeded," I say with a little pride in my voice.

"But while unlocking my space affinity I did make a mistake. I used the new space magic being converted to expand my ability to sense space, to help me solidify my affinity, and to give me time to remember the process thoroughly. But I got carried away, even when I started feeling pain I just kept pushing it far more than I should have without much of a good reason."

She listens until I'm done and nods. "I won't say that was a good decision by any means, but what's most important is that you are ok and won't repeat this again." She drinks some tea before continuing. "But regardless, congratulations, you are to my knowledge the only pony to ever accomplish this." I am surprised to hear a little pride in her voice when she says that, and I can't help but smile a little.

"Have you done anything with your new affinity yet?" Her tone is still a little stern but is much lighter than before.

"No, I decided to wait a while more and I'll take your advice to rest for a few more days. But when I'm recovered I'm excited to see what I can accomplish."

She nods. "Good rest thoroughly. I'd also like to warn you to be very careful and train your control first before trying anything more, take what happened as a lesson if you must but don't rush into this." She says with a kind but firm tone.

"I don't plan to rush anything, and honestly I'm already taking this as a lesson in not pushing too hard. But I'll keep your warning in mind and make sure to take things slow. While we're on this topic I wanted to ask if you know of any good places to start?"

She seems thoughtful for a moment before answering. "Well, I've only ever met one other pony with this affinity and they never unlocked it. But moving things around might be a good place to start, maybe train it the same way you trained your field?" She suggests.

I think about that while getting out my chessboard and setting it up. That's not a bad idea, I could try to manipulate space to move something before I try to manipulate space by itself. And I can scale it up or down depending on whether I want to train strength or fine control. I nod my agreement, "That seems like as good a place to start as any, thank you again."

"It was no trouble, just please remember to stay safe. And to not do something like this again, if nothing else than for your own safety." She reminds again with a stern tone. I nod and look down to move my first piece. "Also." I turn back to her with a look of curiosity. Her tone is now lighter and her smile is back, "It takes a lot of courage and trust to admit you've made mistakes and messed up, especially when you could have said nothing and I'd probably never know."

She locks eyes with me again and smiles more, "So I'd just like to say I'm proud that you admitted this, and I'm happy you trust me enough to tell me." Her tone is soft and genuine, and for a few moments I'm at a loss for words. I'd never thought I'd hear her say that.

I smile as big as I can while looking up at her. "I have no idea what to say to that." Honestly, I'm completely unused to somepony giving me a compliment like that and I'm a little embarrassed. So I just say what's on my mind, which gets a small laugh from her seeing my face and hearing what I said, which doesn't help with my embarrassment.

I move my first piece and try to think of something to change the subject. I remember the contest I was in recently and get an idea. "Now do you want to hear about how I got a stallion in trouble with his wife over a game of chess?"

Author's Note

Thanks for reading. :}

Also two small things. First there is a very small show reference in this chapter.

And the second thing is pointless but just something I found neat. When I started this fic I wanted to make each chapter in-between 1k and 2k, but at some point 2k become the goal. And that's why only four chapters in the entire fic are below 2k.