Princess Celestia and the Quest for Discount Princestby TheWraithWriter
Chapters
Prologue
“Are we ready?” Celestia asked as she entered the room.
“Just about,” Nightmare-Moon replied as she shuffled papers on the table.
Celestia grinned happily as she took her place opposite Nightmare. The two alicorns were in Celestia’s apartment, sitting on opposite sides of the coffee table in the living room. A warm fire blazed in the background and a stereo sat nearby ready to play any song that the situation might call for.
On the table itself were many scrolls; some filled up with notes and diagrams, others blank and eagerly awaiting ink to be lovingly spread across them. Quills and a few bottles of ink were also on the table, ready to lovingly spread the blank scrolls. In the center of the table lay a large rectangular box, its surface idly moving like gentle waves on a calm sea. Surrounding the box were various figurines, most shaped like various magical creatures and quite colorful, but a few generic looking and tan like sand. Dice of various sizes, colors, and numbers of sides littered the surface of the table as well.
And on every available surface and even in a few mountains constructed of nothing but themselves, were snacks and drinks of every kind. And cake. A whole damn shrine to cake.
Celestia helped herself to a slice of the cake (Ooh! Banana Cream, my favorite.) as Nightmare arranged a few more scrolls to her liking.
“You know, I had no idea you and Luna were into this sort of thing,” Celestia said through a mouthful of cake.
“Oh yes,” Nightmare responded. “You have no idea how much of our thousand year imprisonment we passed playing this game.”
Celestia winced. “Could you not remind me of the terrible thing I did to my sister and my future wife every five minutes.”
“I could.” Nightmare grinned wickedly.
Celestia sighed and changed the topic. “So, how did you keep it fresh? One of you must have run out of ideas after the first dozen years.”
“Reading,” Nightmare said simply. “And spying on the world below with our telescope.”
“Remind me again how it was you two had a telescope.”
“My supporters continued to send things to the moon long after those who had witnessed my banishment had passed.” Nightmare smirked at an old memory. “Some of them a tad misguided. I most certainly do not eat kittens.”
Celestia paused just as she was about to take another bite of cake. “They sent you a kitten?”
“They sent an apology for not being able to send a kitten.” Nightmare sighed. “Those crazy foals and their wacky rituals.”
“You do realize there were a number of blood cults devoted to you.”
“Oh of course, I’ve gotten some supreme inspiration from them,” Nightmare said excitedly.
Celestia chuckled softly and went back to slaying the cake, which was foal’s play with her Cakewalk perk, which gave her plus twenty against all cake based enemies at the cost of her never being able to resist slaying every cake she saw.
After a few moments, Nightmare spoke. “So what got you of all ponies into this game?”
“Twilight,” Celestia said, a few crumbs falling from her lips.
Nightmare smirked. “I certainly hope you never played this edition with her.”
Celestia wiped her mouth with a hoof. “Of course not. I’m a benevolent tyrant that has ruled a nation with an iron hoof wrapped in silk for a millennia, not a monster.”
Nightmare laughed. “Been practicing for in game exchanges I see.”
Celestia returned the smile.
“Alright,” the black alicorn said as the last scroll was placed just to her liking. “Now, the rules of this version of the game are no different from the regular edition, for the most part. Mostly it’s just the inclusion of new rules, like seduction and lust.”
Celestia nodded as she pulled her character scroll closer. “I read up on them during lunch.”
Nightmare smiled. “Good, then we can begin right away.” She picked up a scroll and began reading from it.
“It is a dark time in Equus. The lands have fallen under the sway of a powerful and corrupted alicorn: Mistress Midnight,” Nightmare intoned in her Backstory Voice™. As she began reading the next portion of the introduction, the surface of the rectangle in the middle started to shift, the magical, sand-like substance rising and twisting to form the scene she was describing. “You are a servant in the Dark Empress’s castle. You stand now in the throne room, gazing upon the beautiful and imposing form of Mistress Midnight herself.” Nightmare shifted the scroll to get to the next bit of into. “The empress looks down upon you from her obsidian throne, her eyes boring into your body. You-”
“I roll to seduce the empress.”
“Bwa-huh?” Nightmare said, taken off guard by the sudden interruption.
“I roll to seduce the empress,” Celestia repeated, die hold in her hoof. “Or… can I not do that?”
Nightmare’s brow furrowed and she consulted her notes. “Well… there’s nothing saying you can’t attempt to seduce her.”
“Wonderful,” Celestia said with a grin. “Alright, I say to the empress: ‘Oh dark and powerful Mistress, might you allow this humble servant to show you her love in the best and sweatiest way possible?’” She tossed the twenty-sided onto the table. It bounced and skittered around before stopping with a 20 facing the ceiling.
Celestia grinned happily. “Natural Twenty!” she sang, pumping a hoof in the air.
Nightmare blinked a few times before searching her notes for the appropriate reference sheet. Finding it, she quickly scanned the contents of the scroll before clearing her throat and speaking again.
“The empress seems surprised by your brazen request, but not unpleased,” Nightmare said, now using her Narrator Voice™ “‘Servant, normally such a sentence as you have uttered would guarantee a death sentence, but… I find myself strangely attracted to such boldness.’ Mistress Midnight leaves her throne and begins descending the steps towards you, discarding pieces of her regalia as she goes. ‘Servant, did you know that to gaze upon me unclothed in punishable by death?’” Nightmare said, switching between her Narrator Voice™ and the husky voice she used for Mistress Midnight.
Celestia grinned. “‘I would say such a punishment is worth it.’”
“The dark empress grins. ‘Again, such boldness.’ She pulls you close ‘How does a servant acquire such boldness, might I ask?’”
“‘A story for another time. Now, how about we-’”
“Princess?” said the voice of one snuggly book worm as she pushed open the door to Celestia’s apartment.
The two alicorns froze, the silvery sands, which had been depicting the scene as it had unfolded, quickly falling back into the box. The two forced large grins on their faces as Twilight entered. While news of Nightmare-Moon’s reformation had been spread to those that should know, Celestia had yet to mention her current relationship with the former power-hungry maniac to her faithful student.
“Yes, Twilight?” Celestia asked sweetly.
“Sorry to interrupt, but Discord wanted -” she broke off as she caught sight of the coffee table and its contents. “Ooh, are you playing Ponies and Pestilence?”
The two nodded.
Twilight broke out into an adorable smile. “I love that game. What campaign are you playing?”
“I have designed one,” Nightmare said with a hint of pride. “From scratch.”
“Really?” Twilight said excitedly. “Not many players do that. What is it about?”
“It’s a quest to save the land of Equus, which has been taken over by the dark and powerful Mistress Midnight,” Nightmare said, the silver sands forming the image of the aforementioned alicorn. “I’ve designed each and every inch of her castle and a number of dungeons using nothing but my imagination and some inspiration from the Lord of the Rings.”
“By J.R.R. Foalkien?” Twilight asked.
“Who else?” Nightmare grinned.
Twilight stared in awe as Nightmare showed off a few of the locations she had created.
Meanwhile, Celestia slurped loudly from a bottle of soda, drawing the others’ attention. She faked a look of mild embarrassment when they looked to her and then cleared her throat. “Twilight, you said Discord sent you in here for something?”
“Hm? Oh, yes. He said I needed to tell you that he’s decided to invent ‘daylight savings time’, which he explained is just setting your clock back an hour on a certain date and then setting it forward an hour at a later date.” Twilight paused. “He said you have to not change a thing when it comes to the time between sunrise and sunset either.”
Celestia brought a hoof to her face. It was so like Discord to come up with some pointless idea that did nothing but create chaos and then use Twilight to interrupt her sexy role-playing time. She planned on not feeling guilty the next time she ‘accidentally’ set him on fire.
“Very well. But tell him it’s probably not going to fly in the Badlands near Marexico.”
Twilight nodded and then turned her attention back to Nightmare. “It’s nice to hear somepony else likes P&P as much as I do. But I should be going.”
Celestia breathed a sigh of relief. That hadn’t been as bad as she thought. Now, she had some interesting ideas for that broom her character was using-
“Why don’t you join us?” Celestia heard Nightmare say.
“What?” Celestia said quietly.
“Me? I’d love to, but I wouldn’t want to mess up your adventure.”
Nightmare waved a hoof. “Oh, nonsense, we’ve hardly begun. It wouldn’t be impossible to include more players.”
“What?” Celestia said, slightly louder than before.
“Well in that case, could I invite some others? I know a few ponies that would just love a good P&P campaign.”
“The more the merrier.” Nightmare beamed.
“What?!” Celestia shouted.
Both Twilight and Nightmare turned to stare at her.
The alabaster alicorn blushed and coughed quietly. “I, uh, have a hard time hearing lately, should clear up soon.” She coughed again. “What, uh, did you say?”
“I’ve invited Twilight and some friends to join in our game,” Nightmare said happily.
“Oh,” Celestia said, trying not to grind her teeth. “Wonderful.”
Nightmare nodded and turned back to Twilight. “I’ll have to make a few adjustments to the campaign, but it shouldn’t take more than a day. I can draw up some character sheets as well, if you’d like.”
Twilight nodded. “Sounds good to me. And I was thinking about introducing a certain member of the royal family to this game, so some character sheets would be nice.”
“I’ll get to work,” Nightmare said merrily. “See you tomorrow, Twilight.”
“Until then.” Twilight turned to Celestia. “It’ll be just like old times, right princess?”
Celestia forced a smile on her muzzle. “Yes indeed.”
Twilight left the apartment skipping.
As soon as she was certain her student was gone, Celestia rounded on Nightmare. “How could you invite her to play?” she hissed.
“Do you not enjoy playing P&P with your student?” Nightmare asked.
“I never said that. But I would rather not play this game with her!”
Nightmare waved a hoof dismissively. “She is an adult, is she not?”
“That’s not the issue. The issue is we just about to have some kinky roleplay sex!”
“Which would have been better had you let me finish.” Nightmare deadpanned.
Celestia scrunched her muzzle. “You are never going to let that go, are you?”
“Not that. My introduction.” Nightmare pointed to the rather large scroll. “I had a lot prepared and you bypassed most of it.”
“So you weren’t enjoying what was happening before Twilight interrupted?”
Nightmare gave her a seductive smirk. “I never said that. But this is a golden opportunity to show off my skills.” She quickly gathered up a few scrolls and quills. “Besides, did we not have passionate, sweaty sex last night?”
Celestia grumbled. “Yeah…”
“Then it shouldn’t kill you to not get any tonight.” The black alicorn stood up and gave Celestia a kiss on the horn, eliciting a gasp. She smugly trotted off as Celestia flushed hotly. “Oh, and I would rework your character a little. More emphasis on adventuring,” Nightmare called as she left, likely heading for the library.
Celestia sat there for a time, gazing longingly at the piles of snacks and all the dice on the table. She focused on the one that had given her the natural twenty she needed to get in the empress’ pants. She picked it up and tucked it away, saving it for the game tomorrow night.
The alicorn was just about to go take a cold shower when she suddenly remembered the contents of one of the larger cakes.
“I do believe this cake’s filling is quite tasty,” Celestia recited.
On cue, the cake burst open to reveal none other than Captain Spitfire of the Wonderbolts. Celestia barely batted a regal eye as chucks of cake landed everywhere.
“Not to mention smokin’ hot!” Spitfire proclaimed, throwing her forelegs wide.
“Show’s been called off, captain,” Celestia said tiredly.
The pegasus dropped her forlegs and look around. “It has? Oh thank goodness.”
Celestia raised an eyebrow. “I thought you were excited to do this?”
“Oh believe me, I was, but then something came up and…” Spitfire trailed off and shrugged. “It’s not important, princess. Can I go home?”
Celestia nodded. “Of course. But please keep the fee, I may need your services soon.”
The pegasus nodded and stepped out of the ruins of the cake, quickly trotting out of the room.
Celestia sighed again and turned towards the shower again. She paused for a moment, and then took a chunk of the destroyed cake with her.
You All Meet at The Horny Princess
“We all meet at the what?” Princess Celestia asked in a tone that suggested she was unsure of her brain’s ability to process the words she had just read properly.
(Oh that wasn’t long winded at all. What, are you getting paid by the word here?)
(…….Mayhaps.)
“Hm?” Nightmare-Moon replied, looking up from her cup of coffee.
The two alicorns were once more in Celestia’s apartment inside Canterlot Castle. The coffee table they had been using the previous night had been swapped out for a larger table, as to accommodate a larger number of ponies. Nightmare’s Environment View Box™ sat in the center of the table, again surrounded by numerous figurines and scrolls. The mountains of snacks now resided in a corner instead of spread all over, making it easier to move around the room.
Except for a large rum cake, which sat next to Celestia’s spot at the table on its own little pedestal.
The cake-tyrant herself held up the scroll from which she had been reading for her fiancée to see. “It says right here we all meet at a tavern called The Horny Princess.”
“Celly!” Nightmare cried, snatching the scroll away. “If you read my notes, you’ll spoil the whole adventure!”
Celestia scoffed. “I wasn’t reading your notes, I was reading your introduction.” She then frowned. “Now explain to me how a tavern called The Horny Princess isn’t a jab at yours truly.”
Nightmare laughed as she rolled up her scroll. “Oh Celly, you’re such a narcissist, everything is always about you. The name could easily be a jab at your promiscuous niece.” The black alicorn tucked the scroll away in her mane. “And besides, it’s not a tavern.”
Celestia raised a regal eyebrow. “Oh?”
Nightmare nodded. “It’s a brothel that also serves refreshments.” She chuckled like it was the most obvious thing.
Celestia’s mouth fell open. “The adventure starts in a brothel?”
“As all good adventures should.”
Celestia groaned and brought a hoof to her forehead. “Moony, if it was just you and me, I wouldn’t mind if you started the adventure at an orgy.”
Nightmare quickly scribbled a few notes.
Celestia shot her a glare and kept going. “But, we’re going to be playing this game with Twilight Sparkle, the mare I practically was a second mother to, not to mention whatever friends she brings by.”
There was a moment of silence between the two.
“…And?” Nightmare asked expectantly.
“And what?”
“And where’s the problem?”
“We’re starting at a brothel,” Celestia said pointedly, receiving a blank stare from Nightmare. “A place where players can get sex from NPCs. In an edition of the game that includes rules for sex. Which you encourage players to act out for role-playing exp.”
Nightmare just shrugged. “They don’t have to. They can easily just read the pre-made sex scenes I wrote.”
“That’s beside the-” Celestia halted mid-speech as her brain process what had just been said. “You wrote sex scenes?”
Nightmare nodded. “In case the players were uncomfortable with having it described aloud to them or describing it themselves.” Nightmare gave a small grin. “A thousand years on a barren rock in the sky taught me to think ahead, Celly.”
Celestia groaned again. “Okay, new rule: every time you mention the banishment I spent a thousand years feeling guilty about, I’m taking a drink.” She turned to the rum cake. “Or an equivalent,” she said before shoving her face into the pastry.
Nightmare just smirked. “You’re very dramatic, Celly.”
“Fuck you,” Celestia mumbled around the cake she was shoving in her mouth.
Nightmare opened her mouth to say something, but was interrupted by a knock on the door. “Not right now dear, your student has arrived. Perhaps later.”
The black alicorn trotted over to the door and pulled it open.
“Good to see you again, Twilight.” Nightmare smiled. “Ah, and your brother as well?”
“Yep!” Twilight said happily as she trotted into the room, followed by Shining Armour, who looked at the dark alicorn with a neutral yet wary expression.
To Nightmare’s surprise, Armour was quickly followed by Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, who was looking around the room curiously. And as though that surprise was wrapped inside another like a corndog in its suit of corn-based bread, Queen Chrysalis of the Changelings came inside the room as well, smiling in a friendly manner at Nightmare.
Nightmare hummed to herself as she closed the door. “Quite the group we have tonight.”
Twilight nodded as the others began looking over the room. “Sure is.” She blushed. “I, uh, hope it’s not too many.”
Nightmare shook her head. “Oh not at all. The more the merrier, I say.” She smiled at the trio Twilight had brought. “Hello, I’m Nightmare-Moon and I shall be your Dungeon Master.”
To Nightmare’s bemusement, Cadenza suddenly turned a few shades of pink darker. The black alicorn raised an eyebrow. Queen Chrysalis nudged Cadenza.
“I seriously doubt she means it like that.” The Changeling deadpanned.
Nightmare snorted lightly in amusement as she realized what Cadenza must have been thinking.
“Dungeon Master means she runs the game,” Armour explained, a grin and light blush on his face as well.
Cadenza’s blush only darkened. “I know that,” she said defensively.
“Princess, why is your head in cake?” Twilight asked her mentor.
“You don’t know my life!” Celestia said through a mouthful of eggs, milk, sugar, and rum.
“O…kay?” Twilight said, deciding it was best to not bother at the moment. She turned to Nightmare. “So, you know them already?” She gestured to the others.
“I certainly know of them,” Nightmare said with a smile. “Your, ah, exploits make quite a good story, Captain Armour, Princess Cadenza, Queen Chrysalis.” The alicorn inclined her head to each in turn.
“It’s just Shining, in all honesty,” Shining said with a friendly smile and an offered hoof.
Cadenza spoke next. “Anypony that’s a fu-” she received a magical jab in the ribs “-I mean friend of Celestia is a friend of mine.” She offered her hoof. “And my friends call me Cadance.”
The glow that had briefly surrounded Chrysalis’ horn dissipated as she held out hoof as well. “I’m hardly a queen anymore. And even if I still was, I would insist you call me Chrysalis.”
Nightmare beamed. “Huzzah! This will definitely ease the gaming process, as referring to you by you’re full titles would have likely become tedious in a short amount of time.” She grinned as she shook each hoof. “And I invite you to call me Nightmare.”
“Awwww,” Celestia said, having pulled her head out from her cake. “It’s nice to see they're hitting it off.”
Twilight nodded. “Yep, which means we can get right to the game,” she said excitedly.
“Ah yes, the game,” Nightmare said s she moved to her spot at the head of the table. The others found spots at the other end of the table, taking up residence on stools and chairs.
“Now, anypony here that is new to this type of game?” Nightmare asked as she moved a few more scrolls into place.
Both Chrysalis and Cadance raised their hooves.
Nightmare nodded, a tad surprised Twilight Sparkle’s brother had not raised his hoof as well. “Very well then, allow me to lay out the rules.” As she said this, she used her mane to press play on the stereo, and a phat beat issued forth from the speakers as the black alicorn began bobbing, readying herself. She sucked in a breath-
“Oh sweet baby me no!”
The music abruptly cut out as Celestia pressed the stop button with a vengeance.
Nightmare pouted. “But Tia…”
“No, absolute not, Moony- I mean, Nightmare,” Celestia said firmly.
Nightmare grumbled something about the white mare keeping her down, but quickly composed herself.
“Alright then, the rules, at their base, are simple: I am the Dungeon Master, or DM. I control the game world, but I do not control you. Therefore, we all influence the game as it progresses. For every action that has a chance of succeeding or failing, you roll a D20. Rolling a high enough number means you succeed, rolling a too low number means you fail. Rolling a One means an instantaneous critical failure and rolling a Twenty means instantaneous critical success.” Nightmare paused and looked at the five before her. “I encourage all of you to be creative in all situations and I encourage role-playing. Also, since some of you are playing this for the first time, I will allow minor tweaks to you characters after the group completes the start quest.”
Nightmare retrieved a few scrolls and placed them in front of Cadance and Chrysalis. “I’ve taken the liberty of pre-rolling a few characters for you.” She turned to Shining. “Celestia has one already and Twilight told me she has prepared one as well. But since it seems you have played before, I take it you have a character already?”
Shining nodded and pulled a scroll from his saddle bag which he totally had earlier in this scene. The unicorn handed over the scroll to the alicorn, who quickly looked it over.
She then looked back at Shining and raised an eyebrow.
“‘Storm-Cloak the Awesome’?” she said skeptically.
Shining nodded. “Twilight said you were going to start us at level five, so I just dialed one of my previous characters back a few levels.”
Nightmare frowned. “Hm, well, I don’t see anything that could be a problem to the narrative or the others, but are you sure you want to play a paladin on this adventure?”
Shining nodded. “I always play paladins.”
Nightmare shrugged. “Very well.” She returned the scroll and looked back at Cadance and Chrysalis. “Have you found something to your liking? If not, I suppose it wouldn’t be too difficult to roll up a new character.”
The mares shook their heads. “I think we’ve found some good ones.” Cadance nodded excitedly.
“And we have some good names as well,” Chrysalis added.
Nightmare quickly glanced over at characters they had selected. “Ah, I heartily approve. This shall be fun!”
Just then, a loud ‘ding!’ came from further inside the apartment.
“Oh, my moon-pies are ready!” She quickly excused herself from the table. “Please mingle whilst I retrieve them!” She called back to the table as she trotted to the kitchen.
Shining couldn’t resist a snicker. “Moon-pies…”
Cadance rolled her eyes. “Corndogs,”
“Where?!” Shining said excitedly, looking around, much to the amusement of the mares.
Twilight glanced over at her former mentor, whose slightly sour look was not fazed by the joke at Shining’s expense, nor at the prospect of moon-pies.
“Don’t like eating moon-pies, princess?” Twilight asked.
Celestia gifted Twilight with a small smile. “Oh Twilight, you have no idea how much I would love to be eating a ‘moon-pie’ right now.”
