“Um… Princess Celestia, why exactly are we out here in the middle of the ocean?” Twilight asked.

Celestia heaved with a deep grunt as she swung her oars deep into the sea’s surface, pushing their rowboat further out into the waves. “Like I said the first dozen times, Twilight, it’s a secret.”

“But you said now that I’m a princess there wouldn’t be anymore secrets,” Twilight said. She lifted up a brochure. “It says so right here. No more deeply guarded, mind-breaking secrets. Also, ten percent off at Princess Burgers with any combo meals.”

“Okay, I’ll tell you a secret right now.” Celestia stopped their rowboat, the waves gently lapping at the wooden sides. “Aliens exist.”

“No way.”

“Indeed.” Celestia wiped a hoof across her brow and frowned at the unforgiving sun above her head—her sun to be exact, but still unforgiving to its controller. “They keep on trying to abduct cows all across Equestria.”

Twilight tilted her head, her ears pointing themselves to where the breeze flowed. “Wait, why would they want to abduct cows?”

Celestia shrugged, picking up the oars once more. “Oh, some strange religious practices where they revere cows as their god or something and the other.”

“So is this why we give cows tax breaks and casinos?”

“To prevent an alien invasion, yes.” Celestia blew out a breath and dragged her oars across the waves once more, a sheen of sweat covered her white coat which caused her ethereal mane to stick to her neck. “But this is much different.”

“Is it vampires?” Twilight asked, looking with wide eyes over the side of the boat to the unclear ocean below. “Werewolves? Ghosts? Headless horseponies? Reality television actually being real?”

“Twilight, don’t be ridiculous. Of course reality television isn’t real.” Celestia snorted. “Now, for those other ones…”

Twilight peered closer into the murky blue depths of the sea and furrowed her brow. “Actually, since we’re in the middle of the ocean, is this secret about Atlantis being real?”

“What? Nah. Starswirl the Bearded made that up centuries ago just to screw with ponies.” Celestia narrowed her eyes. “He was a deceptive bastard, that he was.”

“So then why are we out here in the first place?” Twilight splashed a hoof into the water. “Without even teleporting here or flying no less.”

“Well, I needed the exercise, and you needed the sun,” Celestia said. “Plus, the guy we’re going to doesn’t tend to like ponies flying over his domain.”

“Why?”

Celestia rolled her eyes, dipping her oars once more into the waves. “Something about a grudge against his brother.”

With one last tug, Celestia sighed in relief and placed her oars back into the boat, the small craft rocking against the waves out in the middle of the seemingly never ending ocean.

“Okay, Twilight, we’re here.”

“How can you tell? There’s literally nothing for miles around except ocean,” Twilight said, pointing her hoof all around themselves.

Celestia chucked, a warm smile more pleasant than the sun touching her lips. “Call it a hunch.”

Twilight’s muzzle scrunched up and her ears drooped as she glanced back to the unchanging ocean. “So… what’s this secret I’m going to learn about exactly?”

Celestia waved her hoof exasperatedly in the air for the intended dramatic effect. “The origins of ponykind and who created our species.” Noticing Twilight’s expression remained unchanged, Celestia sighed. “Okay, basically you’re going to discover who made us.”

“And that discovery is in the ocean?” Twilight asked, leaning out of the boat to stare at her muddled reflection.

“Actually, at the bottom of it,” Celestia said, tipping Twilight over. “Hold your breath in!”

But for Twilight, it was too late… well, to hear the last part of Celestia’s sentence, since she was already overboard and sinking fast. Faster than what was natural, actually. As she choked on water, Twilight’s descent down into the deepest reaches of the sea quickened, until she was plunging past depths that would normally crushed the typical pony body beneath the high pressures. Further and further she sunk, until the gloomy bottom of the ocean could be spotted, approaching her at a tremendous speed.

Twilight closed her eyes and held out her hooves in a bid to prevent herself from being turned into an extra soggy pancake far below the sea, but instead she gently landed on her hooves on the sandy ocean floor. Opening her eyes, Twilight stumbled upon some amazing discoveries. First of all, she could breathe, which she did in great quantities while spewing out half-swallowed seawater. Secondly, she was alive, which in itself was quite an achievement since being this deep underwater should have snapped her bones like twigs and turned her insides into jello. And last of all, she could actually see, even though she was hundreds of feet underwater out of the reach of the sun.

Spitting out the last water from her lungs, Twilight said, “What in the… what in the name of Celestia happened to me?” She waved her hoof in the air, which was actually air and not water at all. “And where am I?”

“WHO DARES INVADE MY REALM?!” a booming voice that shook the earth and caused the sea currents to twist and spin asked.

Twilight felt eyes on her back, crushing her spine with their very will. Shivering, she turned around to where the voice had spoken.

Before her rose a majestic throne made out of golden coral reefs with spines that reached dozens of feet overhead. Pearls of every shape and color adorned its surface like a galaxy of stars capture in the throne’s gold. Seaweed of all the colors imaginable were planted in a perimeter around the throne so that it appeared to be what was truly at the end of a rainbow. And instead of a leprechaun hoarding a pot of gold, a strange creature was seated on a throne of gold.

This creature shone with a radiance brighter than Celestia’s sun, his skin so bronzed that Twilight suspected if she licked him she would taste chocolate. Actually, she knew for a fact it was a him, since no one else could have such amazing rock-hard abs like he did, and she was almost certain he could bend steel between his magnificent pecs. An incredibly long beard the color of a thunderstorm could be seen on his handsomely sculpted face, while eyes greener all the leaves in a forest bore down on her. He was dressed in a toga of a deep, rich blue and grey that lazily clung to his body while its surface shimmered like it was made of water.

The creature smashed the end of his mighty trident it held next to his throne against the ocean floor, creating an aftershock that nearly tipped Twilight head over hooves. “ARE YOU DEAF? SPEAK YOUR NAME AT ONCE WHILE YOU STILL HAVE THE BREATH TO DO SO!”

“I-I am Princess Twilight Sparkle!” Twilight quipped at once, stuffing a hoof in her ear to prevent further eardrum damage from the creature’s voice. “I have arrived upon the wishes of my mentor, Princess Celestia, to learn of the origins of ponykind and the being who created them.”

The creature furrowed his brow, nodding slowly as he tugged with a weathered hand at his beard. “Oh, well, why didn’t you say so?”

Twilight instinctively cringed, but quickly retracted it when she realized he was going to make the big, booming voice again—which, she might add, put the Canterlot Royal Voice to shame. “Wait, what?”

“I mostly just put the big show up when I intend to smite someone, but you seem pretty alright. Name’s Poseidon, by the way.” Poseidon leaned his trident against his throne, then pulled a lever on its side and kicked back, the throne reclining for a much comfier back support. “God of the Sea, in case you weren’t already hinted by, well…” Poseidon waved his hand dismissively, “all of this.”

Twilight blinked, giving Poseidon another once over (taking her time, of course, to appreciate all the intricate and muscle-bound details). “So… erm, Poseidon. You’re a god? Like, an actual G-O-D, god?”

Poseidon chuckled, pointing to his trident. “Well, they don’t give these oversized forks to just about anyone, you know. I am the god of the sea, thus making everything beneath the ocean’s surface my realm.”

“But… but Princess Celestia told me I was to meet the creator of ponykind. And there is here is, well, you.”

Poseidon and Twilight stared at one another in increasingly awkward silence. Finally, Poseidon was the one to break it when he grumbled, “Listen, kid, if you didn’t already figure it out yet, that would be me.”

“You created ponykind?” Twilight’s brow shot upward. “But you don’t even look anything like us!”

“Hey now, when you make a work of art, you don’t have to exactly put it to your own likeness each and every time.” He shrugged, scratching a hand against the back of his neck. “But yes, I am your kind’s creator. Well, technically I made horses, but you pretty much sprouted from them along the line.”

“When? How? Why? What?” Twilight asked in a flurry of rapid-fire questions.

With a chuckle Poseidon raised his hands. “Now, now, simmer down, girl, easy does it. For when exactly this happened, why, it’d have be…” Poseidon drummed his fingers against the arm of his throne, humming lightly under his breath. “Oh, around a million years or so, give or take a few millennia.”

“Wow, um… that was a pretty long time ago,” Twilight admitted, her eyes as wide as dinner plates. “Celestia’s the oldest pony I know, and I don’t think she’s even close to a million years old.”

“Oh, she’s a young filly compared to the age of a god, but she’s a wiry one, I’ll give her that,” Poseidon said with a wink. “As for your second question—the how—I basically collected a bunch of sea foam and then sculpted the beginning of your species’ bodies from that. From there I gave birth to the most beautiful land creature ever made, which helped me win an argument which works in conjunction to your third question.”

“Wait, wait, hold up please.” Twilight raised her hoof and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. “Sea foam? You seriously created ponies from sea foam? How is that even possible?”

“Hey now, sea foam is more magical than you’d think,” Poseidon said, waggling his finger at her. “Why, the stuff comes from castrated genital sperm for crying out loud. It can do practically anything!”

Twilight’s left eye twitched and her mouth turned to a deep pout. “C-castrated… g-g-genital sperm?”

Poseidon snapped his fingers and pointed a single digit at her. “Ooh yeah, you don’t know the story. Well, it’s fairly long and typical, but I can give you the abridged version of it. Basically, my father cut off my grandfather’s genitals in this big coup he threw along with his other siblings and threw them into the sea, thus creating sea foam. Which gave birth to my sorta sister or aunt Aphrodite. Now, if that stuff could make a god, just imagine the possibilities in creating another species!”

Twilight’s face was a pale shade of green now, her mouth flapping open and closed like a fish out of water. By her expression, she was either close to the stages of vomiting all over the floor, fainting, or both at once.

Poseidon nodded his head. “Now, you still seem pretty confused, so let me shed some light on the entire reason why I created your race from the byproduct of dismembered god genitals. See, I had a bet with my sister, Demeter, in which I was challenged to create the most beautiful land animal anyone has ever seen. And looking at you, I still know I won that challenge in a sweeping victory.”

“You… you created my species just to win a bet?” Twilight asked at the top of her lungs, her lips and spine quivering at the drastic weight of this news.

“It wasn’t just any bet. If I won it, I got laid. Which I did.” Poseidon cracked his knuckles and wiggled his eyebrows at her. “Verily, I might add.”

“You made my species to win a bet so you could bang your sister?” Twilight screamed, her voice breaking.

“Well… yeah. I don’t know what the big deal is,” Poseidon said, paying no mind to Twilight’s worsening nervous breakdown. “It’s up to you to decide which is worse. Your species being created so that a god could get lucky with his sister, or being made out of god jizz. Actually, both of those happened, so you don’t really have much of a choice in the matter of which is worse or better.” Poseidon stroked his beard wistfully. “Wow, I’m not really good at this whole comforting thing.”

Twilight, meanwhile, had been reduced to a blubbering mess on the floor as she spouted out incoherent mumblings while petting her frizzled mane.

“Hey now, don’t do that. I just cleaned there.” Poseidon poked her with the non-stabby side of his trident.

“Then what am I supposed to do? Live with the fact that my kind’s existence was over an incestuous bet that caused an extremely horny god to make my species out of… ugh, I don’t even want to be reminded what we’re made out of!” Twilight flopped her head on the sandy ground and groaned. “This is the worst deeply guarded secret ever.”

“Well, I wouldn’t call it the worst.” A smile crept like an approaching storm on Poseidon’s comely features. “In fact, one other species probably has it worse than your species does.”

“I find that hard to believe after the events that just transpired,” Twilight said, her muzzle still in the sand.

“Oh really? Do you recall how minotaurs appear to have the head of a bull but body of a man?”

Twilight slowly lifted her face up from the sand. “Yeah?”

Poseidon chuckled, tapping his temple. “Think about that. How exactly do you suppose their species sprung up?”

“Well, a bull and a man would have to… to…” Twilight’s face turned green again.

“Actually, interestingly enough, it was a bull and woman that did it.” Poseidon grimaced. “My brother, Zeus, had some crazy-weird fetishes going on. Like, even by my standards the dude was just… ugh.”

“So, it was a woman and a bull. How would that even work?” Twilight asked. “I mean, wouldn’t there be a size difference of some sort?”

“Indeed there was.”

“And the birthing process would be…”

“Indeed it was.”

“And the—”

“Before you ask, yes. Yes it was. Horribly. It got everywhere!”

Twilight stared at Poseidon for several seconds, teetering on her hooves for several seconds as she continued to retain eye contact with him without blinking. Then she vomited all over the ocean floor.

“Oh, come on, I just had that sand cleaned and steamed!”

Author's Notes:

Remember, don't spoil anything too much in the comments!