Have you ever wondered what it would be like to partake in a high-stakes adventure against bitter rivals in a magical steampunk fantasy? Well, you can keep wondering. This story promises just that, but with only two chapters and a hiatus stretching three years, it fails to deliver.

Instead of donning our pith helmets and strapping on our saddlebags for wild, steamy adventure, let us instead roll down our stockings, pick up a shovel, and see if we can't get our hooves dirty looking for buried treasure in this ye olde fanfiction. Hopefully, we shall encounter something other than snakes.

In a steampunk-inspired setting where Equestria is ruled not by immortal Princesses but by a democratically-elected Emperor, two rival casts of characters compete to find treasure left behind by Nightmare Moon.

This description is short and to the point. It gives hints of the AU setting without explaining everything in great detail. It also gives us the bare bones of the upcoming conflict without spoiling anything. I think as far as hooks go, this one does a decent job.

It's nice to see a story that's well presented, though I do notice that it has a longer title in the cover art, for some reason. I presume that Alyosha Cartwright is an alias of the author, Eldorado.

Main cast consists of a mix of my own creations and favorites from the show. All mane 6 will have at least one appearance before the end, as will some of my favorite villains and side characters.

Based on the cover art, the main cast consists of four OCs, Celestia, Nightmare Moon, and Philomena. I'm not sure what promising all those cameos accomplishes. While it'd be interesting to see how the main six live out their lives in a steampunk world, it's better to introduce characters as they become relevant to the plot rather than just going through a checklist of forced appearances.

Moving on, let's see what lies ahead in Chapter one: 1 - End of Days

Princess Celestia awoke to the sensation of cold stone biting into the side of her face. Her body lay twisted on the floor, her limbs sore and aching. Her once-immaculate ivory coat was sullied with a fine layer of ash and soot. She lethargically lifted her head, taking a look around. Flames were climbing up the velvet curtains in the window, and all the stained glass lay in scattered shards on the floor. Her grand four-poster bed had been crushed into firewood under a falling column. Smoke hung thick near the ceiling in a suffocating black cloud that dimly reflected the eerie orange light of the fire she heard roaring all around her.

Shaky limbs struggled to heave her broken body upwards into the closest approximation of a standing position she could manage. Bits of stone and wood slid off her coat, along with some of the dust and ash. She coughed, fighting her own weight as she tried to get her hooves underneath her and stand. As soon as she was upright, Celestia’s entire skeleton lit up with blinding pain, her fractured bones protesting her movement with their agonizing screams. Tears welled up in her eyes and rolled down her face, mixing with the dirt and grime. Celestia winced and strained to hold her balance, her vision blurred and barely comprehensible. She heard a few beams fall out of the ballroom ceiling far off down the corridor, brought down by the fire sweeping through the castle. The chandeliers jingled as they were struck by falling debris from the ornate hoof-carved ceiling. Celestia hung her head in despair. She should have seen this coming.

Sorry for the long quote, but I want to point out just how beautifully this is written. These paragraphs are thick with vivid, engaging description. Note the way that visual imagery is interlaced with sensations of touch, pain, and sound. By mixing the senses, we don't just see the scene, we experience it. This commands attention and is a strong way to open the story. Yet, this story's overall rating is only 31-6. I would have expected something with such solid prose to draw more attention, so there must be something lurking ahead that turns people off.

A quick aside: Due to this story's overall length, I'll be providing more of an outline than a full summary.

Continuing on, this story goes through a series of flashbacks that tell of Luna's growing resentment and her eventual betrayal and rise as Nightmare Moon. There are a couple of problems here, and they're not just due to the fact that several pieces have been invalidated by season four canon.

First of all, Celestia constantly blames herself and beats herself up over how 'obvious' Luna's betrayal was in retrospect and how much she deserved it, yet, there's hardly anything to support that line of reasoning. When Luna bemoaned about feeling unappreciated, Celestia's response was to offer praise and wing-hugs. She also respected Luna's obvious desire for privacy, and the one time she did make a stupid error, she apologized for it. Those are not the actions of a pony who 'obviously' drove her sister past the crumbling edge of her sanity with extreme jealousy. About all I can blame Celestia for is being an eternal optimist.

Secondly, Luna doesn't have much of a personality and her actions honestly don't make sense. She comes off as being a whiny bitch who's completely unreasonable. Celestia's constant self-depreciation tries to paint Luna in the right, but it just doesn't work with nothing to support it. The story seems to realize this, and comes up with additional goofball excuses that also don't work.

Luna was merely a filly in the body of a Princess, understandably confused about the nature of her role in society.

Luna had been young when they found the Elements of Harmony and vanquished Discord, and even centuries of leadership and real-world responsibility hadn’t purged the adolescence from her.

Luna was still very young inside, hardly a filly when Celestia decided to drag her into standing beside her against Discord. It was likely she would never grow out of it now, not within any conventional measure of time anyway.

According to snippets like these, Luna is a little filly trapped in the body of an immortal princess. (The Elements of Harmony did that.) She does sound immature when she speaks, but the way that she plots behind her sister's back and devotes herself to studying magic shows a level of foresight and maturity that one would not expect from an impulsive, whimsical child. Her transformation into Nightmare Moon wasn't brought on by a tantrum or a fit of jealousy; it was carefully premeditated, and I don't think that a mere child could come up with a plan so intricate as hers.

Well, the story seems to feel the same way, because it tacks on yet another lame excuse for Luna's poor behavior.

“Oh, Luna…” Celestia sighed helplessly under her breath. She’d heard the warnings about the power of the Elements of Harmony before, but always generally disregarded them as harmless superstition and old ponies’ tales. Strong negative emotions coupled with the near-infinite magical power of the Elements could bring about all manner of horrors. Luna’s jealousy went far deeper than Celestia ever imagined possible, much more so than she ever let on. Now, with Celestia deposed and cut off from her own magic, Nightmare Moon was the most powerful being in Equestria, and she was looking for revenge on her sister in the name of the night.

I'm going to go ahead and say NO here. While 'power corrupts' is a common theme in literature, these are the Elements of Harmony, and not the Elements of the Funk Stuck Between Discord's Toes. Well, maybe in this story they are. It personifies them into chaotic beings of their own, which conveniently absolves Luna of her actions since they are to blame and not her. No... just, no. It leaves a foul taste in my mouth to see such an iconic force being maligned for this purpose.

I don't even get it. Luna's an obvious villain here, so why is this story trying so hard to sympathize with her? Is this some kind of 'best pony' syndrome? Anyone know?

“It’s the only way to make them appreciate everything the night has to offer. If any other option exists, they will take it. The only thing I can do is obliterate all other options and leave *only* an eternity of glorious night, and that means getting rid of you and your vaunted daylight, permanently.”

I'm quoting this part to point out a formatting error. Because the flashback sequences are all-italic, the author needed to use something else to emphasize certain words. This is usually done via bold, de-italicizing, or even all-caps. Asterisks though? Flat-out wrong.

So at long last, the flashbacks end and the story catches back up to the present. All and all, the flashback sequence was a slug to get through. Aside from the problems mentioned above, it felt like it dragged on,

and on,

and on,

and on,

and on,

and on,

and on.

Yeah, the pacing's terribly slow, and I feel as though it's mostly due to the way that part of the story is structured. Every time the story jumps back to the present after a flashback, Celestia takes the time to mull it over, and the story re-establishes the setting of the burning castle again. There's an awful lot of repetition, and as soon as Celestia gets moving, the scene cuts off to another flashback. It's about as exciting and action-packed as, well, this.

Lastly, I'd like to point out that the final flashback is the one in which Luna springs her trap and transforms into Nightmare Moon. Yep, that's right; while wandering in the dangerous, deteriorating, smoke-choked, crackling, burning wreckage of her formerly glorious home, Celestia takes the time to relive an event that literally happened five minutes ago.

Thankfully, the pacing picks back up once the story manages to pull itself together. Celestia makes her way to the Elements of Harmony and, uh-oh.

Without the ability to use her horn, Celestia could not bring the power of the Elements to bear against Nightmare Moon. Her struggle had been for nothing; she may as well have been killed upstairs when her sister first launched her coup. Part of her wanted to keep fighting, trying to think of another way to win even despite everything. But she no longer believed it was possible. She had been beaten. Nightmare Moon had won.

Oh look, a wild summery-atus, interrupt-us has appeared! Out of context, it doesn't look like there's anything wrong with this paragraph, but all it accomplishes is to summarize and regurgitate the same exact information that we just read. Don't do this. It hurts the pacing and insults the reader's intelligence.

As a thought experiment, I'd like to imagine printing off this chapter and going through it with a vivid, yellow marker. Highlight every description, idea, and passage that's either a direct repetition, summary, or obvious based on information already provided. Then sit back and ask: who the hell would want to read something that looks like it's been drenched in piss?

“I did some further research into the Elements while you were limping your way down here, and I discovered that the link they forged between us is so strong that it binds our lives together. I could no more easily kill you than you could kill me, and using the Elements themselves as a weapon would end us both. But it is no matter. So long as you are out of the way, locked away somewhere nopony will ever find you, my plans can still proceed.”

If you're wondering why Celestia had been left alone, it's because Nightmare Moon abandoned the battle to read a book. I need more hooves to slap on my face because four just isn't enough. Why, exactly, did Luna never come across this tidbit during the weeks and months that she spent studying the Elements of Harmony in her plot to overthrow Celestia?

Well, in one final gambit, Celestia invokes the only form of magic she has left in an effort to activate the Elements. She succeeds, but the Elements are confused, and they split the universe into parallel dimensions. You might have wondered why I complained about this story not conforming to canon earlier, and that's because this story went through the time and effort to establish the fact that it is, in fact, an alternate dimension. Since we can point to the exact location where the universes diverge, I'm left with the impression that everything prior to this point was meant to conform with the show. How well did it do?

•Luna was not a filly when they confronted Discord. (Season Four—Princess Twilight Sparkle)

•The Elements of Harmony were gems sealed in a hidden chamber and not the bulky stone orbs from season one. (Season Four—Princess Twilight Sparkle)

•Luna's corruption was due to the forces of nightmare, and not the Elements of Harmony. (Nightmare Rarity comic arc)

•Luna's speech was distinctly lacking a certain ham. (Season Two—Luna Eclipsed)

•Luna's night guards were bat ponies and not pegasai. (Season Two—Luna Eclipsed)

While I can't fault the story for not conforming to the comic book or episodes that hadn't aired yet, it was published several months after "Luna Eclipsed" came out. Fail.

One last nitpick on this chapter: Celestia can apparently cause explosions by attempting to move the sun, so I doubt that imprisoning her would actually work.

Well, that's chapter one, and it, uh, establishes the historical background in which this story takes place, I guess? While it's nice and all, I was kinda expecting something a bit more steampunky and adventurey. Maybe chapter two will actually contain something related to this story's premise?

2 - Unrealized Dreams

Do you remember all of that wonderful, vivid imagery at the start of the previous chapter? Well fuck that shit, because all you're getting now is just a color and a race.

“…and with Celestia out of the picture and all Equestria under the command of her newly-formed Empire of the Moon, Nightmare Moon went right to work on finding ways for ponies to survive in an environment of endless night.” The yellow unicorn’s voice echoed off the hard walls of the darkened library. “No small task, mind you, but she did have the Elements of Harmony.”

“Mm-hmm,” the brown stallion lying on the chaise longue across the library absently agreed. The drone of an airship passed lazily overhead, muffled by the manor’s brick walls.

See those scant few details there? Those plus a comic book are all you're getting for the next thousand words. Apparently the history lesson isn't over yet, because yellow unicorn launches into a lengthy lecture that brown stallion actively ignores by lounging and reading his comic book. I can understand that the point here is to dump all the exposition that didn't happen in the useless first chapter, but I'd prefer to see more focus on the immediate setting to better place what's going on. As-is, it's borderline talking head syndrome.

Why did I call the first chapter useless? because we've jumped a thousand years, and according to the history given, both Celestia and Nightmare Moon are dead.

All we know for certain is that Nightmare Moon was cast down and likely killed by the rebels when they marched on Canterlot. Her death would end Celestia, too, whatever was left of her after five and a half centuries of imprisonment. And with the princesses dead, the Elements relinquished power of the sun and moon back to nature itself for the first time since before Discord, allowing for the regular day/night cycle we have today, even without the Princesses’ influence.

Nightmare Moon could be killed by ordinary unicorns because they had a connection to the Elements of Harmony thanks to the false sunlight spell she'd taught them. Since control over the sun and moon is the magic that made Celestia and Luna immortal, having that relinquished back to nature can be taken as proof of their demise.

Thus, I'm left wondering what the point of the first chapter was. Since the characters are dead, the tiny details aren't going to matter. Did we honestly need to see that in-depth, ventricle contraction by ventricle contraction slow motion replay of ancient history? The entire first chapter could have been summarized into a few paragraphs and tacked onto the start of this one and it would have made no difference.

The unicorn sighed as he levitated away the dusty leather-bound book he’d been studying during his lecture. “I shouldn’t be surprised. You’ve lived here for six years, and I can’t for the life of me remember a time when you actually did [listen to me].” He looked absently at the ceiling of the library, pondering the stallion’s existence. “I don’t get it. Wasn’t learning a few things about history the whole reason you took this job?”

The comic book fell to the stallion’s lap, his eyes half-closed with detached apathy. “No, I took the job because it sounded like an easy gig,” he stated. The comic book rose again and obscured his eyes, but he lowered it almost immediately when he realized how he must have looked lying there sprawled out on the chaise longue. “And it is.”

By the pulsating pectorals of Biceps the Bulk! I don't even know his name yet, and already I detest this brown pony. He was HIRED to act like a useless lazy jerk? What the actual fuck! He's exceptionally crass and shows no respect for his employer! His unwashed flea-bitten hide should be out in the cold, sleeping in the gutters, not wallowing in a life of luxury that he doesn't deserve!

And...

It gets worse...

He's also a young adult with no cutie mark, and his name is Sky Shadow, which is edgy and makes no sense for an earth pony.

Ostensibly, [Dr. Ersatz Lexicon—the yellow unicorn] had hired Shadow to take care of the manor in exchange for the privilege of inhabiting it, but all he had truly wanted was a captive audience to spew random strings of historical information at while he pored over his books as a way of reliving his glory days at the university. Since then, the two of them had spent most of their days together in the extravagant Lexicon Manor’s immense library, where the last surviving pony of the historic Lexicon family’s genealogical line frittered away the remaining few decades of his existence by burying his muzzle in various books about history and going on long-winded lectures to a selectively deaf handyman who would rather fritter his own existence away with his muzzle buried in a choose-your-own-adventure-style Daring Do comic book. It was far from an exciting life, but it did make the both of them content. [Emphasis mine]

Oh look! Sky Shadow's being praised for something that he DOESN'T EVEN DO! Excuse me for a moment while I go vomit through my nose so that I can experience a more pleasurable form of agony.

Mail arrives and we finally learn about the treasure that this story is supposed to be seeking. It's a place called the Nightmare Vault, and I'll let Lexicon describe it since talking seems to be his special talent and he's hopelessly desperate for an actually captive audience.

“It’s where Nightmare Moon hid all the valuables from Canterlot when the unicorn rebellion destroyed her magic, so they couldn’t take it all for themselves,” Lexicon explained as he stepped quickly down the sweeping grand staircase in the manor’s cavernous entrance hall. “It’s the greatest treasure in Equestrian history, a legendary legacy of wealth beyond anything you or I could even imagine. But Nightmare Moon covered her tracks very well, and what little evidence she left behind was largely destroyed in the rebellion. Hundreds of ponies have tried to find it over the centuries, but nopony ever has. Some hit dead ends and gave up, some came back badly injured, and some never returned at all. One way or another, every last one of them failed, even—” Lexicon reached the front door and flung it open with his magic.

Not to rain on his parade, but Celestia's prison was never found either, so her remains are obviously going to be there as well. And yes, in this story, Daring Do was a real adventurer who also failed at cracking the Nightmare Vault.

Sky Shadow continues to be a douche by lying to the mail pony for no good reason, but at least we've finally hit upon a subject that matches his narrow, comic book-centric interest. With Daring Do as both a historical figure and a cartoon, they now have common ground and can actually communicate with each other for the very first time.

How do I know that it's their first real conversation since Sky Shadow was hired? Because the topic is Lexicon's life's work: his search for the Nightmare Vault, and Sky Shadow's just learning about it now. Given how much Lexicon likes to talk, and how important the subject is to him, I can't imagine him never saying anything about it before. The only valid explanation is that brown turd takes so much pride in actively not listening that the undusted cobwebs in the dark corners of the room have a better grasp of basic, equine decency than our shitty protagonist. Six years spent living with the guy and Sky Shadow never once heard this subject before? Both of these ponies are pathetic.

“And what if you do? Why are you so interested in this?” Dr. Lexicon’s obsession with the treasure was almost as startling as Sky Shadow’s inexplicable desire to care about something his employer was working on; that had never happened before. [Emphasis mine]

I hate it when authors force their characters to do things for reasons that they actively tell us they can't explain. If they don't know why their characters act the way they do, then how are we, as readers, supposed to follow along?

Well, since this story can't find a reason for Sky Shadow's interest, I'll go ahead and provide one: It's because having a no-good, festering, apathetic lump as a main character in an adventure story is an awful, stupid idea. Thus, this story would rather just ignore his obvious character flaws than attempt to build a well-rounded character who actually suffers from them.

This rare gem of proper character interaction was apparently a fleeting moment, because Sky Shadow goes back to actively reading comic books. Though, to be fair, it was Lexicon who turned him away. I can't blame him really; I'd be surprised too if the detritus on my couch suddenly got up and started talking to me.

Since we're following Sky Shadow and he's reading comics, we actually get to read the book that he's reading. I'd complain, but this part is done well.

CRACK! CRUNCH! The ancient stone doors parted, opening up the way into the passage beyond. Daring Do, the intrepid adventurer, and Valor, the earth stallion she’d met back in the Njama Kifaa Bazaar in zebra country, stared into the abyss before them, wary of what they may find. Steeling themselves, they went inside, their hooves tap-tapping on the cobbles. As they passed through the door, the darkness spread out into the distance all around them.

“This has to be it,” said Valor’s voice from the darkness. “But I can’t see a thing!”

“Here’s a torch,” Daring do replied. She pulled it blindly off the wall. “You still have that book of matches?”

“Of course.” Valor produced a little wooden stick and struck it on his front hoof. The tiny little orange flicker cast enough light for him to see the torch Daring Do had found. He touched the match to the top of it and Whoosh! The torch flooded the corridor with light. At the far end, a giant gold crown adorned with every type of gemstone imaginable sat on a red velvet pillow atop a sturdy pedestal.

Huh, Daring Do's name is actually miscapitalized in the middle. That's the only typo I've noticed thus far. Regardless, can I have this story instead? It works so well for what it represents that I think I like—Aaah! It has snakes. Er, back to the main event!

Sky Shadow decided he was thirsty. He glanced to his side, and noticed that the cup he’d put on the end table last night was empty. With a reluctant grunt, he closed the book in mid-scene, slid off the side of the bed, and exited for the hallway.

Ack! This lazy bum is so lazy that he can't even finish one laziness before deciding that he wants to be lazy in a different way! And, uh, that didn't make any sense, did it?

Anyway, he gets back up and the water's plot-conveniently placed next to Lexicon so the story can bring them together again. Lexicon's still stumped by the puzzle of the Nightmare Vault, so Sky Shadow steps up to the plate and solves everything. How does he manage this? By being 'part-pegasus,' his mixed heritage gives him access to something called 'pegasus grid code' which is an old form of map co-ordinates used only by pegasai. Lexicon never heard of this because he's a unicorn. Excuse me while I hurl again.

This is stupid! Lexicon's spent his whole life studying ancient texts from all races including maps and he's never once come across something so fundamental to early exploration? The only reason to do this is to paint Sky Shadow as a hero and heap more praise on him that he doesn't deserve! He wouldn't have even known about the code at all if his uncle hadn't forced him to learn it!

Hmm, while I dislike the manner in which it was brought up, I will give this story credit for putting good thought into how things work and for being able to pass that information onto the reader with good clarity.

Shadow bit the pen and took it to the globe, his uncle’s words sounding in his ears. “That first ‘2’ should mean ‘northern hemisphere,’ so I’ll only do that half to save time.” Lexicon watched him draw long vertical lines from the planet’s poles down to the equator, spacing them every few hundred miles. He went all the way around, then drew in more lines horizontally. So far, it looked like the same basic idea as latitude and longitude, except the lines didn’t match up and the system was based not on the intersection of any two given lines but instead on the spaces left in the middle. Once he was done drawing, they had to count.

This a sample of how the grid code works, and with the full instructions shown in the story, I could almost pinpoint a location myself given a different set of coordinates. All I'd need would be more information on the first number if it happened to differ from two. My only real complaint about the code itself is that it requires a globe to work, and even if the world is round (we've seen only flat maps in the show), I wouldn't expect ancient pegasai to know that.

I'd also like to point out that the specific piece of the puzzle that unlocked the location of the vault was not in the Daring Do journal that just arrived, but rather in an older manuscript that Lexicon already had. Thus, if those two had actually talked to each other, they could have solved the puzzle years ago.

Sky Shadow made Lexicon feel sad. He was a bright young colt with plenty of potential; he recalled how to use pegasus grid code based on lessons from an uncle he hadn’t seen in a decade. He’d solved the greatest puzzle Dr. Lexicon had ever worked on, and he’d made Lexicon look stupid while doing it. And he didn’t have his cutie mark yet, had no intentions of ever figuring out what it was supposed to be, and would doubtlessly live the rest of his life reading works of fiction instead of actually living his life. Dr. Lexicon shook his head.

Ugh, way to rub in how 'amazing' Sky Shadow is while trying to make us feel sorry for him. My nasal passages are already clogged with vile fluids and I don't think that I can dry-heave any more.

Well, with the location of the vault pinpointed, they decide to commission an airship and the chapter ends.

How well did it do? I dunno, I was kinda expecting something a bit more steampunky and adventurey. We did get some adventure, but I'm not sure if it counts since it was from an oil-fracking comic book! In two chapters, we have yet to see anything even remotely resembling steampunk technology.

Sky Shadow might be a vile abomination whose mere presence threatens to sabotage any enjoyment that one could garner from reading this fic, but the story does have a lot of good points and it was one of the more engaging ones that I've read. The detail, when present, is exquisite. The world-building shows a high level of thought, and aside from a few formatting errors, the grammar and overall presentation is neigh-impeccable. It does seem predictable, though, but I can't tell because no other chapters have been published. I can, however, make some guesses:

•The rival team will have the missing page from the Daring Do book and thus know the vault's location as well.

•The rivals will be painted as 'evil' simply because they're working against Sky Shadow.

•Sky Shadow will solve a crucial puzzle in the vault thanks to comic books. (Even though it was revealed that the comics are mostly creative works and only loosely based on fact.)

•Sky Shadow's special talent will turn out to be adventuring, thus conveniently nullifying his sedentary lifestyle. Who needs actual training and finely honed skills when you've got a cutie mark in freeloading destiny?

•Celestia will somehow still be alive in the vault (petrified or something), and when she's freed, Nightmare Moon will return too.

•Sky Shadow and Lexicon will work with Celestia, while the rivals work with Nightmare Moon to recover the lost Elements of Harmony.

Okay, those last two are pretty wild guesses, but they are what I'd expect after reading this setup.

Angsty Alicorn Award: I've avoided using the term, but Sky Shadow is a definite Gary Stu.

Conspicuous Contrivances Award: This medal is related to the above. It might sound like I've picked on Sky Shadow simply for being a lazy jerk, but that's not the case. I wouldn't mind his personality if the story was realistic about it. Whenever I said that he got something that he didn't deserve, what I meant was that the story warped reality to give him a freebie for reasons such as avoiding conflict, dodging character development, or simply to make him look special.

Case in point: Sky Shadow randomly has a job that he doesn't qualify for, and solves the puzzle that Lexicon devoted his life to in less than five minutes because of racial knowledge that somehow only he has.

Shoddy Script Award: It's generally not a good idea to start a story with a different story. That gets the readers deeply invested in the entirely wrong set of characters! There's a reason that prologues are generally short and telly. The lecture at the start of chapter two did this right, but with chapter one the way it is, I'm left with the impression that the entire story is supposed to be about Celestia and Nightmare Moon.

Unfortunate Letdown Medal: Given how strong certain aspects of this story are, it's a shame to see the whole thing dragged down by poor treatment of its characters.

Good Sport Ribbon: Supposedly, the author requested a review, though I never was able to track that comment down. So who knows? It could be a trap.

How can this story be improved?

If you are planning to get back to this, it might be for the best just to bite the bullet and take off that first chapter. At this point, it's far removed from the show's canon and Luna's characterization is weird and hard to justify anyway. It's not really a great experience to read something and keep thinking, Well this sure aged poorly. With structural problems on top of that, it'd be hard to fix without a major rewrite, though it would be a shame to lose such lovely descriptions. Perhaps if Celestia and Nightmare Moon do return, the relevant bits could be added back in as needed. Alternatively, chapter one could be decoupled from the main story and published independently as a side story or prequel.

Speaking of description, chapter two could definitely use more of that, particularly at the start. The entire manor house shouldn't consist of just a library and a couch. Fill it out more and add some actual steampunk stuff too. Lexicon's rich enough to afford some luxury items. The show itself occasionally uses that style of machinery [1] [2(background)] [3], so it shouldn't be hard to work something in.

As for fixing Sky Shadow's overpowering fetid rancidness, that might take some thought. What really makes a Stu a Stu is the way the story treats the character and warps itself unrealistically around him. Take Lexicon, for example. He's an elderly scholar who's devoted to his studies and just needs a helping hoof to take care of menial tasks. Apprenticing somepony who can keep the manor tidy while also aiding in his research would be ideal. There's absolutely zero reason for him to hire and keep on an ungrateful oaf who admits to enjoying a free ride and who refuses to listen to any lectures and hardly even does any work!

Imagine instead, if, say, Sky Shadow was Lexicon's illegitimate son who wound up fobbed on his real father's doorstep after his mother's affair was exposed and her marriage crumbled. That's a more believable scenario, and it'd paint the way for character conflict and drama. Which, I'd like to add, is more intriguing than an inexplicably harmonious parasitic relationship.

What it really boils down to is this: as long as every character is a distinct individual who acts realistically according to his/her own interests, there shouldn't be any problem with Stu-ness. If you can manage that, your readers will be less inclined to attempt to scour their brains with their own stomach acids in a futile attempt to forget that your character exists.

If you're not planning to get back to this story, then go ahead and give yourself some peace of mind by flagging it as 'cancelled.' Leaving it behind might be painful, but it will free you up to move on to ritzier outdoor dining fields. It's something to ponder over a cup of coffee.