Dreamspark Ink sighed once more, pushing the vegetables on her plate around joylessly as she lay her head down to rest beside her plate.

Across from the mare her friend, Jack Hammer, threw her some worried looks. His own plate was empty, and he noted with some dissatisfaction that he had finally succeeded in removing every last crumb from it. He wouldn’t be able to pretend he was still eating much longer, and he knew Ink would feel even worse than she already did were she to realise she was making him wait.

Several other ponies eating nearby looked at her quizzically. A beautiful mare moping outside on such a bright and sunny day was a rather odd sight, after all.

And she was beautiful, Jack mused. Her long, fuchsia-coloured mane somehow fit her emerald green eyes perfectly, and her white coat was a sight to behold, with the way it sometimes seemed to change colour if you held your head just right and the sun reflected off of it in exactly the right way.

While those were the things that attracted him personally, he knew that a great many other ponies mostly noticed her cutie mark. It looked like a random collection of ink blots and to Jack it had never made much sense. Still, everypony else always seemed convinced they recognized some creature or object in it, and so far Jack had never heard two ponies agree with each other on the subject.

He preferred his own cutie mark, a simple hammer over a piece of wood. It got the message across: he was there to build and fix things. But artsy types just didn’t ‘do’ to the point, he supposed.

Still, when he looked at the vibrant collection of colours on her, he wished his were a little less dull. A dark brown mane, brown eyes and a light brown coat got the job done, but he was far from smashing.

He stopped to think about that for a moment. Why did these thoughts only come to him when he was around Dreamspark? She was colourful, sure, but so were many other ponies...

“Come on Spark, you have got to eat something,” Jack pleaded with her. The mare shoved some of her carrots around in response, before looking at him from the corner of her eyes.

“Oh Jack, what should I do?” she asked with a desperate tone in her voice, before sighing yet again.

“Empty your plate, for one...” Jack replied, earning an angry look from Dreamspark as she lifted her head up off of the table. Well, at least she wasn’t moping around anymore.

“Very funny, Jack. You know perfectly well what I mean. I haven’t sold a single painting in months - not one! And I can’t even blame anypony for not wanting any of my recent work; I’ve never felt so bad about even trying to sell a piece in my life,” she said sadly. “What I wouldn’t do for some inspiration right about now...”

“Awww, it’s not that bad,” Jack protested. “You just need to take your mind off of it for a bit, that’s all.” He looked pensive for a moment. “And I think I know just the thing... Ever heard about Astral Reality?”

The quizzical look she gave him provided all the answers he needed. “Ok, look... euh, it’s like... It’s a game, basically, but it feels like you are right in the game. Like you’re in the, erm... ‘world’ of the game,’ he concluded somewhat incoherently.

Spark raised an eyebrow at him and the stallion sighed. “Look, it’s got something to do with magic, alright? I’m terrible at explaining things.”

The mare nodded, this at least she knew to be true. She kept silent and allowed her friend to finish speaking, her frown conveying her skepticism. “It came out of Canterlot; they set up an AR store by the northern river just last week. I checked it out. It was a lot of fun. I went back a few times, even. Let’s go play it out together, huh? Come on, what do you say?”

Dreamspark considered it for a few moments, tapping a hoof against her chin. “Well, I don’t know...” she started, but then she noticed Jack staring at her pleadingly with that innocent face of his. She sighed as she realised she lost the exchange; turning down Jack felt like keeping food from a baby kitten at times. “Pah, fine...”

Not even fifteen minutes later the two of them were standing outside the shop in question. Dreamspark couldn’t recall ever having seen a building there before, so the entire thing was probably brand new, something the fresh paint job attested to. That explained why Jack, of all ponies, knew of something like this before she did: if a new building was to be erected in Ponyville, he’d be amongst the first to hear about it.

A sign by the door proudly announced the shop’s name for all to see, ‘Lucid Dreams’. Ink didn’t see what was so dreamy about the place. It looked just like the many buildings around it - except bigger. Much bigger than a simple store had any right to be, in fact. They only needed a counter and some storage, right? This place reminded her more of an inn.

Jack stepped forward and pushed open the door with a hoof, holding it open as he bowed and stepped aside, allowing Dream to pass. “After you, milady.”

She smiled despite her foul mood; the effort Jack put into making her feel better was quite endearing. She was lucky to have a friend like him here in Ponyville, who made her think less of the ones she’d left behind back in Trottingham.

Dreamspark’s mouth fell open in awe as she walked into the store. As mundane as the exterior had been, so extraordinary was the interior. The walls were lined with shelves - even behind the counter - which were stacked full with gems of various sizes and descriptions. Some were mounted on some manner of pedestal, while others seemed to be part of crown- or tiara-like jewelry. It only took Dream a few moments to realise every pedestal matched one or more crowns or tiaras in material and design, which was the only reason she didn’t assume they had wandered into some kind of jewellery shop by mistake.

As Jack stepped into room behind her, the sound of a door opening to their left announced the arrival of one of the shop assistants, a filly with a cyan mane and a vaguely green coat who looked just old enough for Dream to suspect that this was her first real job. She smiled at the two of them from behind the counter.
“Good afternoon, how may I be of service to you today?” she said with a surprisingly soft and soothing voice.

“Ah, hello,” Jack replied as he walked up to the counter, with a confused Dreamspark in tow. “We’ll have a room, please... I think two hours will do,” he said with a little nod to the clerk.

“But of course, sir,” the filly said cheerily. “That’ll be two bits and two spurs each, please.”

Jack quickly produced five golden coins and put them on the counter. “I’ll cover for both of us,” he told the clerk as he looked Dreamspark - who was already opening her mouth - in the eyes, dissuading her from speaking out against his generosity.

The store filly quickly swept the coins off the counter and into the register before disappearing into the backroom, returning moments later with a crown and a tiara, both fashioned out of copper with a purple gem set at the fronts. She stepped out from behind the counter and put them on Jack and Dream’s heads, respectively.

Spark still didn’t understand any of it, but she shrugged and decided to just play along for now. And, she had to admit, wondering about all of this was taking her mind off of her monetary problems.

“This way please,” the shop pony said as she pushed open a door in the wall opposite to the entrance, leading Jack and Dreamspark through the hallway that lay beyond. They passed several doors both on their right and left, but eventually the store filly stopped in front of a door that looked identical to all the others.

She held it open for the pair and motioned for them to head inside. “Here we are. I hope you’ll have lots of fun, and I’ll see you again in two hours!” she exclaimed cheerfully.

Jack stepped into the room without hesitation, and Spark shuffled in behind him, turning her head to mutter some words of thanks to the clerk before letting the door fall shut. When she finally directed her attention towards the room in front of her, she was dumbfounded for a moment. The only things in the room were two beds against the walls and a large amethyst suspended from the ceiling like some sort of chandelier, that was it. Apart from those, the room was completely bare.

She glared at Jack angrily. He must’ve felt the her daggerlike gaze dig into his back, since he turned around to look at her. “What’s up?” he asked nervously.

“What’s UP?” she yelled at him. “I’m not exactly sure what passes for distracting a mare from her troubles here, Jack Hammer, but I’m sure I don’t like the look of this!”

The stallion let out another confused “Wha-?” as he looked around the room. Suddenly he broke into laughter as he realised exactly what Dreamspark was going on about. “Oh, I see! Ahahaha, you thought... that that I, hehe... and we... ohohoho!”

The stallion supported himself against the wall for a few seconds, gaining him more angry looks from the mare as he tried to steady his breathing and get himself under control. “Heh, seriously Spark, you know me better than that! The beds are there so you won’t feel like you’ve been lying on the floor for two hours when the session is over. That’s all. Now come on! It’ll start in a minute or so, and you don’t want to be caught standing there when it does,” he said as he hopped onto one of the beds and made himself at home.

She was more confused than ever now, albeit admittedly relieved that her suspicions had been unfounded. She cautiously stepped onto one of the beds and lay down on her stomach, facing Jack.

“So what is the tiara for?” she asked.

“To establish the link,” Jack said matter-of-factly.

Spark looked at him quizzically for a moment before she opened her mouth, clearly intent on demanding he elaborate. Yet before she could speak more than a single syllable, the amethyst in the center of the room began to glow, and the question died on her lips. Surges of energy arced from the gem to the jewelry upon the two ponies’ brows, and the room spun before Dreamspark’s eyes.

The room’s colours swirled around her, like a vortex carrying her towards her destination. When everything finally stopped spinning she found herself floating in a vast expanse of greyness, all alone. She tried shouting for Jack a few times, but no answer came. Despite all this she felt oddly at peace, as if something there was telling her to stay calm and rest easy.

“Welcome.” a strangely hollow, personality-less voice rang out behind her. She turned around to face what she thought to be a pony, but it was hard to tell. It was as if someone had started on the line work for a full-body sketch and then simply left it at that, never bothering to really give the drawing any colour or essence.

She tried to study the thing more closely, but found it incredibly hard to keep her gaze focused on it. The more she tried the more she seemed to simply look through it, not unlike the way in which water eludes those who try to grab hold.

“Who are you?” she asked. “No, wait, scratch that. What are you? And where are we?”

“I am your avatar, here to assist you. We are in character creation,” the creature said with its unnatural voice, although Spark couldn’t distinguish any mouth the words could’ve originated from.

None of what it said made any sense to her, and further questions kept giving her the same answers, as if that was all the thing knew to say.

But she was smart enough to realise this all had to be part of that strange game somehow, and Jack would never have brought her here if there was any danger whatsoever. She was certain of that, so it couldn’t hurt to simply play along for the time being. She sighed.

“Alright, alright. Just, euh... Tell me what to do, I guess...” she mumbled.

The creature bowed its head and waved a hoof, and the greyness between Dreamspark and the avatar twisted and turned until the mare stood face-to-face with three more silhouettes not unlike the avatar, but more clearly outlined.

They still looked like unfinished sketches, but it didn’t take her any effort to continue looking at them, and she could make out a lot more details.

The wings on one of them clearly marked it as a pegasus, and the horn on the middle one was unmistakably a unicorn’s. The third one lacked both of these features; an earth pony. Somehow simply looking at them filled her head with facts and figures, as if she was looking at a list detailing the strengths and weaknesses of each of the three races.

A lot of the information made sense to her; it was, after all, well known that an earth pony’s endurance outshone that of the other two, or that pegasi were, by and large, the most agile. But why did she keep thinking ‘Pegasi have the least affinity for magic.’ whenever she looked at that one? That didn’t make any sense, pegasi couldn’t use magic at all! Right?

“Choose a race,” the avatar said with the emotional charge of a damp pancake.

“Euh, earth pony?” she stammered as she blinked in confusion.

The avatar simply nodded and walked straight into the earth pony still standing there. The shape seemed to cling to its own, and soon there was no telling them apart. The avatar had effectively taken on a new appearance, and Dreamspark breathed a breath of relief; she felt she’d have gotten a huge headache sooner or later if she had had to look at its original form much longer.

The unicorn and the pegasus faded into the greyness, and Dreamspark finally caught on to what was going on: She was creating a character, just like the avatar had said. She wasn’t exactly sure how this character would tie into the game yet, but at least she had some idea as to what was happening.

Two shadowy figures rose up out of the greyness again, replacing the pegasus and unicorn that had vanished just a moment before. This time the shapes were both unmistakably earth ponies, one clearly male, the other undoubtedly female. She hadn’t realised how androgynous the avatar had looked before, but compared to the two standing there it was hard to miss.

The avatar started to speak again, but she already knew what he was going to ask.

“Choose a sex,” it simply said.

“Female,” Dreamspark immediately replied.

The avatar nodded and repeated the process of walking into the shape representing her choice, slimming down slightly and acquiring a more feminine head in the process. Dreamspark was pleased to see that this latest transformation had finally given the avatar a mouth - the disembodied voice had been creeping her out ever so slightly.

The avatar waved a hoof again and the greyness changed and shifted at her unspoken command. When the metaphorical dust settled Dreamspark spotted eight colourful circles on the “floor” - for want of a better word - each containing an illustration depicting a pony carrying out some sort of activity, and ten round holes surrounded each of the circles.

Out of the first three pictures one showed a pony lifting a heavy object, while another showed a pegasus running at top-speed and the last one displayed a somepony taking hits. Just like before with the three races, simply looking at one of the pictures flooded Dreamspark’s mind with a list of information. She was able to tell at a glance that the first picture represented strength, and exactly what having a lot of strength was good for. Then again, she mused, so could a schoolfilly without any help at all.

Some of the other pictures were less straightforward though, to the point where they raised more questions than they answered. Exactly what was “divine magic” and how did it tie into wisdom? What exactly did they mean when they said stamina increased your “health”? What kind of game was this anyway?

“Determine attributes,” the avatar said, and Dreamspark was pleased to note the voice didn’t sound completely hollow anymore. Instead, it had a vaguely feminine quality which gave it a certain warmth which it had lacked up until then.

As soon as attributes were mentioned Dream’s attention was drawn towards a stack of small discs lying at the avatar’s hooves, something she had managed to overlook up until now.

“Erm, what?” she asked.

“Put the discs into the holes. The amount you put into an attribute will be added to the base value for your chosen race, determining your starting value. Attributes affect how effective you are at a given task, together with your skill in that task, which you’ll have to build up over time,” the avatar explained.

Spark nodded slowly, trying to take all of that in. With eighty holes and only thirty discs she knew she’d have to make some sacrifices here or there, but she had a pretty good idea what she wanted to do already. She put only two discs into each of the physical attributes; she’d never liked sports much and hardly considered herself an athlete.

She put four each into wisdom, luck and intelligence, since four corresponded most closely to an average score if you took into account the amount of discs compared to the amount of circles, and she didn’t consider herself to be either wise, intelligent or lucky, but not ignorant, stupid or unlucky either.

That left her with ten discs to put into charisma, which she promptly did. With charisma governing the arts as well as “force of personality” - something Dreamspark equated with imagination, originality and creativity in her mind - how could she not have?

The avatar looked at her expectantly as she put the last disc in place and checked her work to see if she hadn’t messed up somewhere. That didn’t appear to be the case.

“Alright, that should be it,” she told the avatar, who promptly nodded and walked over to the first circle, so that all of the circles were in a line in front of her on the floor.

The shadowy mare stepped forward onto the first one and suddenly a red light flared up all around her, as two orbs of the same colour detached themselves from the two discs Dreamspark had put in that circle. They flew around the avatar’s head for a few seconds before floating to her chest, sinking into it as they were absorbed completely.

The process repeated itself as the avatar continued onwards, each time with a new circle and new colours. Every time the avatar absorbed a new set of orbs, her form seemed to change to match.

After walking over the physical attributes her muscles were more clearly visible, her gait more refined and ever-so-slightly more elegant, compared to what it had been before. The mental attributes of course didn’t do much in terms of outward appearance, but they affected how the avatar carried herself. She seemed to become more self-aware, prouder and tangible in a way that Ink couldn’t really describe.

The silver-coloured charisma circle brought about the biggest change, and from one moment to the next Dreamspark felt her heart fill with admiration for the avatar, and a little voice at the back of her head whispered she’d probably be fun to talk to.

Spark was convinced the intensity of the reaction was mostly thanks to seeing the avatar go from nothing to this in a single flash. Without that contrast the effect on her would probably not have been this big, or at the least somewhat more subtle.
Still, she was pleased with what she was seeing.

“So what’s next?” she asked excitedly. She was still none the wiser about the purpose of this entire process, but she had to admit she was having fun. Putting together a pony in her own image step-by-step was a blast!

The avatar waved a hoof and the circles disappeared, but this time nothing appeared in their stead. Dream was about to ask what was going on when the avatar said “Choose an appearance,” and Spark was pleased to hear her voice had changed once more. On top of being female in nature, it was now also soft, soothing and generally pleasing to listen to.

Dreamspark looked around for some kind of tool or device to set the appearance with, like the attribute circles before, but nothing appeared.

“Erm, so how do I do that?” she finally asked the avatar.

“Simply imagine or command it, and so it shall be,” the creature immediately replied.

For a moment Ink was tempted to command her to “Copy me”, but the imagination option intrigued her. Surely that thing wouldn’t be able to see into her mind? She closed her eyes and pictured herself as she recalled from photographs and mirrors, going by several things her friends had told her as well.

She’d heard a lot of those friends comment on the way in which the colour of her coat sometimes shifted slightly in the light, but she had sadly never been in a position to witness it herself. She just couldn’t seem to get quite the right angle. Nevertheless, she was determined to include it in her design, so she incorporated it as best she could imagine.

She opened her eyes and immediately drew in a sharp breath of air as she stood eye to eye with herself. The similarity was so uncanny, it was like looking into a mirror. Well, not exactly like a mirror, Dreamspark mused as she noted one dissimilarity; she had way overdone the shifting colours on the avatar’s coat.

It had gained an almost iridescent quality, the colours shifting in the corners of Dream’s eyes whenever she turned her head. Only when she held her head still and looked directly at the avatar did she appear fully white, but as soon as either one of them moved even the teeniest tiniest bit a pearlescent sheen appeared.

The effect was quite captivating, and she wouldn’t have minded just staring at it for a bit longer.

“Is this satisfactory?” the avatar asked, breaking her out of her fascination.

“Your voice, can you make it mimic mine?” Dreamspark requested.

“But of course,” the avatar replied, and Spark was pleased to hear that her request had already been granted, although it retained that soothing, pleasing quality.

“Choose a name.”

“Dreamspark will do, right?” she said uncertainly, but the avatar only nodded. “So are we done?”

“One last thing,” the avatar said as she looked her creator in the eye. “You are allowed to barter for one wish or special request.”

“Erm, a wish?” Dreamspark said ponderously. “Hmmm, how about... Unbridled imagination!” she giggled before breaking into a dorky grin. It was more than a little cheesy and she was convinced the avatar would refuse it out-of-hoof.

She was all the more surprised when the avatar nodded again. “In return you will be unable to make another’s style your own, do you accept?”

Spark frowned. As an artist she took great pride in her own style anyway, so what the avatar was suggesting wasn’t exactly a problem for her. Then again her request had been nonsensical as well, so in effect she stood to gain and lose nothing from the entire deal. She was fine with that.

“Alright, I accept,” she said.

The avatar smiled and bowed her head. “Then it is done. Goodbye.”

“Wait!” she yelled. “What do you mean goo-”

She didn’t get to finish her sentence as the avatar came running straight towards her at full speed, already too close for Dreamspark to react.

She braced for an impact that never came, as the avatar’s form simply fused with her own, not unlike what had happened when she chose a race earlier. For a dizzying moment, she felt like she was not one, but two ponies, before everything finally fell into place.

Without giving her even a moment to relax a grey vortex sprung up around her and carried her away. When she could see again she was no longer in the wasteland. Instead, she had somehow been transported to the middle of a grassy clearing amidst tall trees, on what appeared to be a bright and sunny day. The middle of the clearing - where she was standing - had been marked by a series of poles and ropes, and a wooden sign reading “Bronzewood Forest: Spawn Area”, whatever that meant.

“Ah, Dreamspark, you’re here!” a familiar voice rang out from behind her, and she turned around to face its owner.

“Jack!” she said as she started walking over to him. He looked exactly like he always had, albeit slightly more muscular. She was about to ask him about that when she noticed an assortment of colours playing around in the corner of her eyes. As she looked down she realised it was the iridescent sheen of her own coat, the sun reflecting on her as she walked. “Oh! So I... and the avatar... ?” she managed to stutter. Jack simply laughed and broke into a smile.

“Welcome,” he said as he lifted a hoof and motioned at everything around them, “to Eternia!”