*Chapter retouched 6/10/2020

A day later Twilight found herself pacing around her library, or more specifically the small table in the middle that has the bust of a pony on it. Spike was off to the side, watching her with boredom clearly present in his eyes. Finally, after only a bare ten seconds passing, he finally had enough. He had to know what was eating the purple mare up.

“Twilight, why are you pacing around the library so much? Is there some sort of danger going on that I don’t know about? Because if you keep this up there will be a hole in the floor sooner or later.”

She stopped her pacing when she heard her faithful assistant speak, turning to look at Spike she said, “Oh, Spike. You don’t know the half of it. There’s a military base being built next to Ponyville Lake, and the only reason for that kind of military mobilization is because some ancient evil deity decides to throw down a portal wherever he feels like! Not only that but apparently the elements won’t work this time! Ugh, I need answers!”

Spike rubbed his chin with a claw, looking up in thought when he heard what Twilight said. But she wasn’t done.

“And let’s not forget that deity is the mad god! We know so very little about him despite the fact he has been a large part of the world for several millennia! How do we face something that we honestly know next to nothing about?!”

“Well, why don’t you try and find a way to learn more about the, uh, mad god? Surely the Princesses have some more knowledge tucked away somewhere, or at least a book on it right? And besides, we faced threats we knew nothing about before, right? Sombra is a good example,” Spike replied helpfully.

Twilight sighed, “I wish that was the case Spike. I asked Princess Luna what he was, she only told us what the name of his class of Daedra was, and the species he takes as his form. She didn’t seem to know much else...” Twilight was silent, thinking. She seemed to get an idea though, “I know! I’ll ask the mad god myself!”

“Wait what?”

“Yes! That’s a wonderful idea! Oh, stop looking at me like that Spike, I’m not going into his realm, I’m going to summon him here! There’s a shrine somewhere just east of the lake, in the surrounding forest. Or at least I think so,” Twilight tapped her chin, trying to remember if there actually was a shrine there or not.

Spike still looked unsure, “That still doesn’t seem like a good idea Twilight. The guy is probably called the mad god for a reason right? Who’s to say that he wouldn’t just ignore your question just to torment you?”

“I suppose he could… but I should still try. Maybe he’d be willing to share, he is mad after all and could also be just as likely to tell me what I want to know.”

“Well, if you’re sure about this… But how are you going to summon him anyway? I don’t think there is a spell out there that can summon a god,” said Spike.

Twilight scrunched up her face, her mind trying to remember what was needed for the summoning of the mad god at his shrine. She gave up trying to recall what was needed, her horn lit up and a book was wrapped in her magical aura and floated down in front of her face. With quick precision, the book snapped open and pages flew by, Twilight's eyes darting across the pages and scanning the contents of each one until she finally came across what she was looking for. With a grin, Twilight read, “Let’s see… The book says there are three things one needs to summon him. The first is some string. The second is… a head of lettuce? And the third…” She thought about what the third was until her eyes shot opened wide and her ears fell flat against her head.

“What?! What’s the third?!” shouted Spike.

Twilight licked her now dry lips and shakily said, “The third item is a… soul gem.”

Spike's jaw fell and he gaped, he knew about the laws, he’d have to if he wanted to live in Equestria. He knew soul gems were made illegal in Equestria, he also knew that they were a rare delicacy to dragons, a fact he learnt during the dragon migration as they didn't tend to care about Equestrian laws regarding them. He looked at Twilight, apprehensive about the plan to summon the mad god now.

“Uh, Twilight? This is starting to sound increasingly bad now. Perhaps-”

He was cut off when twilight interjected, not seeming to hear his objection, “But how will I get a soul gem? They are highly illegal and if I get caught… magic kindergarden would be a cakewalk compared to the punishment I’d receive.”

“Exactly! I think you sh-”

He was cut off again, Twilight still not seeming to notice, “But… what if I ask Princess Luna for permission? All I’d have to tell her is that it’s for the sake of learning about our enemy. I’m sure she’d see the reason behind my request. Alright! I’m going to ask her!”

“But-”

“No time Spike! Time is of the essence! I’ll be back home in time for dinner!”

Twilight galloped out of the library, leaving behind an irritated baby dragon. Spike huffed and crossed his arms, “Sure, don’t listen to the baby dragon. Not like he wants to give you some sense or anything.” He stopped his grumbling, rubbed the bridge of his snout, and sighed as he realized there was nothing he could do now except wait for her to return, “Now that she reminds me… what should I do for dinner?”

“Absolutely not Twilight Sparkle,” refused Luna, drinking a cup of tea as the two talked in her personal quarters in the military outpost.

“But why?! We could learn so much if we just simply ask him a few questions!” Twilight begged, suddenly hugging the foreleg of the night princess in a desperate and pleading grasp.

“You do not understand Twilight. What you are suggesting… he could easily try to influence your mind. Try and bring you slowly into madness, rendering the elements but useless trinkets. There is far too much at risk,” Luna shook her head, trying to disentangle her leg from the surprisingly strong grasp of the unicorn.

“But there is so much to gain from it as well! Think about it princess, if we can understand how he came to Equestria then maybe we can begin to better understand his motives! Besides, he can’t manifest his full power in Equestria, right? And I’d guess even less when it’s through his shrine. Can’t you place a protection spell over my mind just for that influence?” Twilight argued.

Luna bit her lower lip and replied, “I… could yes. Mind magic is my specialty so you make a fair point. But I must ask why you feel the need to go so far to learn this information. Even so far as to bring a soul gem into the mix, you know the laws and their reasoning against those dreadful things.”

Twilight released her grip on Luna’s leg, pleased with the small progress, the monarch though was just silently relieved that the death grip on her leg was gone. Twilight looked up at Luna and said, “Because maybe if we learn as much as possible about him, he will be easier to deal with. Elements or not. If he is as powerful as you claim then maybe we should not be trying to deal with this problem with force. Maybe we should be dealing with it in other ways. Ways that don’t involve fighting.”

Luna was silent, thinking over what Twilight said. After a few minutes, she sighed and smiled down at her, “You would make a fine Princess, Twilight. Very well, procuring a soul gem shall be easy for me. We keep all confiscated ones in a secret vault that only a very select few ponies know where to find it. Give me but a moment and I shall return.”

Twilight nodded at the princess, watching her leave in a flash of magic. Luna was not exaggerating when she said she would be back in a moment. The flash of magic signaled her return as the teleportation finished, she appeared before Twilight with a small bag around her neck. The bag gently floated off her neck with her telekinesis, opening to show Twilight the contents.

“This here is what is known as a grand soul gem. ‘Tis the highest tier of normal gems alongside those accursed black ones,” said Luna as she closed the bag and placed it inside Twilight’s saddlebag. “Let me write you a Royal Decree, Twilight Sparkle. Therefore if a guard should happen to see the gem simply show them this and you shall be pardoned and allowed to continue on your journey.”

“Thank you, Princess! Thank you so much!” Twilight's smile grew wide and she squeed a little.

Luna waved her off, quickly writing the decree on a scroll with a quill help in her magic, “Think nothing of it Twilight. I may despise that mad fool with my entire being but I can see the wisdom in knowing more about him. Here,” Luna, after stamping the paper held the scroll aloft in her magic and flew it over into Twilight’s bag, “Now the only thing left is the spell to protect your mind. Stand over there, on the round rug.”

Twilight did as instructed, now in the middle of the room. Luna’s horn glowed with a high amount of magic, temporarily blinding Twilight and making her wince when she looked into it. A trail of wispy magic slowly seeped out of the tip of Luna’s horn, drifting over to Twilight. The magic briefly circled her head, connecting in a wide circle around her forehead and centered over her horn. The magical circle contracted until the spell entered Twilight’s head through the tip of her horn. Once finished Luna’s horn stopped glowing and she started breathing heavily, falling down onto her haunches.

“Are you alright Princess Luna?!” Twilight rushed to help the princess up, concern evident across her face.

“I’m fine, Twilight. That spell required much of my magic to cast, I had to put as much power as possible into it. I do not wish to take chances with something such as this, not when it comes to a friend,” Luna shakily stood up with Twilight's helping hoof, giving her a smile of thanks at the gesture.

“Thank you again, Princess Luna. I’ll be sure to return, with plenty of notes!” Twilight saluted the lunar princess.

“You’re most welcome Twilight. Now hurry along, the sooner you finish this mission of yours the sooner all of this can come to a close and I may cease worrying,” Luna nodded to Twilight, dismissing her. With permission granted Twilight teleported out of the monarch’s room in a bright flash of purple magic, ready to tackle her self-imposed mission.

“Let’s see here... String,” Twilight levitated some string onto the pedestal, “Check. Head of lettuce?” The lettuce followed, “Check. The… soul gem,” The large grand soul gem gently landed next to the lettuce with a small click. “And check! Now I just need to pray to invoke his presence right?” Twilight closed her eyes in front of the shrine of Sheogorath and prayed for him to talk with her.

“Well. Well. Well. Now, who's this that has come to visit the shrine of little old me? Why, this shrine of mine has been quite the host to some interestin' people lately. I do hope it has at least offered you somethin' to eat? But enough about that, I must say that you are an interesting looking one. You breathin’ alright? You look a bit purple! You haven’t been to any weddings recently have you? Nasty business those,” A voice rang in Twilight’s head, though she could not quite place the accent it had to any region of Equestria.

Twilight looked up, ears briefly splaying back in fear when she heard his voice in her head before they righted themselves, but her eyes never lost the sparkle of excitement at this chance, “Hello, my name is Twilight Sparkle, and you must be Sheogorath am I correct? And uh… yeah, my brother’s wedding actually.”

“Why that’s a very good question little lady! Am I him? Is he me? Are me am me? You’re not me are ya?”

Clearing her throat Twilight said, “Er… no I’m not you. But I do have a few questions to ask you if that’s alright of course!”

“Of course you're not me! Much too small, and weak. And purple! No, wait, I have lots of purple on me. Just weak and fragile, so easy to rip apart and sing with your spine! Enough of this spine-tingling pillow talk, maybe I have answers! Or maybe I don’t. Usually, people that call on me don’t exactly have many questions they need answerin', it's mostly just "Paint me across the canvas!" or "Give us some of your divine cheese!". I NEVER share my cheese. I did so once, you know? Had a wheel of my finest fall from the sky of my worshipper. Splattered his corpse all across the clearing, quite rude if you don't mind me saying. Now, what do you want to ask?”

Gulping and wincing at the blatant and casual mention of the brutal murder of one of his own followers, Twilight levitated her notepaper and quill and ink out of her saddlebags. “Well, I’m just curious about you. Like, for example, what you truly are and how you came to Equis!” Twilight grinned as she stared at the shrine.

There was a silence before laughing rang out inside her head, making it feel like her brain was rattling around in her skull, “Haha! Well now, this is a first! I’ve never had anyone ask me how I came to be here! You mortals really are so full of surprises! Hahahaa!”

“So is that a no? Or…?”

“It is a yes! Hah! Sure little pony, I’ll indulge your curiosity. Just don’t interrupt me, or I’ll gouge out your eyes and turn them into jelly! Or is it jam...?”

Twilight nodded a bit too quickly at that, she didn’t want her eyes gouged out and she didn't want to die to a falling wheel of dairy. She sat down in the grass of the clearing and kept her note-taking supplies at the ready. She couldn’t wait for the new information to be given.

“Let’s see… Give me a minute, it's been so long I do think I can barely remember anything anymore.”

“Yes! I remember now. Try not to have your little mortal brain implode from the knowledge. Or have it implode, what do I care? Ah, it was right after that uh… Hallopeen party. Or was it Halloseen? Halloqueen? Eh, whatever. It was after some sort of party...”

Twilight had no idea what that gibberish disguised as words meant, but she leaned forward and paid rapt attention to what Sheogorath started to say.

I had no idea where I was at first, you know? I vaguely remembered some hazy dream, me floating in some sort of abyss, collecting myself. I was scattered, not fully myself but not fully gone. But I was pulling myself back together, slowly, the hazy dream I was in fading away into nothingness with each passing second. When I finally came too I did not know how long I was out, but it time means nothing to me now. Or at all for that matter, Time is so subjective and limiting! But you mortals depend on it so much! Here in Oblivion, well, such matters are trivial. And once you've experienced that oh-so limiting mortal side and then the other not-so limited side your perspective changes, grows, becomes so refreshingly new! At any rate, all I could see was the endless span of Oblivion that I was floating in.

It was a rainbow of colors, some colors that I didn’t even know existed until I experienced them! It seemed to stretch infinitely, and it does! I was understandably afraid at first, oh I was so young then, but I was curious, oh so curious! I found that simply exerting my will on this endless span of energy surrounding me bent it to my whims. I could create whatever I wished, and it would work! Food, liquids, electronics. Nothing was impossible, ohhoho I had a grand old time!

Until I didn't, but we'll get to that later. At some point, I created a mirror, and I saw that I was not meself. Yes, I was not always a Daedric Prince. It seemed that I became Sheogorath, the face, the clothes on my back, the staff, the cheese! Everything about me had changed oh so dramatically...

I was understandably elated you see!

Going from my dull, dreary, day to day life to Daedric Prince? Quite the honor if I do say so meself! But despite my new understanding of what I am, I still suffered from loneliness. I created the Shivering Isles, my realm, my greatest creation! All in order to offset the day to day boredom of being the only thing in the infinite planes of Oblivion. Why, haha, it drove me mad! ...A joke, my dear.

Of course, I grew mad long before I figured it out, my mind was still... processing what I had become. It could not hold the power of a Daedric Prince such as myself for long, it needed to reshape itself to fit my new station in eternal life. I did manage to find out how to create lesser Daedra after so long being all by my lonesome, it was so easy I couldn't believe I hadn't thought of it earlier! My chamberlain, Jeeves, was the first of the Daedra I created. In my mad glee, I created many many more, some even didn't agree to serve me! Outrageous! Ungrateful barrels of excrement! They'll never be able to challenge me of course, but it's the principle of the matter! Soon the Shivering Isles had its small, humble population of Daedra willing to serve me for all eternity, a wondrous populous full of madness! It was after I created my servants did I realize I could see into the mortal realm. My sphere of influence in Oblivion had grown large by that time, my power was great enough that I could walk between the mortal realm and my own whenever I so pleased. And that was when I realized that you mortals, in your oh so pitiful lives, needed a guiding hand.

And some of you, the truly worthy, even get to live in my realm.

"Just remember little pony, I'm always at the edge of your mind, that shadow in your subconscious, that tiny little blemish in your oh so fragile little psyche that you so desperately want to believe is an ironclad lock that nobody with the right tools can crack. Even before I walked the mortal realm the races knew me, they just didn't know it yet."

"So, what are the Daedra then? Conjuration has been a major school of magic for so long, but the Daedra that are summoned either can't speak or simply refuse to say anything," Twilight asked, putting aside that worrying statement for now.

“Well of course they don't want to say anything! How would you feel if you were ripped from your plane of Oblivion and forced into the service of some petulant mortal? Doing trivial deeds because the magic used to summon you also binds your will temporarily to the mage? It makes many cross at the idea. Of course, it's also hilarious when they die in service in such stupid ways! Ah, well, anyway, we Daedra are the embodiment of change. Change and permanency. Quite the contrary definition isn't it? But, that is what it is and there's no changing what is into something that isn't. Well, most of the time at any rate. I will let you try and figure that out on your own, my dear. But anyway! Run along now, and do be sure to drop by once in a while! We can have tea! How do you like your biscuits Twilight Sparkle?”

Twilight finished writing down the last bit of her notes and nearly stabbed through the paper with the quill at the last question the mad god asked. She looked at the statue on the shrine with worried shock reflecting out of her eyes, “How did you know my-”

“Go! Begone! Cease. And. Desist! Before I pluck off yer horn and stab ya in the liver with it!” Sheogorath shouted, nearly snarling at the end of his yelling.

Twilight eeped, gathered her things, and galloped out of the clearing. The mad cackling of Sheogorath ringing in her head as she nearly tripped over a fallen log and ran through the forest. It was a few minutes into her gallop that she remembered she could teleport and her horn glowed with power. Her magic expanded from her horn and she flashed out of the forest with a crack and a flash of purple magic. She arrived on the edge of the lake gasping for air, legs shaking, and she could swear the echoing voice of Sheogorath was just at the edge of her mind.

Sighing in relief at not being threatened by the mad god anymore Twilight still glanced over her shoulder every now and then as she walked back to where Princess Luna was staying, just in case something happened. Twilight knew that the magic used long ago kept the Mad God from affecting the mortal realm in any sort of major way, but it never hurt to be careful. It never hurt to just make sure that he wasn't watching her as she left the forest.

Right?