Princess Celestia couldn’t help but feel a sense of fear regarding Rising, as he continued to stare at her with the most intense amount of attention he had ever given her.

Her sister, Luna was looking between both Celestia and Rising, a slight frown of worry upon her face as she was uncertain whether or not to mediate between the two or if she even should! What worried Luna more was that either or both would resent her if she did.

Friendship, it seems, was a fickle relationship amongst humans.

Rising demanded again, raising his voice just a little, “Well?”

Both Princesses exchanged worried glances with each other before Celestia answered hesitantly, “I―we’ve always been able to do that.”

Rising wasn’t convinced with her answer, “That would’ve meant we would have either foreknowledge or even hinted words of you two being capable of moving literal planets, stars, and moons! Seeing as how we’ve had no word nor hint neither felt any disturbance from either here or from behind the Veil during our stay here, and we’re still sensing nothing; How have you done this?!”

This made Princess Celestia blink in confusion at Rising, though now that he was clearly expecting an answer, she quickly answered, “Neither of us know how we are doing this! Ever since we first realized we were doing this as small fillies and earning our Cutie Marks from moving the Sun and Moon, we never looked into why or how we could! Since neither Starswirl, our mentor, nor our mother and father found any fault or affect to anypony, we never considered it anything other than our magic doing this!”

Rising continued to stare at Princess Celestia in silence, his eyes still blazing and his expression still hard. Luna tried to help and added, “Even during our banishment to the moon, we felt nothing wrong other than a sense of being bereft of our duty, Rising. What we have and continued to do never harmed anything.”

It still didn’t change his expression.

Despite that, Rising didn’t do anything aggressive or hostile to either Princesses, even when Luna tried to nudge him with an attempt of comfort; Which was more daring of Luna than Celestia could bring herself to do.

Princess Celestia blinked and jolted as she noticed a very sudden occurrence.

Rising had disappeared.

Completely.

Right before her and her sister’s eyes.

It took a little longer for Luna to realize the same thing, but once she did she gave a small squeak in surprise that an alicorn that was larger than either of the two Princesses had suddenly disappeared without a trace.

Princess Celestia felt a sense of dread and fear start creeping up, having little knowledge of just what Rising was completely capable of, and with the realization that he could either turn invisible or disappear, anything could be possible now.

Both Celestia and her sister started looking around immediately, desperate to locate and try and figure out what Rising would do next.

Despite numerous beliefs and contrary to the more popular belief, both Tolkien and Jackson were the closest with their interpretations of their Wraith-World. Though it could be as close as one could get without moving past physically living and sacrificing the chance to tell others what it's like.

And the ease of access to and from both realms was as easy as breathing.

The world had turned from a bright, cheerful, and colourful place into a contrast between light and dark. Life and souls in the surrounding area were given a pure light. With the plants, their physical detail easily seen, whereas with living beings such as Princesses Celestia and Luna who were now running helplessly trying to look for him, their hearts shining brightly as their location of their very souls inhabiting their physical body and left an aftertrail as they moved about.

With the absence of the Heavenly Kingdom, the still and lukewarm darkness had filled the void left behind and replaced the once present, comforting, and warm light that would shine out and down from the Gates.

Only issue was, once arriving within this realm, there was little to no ability to interact or interfere with the physical world, not without permission that is. Which was why it reasonably stood as a barely used if ever considered ability, even if one wanted to ‘check-in’ His Kingdom for anyone in particular. It was more useful to just look up or reach out to Him and simply ask for whatever they required.

Rising, in his truer form that was and ever would be, human, didn’t have any of that on his mind however. He still fumed at how he and the Legion spent more than a week within this new world and not once had they noticed that the sun and moon moved to the whim of two ponies, magic or not.

Having to know the very rules of the reality around you for your entire life, then seeing two ponies who are, within fair comparison to most of the Legion, younger than yourself and are able to move and control day and night?

It demanded more answers than the questions that now blazed around the Tower of Eternity.

Rising turned around and looked towards the sun, utterly dim in comparison to the bright souls around him. He breathed once, flexed his back.

And very nearly overshot the sun of the solar system that bent to the will of Princess Celestia.

Or rather, what used to be the sun.

In front of him was not a great ball of white plasma, but instead was a white dwarf just slightly bigger than the very Earth.

Rising ‘tilted’ his head in confused interest. Perhaps this was the explanation that he saw the vision of heat and fire engulf his Sanctuary. Which clearly would mean that both he and the Earth were more ancient than the Legion thought, as the scientists during the human era had predicted and guessed at when the sun would explode and turn into what it is now.

It was easily dismissable that the Earth was still around, let alone how the star didn’t tear it apart and was in a perfect and stable orbit with the planet, otherwise Rising wouldn’t have been left there and the King wasn’t even close to being dumb or cruel enough to just leave Rising and the Legion to get destroyed by the sun.

Regardless, he and the Legion inspected the white dwarf, seeing and feeling nothing different nor unusual how any other white dwarf could’ve felt other than just as warm as the sun was.

He frowned and decided to look back towards Earth, more specifically the moon, looking past the clear absence of both Mercury and Venus and the now pale and grey planet of Mars, having boiled whatever was existent from the intense heat.

Once again, nothing felt changed and nothing felt out of the ordinary other than the sight of both the Earth and its moon surviving the sun’s death.

Overall, there was nothing out of what was expected, outside of the small but familiar presence of magic he had felt, but none of it felt enough to change anything.

As if the magic the two alicorn mares wielded were truly just reaching out, grabbing and shifting either the sun or Earth and the moon and positioning them to turn night into day and vice versa.

This made Rising and the Legion within stare at the sun for a good long while before a few of them threw their hands into the air and gave up.

Apparently, they weren’t going to find answers by themselves.

Both Princesses were now in a worried panic. Rising was nowhere to be seen, had shown clear distaste or unhappiness regarding what they were able to do and had done for over a thousand years and had shown no clear intentions of what he would do next.

Luna had already began to use magic and scanned for him outside of Canterlot while Celestia did the same in Canterlot, hoping to just know where Rising went.

Celestia was praying desperately that nothing wrong would happen as she did so, her magic scanning room for room and hallway through hallway.

What had she done wrong? Was it a mistake to tell him? Was it a mistake to show him that they could raise and lower the sun and moon?

Was it a mistake to befriend him so quickly?

“Enough.”

Both Princesses immediately haltered their spells when they heard a familiar voice and looked around to quickly find Rising appearing exactly where he had disappeared, his eyes closed and his expression lightening to a more neutral air.

Princess Celestia immediately galloped over to him, desperation still running through her to try and placate Rising before he did anything, “I am so sorry! I did not know that you would take offense―”

Rising raised a hoof at Celestia, quieting her, “Don’t... it’s as you’ve said, nothing was affected nor changed and nothing wrong has actually occurred from what you’ve been doing for the past centuries. While we will apologize for seeming hostile to you, there is a reason for our reaction.”

He took a few seconds to breathe slowly before explaining, “The movement of both the sun and moon during the Era of Humanity is significantly different to how they move now; Our Lord had set intensely intricate laws regarding the movement of the heavenly bodies, this planet included. It is disconcerting to learn that the movement of these bodies has been altered from those days long ago. As normally, He did not let anything interfere with the heavenly operations, so to learn that two lifeforms who are not Eternal to move these celestial spheres ... it’s extremely disconcerting for myself and all within the Tower of Eternity...”

Both Princesses Celestia and Luna looked at Rising in silent anxiety as he paused before he opened his eyes, looked at them and said, “While we are alright that what works is working, and that nothing is wrong or out of place; We need to know what, how and why you are able to do all this.”

“Well?” Twilight asked, turning away from her library’s window after watching the newly minted Cutie Mark Crusaders rush off to school and looked at her assistant and considered brother, Spike.

“Well what?” he queried back, not understanding what Twilight was asking.

“‘Well what?’ Well, has anything arrived from Princess Celestia?” Twilight sighed, exasperated, “Since she did answer one of my reports, surely she might give advice or any sort of feedback on this report!”

Spike simply continued to stare at Twilight before frowning, “Twi, just ‘cause the Princess answered you once, it was ‘cause she didn’t get what you were saying.”

This seemed to put her out, leading her to munch on her toast before she remembered about the human, “Well maybe the human might respond? What if we made a letter to him?”

“Who’s ‘him’?” The sudden sound of a certain pink pony made Twilight give a shriek of surprise while Spike merely waved, barely fazed at the sudden appearance, “Hiya Pinkie Pie!”

“Hi Spike! So what-cha-talking-about, who’s-this-’him’-you-guys-are-talking-about? Is-this-’him’-somepony-you-like-is-he-someone-you-don’t-like-as-much, though-that-reminds-me-I-still-don’t-like-” Pinkie Pie had waved back before launching into a chatting rant that Spike quickly lost track of, as he turned his attention to Twilight who had impacted hard enough into the first story ceiling with legs dangling.

After a minute of Pinkie continuing her tirade and Spike doing what he could to help Twilight and repairing the hole she left behind after falling down, Pinkie had stopped just long enough for Twilight to ask, “Hi Pinkie, what are you doing here?”

A long gasp and then, “Hi-Twilight! I-came-over-because-I-reeeeeallly-need-this-one-little-book-fo--”

Twilight placed a hoof on Pinkies mouth before asking, “Pinkie, I can’t understand you when you talk that fast.”

“Okie-dokie!” Pinkie Pie said while bouncing, “So what I’m saying is I need a reeeeeeeally important cookie bookie because my Pinkie Senses were ReeeeaaaalllLLLy going nuts, which tells me that I’m about to meet somepony new!”

Pinkie quickly galloped and took hold of Twilight’s face and brought it close and continued, “And I’m really excited to see who it is, also who are you talking about, who’s this him, huh huh, who’s this him?”

Twilight started sweating slightly as she didn’t know how to respond to Pinkie’s prying, “Uh ... um.”

“Hey, what’s going on?” came yet another voice, this time by a familiar cyan pegasus.

“Hi-Dashie! Twi’s-got-a-new-friend-she’s-gonna-tell-me-about!”

“Hi Pinkie, what’s this about a new friend?” Rainbow Dash asked Twilight, quickly looking around if the ‘new friend’ was nearby.

Now Twilight was visibly sweating, which didn’t go unnoticed by Rainbow, who stared blankly at here before grinning smugly, making the unicorn panic a little, “Twilight’s got a stallion.”

Pinkie gave a loud and long gasp while Twilight blushed and sputtered, “Oh-My-Celestia! Twilight’s-got-a-stallionfriend!” She quickly took Twilight into a spinning hug, “This-is-gonna-be-the-best-day-ever!”

Pinkie stopped and gasped again, “I-need-to-make-a- ‘Twilight’s-got-a-stallionfriend’ party! I’ll-be-right-back!”

And with that, she left in a blur, leaving Twilight to continue spinning dizzyingly to the floor.

Rainbow Dash’s grin grew mischievous and nearly yelled, “I’m gonna tell everypony else!!”

“Rainbow, no!” Twilight exclaimed in horror and lit her horn to stop the pegasus, but was too late as Rainbow flew out of the library in a rainbow line.

Now Twilight was in a full blown panic, she had sworn to keep the human secret and now the rest of her friends was about to find out about this secret resulting in her failing Princess Celestia.

’No-no-no-no-no, the Princess is going to banish me!’ Twilight ranted mentally as she started racing around trying to find a way or an excuse not to talk to the other mares about the human.

Meanwhile, Spike simply watched the chaos that Pinkie and Rainbow left Twilight in before he asked, “Do you want me to ask the Princess for advice?”

“Nooo!” Twilight nearly screeched in horror and unleashed panic. It was the last thing she wanted her mentor and ruler to find out that she couldn’t find a way to not let her friends know about the human.

Spike jumped and shrank back from Twilight, though not out of fear. He was used to Twilight’s panic attacks happening frequently enough that while Twilight’s panic attacks wasn’t scary to him, it was still sudden and surprising when they came. Twilight started pacing and muttering to herself as there was a knock on the library door, forcing Spike to leave her to her own musings to answer the door.

Once he opened the door, he was greeted with the sight of Rainbow Dash nearly dragging Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rarity inside. Wisely, he leaped out of the way as the mares piled in with various degrees of complaints.

Rarity was the first to air her complaint, bringing a comb that she had on her incase of quick mane and tail touch-ups to fix what the cyan pegasus mussed up, “Honestly, darling! I would have arrived on my own hooves! That was absolutely unnecessary and drawl of you to drag me like a common stack of hay!”

“Ah’d say th’ same, Dash!” Applejack chimed in, “While Ah’m interested hearin’ bout Twi gettin’ a stallion, you hootin’ an’ hollerin’ before dragging us all off ain’t th’ best way to do it!”

Fluttershy didn’t say anything as Rainbow Dash defended herself, “Hey! I was tryin’ to tell you about it and you all weren’t doing anything anyways! Besides this is Twilight we’re talking about! Twilight Sparkle, the local egghead of Ponyville?”

Rarity sighed at the pegasus’ antics, “Well, I do suppose she is right. As far as I can remember with the mare, she’s never been interested with love before.” She looked around before seeing Twilight growing in panic and her muttering getting louder, “Oh my. Um, dear Fluttershy, I think the poor dear needs your help.”

The shy pegasus was quick to move to help Twilight once she saw the unicorn. Fluttershy turned around and asked, “Um. Rarity, maybe if you could go and make some calming tea? It—it may help, if you could?”

While Rarity moved off to the kitchen to make tea, with a lovestruck Spike mystically floating after her; Fluttershy wrapped a wing over Twilight and looked at Applejack, “If, um, could you come over here and help keep her still, if you’d like to?”

Applejack didn’t say a word as she came over to do just that, while Rainbow Dash watched before flying quickly in front of Twilight and was just about to ask her more about her stallionfriend.

Fluttershy immediately stopped her with a powerful and silent Stare, which made Rainbow Dash fall to the ground with a grunt before asking quietly, “What the hay was that, Flutters?”

Fluttershy pointed a hoof toward Twilight who was hyperventilating and her body would occasionally twitch and spasm, “I know that you’re excited and happy for Twilight,” she admonished sternly, as if talking to a foal, “but Twilight needs our support in this very emotional time. She needs your support. Be the friend I know you can be, and not so caught up in your excitement for Twilight that you remain blind to her need for you to help calm her down from her panic attack.”

Once she had finished admonishing Rainbow for not helping, she turned her attention back to calming Twilight, who had started to squirm and struggle at both Applejack’s and Fluttershy’s attempt at holding her still.

Rarity came back with a cup of Camellia, “Will this work, darling? Twilight doesn’t seem to have anything other than green tea, the darling is unhealthily obsessed with caffeine.”

The pegasus took a small sniff and nodded, “Oh yes, that will help. Here you go now.”

Twilight resisted at first before getting a long gulp before she sighed and muttered, “Thanks, mares.”

Applejack was the first to give a smile and bumped a little closer to Twilight, “Jes’ concerned fer ya, Twi. So, now that we got ya to settle down all them jitters and shakes, ya feelin’ like tellin’ us bout that somepony Dash kept hootin about?”

Twilight’s expression turned sour and uncomfortable, “I ... it’s just ...”

Rarity gave a small sigh, “Come now, darling. I’m sure it isn’t as bad as you make it. It could just be a penpal for all Rainbow is exaggerating!”

“Well,” Twilight shifted and fidgeted between her two friends, “It’s not a stallionfriend, for one. He’s ... a new visitor to Canterlot that I met and was curious about—”

“Is he hot?” Rainbow Dash butted in, flying low as she flew closer to Twilight and nearly hitting the cup of tea, “Is he buff like Big Mac?”

“What was that ‘bout mah brother?” Applejack deadpanned and glared at Rainbow.

“Uhh,” Rainbow gave a nervous grin and flew up a little higher to give herself the chance to escape if Applejack decided to chase her down, “well, he is.”

Applejack kept a stern eye on her friend as Twilight gave a frown, “Not, exactly? He ... sort of, is strong?”

“Is this mysterious pony a knight?” Rarity chimed in, leaning her head close and under Twilight’s chin before moving away and dramatically placing a hoof over her forehead, “Oh he must be royalty if he’s in Canterlot! Wherever did you meet him?”

Twilight felt as if she dug herself in a deeper hole as she lowly admitted, her head slowly lowering to the ground, “W-with the Princesses.”

Both Rarity and Rainbow Dash gasped, though the former did so with sparkles in her eyes and glee while the latter was simply shocked.

“Okay, what the hay, why was he with the Princesses? What did he ever do to be visiting them?” Rainbow grumbled, “I mean we save the day on a daily basis here in Ponyville and yet we don’t get to see them much, not even a recommendation or a word to the Wonderbolts either ...”

“The Princesses have Equestria to run, Dash. You know boring stuff like sitting still and-” Twilight mock-shuddered with a pained grimace on her face as she managed to squeak out a pained-sounding, “paperwork,” Twilight chided as Applejack and Fluttershy let her go and let her stand by herself with the cup still in her magical grip.

Twilight continued to drink and smell the aroma from the tea as Rarity fawned about, “Even better! Oh he must, must, must be somepony of amazing importance! To be with the Princesses! Oh you must tell me more!”

Spike, who still had been mystically floated after Rarity even after she delivered the cup of tea to Twilight, took it as a command from his crush. And before Twilight tried to keep the human secret, the little lovestruck dragon gladly obliged that command and opened his mouth.

Rising looked up from his floating cup of tea, “And that’s all?”

Celestia nodded, her magic holding the tea cup for both Rising and herself, while Luna sat close to her, eating her breakfast “It’s all we know. Outside of that, we never really understood why or how we could do this. Other than one day after watching Starswirl and a group of unicorns move the sun and moon and then trying for ourselves and earning our Cutie Marks from doing so.”

The former human looked down again and stared at the floating cup, which raised slightly in case he wanted another drink from it. Rising closed his eyes before moving his head up and looking at the blue sky with a pensive frown.

On the table between the three Alicorns and scattered around delivered plates of their breakfast was ancient texts, tomes and even pictures in various art forms, from rubbings to hoof painted and magically painted.

“Let us summarize what you’ve told us,” Rising said after leaning forward and drinking from the cup, “Before either of you two, there had been a very long line of unicorns that were placed in charge over the sun and moon, which is the reason why we saw a magical aura of sorts permeating around them. The reason why was because the sun, moon and Earth had been slowly failing to continue the same orbit? With the moon either drifting further away or wavering too close, and the sun not moving from one point of the sky?”

Princess Celestia nodded, “Before the unicorns took on such a task, the ponies back then before they migrated here that would become Equestria had been fraught with confusion, superstition and paranoia, trying to explain why they happened. As far as I was told, they blamed one of the other tribes just to have a sense of justified reason for attacking their fellow pony, placing them as enemies and rationalizing through the de-equinization of said enemies so that their soldiers wouldn’t have to deal with the reality that they were harming and attacking their own kind.’”

Rising blinked before he continued, “And it wasn’t until the unicorns found out they were able to move the sun and moon?”

“At the terrible cost of their own magic. The assigned unicorns, which were numbered ten at a time, found themselves no longer able to use magic. Some were able to slowly recover and were barely able to attain the same magical strength they had before, while others had no magical power outside of what allowed them to live in good health.”

Princess Celestia moved one tome with her hoof and poked at one picture depicting three unicorns rearing up with their horns pointed at a depiction of the moon and sun, with what seemed to be Earth Ponies and Pegasi bowing down to them, “Soon after discovering this, the unicorns firmly established their discovery as part of their tribe’s duty, alongside the Earth Ponies holding control over the land and food, and the Pegasi controlling the weather and being the military strong arm of the species,”

Celestia turned the page and poked at a new picture on the next page, depicting the Unicorns holding scepters and other royal symbolic objects while having the same Earth Ponies and Pegasi bowing down, this time with a few more numbers, “The Unicorns used this as a reason to lord themselves over the other tribes, as the Earth Ponies couldn’t grow anything with either too little or too much sunlight while the Pegasi couldn’t control the weather itself.”

“Likely due to the moon’s influence over the polar region and tides,” Rising muttered, which caused Luna to tilt her head in interest.

She quickly asked, eager to discover if her moon was more important than signalling the arrival of night, “Doth thou meanst our celestial body is of influence of the very weather itself?”

“Not directly,” Rising replied, turning his head to face Luna, “however the moon has enough gravity of its own to push and pull on the oceans, generating high and low tides. It even has influence over animals when it is at its brightest, giving enough light that some animals may stay out longer and remain more active, thus being more likely to be traumatized or injured. In fact, during full moons, the sheer brightness from it has been enough to influence the sleeping patterns of humans, reducing their sleeping hours by twenty minutes and making it harder for them to fall asleep, due to the blue or white light that tricked our minds into staying awake. In addition to its influence on the oceans, it also affects the air and air currents. Think of the moon as a gravitational environmental force, whereby its rotation around our planet, causes the oceans to churn and remove trash and impurities, it helping the air circulate and prevent the air we breathe from stagnation and even holds influence over the biology of this planet’s living creatures and even flora.”

Luna felt her spirits lift and even smiled brightly over learning that her celestial duty over the moon was indeed more important that just being a visual signal of the arriving night, though it dampened her spirits a little knowing that the moon was just as capable of harming others.

Celestia noticed her sister’s changes of attitudes and gave a loving nudge, which was accepted with a small smile before Celestia asked, “How then, was the celestial bodies supposed to work, if they didn’t require magic?”

Rising gave a smile as he started to explain, “Well, first we’ll need to shortly explain how the moon orbited the earth, then how the earth orbited the sun, and then how the sun orbits our galaxy.”

Rising was met with two confused Princesses, ““Shortly”?” Celestia asked.

“If we went into the fullest explanation, we would be here a two full days and one night, and since you are the ruling diarchs, as much as interesting as our explanation would be, you have other things to do other than listen to us go into such a lengthy lecture,” He replied readily as he began to look around for several objects to try and explain, “To start with, our Lord, is someone who likes order and laws with a good deal of figurative legroom wherever possible. Thus after he created the earth, the moon, and the sun, he instituted inviolable laws in order for his creation to exist in accordance to his will. One of these laws is that of Gravity, if that is familiar to you?”

Both Princesses nodded, with Luna replying, “Ser Newting hath studied and discovered this, stating in his study about “size” and “mass” and that the greater mass something has, the greater its own strength in pulling objects closer.”

The stallion nodded in kind as he returned himself back to the table, “Close enough to the same name and the same properties.” Since he failed to find any immediate objects, he moved one forehoof and then used his other forehoof to revolve around his other hoof. “Through this, it is possible for objects of smaller mass to revolve around those of greater mass by getting caught by the greater object’s gravity, or more eloquently termed a “gravitational field.” This is how the moon revolves around our planet, because our planet is both bigger and has greater gravity, as was enforced by this very law.”

“Now as for the sun,” Rising said, tilting his head and moving his hoof a little further away, “has a far greater mass, thus it has our planet in its own gravity. As such, the moon orbits us, while we orbit the sun.” He looked at both Royal Sisters waiting to see if they had anything to ask. Once seeing that they didn’t misunderstand or wasn’t confused, he added, “Now here comes the fun part. Our sun is in fact in orbit with a much greater object.”

Now both Princesses semed lost as he explained, “What comes next are what we humans had come to name as “galaxies,” these galaxies also have mass, and on a much larger scale. Because of a galaxy’s mass is this great, the more massive stars that dwarf even our sun, both now and before, revolve around the center of the galaxy’s gravity. Which means our sun, because it is one of the innumerable stars in our galaxy, which we named as the “Milky Way galaxy,” revolves around our galaxy’s center of gravity.

“Now this isn’t the only law He made. There are other laws such as the Law of Motion.” He noted that Princess Celestia nodded in familiarity while Princess Luna had somewhat of an agreeing nod. This told him that Equestria was also familiar with this, allowing him to skip and skim over explaining the Law, “Our planet rotated while it revolved around the sun. Doing this was imperative so as to regulate the global temperatures and prevent one side from being blood boiling hot to sustain life, while the other side would have frozen life into solid ice. This would leave a narrow band of life-sustaining real estate around the hemisphere between full day and full night, which was recorded to be a twelve hour passage between our day and night. Otherwise, it would have required us all to live underground and nearby the core of the earth just to keep from freezing to death and from boiling to death.”

This made Princess Luna’s blood chill, as she was still familiar with her plan as Nightmare Moon to enact Eternal Night over Equestria. Now knowing that had she succeeded, she would’ve rendered almost all life on the planet extinct. She took two hoofsteps back in horror before her sister stopped her and brought Luna closer with her magic and into a tight hug from Celestia’s wing.

Rising stayed silent and observant as Celestia moved her head closer to Luna’s ear, whispering and murmuring lowly enough that Rising couldn’t discern as he waited patiently.

He and the Legion watched as Luna trembled and shook in her sister’s holding grip, her head shaking and mumbling back at her sister. It intrigued them that she seemed as if she was still traumatized to her experience and it seemed to guilt tripping her the more she realized how much she nearly harmed or doomed lives around her.

‘Where are the therapists?’ Rising asked, almost muttering to the Legion, ‘Where are the doctors who are trained in dealing with mental trauma? Does Equestria not have them?’

‘These two are in charge of their kingdoms welfare and Equestria relies upon them to think clearly and fairly, yet the moment Princess Luna learns the delicate balance between the sun and moon is with the Earth, she nearly breaks down and seems to still hang onto her experience as this ‘Nightmare Moon’ far longer than need be.’

‘And instead of seeing it as the opportunity to learn from her mistakes, accepting what consequences would have happened and improving herself or even helping others by using her experience, she seemed content to corner and suffer in guilt. Unless these ponies take guilt and wrongdoing much more deeply, she should be within the stages of moving on, why isn’t she doing so?’

It would take five minutes of watching the two nuzzle and privately murmur between each other before seeing Princess Luna give a deep breathe before giving her sister a few firm nods before they separated and returned their attention to Rising.

He didn’t comment or say anything on their clearly emotional moment, however his observant attitude spoke volumes to the two. Before Princess Celestia could try and make an excuse, Rising said, “Once we have a bit more time to talk, we’ll discuss a little more about her and this ‘Nightmare Moon.’”

His brusque comment bit at both Princesses, but they could understand what he meant. Though he understood and respected Luna’s need for emotional support, clearly he didn’t seem to agree with how it should have happened during an exchange of knowledge, both of Luna’s reaction to learning about how delicate the balance was for Earth to maintain life, and the need to pause and tend to her psychological needs.

Rising closed his eyes for a moment and gave a small sigh before returning to his lecture, “Now here is the Law of Change. It is thanks to this law that the Earth’s axis has tilted to a degree that depending upon where it is in relation to our orbit around the sun, then we will change seasons. When where we are on Earth gets the most direct sunlight on a hemisphere, you have summer. Conversely, when you have the least amount of sunlight, you have winter. And as you transition from the least amount of direct sunlight to more direct sunlight, you have spring and then fall once going from more direct sunlight to less sunlight.”

Rising shifted in his seat a little as he recalled back to an earlier topic with Princess Celestia, “This is why we had asked why the seasons here move backwards, because originally they all flowed in the pattern of winter, spring, summer, and fall before coming full circle with the return of winter once again.”

Princess Luna blinked before looking at her sister, who nodded as Rising moved on, “It is by these laws which He enacted and enforced, that our planet was capable of sustaining the vast enormity of life, humans or otherwise. And it is because of these laws that could self-enforce themselves alongside the Almighty seeing to them, that no one, mortal or otherwise, might or even could cause what He created to violate these well enforced laws.”

Both Princesses seemed awed at what his lecture, impressed that the world around them was so well built and almost self-maintained for so long that even today they still ran, even if it required magic to push things around from time to time.

Princess Luna then asked, “Is this all that you learned from your lord, or ...?”

“Much of what we said was discovered and learned by humanity, the part of how was what our Lord told us.”

Princess Celestia was the next to ask, “So ... what does this ... ‘galaxy’ look like as we’re in it?”

Rising gave a small hum before responding, “We may need your help in demonstrating this, since we don’t seem to see anything that could help us show.”

Both Princesses’ horns immediately lit and created a good number spheres of magic in the same size but in different colors of blue and yellow.

Rising blinked in surprise at how fast they casted before mentally shrugging, he batted at one sphere to bring it closer to him before placing it on one spot before trying to fetch the others much akin to a cat trying to gather the spheres.

In fact, it looked so similar that Princess Celestia gave a small giggle and instinctively moved one sphere out of Rising’s reach as he tried to gather it.

She quickly surrendered the sphere when he turned and gave a threatening stare at her, not even needing to know what he would’ve done to make her stop.

Once he had the magical spheres floating nearby, he began to work on setting them in a line, occasionally asking for the two Princesses to either increase or decrease the size of some of the spheres.

After accomplishing that, he said, “Now we make these nine spheres go in a circle around the ‘Sun’ if you would, please.”

As the spheres moved, he made some move faster while others slower, and even asked for one of the further ‘planets’ to have its orbiting pattern in a much more different and elliptical path.

Rising then stated, “Now that we’ve established how our solar system is orbiting the sun.”

Princess Celestia raised a hoof in question, “I don’t suppose the sun is spiraling around this ‘Milky Way galaxy’ would it?”

Rising was very quick to point at her, “Not even remotely close to how it goes around, and it's something a lot of people get wrong. We don’t orbit around the galaxy in a spiral or in a helix pattern, instead we are bobbing up and down similar to how floating objects bobs up and down in water waves. Now, tilt this whole thing slowly into a sixty degree angle with the sun being the center point.”

The mathematical term went over Luna’s head, as she hadn’t completely committed modern geometry, however with some help she was able to follow Rising’s instruction.

The result of seeing the whole system spin and then letting the system start bobbing up and down in an orbit around the table was quite mesmerising, both mares couldn’t help but continue to watch how the system spun while the ‘planets’ orbited in various speeds around the ‘sun’.

Princess Celestia tore her eyes away from the display to look at Rising, who had been watching them with some amusement much akin to a parent watching their children stare and watch at an interesting science display. She gave a quick look at the solar system as it dipped down in front of Rising before she asked, “What about this “galaxy” you mentioned several times? How big is it?”

Rising’s smile grew, “First we’ll need to shrink this solar system. So let’s start with that.”

Celestia blinked at what he said and asked, “How small should we make it?” The question brought Princess Luna out of her reverie to look in askance at her sister and Rising.

“Until we say stop.”

Both Princesses looked at him in confusion before following his instruction again. Before they started the “solar system” was in a rough diameter of a yard. As they continued to cast the spell that shrank the solar system, Princess Celestia kept an eye on Rising, who watched impassively.

Now the system was about a foot long in diameter, and yet Rising still said nothing, telling the mares to keep going.

Three inches.

One centimeter.

It was now barely visible and both Princesses had to pause just to move the now tiny solar system that was almost a grain of sand into somewhere where they could still see it, and Rising still hadn’t said stop.

Both Princesses were sweating at the tiny shred amount of magic they had to have just to keep the solar system existent, it was as hard as trying to balance two scalpels by the tips of their points.

Rising immediately said, “Stop.”

The Princesses then tried to stop and hold everything together, but finally had enough and lost control of their magic at holding something so small and complex, leading to a small spark resulting in the death of their tiny solar system.

Princess Luna had fallen off of her seat and was panting audibly on her back while Celestia was clearly sweating, her mouth dry and didn’t dare try to reach her own cup with her magic, forcing her to ever so slowly reach out with her own head and neck to drink from it.

Rising smiled apologetically as he waited for the two mares to calm and settle down, though once Luna was able to stop shaking and was able to get back onto her seat, she glared at him for the effort both she and her sister had to deal with.

Celestia also glowered at the stallion, as she asked heatedly, “Was that really the size of our galaxy or was this some excuse to see how much control we had over our magic?”

“Jolly good guess!” Rising replied, adding a slight Scottish accent mixed with something else before dropping it and adding, “But the former is correct, that is how small we are and how big the galaxy is, though it's not correctly small enough--”

“Not small enough?!” Luna nearly shrieked.

“Yes, not small enough, in fact to actually know the real size of the galaxy and our solar system, we’d have to consider the distance from here to the very edge of the Griffon Kingdom’s territory as the radius of our “galaxy” and our solar system would still be about the size of a grain of sand, whizzing up and down around the inner middle of its “arm.””

Both Princesses still glared at Rising for putting them through the whole ordeal, but it threw them off knowing just how big the galaxy was in comparison to their solar system.

Then Rising told them that the galaxy itself wasn’t stationary either, and it wasn’t the only galaxy in the universe, neither was it the biggest or smallest.

“Th-that’s not possible ... .” Celestia croaked, shocked at just how utterly small everypony was in Equestria, how small she was.

“And ... all of this was ... ‘created?’” Luna asked, equally shocked and skeptic at how all this could be true.

Rising gave an affirmative “Mhm” before he continued, “Humbling isn’t it? Knowing that compared to how the entire universe works and how its always moving and even the most biggest event won’t be seen to us for at the minimum a decade or two, and it would surpass and overshadow anything we could do and yet all eyes were on this planet. It’s mostly due to how it all happened that’s been argued back and forth, some say He simply said, “let there be ...” and there everything was, others say it was a colossal bang that appeared out of complete nowhere from nothing, and a few more others believed that the universe was already existing and had no beginning.”

“And, what do you believe?” Celestia questioned.

He looked at Celestia directly and replied with a expectant eyebrow, as if she asked something incredibly silly, “We don’t believe either of them, because we don’t need to believe in either of them, since we already had our answer given not soon after we asked it and from the very being who made it all in the first place.”

Luna couldn’t help but ask helplessly, “Then how are we able to move the stars themselves if they are so far away ...?”

Rising blinked and stared in wonder at her before answering, “It is possible that you are not actually moving the stars themselves but instead manipulating and moving the light from the stars themselves as they reach the Earth.” He went on to explain how light worked in space and was used by the human astronomers, though he shortened them down when a guardspony quickly trotted by and reminded them of the Day Court, “Even now, a star out there is likely dying and we’re likely to never notice it until at maximum of several thousand years.”

“So thou sayth we control light rather than the stars themselves?” Luna asked in a wondrous tone.

The stallion gave a sideways nod, “Quite possibly, though it could also be a massive illusion, or even an alteration of visual perception of those who gaze at the night sky. Given that we do not know what magic is capable of, these are merely guesswork and theories right now. We’re not entirely sure nor what it means what you could potentially do.”

“Your Majesties?” The three alicorns turned and saw the Majordomo trot forwards, his expression firm, “The day court requires you, now.”

Princess Celestia sighed in unhappiness, “It seems we will have to stop for now.”

“We can always continue this another time,” Rising commented as he left his seat and nudged against Celestia’s side, a bit more rougher than he wanted as he was still trying to master having four legs rather than two. He quickly apologized as Celestia recovered from his shove, “Sorry. Besides, we have all the time in the world and we’re not likely to go anywhere for the time being.”

Celestia gave a huff, rubbing her shoulder with a hoof, “Fair enough, though I would rather not have to spend lifetimes just to learn about you and from you.”

Just before they left, a puff of light lavender magic and a scroll appeared in front of Princess Celestia, surprising the three alicorns.

Princess Celestia calmly opened the scroll and immediately sat backwards and double facehoofed and muttered, “Oh my Faust.”

Luna took the scroll and read it before feeling herself shrink a little as she gave a pitiful groan.

Rising gave an unhappy huff and yanked the scroll out of Celestia’s magical grip and laid it on the ground to read it himself,

Princess Celestia I am so sorry! We tried to keep the human secret but our friends caught on and Spike still has his adorable crush with Rarity! We’re trying to get them to agree on keeping this secret, please-dont-send-me-to-the-moon-I-can-fix-this

The note continued on, but it lost any resemblance of coherent writing and became nothing more but hurried scribbling.

Some of the Legion grimaced and gave some concern at the clearly sharp decrease of mental stability Twilight demonstrated at losing control of a situation.

“Clearly, secrets are nigh impossible tasks to hide, Princess.” Rising commented while raising an eyebrow at Celestia, who hadn’t moved her front hooves away from her face, “Though,” Celestia lowered one hoof to look at him as he hoofed the scroll back into a roll, “this can be salvaged, just means we need a firmer and stern hand on this before it gets out of control.”

“I truly hope so,” Princess Celestia muttered as she came back onto her hooves and magically grabbed the scroll and tucked it under her wing, “while I can at least trust Twilight, Spike and their five friends, as they are the Element Bearers, your presence truly must remain close to our chests before your official introductions.” She turned her head upwards and muttered more quietly, her eyes closed, “Just two more days.”

“Will you be asking them to come here?” Rising asked as the Royal Sisters started moving again, preparing themselves for their Day Court duties.

Princess Celestia gave a small hum before sighing, “We might have to.”

Luna looked up at her older sibling and said, “Sister ...”

“It’s alright, Lulu.” Celestia quickly replied, her voice warm and didn’t have any edge to her tone, “We’ve already had this discussion, you’re already paying your dues. There’s no need to add anymore onto you. This is just something that we hadn’t accounted for.”

This didn’t seem to convince Princess Luna until her sister nudged against her side and the side of her head, which Luna moved herself a little out of Celestia’s reach but her smile returned slightly.

Rising asked in clarification, “Are you sure you want them here? Rather than sending a letter to them warning them to keep us secret?”

Princess Celestia shook her head, “Word by mouth can be more effective than word by letter. As you’ve said, a firmer hoof is required in your case.”

Just before they arrived to the doorway where Rising would enter and attend the Day Court unseen, Princess Celestia asked one of the escorting guards that had been silently following them alongside the Majordomo, “May you send a letter to my student and ask her and the other Element Bearers to come to Canterlot so we may discuss about Rising? I would very much like to make sure that they know the importance of secrecy.”

The stallion saluted and galloped away as Rising watched the guard go, causing Celestia to ask, “Do you not agree to this?”

“The options on dealing with this aren’t agreeable whichever you decide, but we will give advice where needed and little else; This is your kingdom, Princess, and thus it is your decision upon what to do, not ours.” Rising replied readily, turning his gaze to Celestia, “We may have been a proxy to our Lord, but even we know when to let those with responsibilities remain with those who are duty-bound to govern. It is only when they forget and forgo their duty for selfish or ill means are they to be replaced and set by example of what not to do.”

Celestia felt his reply seem relatively aloof, though not in the way of separating himself from her, but more as an easily given reply as if he had answered this before, “You do not have to reply so coldly,” she said, feeling somewhat hurt.

Rising breathed slowly before answering softly, “We did not mean to say it as coldly as you believe, but regardless the answer still remains. It is by your choice ... . Princesses. Majordomo.” He gave a polite nod to the sisters and to Forward Bastion before entering through the door and closing it behind him.

Princess Luna quipped, returning her sister’s nudge from earlier, “He doth speak sagaciously, sister. E’en I would reply in such a way to another ruler.”

“Perhaps,” Celestia muttered before turning away and trotting off to the throne room, with both her sister and the Majordomo following after her.

Twilight had completely lost it.

Her tea was gone and rendered useless in her panic, and Rarity was barely able to save the teacup from breaking on the ground as the lavender unicorn shrieked after realizing five full seconds after Spike admitted everything he knew about the human.

Her shriek of horror was able to snap Spike out of his reverie and confused him for a little before seeing his foster sister gallop to the nearest scroll of parchment, inkwell, and quill.

“Settle down now, suga’cube!” Applejack was the first of the seven to respond to Twilight’s meltdown as she furiously scribbled on the scroll and immediately teleported the scroll off.

Sadly, Twilight’s panic caused her to not recognize how bad of an idea it was to personally teleport a letter to her mentor rather than relying upon Spike to send them. Twilight stumbled like a newborn foal learning to stand on four hooves.

Fluttershy once more stepped up and whispered, “Somepony catch her!”

Applejack and Rarity were the only two to hear Fluttershy and moved to stop Twilight from falling down and hurting herself.

Finally, Spike’s young mind caught up with what was going on and said, hurrying over to his sister, “Twilight! You shouldn’t send letters without me! You said the distance was too far!”

Rarity gave a slight gasp, as she remembered her own lessons in utilizing her own magic as a foal getting lessons from both the schoolteacher and from her parents. She had some knowledge about teleporting objects, though she hadn’t had much interest in the more advanced magical classes.

But one thing she did recall was that distance was a major role in terms of teleporting anypony or anything. The greater the distance, the more magic and energy it required to perform something than what it would have been if it was closer, the size of the pony or object never changed anything to matter. Most unicorns, as she learned and gathered, could teleport objects at the maximum distance from one side of Ponyville to the other.

And while she knew that Twilight was powerful, well she was mentored and taught by Princess Celestia herself! Of course she would be incredibly powerful under such a tutelage! But still, having to perform something as demanding as that?

“She must be under magical exhaustion!” Rarity claimed, causing the everypony in the room except for Rainbow Dash to stare at her in surprise.

She looked at them and said, “What? Just because I am a fashionista doesn’t mean I don’t recall tidbits of magical lessons I had as a little filly!”

“Regardless,” Rarity continued, “we need medical help. Somepony must go and retrieve Nurse Redheart. Inform her that Twilight is suffering from extreme mana depletion. She would know what to do with a patient suffering from a case of mana depletion.”

“Wait a sec!” Rainbow Dash cried at long last, having been dumbstruck by what Spike dumped on the mares, “Didn’t Spike just say that he and Twilight saw and met a human?! C’mon mares, that’s a whoooole bigger news than getting the nurse!”

“Rainbow!” Fluttershy quietly snapped, getting a hoof around her fillyhood friend’s tail and tugged her down hard and forced Rainbow to look at her in the eyes, “I know you’re excited about meeting a ‘cool’ alien, but you’re losing sight of what’s important right now! Twilight needs somepony who is fast and can quickly bring medical help to her!” The technicolor mare withered at the assertiveness that the normally shy mare had usually kept well hidden away as Fluttershy continued, “As one of Twilight’s friends, I want you to go and fetch Nurse Redheart and bring her here and you are not going to focus on anything else other than successfully completing this mission! Do I make myself clear?”

With Fluttershy appealing to Rainbow’s passion to emulate her Wonderbolt idols, Rainbow snapped off a salute while responding with a rehearsed shout of, “Y-yes, Ma’am!”

Fluttershy let Rainbow Dash go and gave a disappointed glare at the chastised mare, who took little incentive to take flight and rush out the door, looking for Ponyville’s local nurse.

Everypony except Twilight, who was now in an incoherent daze, sweating lightly and was lying on her side with a pillow between her head and the wooden floor, was staring at Fluttershy with jaws hanging open.

“S-suga-” Applejack stuttered, “Wh-where in tarnation is all this comin’ from?”

Fluttershy squeaked and shrank a little before saying, “W-well, I kinda d-do handle the forest animals, an-and they do sometimes act up.”

The two mares and baby dragon continued to stare at Fluttershy in stunned silence, who shrank back a bit more in embarrassment, until Rainbow Dash returned a minute later. Her arrival was announced by hearing Nurse Redheart’s voice protesting, “Honestly, Miss Dash! There’s no need to drag me! I’m perfectly capable of-”

The nurse’s protests were cut short the moment she saw Twilight, “Oh my Celestia! What happened to her!”

As Redheart galloped over to Twilight, Rarity replied, “She is suffering from a case of extreme mana depletion, the poor darling in a panic teleported a scroll off to Princess Celestia.”

The nurse stopped checking over Twilight and stared at the fashionista in shock, “From here? To Canterlot?!”

“Ah don’ git it.” Applejack remarked, scratching her head with a hoof, “Not too long ‘go, Twi was sendin’ away an Ursa Minah back to its mama, magic carryin’ it like a foal in a foal cradle, how’s this som’ big deal?”

“What AJ said,” Rainbow chimed in, “Twi’s pretty eggheadish with her magic, on top of whatever Princess Celestia taught her to do, something like this should be barely a prob!”

Redheart nodded, “Indeed, even I’m impressed with how strong Twilight’s magic is, though I suppose being taught by Princess Celestia herself does come with their perks. But teleporting is a different matter entirely. It has its own separate rules as far as unicorn magic goes.”

Applejack and Rainbow simply stared at the nurse in confusion, with the farmer mare repeating, “Ah still don’ git it.”

Rarity pondered how to best respond, mostly trying to gather whatever she could remember, “Hmm. Perhaps ...” She paused to think how to best answer the question in a way that Rainbow could understand. After a few moments, Rarity’s expression brightened and stated, “Aha! For you, it would be like disassembling Canterlot Castle! All of it! An-and pushing every bit of it through a pony sized tunnel all the way to Appleoosa! And you cannot use carts, sleds or even baskets! And everything had to be reassembled perfectly, without anything out of line or out of place!”

Rainbow would’ve passed the challenge as far too easy, but when Rarity added in how it was going to be done started making her nervous and felt a drop of sweat roll down the side of her head. After Rarity finished, Rainbow had landed on her flanks, her eyes wide and her expression pure horror at the unfair difficulty she was just given.

“Are you nuts?!” she exclaimed, “That is soooo unfair!”

It was Applejack’s turn to frown nervously when Rarity looked over to her and said, “And try thinking about collecting your harvest from your orchards without bucking any trees, using ladders or wagons. Depending upon what else is coming with a unicorn when teleporting, it may be twice or even thrice as many orchards.”

Applejack took her hat off and waved it a little at Rarity, “Alrigh’ Rars, yah got me. Ah’ll keep tha’ in mind if Twi goes off like this again. But that sounds ah lot like it could really hurt somepony.”

“By Celestia, I hope we never get another case like this, and it really can hurt a unicorn when they’re pushed further than what they’re capable of.” Nurse Redheart said as she turned Twilight onto her back and made quick checks to her eyes, breathing, and heartbeat. She gave a small sigh of relief, “Besides doing something incredibly reckless and beyond stupid, she’ll be alright. She just needs a little jumpstart. Rarity? I need you to cast and transfer a little bit of your magic into Twilight, do you know how to do that?”

The fashionista gave a nervous chuckle, “I, most unfortunately, do not.”

The nurse gave a sigh before explaining, “First you need to connect your magic to Twilight’s horn, much like you’re casting a levitation spell on her horn, however do not move it.” Once Rarity performed the task, Nurse Redheart continued, “Now, I need you to slowly pour more magic into her horn, then try to push the magic into Twilight. Envision your magic as though it was a fluid, like water and you’re pouring it into Twilight’s horn and from there it’ll fill the thaumic gland underneath her horn. You don’t want to ‘pour’ too much or you could overwhelm her thaumic gland or cause her horn to heat up, crack, or even break. But you don’t want to ‘pour’ too little because then it will not only cause Twilight’s recovery time to lengthen, but will place unnecessary stress on both of your thaumic glands and mana reservoirs.”

Twilight gave an immediate reaction when Rarity did so, giving a sharp gasp and her eyes flying open. She looked over and around, still feeling some of Rarity’s own mana enter into her own.

She tried to say something, but Redheart quickly shushed her, “Easy now, don’t talk just yet. You’re not completely out of the Everfree yet. Ok, Rarity. You can stop casting. I need water, if somepony would, please?”

Applejack was the first to go and fetch for water, and despite Redheart’s orders, Twilight groaned and asked, her tone a little airy, “W-what happen?”

The nurse gave a disappointed ‘tsk’ before answering, “Well what happened was a result of you not thinking clearly, Miss Twilight. You teleported a scroll much further than your capabilities.”

“O-oh ...”

“Here ya’re, Nurse.” Applejack reported, with a glass of water in hoof. Redheart took the glass and placed it over Twilights mouth and gently tilted it for her to drink.

After a few more glasses of water and a little more magic, Twilight was able to stand on her hooves, albeit shakily. Rarity was almost in equal state, though due to using more magic than she was used to using in her day-to-day lifestyle.

The mares gratefully thanked Nurse Redheart for her quick help, though she told Twilight to arrive in her infirmary the day after so she could go through a more thorough checkup.

Once Nurse Redheart left the library, Spike felt like he was about to hurl and belched out a scroll. He caught it and was about to read it before Rarity asked Twilight, “Well, now that we’ve had that ... comotion done and over with, mind if I ask why you were panicking as badly about this ... guest?”

Twilight froze a little, but gave a unhappy groan and rounded on her younger brother, “Spiiiike! Princesses Celestia and Luna asked us to keep this secret!”

The young lizard now realized his fault and sheepishly rubbed a claw at the back of his head, “Eheh, s-sorry Twilight.”

The lavender unicorn gave an even louder unhappy groan, placing a hoof to her head before admitting, “Well mares, this wasn’t supposed to be revealed at all, infact me and Spike weren’t supposed to learn about this yet.”

“Yet? Darling, is this similar to spoiling us a surprise?” Rarity asked, somewhat concerned.

“Well ...” Twilight was about to say before Spike raised his claw and waved the scroll that was in it at her, “Oh fine, Spike. What does Princess Celestia say?”

Spike cleared his throat and unfurled the scroll, “It says,” He said with some fanfare, before reading it a few times over, “We need to get to Canterlot Castle soon, the Princesses want to talk to us personally.”

“R-really?” Twilight squeaked, her balance starting to get shaky again as the feeling of dread started to creep up on her. She sat down and hugged herself and started panicking again, “O-oh no. She’s going to banish us together!”

Applejack came up and replied, trying to calm Twilight, “C’mon suga’cube, Ah don’t think th’ Princess is gon’ do that. Ya’ll need to settle down, now. Don’ want to get the nurse after she just left.”

A knock came from the library’s front door, causing the mares and baby dragon to look at it curiously before Spike went over to open it to find a small present box in pink and white.

“I wonder who left this?” Spike asked before taking it inside and placing it near the mares.

Not sooner after he placed it down, the box burst open revealing Pinkie who cried, “Surprise!! Happy ‘Got-A-Stallionfriend’ Twilight!”

The initial surprise made everypony jump, but once they realized it was Pinkie, they calmed down with Rarity saying, “Um, Pinkie dear. Twilight’s friend isn’t a stallionfriend ... nor a stallion at that.”

This only made Pinkie gasp, “She picked somepony else!? Is it a griffon?”

Rarity, Applejack and Rainbow Dash immediately blushed at the response. Though the implication went over Twilight and Spike’s heads.

“N-no, Pinkie. It’s an ... what was it again?” Rarity turned to ask Spike.

“A human.” He readily replied, despite Twilight’s chagrin.

Pinkie’s jaw hung open before saying, “Ooooooooh, it’s that kind of thing again. I probably should check with the others before we go.”

“Go?” Twilight couldn’t help but ask, getting back on her hooves and approaching the Earth Pony as she dived back into the box, her tail waving to and fro, “Go where?”

“Again?” Rainbow Dash quipped.

“Where else, silly! We’re off to go meet the human out in Canterlot, right?” Pinkie turned around and booped Twilight’s nose before turning around again and disappearing from sight.

The mares looked at each other in bafflement as the box shook and shaken around before Pinkie came back out and said, “Okie dokie! Everything’s goodie now! Of course we might have a little problem once the season finale of season five comes around, but we’ll get a plan some point!”

All that ended up with was her getting stares of confusion. Twilight was the first to dare ask, “S-Season five?”

“Oh don’t worry about that!” Pinkie pronked out of the box and ruffled Twilight’s mane with a hoof, “It’ll be its own adventure for you! Besides, don’t we have a carriage to ride just outside the door?” As she said this, Pinkie wrapped a hoof around Twilight’s head and pointed the other hoof at the door.

On que, the door resounded with a knock again. This time when Spike opened it, a Royal Guard stood at attention and gave a salute, “Element Bearer Twilight Sparkle? The chariot awaits you and the other Bearers.”

Twilight blinked at the guard before saying, “O-ok, let uh, give me a moment.”

The pegasus guard gave a curt snort and trotted to stand nearby a large chariot that was attached to four other Royal Guards, all identical and standing with a professional and stern attitude.

“Well, what are we waiting for?” Pinkie asked eagerly, running off and letting Twilight go, resulting in the unicorn spinning into the floor.

As Twilight got back up, Rainbow Dash quickly flew after Pinkie, exclaiming, “Alright! We get to see an alien!”

“S’long as its not one of th’m “steal yer cows and probin everythin’ that walks.’” Applejack muttered as she trotted off after them.

“Well,” Rarity stated as she looked back at Fluttershy, Twilight and Spike, “this is certainly turning out to be an active day. Dealing with your panic attacks and sudden mana depletion, visiting aliens and visiting with the Princesses.”

Fluttershy dragged a hoof around in a circle and whispered, “I hope this alien is nice.”

“He is,” Twilight replied, just catching what the shy pegasus said, “Though ... he’s a little odd. Not as odd as Pinkie, though.”

“He’s really cool!” Spike piped up, his eyes brightening, “He told me all sorts of things about weapons, armor, and about knights!”

Twilight rolled her eyes with a smile while Rarity gave a giggle, “This alien taught you about knights, did he? Did he teach you how to act like one, too?”

Spike’s grin fell a little but replied, “Well, no. Though he did say that some knights weren’t very chivalrous.”

He continued to talk about what he learned from the human as both he and Rarity went off to follow after the other mares, leaving Twilight being the only one in her library treehouse.

She turned to look at the now open and read scroll on the floor and gave a long sigh. While she didn’t mess up as much as Princess Luna had, she still had failed in her responsibility to keep the human’s existence a secret.

And despite how much support she had from her friends, Twilight still remembered the scary face her mentor had, and mentally prayed that Princess Celestia wouldn’t look at her with the same or worse expression.

Dread growing, she trotted off to follow her friends, preparing herself to face either the music, steeling herself for a trip to the moon or anything else which might be worse.

For once, the Day Court was a relaxing lull from all the events that had happened that morning. It gave Celestia time to consider what to do about Twilight and her friends, now that she had gone through with the plan of bringing them here.

She had a few thoughts about doubling back on it and trying something else.

Ok, a little more than few ... .

Alright, a lot of times.

Celestia had been worrying that she was too hasty in bringing Twilight here again, not to mention including Twilight’s friends in order to contain the secret from getting out. Perhaps she should have gone to them? Should she have wip--

No. Celestia immediately shook her head and gave a forceful stomp with a hoof, before quickly apologizing to one noble during her presentation of repealing a small law, Luna looking at her with some concern. As the noble relaxed a little and hurried up a little, misinterpreting Celestia’s action as subtle impatience, Princess Celestia resumed with her response to that one suggestion.

There was no way she would ever do that to her own student, let alone to anypony. Using magic to purge memories was an affront that she would never accept. She would never look at herself in the mirror if she did. Maintaining a secret at such a level may seem reasonable to use memory wiping, but to do that to a young mare, her own student no less, as well as an infant dragon?

If and when that secret is found out, there would be blood.

‘No, there had to be better ways.’ Celestia thought resolutely as the noblesmare left.

When the throne room was empty, Luna looked over and asked, “Is something the matter, sister? Thou nearly terrified Fortuna.”

Princess Celestia snapped out of her thoughts and replied a little quickly, “N-no, Lulu. Nothing’s wrong. Just in thought.”

“Over how to deal with Twilight and her friends, apparently,” Rising’s voice called down.

Celestia hid her pout under her mane as Luna looked up and called back, “And how doth thou knowest this from up there? Art thou to say thine eyes can see through material?”

“No.” Rising replied, before the sound of a small groan and rusting was heard up there before his voice came back, “It’s because we’re bored enough.”

“Thou art immortal, thou hath seen many events in thine life, events which no other carnal being hath witnessed and thou darest to claim thyself ‘bored!’” Princess Luna exclaimed in astoundment, enough to trot off her seat and turn around fully, lighting her horn and lifting the curtains above to reveal an upside down Rising, his mane spilling out a little over the edge, “while attending a Day Court in the royal throne room in a land of magical creatures thou hath ne’er met nor heard of?”

“While attending a daily meeting of nobles expecting their own rulers to kowtow to their selfish whims.” Rising countered.

Princess Luna tried to give a counter to his statement, but failed to find the words. With frustration, she tugged the curtains over him, trying to get the fabric to slap him. She didn’t know if she succeeded or not, but simply sat back down onto her seat while Celestia chided, “The nobles have enough sense outside of their own ego to know not to demand such thing, Rising.”

“Greed isn't inanimate, Princess.” Rising returned, “It is not something that simply exists without action and temptation. It is all too much like a poison, corrupting a little at a time. It's also an addiction, inflaming and teasing at the desires of the self.”

“I assure you, the nobles can retain themselves to remember who sits upon the throne and whom does not.”

“Your faith in your nobles is touching, but we warrant that more often than not, you have had to either completely refuse, or have had your 'noble's' proposition revised to exclude whatever loopholes or monetary benefits beyond what is required for what has been proposed.”

“Which is why my guards are present throughout Equestria,” Celestia stated firmly, going as far as getting up and looking at him, curtain pulled back again, “My guards and the local guardsponies are as far as Vanhoover and Manehattan, and they are more loyal to my word than anything a noble could dare bribe them with.”

“Outside of their or their families lives,” Rising said as he rolled over and placed both hooves hang over the edge, “either by the quality of their living or direct threat.”

“Rising, you are forgetting that this land is no longer akin to the land you have lived in before.” Celestia said loudly, bringing a hoof down hard, “Yes, greed is still present, but it does not have the same drive with which you are familiar with. I’ve lived and ruled this throne for almost two millennia and I know a pony well enough to see their intentions well enough, and not once have they ever considered undermining my authority for anything. And when Luna returned, it only proved the idea of going against us as alicorns and diarchs is the most counterproductive action the nobles could do.”

He didn’t immediately argue, as he and the Legion had been noticing the same. Before they had gone into stone and slept all those millennia away, greed was exactly as he had told the Princess, it was alive and parasitic, spreading to and fro at a frightening pace when motivated.

But here, it was just an adjective term, barely lingering with little sentience amongst the ponies, easily shaken off with the right push and motivation.

With the death and destruction of the Fallen and their influences, the driving force of Seven Sins had gone stagnant. While still present and still capable of festering into the new inhabitants, it wasn’t powerful unless the infected being divulged themselves further into the temptations.

“It maybe not the same land as we know before, but the choices are still present, whether you know it or not.” Rising said after a moment.

“Am I to not trust and hold paranoia over every pony that I come across of? For fearing either my life, my rule or my sister’s life for the paranoid thought that every pony would take advantage of in blackmail to force my hoof to despicable whims? Are you to have me believe my own sister would choose to start again, except this time with little regret?!” Princess Celestia demanded, now angry at Rising. When she gave reference to Luna’s retaliation a millenia ago, Luna immediately winced.

“Whether you live in paranoia or not is not our call, nor our advice,” Rising countered, frowning and his eyebrows furrowing, “what we take exception, Princess. Is your naivety in to trusting blindly. When one is given a choice of what to do with themselves and has the will to do what it takes, it is better to understand that anything can happen.”

“And I’m taking exception to you being determined to see the worst in anypony!” Celestia retaliated, her voice now rising, her ears swiveling back, “What is the point of making and creating trust and fellowship if you’re only going to push others away and hold a knife in your other hoof?!”

“The same reason you would rather walk into a hungry lions’ den, without the slightest expectation that things could go wrong, and the steps to ensure that if what can go wrong does go wrong, you would have a plan to bring yourself out of harm’s way.” Rising returned, his voice raised but not as loud as Celestia’s.

“For what reason should I? War hasn’t happened or occured to Equestria since the Disappearance of the Crystal Empire!” Celestia was now yelling, and was briefly considering using her long unused Canterlot Voice.

“Enough with thine arguments!” Luna protested loudly, her earlier anger rising again, “Hath thou forgotten we are still in the midst of Day Court procedures? Thou hath reasoned and lad'ned with logic with both o’ thine views! We hereby demand a compromise for ye both. Rising, for thee we do propose tha' ye shall not expect enmity regarding Equestria's nobility and their relationship with the laypony. Celestia, for thee we do propose that thou acknowledge that not everypony has the interest of others before their own self-interest and that ambition can be wielded with selfish intents just as easily as it can be wielded with noble intents.”

Princess Celestia flinched back slightly, her eyes widening as she forgot, while Rising fell silent. His eyes still narrowed. Thankfully and gratefully, during their argument, none of the nobles and petitioners had entered the throne room as they were still waiting outside the doors.

Whether they had heard Celestia and Rising, was unclear.

Princess Luna stared hard at her elder sister, both with unamusement and vented frustration. Celestia refused to look at Luna in the eyes, her cheeks flushed red in embarrassment at being told off and having her own sister settle an impromptu argument similar to an argument between two ponies she had to settle and intervene a year or so before Luna returned.

Princess Celestia quickly let go of the curtains, hiding Rising once more before stepping back onto her throne, calling, “S-send in the next petitioner!”

Said next petitioner was decidedly clear in their intentions, with an incredible amount of sugar coating, and stood stock still throughout their presentation.

Author's Notes:

Alright, now I have an early Christmas present for you all! (And for those who saw the story alert on this around last night, sorry about that! I misclicked and didn't mean to have this out yet!)

And for now, I need to take a quick break from the story, both me and my good friend of an editor have been banging our heads against this chapter for quite some time.

Now initially, this chapter would've been longer, _{(but I'm not that cruel)} so I've had to split this into Chapter Six and Seven. Do expect Seven to come out January to February… at my best possible speeds.

So... I had hoped to post this sooner around November, but well... Life has been demanding pretty loudly... Its not enough to shake me from continuing this, however. I'm sticking to this ship to the end.

But either way, I've got you all this, and I hope you've enjoyed it!