#752
Winter. Year 3 | Day 100. Evening. Changeling Territory.

A recent delivery has gone terribly wrong. My sister had sent me a Level 5 job, which meant that it presented the highest danger, and it has. It started off well, heading northeast of Manehatten and going over the gulf, where on the other side I was to meet with the recipient. Yukon and I flew over the gulf, made it to the other side and we were requested by the recipient to take the place of their courier to deliver another message to the capital.

As it turns out, the entire thing was a trap. I had caught the attention of Queen Chrysalis. When I headed off to their 'capital', too late did I discover that truth. They set up the trap to separate me from my staff and Yukon. They tied us up and placed us in these awful smelling cells that looked like blackened mud, like pitch or tar. Chrysalis took the staff for her own but couldn't figure out how to work the thing. From what notes I can recall, it'd only work with those who had a blood connection and the catch was that it had to be in range of the owner to work.

It was funny that her soldiers didn't strip of my belongings. So I rifled through the Designer's notes again about these Changelings, pony shape in nature but with insect-like features. He studied them for a time, after being alarmed at the rate their hive was spreading when they first came around. He discovered their origins first, rough stories about a mage whose magic became corrupted after some event that caused the town of origin to become infested with this sludge-like substance. After some mixing with local wild life, it caused everything living to mutate into something stranger and darker.

The Designer had to ward off many of the creatures and found it hard to find a place to hide. He discovered that the pony folk too were being transformed. The sick and the dead were placed into chrysalis, green shells filled with thick green fluids. Like the eggs of many insects, they were placed in bunches or grooves in seemingly random places. Even though the ponies that were healthy were doing all this, it was only a matter of time before they were converted. None of them rebelled against the changes. Suddenly they were like bees or ants building a home.

He was right about that and as time went on, the hive grew larger. Eventually he found that the changelings fed off love and that the magic that went wrong was a spell of love. As a result, the hive now hunted for beings that had knew love well and that could come from a variety of different creatures. Especially the ones that they kept locked up for multiple uses. The hive members knew that love was a nearly inexhaustible resource for them and rationing it out was a better plan than consuming it all at once. Eventually they learned how to disguise themselves to take on the likeness of normal ponies. He found out who the leader was too, Queen Chrysalis.

By her physical traits, she matched the appearance of the former princess that lived in the town there. Once everything a princess typically was, is now a blackened husk of her former self. Hair like seaweed and a hard shell of a body with aqua colored insect-like wings. Unlike her followers, she knew language and how to speak, she also knew how to use the most basic of magics. As I was going over this bit of notes, she approached my cell. "What is this?"

"An ancient book, using magic to store information instead of ink and paper." I answered politely.

"Interesting..." she hissed. "I trapped you here because I thought I could use this staff, apparently it's got that old catch of only being used by its creator. Or in your case, someone of the same blood line."

Intrigued and somewhat confused, I asked, "How... do you know about that kind of magic."

"Because I used to dabble in it. The mage that I had as part of my castle staff was the one who caused all this in the first place. You know a bit of the results already, I assume?" She eyed me graciously. I nodded. "Good, I won't have to explain it then. Truth is, Letter, is that I've been looking for a way to reverse the process but nothing I have ever found has worked. After my attempt at Canterlot,I began to look elsewhere. And what a better place to start than at the source."

"So you've been spending maybe thousands of years trying to find this information?"

"Thousands? Nay, only a few hundred and they have been long and dreadful. Commanding an army of mindless and speechless drones,, while it does have its benefits, can get incredibly boring." she groaned. After a stamp of her pocked hoof and releasing Yukon and I from the cell. "Could you help me? I have a feeling that you might knew a thing or two about magic, even if you once were a pegasus."

"If I help you, then what, you let me go home?"

"Yes. I don't need more minions to my collection. A queen has her limits, Letter. If you try escaping then I'll simply kill you and your bird and suck the love out of each of you."

"And if there isn't a way to reverse it?"

"I have something else in mind." she hissed.

It was several days at the castle of hers. Surprisingly, most of it was still in its original shape aside from the occasional creeping black goop on the walls that turned them into mounds. Hiding the flooring entirely. I spent most of the time in the library, where the spell was initially performed. Marking off the drastic similarities between her kingdom's writing and the Designer's system. There were a few differences, but they're few and far between and relatively easy to translate. Wound up with hundreds of sheets of paper filled with random notes by the end of each day. I then focused on the spell itself and its original intention.

It was originally casted to help boost the love between Chrysalis and her beloved prince at the time. Who unfortunately passed away at the time due to an ambush on his caravan. It was that that triggered the backfire of the spell. Both parties had to be alive and she didn't know it at the time. Her mage was the first to succumb to the disease. Panic set in for a lot of folks and threw the kingdom into chaos and none of them ever escaped. Doubtful that any of them remember their pasts now. As always, there was very little information on what to do when spells backfired like this, especially on such a large scale.

I gave it some more time and looked through the Designer's notes again. He had been working on a solution to the problem as well. However, nothing was conclusive enough and the creeping blackness would always come back. Like a battle between life and death, neither side would ever be completely satisfied. I drew out some of the magic work on stiff papers a cleared an area of floor.

After receiving my staff from the queen I asked her to change into her original form. She did so and after shaking the thoughts of her beauty from my mind and subsequently reminding myself I was already married and was not willing to break an old promise, I tapped the floor with the staff. Where there it stood straight and upright, refusing gravity. The circles and magic glowed a light blue and a faint humming came about. Inciting a few words and throwing in the dust of some moonstone, the glow became brighter, and the hum louder.

I stayed outside the circle and watched the green magic that was a trademark of changelings. A green ring of magic that would course along the body, changing the physical appearance from the insect-like form to their desired disguise. The ring that Chrysalis had was forced to the floor and constantly tried to reclaim her. The magic I had sown began fighting with it on its own. Eventually my side of it lost, even after I had tried strengthening it. Chrysalis fell to the floor when the darker magic reclaimed her. Put in shock and I had to sacrifice what love I had. It's rather draining actually and it leaves a bit of hole in your heart that feels like it'll turn into a massive pit.

She gave me a day to rest and with it I felt back to my old self. I reviewed and revised the magic again and figured out a way to create predictions with the Designer's notebook. He put a lot of effort into this damned thing, that man. After creating nearly a hundred failed scenarios with the tiniest of differences and all of them ending in failure, I was nearly ready to give up. Even working with blood and black magic, the results were fruitless. Chrysalis was rather upset at the news, I was too. She only wanted things to return to normal after all. I asked her what her other idea was.

“You take this crystal, wear it as an accessory of some sort, it will drain a little bit of love from you every day as long as you're wearing it. It won't do anything once it's off. I can see the love emanate from you and it flows like an ocean. I wonder how such a pony like you is capable of such a feat. Perhaps the world has a love for you.”

“Perhaps.” I looked over the crystal, clearest quartz I had ever seen. It glowed a faint green from her enchantment. “How often should I come back here?”

“Once a year should be good enough. In the meantime, I will look for the cure.”

“If I don't keep my end of the deal?”

“Then I will drain all of your love and you just might become my slave.”

I took her words to heart as I left her empire, a mass of gray matter speckled green. I marked the date in the Designer's notebook and now I've prepared to leave for home. I left her what notes I could, perhaps she could find the answer where I could not. I'll continue to search for it however. The queen isn't as evil as Canterlot history has made her out to be but perhaps the dark magics have given her to greed.