Esquestria: The House of the Sun - A pony cultist experience

[BirdBodhisattva]

Dear reader! Whether you are new here, archive-reading and whatnot, or you are already someone who has been with us for quite a while, I would like to say a few words that I believe are best kept close to mind.

-This is an MLP quest. And more importantly, none of us are gratuitously cruel. So good things will happen on this quest, and I hope that enough good things have already happened to prove that.
-This is also a horror quest, so bad things will happen. Bad things might happen to good characters if you are not able to protect them, and you most certainly will not be able to intervene if you lack the tools to do so.
-And finally, this is a quest in which you jostle with powers greater than yourself, with all that it entails.

Please, do keep those things in mind as you go forward. But ultimately, this is also a quest in which it is hoped we all have fun! So if any of the above points is not exactly your cup of tea, or somehow make the experience as a whole "not worth it", then this quest might not be for you. Which is fine! Individual tastes are a thing, so don't think any more about it if you don't want to read anymore. And regardless, I hope you have a lovely day!

Spoiler: Or if you'd rather hear it from someone else

PSA for whoever needs to hear it:

Readers should take their own mental health into consideration when voting and not subject themselves to triggering narrative elements like rape or constant mental torture of a friend just for the Greatest Good of a world that doesn't exist.

If those are fine for you or Regrettable is even more triggering, then GREAT! More power to you. But you aren't a bad or selfish person for picking the option that keeps the characters you've emotionally connected with safe. [REDACTED for spoiler warning]

This is a high intensity quest that doesn't hold back when it comes to horror and negative consequences. Take care of yourself.

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(Quote slightly edited to avoid spoilers)

 

[PrimalShadow]

Jokes aside, I agree Copper is having doubts about the Cult.

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Like, the way the whole conversation felt was, I don't know... does she suspect us of having something to do with Jade's disappearance?

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mh.. It's definitely a sign, but of what?

Maybe she COULD be convinced to come to our side if a confrontation with the Master ever happens. It really depends on the source of her distress. Maybe she feels guilt?

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In the last two pages of discussion, (different) people have read this interaction as Copper Secateur being suspicious of Velvet, or of her being unhappy with the Cult and the Master. Honestly, I think either of those options is reading too much into things.

The only thing we really know is that Copper intentionally deflected the conversation away from anything serious or cult-related, and lied about everything being fine and dandy instead of admitting whatever troubled her.

We don't know why she is lying to us, but the simplest explanation is that it is a personal issue - i.e. she doesn't want to show vulnerability or to confront what happened or whatever the case may be - than that she is distrustful of us in particular, either because she suspects that we aren't on the same side as her re the cult (either because she is secretly disloyal, or because she is loyal but thinks we are secretly disloyal).

 

[PrimalShadow]

And then you see it. For the slightest moment, her pleasant complexion seems to become somewhat… strained. Yes, strained seems to be the only way you can describe it.

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I just want to say... looking at what happened here, and the rest of the Copper conversation...

Well, back on turn 7, right after the cult meeting, I had pushed for an action to talk to Copper. And, as it stands now, it looks to me like that would have been a really good decision to make. The time to "strike" so to speak was two months ago, when the trauma was still fresh and we could potentially do something about it. Now? Things have calcified and settled into place, and the place they've settled into isn't what one would call ideal. Our best opportunity was turn 7, and we missed it.

Of course, this is a game of tradeoffs and it is not like we could pull actions out of nowhere; my own proposal back then was putting off a Jade action. Which I think would have gone okay, but then again maybe not? As a reminder, turn 7 we had the action where went to the park with Jade, and tore open that wound, so to speak; turn 8 was the real "mandatory" Jade action where we needed to make sure she didn't metaphorically bleed to death. I think putting off the interaction turn 7 may not have done any harm, though even with hindsight it is not exactly clear.

On a secondary note, we're all lvl 1 or more... It doesn't look like this gave anything special, though who knows.. I've still not stopped to hope for a surprise interlude about it, and there's always the all-3 to look out for.

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Note that the turn isn't over, so it is not really clear one way or another. We only get Realizations for our Lore 3 levels partway through the turn, so I'd broadly expect an "all-lore" bonus to work similarly.

Most interesting, however, is that you can feel that this is not the effect of an Influence. Or rather, you can't feel an Influence about her. This, all of this, is all her.

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is this simply Grail 3, or its related skill? It's certainly a useful perk.

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I think... that what we are seeing here is the +15 (or +20, or perhaps even +25) bonus to convincing people that Grail grants.

We know that mechanically the Lores give a bonus to their related scopes, but how would that look like in-setting? For "convincing people", options I can see include supernatural insight into how to convince people... or alternatively, an aura that implicitly makes your words sound more convincing to people. What we see is basically the latter. Basically, everyone around Copper "wants" to be convinced by her, or somewhat equivalently, infatuated with her. (It is not really the same thing, of course, but we know that "convinced by" is more the mechanical effect of what happens whereas "infatuation" is closer to the narrative method by which Grail functions).

In a similar vein, I think our own bonus to stealth can be, at least in part, described as people "wanting" to not see us, in the sense that their attention just passes right over us when we don't want to be observed. (Though to be fair another part is supernaturally hiding in shadows or moving outside of people's line of sight or whatnot.)


Anyways. I think that the narrative effect is perhaps stronger than what the equivalent roll bonus suggests, but broadly speaking this influence that we are seeing is precisely the narrative counterpart to the +5*Level bonus we to appropriate die rolls mechanically.

I thought I felt a fresh pair of eyes looking at me

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I have a suspicion that this might be somewhat literal, and that the Grail 3 gift is a sense for attention. In other words, you literally feel the attention of people - who is paying attention, and what they are feeling attention to.

Just a thought.

 

[Mage of Eyes]

I wonder if we could use this to, say, read mathematical and physical (and possibly magical?) equations and formulas to actually "get" what they mean, instead of simply memorizing them like many students do...

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I think this is fully possible (and probably already working like that) because, you know, it is not only fully possible in real life, but also the supposed way to study.

Or was that Edge, with that one Hour which is basically a tapestry of scars ( The colonel I think, or was it the Lionsmith? I get them confused sometime)?

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Scars are not wounds. They are the consequence of wounds, but they're very different: scars are not an opening, scars DENY opening. The Colonel has scars on his eyes, so they are closed to light, he has scars in his ears, so they are closed to sound, his skin is one big scar, so no wound can be inflicted — it can't open.
The way to distinguish Colonel and Lionsmith is pretty easy — Lionsmith is the forge one, he also smiths lions to fight them for fun (colonel too serious for this).

 

[Dream Logic]

I believe it was The Antmother who scarred The Colonel, or it's implied to have been her work while they were humans.

I'm very curious what Velvet is like to an outside observer. It seems most of our company is diving into one or two Lores (as is usual) but I wonder what the interplay of many looks like.

 

[SolipsistSerpent]

I believe it was The Antmother who scarred him, or it's implied to have been her work while they were humans.

I'm very curious what Velvet is like to an outside observer. It seems most of our company is diving into one or two Lores (as is usual) but I wonder what the interplay of many looks like.

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Apparently Velvet mostly looks like a ghost who is only seen in glimpses to most casual obervers, which is probably her foundation of Moth Lore.

Admittedly that might be slightly out of date since it was from the first part of the new recruit interlude that covered some time, but this chapter doesn't do anything but support that view.

 

[Ericwinter]

Apparently we mostly look like a ghost who is only seen in glimpses to most casual obervers, which is probably that Moth.

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That was back when Moth was still our main Lore and we didn't have much of else though. Now we've got four different Lores all sitting at Three, another just one scrap away, and two of those are about as opposed as the Lores get to each other. Then there's Secret Histroies and Knock, which are basically the "time and space" Lores.

 

[DawnOfBoom]

In the last two pages of discussion, (different) people have read this interaction as Copper Secateur being suspicious of Velvet, or of her being unhappy with the Cult and the Master. Honestly, I think either of those options is reading too much into things.

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Always a valid option.

Would be kind of weird for her to be so sus though, if there wasn't more to the story.

We don't know why she is lying to us, but the simplest explanation is that it is a personal issue - i.e. she doesn't want to show vulnerability or to confront what happened or whatever the case may be - than that she is distrustful of us in particular, either because she suspects that we aren't on the same side as her re the cult (either because she is secretly disloyal, or because she is loyal but thinks we are secretly disloyal).

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Eehhh, don't think she's against the cult or anything like that (yet~). Also got no clue how/why she'd think Velvet was disloyal "to the cause."

But it's fun to theory-craft the possible whys and how's of the whole scenario, and there's always that small bit of bragging rights if you end up guessing it right, I'd reckon.

Well, back on turn 7, right after the cult meeting, I had pushed for an action to talk to Copper. And, as it stands now, it looks to me like that would have been a really good decision to make. The time to "strike" so to speak was two months ago, when the trauma was still fresh and we could potentially do something about it. Now? Things have calcified and settled into place, and the place they've settled into isn't what one would call ideal. Our best opportunity was turn 7, and we missed it.

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I'd actually disagree with that, for one simple reason.

We needed that Jade action for her to trust us.

This whole build up with her has been to help her recover from her depression, and I'd say that if we had started even later, things wouldn't have ended near as neatly as they have gone so far (ignoring the fact that she's currently MIA, thanks to her Glorious Lantern flex).

While yes, we could have chosen to also help Copper through her reservations and troubles, I'd reckon the best time to do that was with the guards, or possibly right after that to talk her through the event. I'm still really curious as to how, exactly, it almost ended in disaster, too.

As such, two different paths, and we chose Jade over Copper. We shall see how this History pans out, yes?

 

[Ericwinter]

Would be kind of weird for her to be so sus though, if there wasn't more to the story.

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*gasp* Copper killed the store owner! Time to vote her off!

 

[reborn214]

Oh, that is interesting chapter, it was definitely good to see Copper. A pet theory I have which isn't really something that is definitely true is that Copper may have only recently been a social butterfly after the cult.

Like if we think about it, how could Jade convince a social butterfly to come with her to some dark place to listen to a master to unlock Copper's lore? Maybe, she did bribe her with minions like Bakkasama mentioned with that funny short. On the other hand, it may be because for a long time before Jade, Copper was straight up a background pony that no one paid attention to. I can offer you the power to be the center of attention and no longer be the one everyone ignores would be a powerful thing that would convince Copper to join a shady club. Jade mentions that she thinks everyone is left out by society which is why they need the cult, and I don't think Copper would be an exception.

 

[Bakkasama]

I have a suspicion that this might be somewhat literal, and that the Grail 3 gift is a sense for attention. In other words, you literally feel the attention of people - who is paying attention, and what they are feeling attention to.

Just a thought.

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I suspect that that might be the case for her but not necessarily for us. After all, while our Lantern gift comes from the sense of touch, Jade seems to be able to identify things by sight and it is possible that the Master being able to smell emotions could be a variation of it.

Since Grail is about satisfaction of ones desires, I suspect that the reason that Copper could feel attention on her is because she wishes to be the center on attention. It could easily be that the shape of the grail 3 gift depends on what brings satisfaction and thus would be different from pony to pony.

As for why Copper reacted the way she did... well, she seemed to be building a narrative, what with saying that it was a trivial thing despite the fact that we were on the meeting when the Master said it was a close call. My bet would be on the fact that she wants to project certain image since she wants to be the most interesting pony in the room and speaking of her near failure goes against that.

That said, not speaking of cult business at all seem to run counter to that, unless she wants to believe that the reason that ponies want to be around her is because they like her instead of because eldritch knowledge. A situation in that she fools herself into thinking she is the belle of the ball, the popular filly at school everyone likes and wants to be with and that it is because she is herself instead of because she went deep into grail lore.

That might explain why she skipped from speaking work with us, so that it felt we were friends instead of co-workers. Sure, our character sheet says we are friends but if her insecurity is about ponies not liking her or not thinking she is interesting then she could believe deep down that the reason the beautiful mare who rubs fetlocks with princesses and guard captains speaks with her is only work related.

So yeah, my hypothesis was that she was living the dream of being the popular girl what with having a following and is starting to grow nervous due to the dangers involved meaning she has a harder time foaling herself. I wish I could say that she will grow tired of sycophants brought to care about her only due to her aura too but since she is Grail and that is about pursue of desire she will probably indulge even more on that to cope instead.

 

[PrimalShadow]

I suspect that that might be the case for her but not necessarily for us. After all, while our Lantern gift comes from the sense of touch, Jade seems to be able to identify things by sight and it is possible that the Master being able to smell emotions could be a variation of it.

Since Grail is about satisfaction of ones desires, I suspect that the reason that Copper could feel attention on her is because she wishes to be the center on attention. It could easily be that the shape of the grail 3 gift depends on what brings satisfaction and thus would be different from pony to pony.

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That is an interesting thought. I don't know if it is true, but it seems at least possible that level 3 Lore realizations are different for different people.

As for why Copper reacted the way she did... well, she seemed to be building a narrative, what with saying that it was a trivial thing despite the fact that we were on the meeting when the Master said it was a close call. My bet would be on the fact that she wants to project certain image since she wants to be the most interesting pony in the room and speaking of her near failure goes against that.

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I don't buy that. The other ponies are sufficiently far away that I don't expect them to be overhearing things, so I really don't think the conversation was shaped its influence on spectators.

A situation in that she fools herself into thinking she is the belle of the ball, the popular filly at school everyone likes and wants to be with and that it is because she is herself instead of because she went deep into grail lore.

That might explain why she skipped from speaking work with us, so that it felt we were friends instead of co-workers. Sure, our character sheet says we are friends but if her insecurity is about ponies not liking her or not thinking she is interesting then she could believe deep down that the reason the beautiful mare who rubs fetlocks with princesses and guard captains speaks with her is only work related.

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That, I could perhaps believe. If it is a show she is putting on for herself, in a sense, then that would be consistent with what we saw.

I don't think we have nearly enough evidence to suggest anything that specific, but it is a reasonable possibility to consider.

My own hypothesis is that the risk of something bad almost happening, potentially(but not necessarily) combined with moral qualms about the cult's actions, had led to Copper being rather uncomfortable with things and that that is all there is to the matter. I think that is probably the simplest explanation. But then again, while simplicity is a virtue, it is not the only virtue, and as I mentioned earlier we have far too little information to truly narrow things down to a specific explanation at this point.

 

[ω₁]

There are a lot of things about this update that leave me itching to go into full epileptic-tree mode about the nature of the Mansus and the Lores. For now, though, something more concrete:

Besides every now and then the sun will simply sit on the horizon for a few more hours than it should while patiently waiting for the sunset to happen, so there is a very real possibility that you will be back home before night actually falls.

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This does not sound like something which it will be safe to put off dealing with for much longer, if at all.

 

[PrimalShadow]

This does not sound like something which it will be safe to put off dealing with for much longer, if at all.

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Do you have a proposal for dealing with it?

 

[Mgunh1]

Apparently Velvet mostly looks like a ghost who is only seen in glimpses to most casual obervers, which is probably her foundation of Moth Lore.

Admittedly that might be slightly out of date since it was from the first part of the new recruit interlude that covered some time, but this chapter doesn't do anything but support that view.

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Personally, I'd think Velvet is appearing more as a spider now. Someone who just isn't there until they make themselves known, who vanishes once you take your eyes off them and is subtly dangerous in a way that is hard to describe. Not exactly a threat to you, but dangerous nonetheless.

Someone who may or may not be there at any time, watching, waiting. Waiting for what, you don't know, but somehow that not knowing is just worse than if you did know what she wanted.

She doesn't move her head either anymore. It's a subtle thing, something you won't notice unless you look for it, but she never seems to look at where she's going, yet navigates any environment with ease. She'll move in odd ways too, ones that will have even the most adept social navigator tripping over feet and chairs, disappearing behind one pony only to appear behind another on the other side of the room. Like she is taking pathways no-one else can see.

Seriously, Velvet has multiple level 3s, while the others have one or maybe two. She would have a subtle yet truely eldritch aura. She knows things she shouldn't know, walks paths others cannot walk, is unseen until she is right there. She is no longer merely a ghost, she is something more, something dangerous.

Not like Edge, Edge is the beared teeth, the flash of a predator's claws. The danger of something big and hungry. The glimpse of a bear in the woods, the howl of a wolf on the hunt.

Seeing Velvet us more like seeing a lounging panther. An ambush predator that has allowed you to see it because it is not hunting you. Yet seeing it fills you with the knowledge that even at rest, you would never have seen it if it hadn't wanted you to, and that if it was hunting you, you would never know until the moment it's teeth slipped around your neck and you knew no more.

At least, that's how I personally perceive how others would perceive Velvet. Not the enforcer like Comet, who is a visible reminder at all times, but the assassin who only shows up when you've truely fucked up, or when she wants to remind others she is there, watching, always watching.

She is the Loremaster, the one who watches and learns, the spider in the web, waiting.

 

[Ericwinter]

You know, it was totally an accident, but building the Cult's Knock Level this turn probably looks like we're preparing for the eventual summoning rituals that we should, hopefully, get next turn. Kinda funny and perfect timing.

 

[Mgunh1]

This just came to me as I was thinking about how Velvet would be perceived by the other cult members.
I can't help but feel that Copper's evasiveness might be less to do with her worries about the cult as some seem to think and more to do with... other things.

A Moment of Doubt

Stepping out of the club and into the hall, alone now Copper Secateur allowed her mask to drop a moment giving in to the shiver she had been repressing. That... had not been pleasant.

Why? Why now? Why had she shown up?

Velvet had changed over the last few months. Success after success, even when she failed she somehow succeeded, finding a useful element from broken plans. It was no wonder she was the Master's favourite. When they met in the Forest, when the Master's gaze turned upon her, her voice was always so calm, so confident. She always got results, solved problems. Like Jade, that traitorous part whispered. She had gone missing after failing her ritual. She hadn't been replaced, so she wasn't dead, but...

But she failed, she was a problem. It whispered again, Velvet solves problems.

And so had Copper. She had failed too. Would she be whisked away like Jade seemed to have been? Useful only for her lore connections? Her way of thinking?

Perhaps she was over thinking it. Perhaps the rumours were utterly baseless and Velvet had nothing to do with Jade's disappearance. But it was her role to listen to the rumours, to ferret out the truth behind them, and that part was telling her that Velvet had something to do with Jade.

So Copper had done her best to avoid the topics Velvet wanted to talk about. To talk around her and back to less... incriminating things, even if Copper wasn't sure what would be incriminating to Velvet. She hoped she had been skilful enough to avoid Velvet noticing, and her two apprentices messing up had been a miracle, allowing her to bow out without looking like was running away the way she had wanted to.

When Copper had turned around again, Velvet was gone, as though she'd never been there at all.

Hopefully Velvet had been honest, that she'd just wanted to catch up.

Hopefully everything would be fine.

Hopefully Copper wasn't a problem to be solved.

Copper took a breath, centred herself and stepped back into the club. A smile gracefully spread across her face as she returned, looking to all the world as though she had simply stepped out to refresh herself.

 

[Pittauro]

That, though, could be just me reading way too much into it.

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maybe? it's a valid reading, but there's also a difference between how someone treats their inferiors/underlings, and how they treat their equals/friends.

In the end a character is more than his/her lore affinities.

We don't know why she is lying to us, but the simplest explanation is that it is a personal issue - i.e. she doesn't want to show vulnerability or to confront what happened or whatever the case may be - than that she is distrustful of us in particular, either because she suspects that we aren't on the same side as her re the cult (either because she is secretly disloyal, or because she is loyal but thinks we are secretly disloyal).

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we didn't really give reasons to believe we're disloyal to anyone who doesn't know about Selene.

Admittedly she knows us better than most, so she might suspect we disagree about what happened with the ritual..

Well, back on turn 7, right after the cult meeting, I had pushed for an action to talk to Copper. And, as it stands now, it looks to me like that would have been a really good decision to make. The time to "strike" so to speak was two months ago, when the trauma was still fresh and we could potentially do something about it. Now? Things have calcified and settled into place, and the place they've settled into isn't what one would call ideal. Our best opportunity was turn 7, and we missed it.

Of course, this is a game of tradeoffs and it is not like we could pull actions out of nowhere; my own proposal back then was putting off a Jade action. Which I think would have gone okay, but then again maybe not? As a reminder, turn 7 we had the action where went to the park with Jade, and tore open that wound, so to speak; turn 8 was the real "mandatory" Jade action where we needed to make sure she didn't metaphorically bleed to death. I think putting off the interaction turn 7 may not have done any harm, though even with hindsight it is not exactly clear.

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yeah, we had lots of trade-offs to consider. I agree that was THE moment to talk to her, but we can never be completely certain about what would have happened to Jade.

Even if she wasn't emotionally unstable to the point of suicide, there's always the chance that without our intervention she might have completed the ritual sooner and without helping us (presumably) keeping Selene hidden

Note that the turn isn't over, so it is not really clear one way or another. We only get Realizations for our Lore 3 levels partway through the turn, so I'd broadly expect an "all-lore" bonus to work similarly.

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I know, that's why I said I'm still hoping for a surprise interlude

I have a suspicion that this might be somewhat literal, and that the Grail 3 gift is a sense for attention. In other words, you literally feel the attention of people - who is paying attention, and what they are feeling attention to.

Just a thought.

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It certainly makes sense, good thought.

I think this is fully possible (and probably already working like that) because, you know, it is not only fully possible in real life, but also the supposed way to study.

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Sure, but while people easily understand the concept of, say, addition, or square root, understanding more complicated concepts like... I don't know, transcendental numbers, it's not as easy for most.

Then again this probably is already translated in the basic lantern bonus.

You know, it was totally an accident, but building the Cult's Knock Level this turn probably looks like we're preparing for the eventual summoning rituals that we should, hopefully, get next turn. Kinda funny and perfect timing.

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we also lack a Knock specialist, so it makes sense the role would fall to Velvet.





Secondary thought: next turn we're probably going to take a Winter Lesson.

If we're not going to ask the "why are we needed to get these rituals/Why don't you already know them/Why can't you teach them to us", or an Alicorn related question, how about asking about how exactly the mind healing ritual would work if we used it on ourselves?

Because now that Stormchaser is in the know, I'm really tempted to remove the mental/physical wounds we have.

Who knows, maybe we can blame its disappearance on Discord/the Element of Harmony's rainbow beam if we're close to him when he's defeated? Or if Zecora is known maybe we could lie and say we got a potion from her (only to these people who DON'T know her personally, obviously, but then again in ponyville only our family, our maids and Rarity know of the scar, and family and Rarity are safe enough)

 

[Emissary]

You know, it was totally an accident, but building the Cult's Knock Level this turn probably looks like we're preparing for the eventual summoning rituals that we should, hopefully, get next turn. Kinda funny and perfect timing.

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If we want to start summoning, we should probably be going on more expeditions into the Mansus and start turning influences into spirits into disposable expedition fodder.

 

[Ericwinter]

If we want to start summoning, we should probably be going on more expeditions into the Mansus and start turning influences into spirits into disposable expedition fodder.

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That is the plan for next turn, yes. It's even our Cult assignment.

 

[reborn214]

Who knows, maybe we can blame its disappearance on Discord/the Element of Harmony's rainbow beam if we're close to him when he's defeated? Or if Zecora is known maybe we could lie and say we got a potion from her (only to these people who DON'T know her personally, obviously, but then again in ponyville only our family, our maids and Rarity know of the scar, and family and Rarity are safe enough)

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the most annoying part would be dad or uncle to be honest if one of our scars disappeared. They would think of our healing as a possible commercial opportunity to sell this possible cure unless we say it can't be replicated or stuff. For most people, I don't think we would have to worry much though if we gave a partial truth out though. Like as a hobby we research ancient magics and came across an esoteric healing ritual and tried it on ourselves to great effect.

It would make a lot of sense given that we read a lot, went to university, and sometimes ask ponies to give us ancient artifacts that we could do this. I wouldn't really want to try forge redemption or incision of the heart now though since failure will have nasty repercussions when Storm sees his wife get physically or mentally hurt by occult magic right after they reached some sort of understanding and our skills in those lores aren't that great for any high success chances unless we get the master to cast it which I guess I would be fine with the forge redemption, but I would not be okay with the master rooting in our brain with a heart incision.

 

[ω₁]

Do you have a proposal for dealing with it?

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"proposal" is a more charitable description than I'm willing to give, but I have a few possible starting points. In approximate order of increasing badness:

The first — variations on which have been discussed before — is "go into Celestia's dream and hope that there's something we can do there". Perhaps we can tell her (technically, truthfully) that we visited Luna in a dream and that she seemed to be unharmed. Perhaps we can tell her (not entirely truthfully) that an organization of dreamwalkers performed a ritual to find Luna, and it turned up nothing, not even a corpse. Perhaps Celestia is being attacked in her dreams by a Worm, and we can interrupt it. Perhaps she is being attacked in her dreams by a Worm, and we can't interrupt it there, but we can use what we learn to send her a message in the Wake. Perhaps none of the above are true; at the very least we should learn something. (If we're very lucky, we may learn that I'm completely wrong.)

The second is "get Twilight Sparkle and/or the Elements of Harmony to intervene". I don't have any idea how to do that; hopefully either the meeting with Twilight today or the option above may provide some clues. (Failing that, one could perhaps suggest outright that whatever happened to Luna a thousand years ago may be happening to Celestia now. As noted previously, it might even be true.)

The third is "summon something to tell Celestia that Luna is alive but hidden". (I'm thinking the Baldomare, but a Raw Prophet would probably do in a pinch.) This should conceal from Celestia any connection between Velvet Covers and the message — the Master or the cult might notice, but we can reasonably claim to be trying to keep Celestia from becoming a Worm-host, as Luna had. This can't be done for at least two months, though, and depending on the requirements of a summoning ritual may turn out not to be possible even then.

The fourth is to use "The Path through Nightmares" to send Celestia nightmares — not nightmares of finding Luna dead or insane, which is probably what she's having already, but nightmares of finding Luna perfectly safe and recovering... except that, in finding her, Celestia has exposed Luna to the world, and in particular to whatever enemy she was actually hiding from. (The thrust of this approach is that it allows Celestia to convince herself that "not looking for Luna" is an option with tradeoffs and attached hope, rather than just a form of giving up forever. It may alternatively convince her to shift to more covert searches, which would replace the current problem with one we can put off. It may, alternatively again, convince her that all options are pointless and so drive her immediately to total despair.)

The fifth, of course, is to replace her with the Clockwork Sun.

 

[Mage of Eyes]

the most annoying part would be dad or uncle to be honest if one of our scars disappeared. They would think of our healing as a possible commercial opportunity to sell this possible cure unless we say it can't be replicated or stuff. For most people, I don't think we would have to worry much though if we gave a partial truth out though. Like as a hobby we research ancient magics and came across an esoteric healing ritual and tried it on ourselves to great effect.

Click to shrink...

Why tell the House though? I don't suppose Velvet goes to them often, especially without clothes. The ponies outside of our close friends and family circle probably don't know about the scar at all, we are too mothy for that! Well, except for some doctor, I guess, but we could not use that doctor's services anymore.
I think the only way for trouble to appear is for Silky/Selene to somehow tell someone from the House about our miraculous healing, but that could be easily solved with a lie good enough.

Clockwork Sun

Click to shrink...

—E SUN THE SUN THE SUN THE SUN THE SUN TH—

 

[DaLintyGuy]

I realize this may be getting ahead of ourselves... But when can we put in a Social action with Cadence? If for nothing else then she could inherit a bit of a mess that will need trusted individuals to reorganize.

But mainly because I want to follow up on our work, develop contacts, etc.

 

[Skelm]

preparing for the eventual summoning rituals that we should, hopefully, get next turn.

Click to shrink...

I really don't think we should hurry on this one. Remember how many omakes have us running from cult summons? We can make sure that doesn't become a reality by putting this off further.

But she failed, she was a problem. It whispered again, Velvet solves problems.

Click to shrink...

We do! We snuggle them until they go away and never bother us again!

And so had Copper. She had failed too. Would she be whisked away like Jade seemed to have been? Useful only for her lore connections? Her way of thinking?

Click to shrink...

I would have thought a Grail adept would be more... excited at the possibility of being whisked away by a mysterious noblemare...

 

[Ericwinter]

I really don't think we should hurry on this one. Remember how many omakes have us running from cult summons? We can make sure that doesn't become a reality by putting this off further.

Click to shrink...

Only the one, I think. And do you have an excuse for when the Master asks us why we've ignored their orders? We need to progress in the Mansus, at least, even if we don't manage to actually get the ritual. Maybe if we aimed away from the obvious solution we could say we just accidentally went the wrong way, but I actually want to get the summoning anyways, since it could be really useful.