Face down in the dirt, only his pride is hurt

[onehandsomeslickninja]

Who: Pony!Edge.
What: Suddenly, a pony. He was not prepared to be a pony.
Where: Ponyville.
When: Shortly after access to Ponyville opens.
Warnings: Overuse of the word pony.



Some days, Edge wondered just how his life had come to this.

"This", in this case, was his unusually long face planted in the dirt, after he had taken two steps into the new world, tripped over forelegs that had been arms just seconds ago, and pitched forward ungracefully. His swords, no longer gripped in his hands since he had no hands to grip with, lay on each side of him in the ground, while his cloak was splayed out between two wings that his body had instinctively spread to try to catch his fall.

"I'd say this was all a bad dream," he muttered into the ground, "but I already knew that."

For the moment, he'd honestly lost all will or desire to move.

Comments

[onehandsomeslickninja]

"That's them. Summoned monsters, called monsters... they have a lot of names." He hesitated, balanced on all four legs, because this felt weird -- he ought to be on his knees, like this, not standing perfectly.

He very carefully began tapping each hoof in turn on the ground, just to acclimate to the new and strange sensations this new body brought.

[earthshatter]

Aeleus nods at the comment. It's hardly surprising, given the various different worlds, and honestly as long as he has a point of reference, it doesn't much matter to him what Edge wants to call them. The names don't matter nearly as much as the phenomenon as a whole.

"I don't believe we are currently eidolons, no. If anything this is likely more akin to being made a frog or a pig. In fact, if one ignores the unusual colors, we mostly resemble ponies."

[onehandsomeslickninja]

"Ponies?"

Edge stared at the other pony with undisguised shock.

"You mean all this time, Luna and Rarity, there has been a word for what they are and no one ever told me?!"

[earthshatter]

Of all the reactions that could have come in response to his comment, Aeleus could honestly say that Edge's wasn't one of the ones he was expecting. Still, it wasn't a hard question either, not that he would have been less inclined to answer if it had.

"There has been, yes. What have you been calling them, if I may ask?"

[onehandsomeslickninja]

"Eidolons. That's the closest thing I could think of to what they're like." Edge laughed awkwardly. "Well, guess I owe them an apology."

[earthshatter]

Aeleus simply nods at the comment. Without any reference to horses, he can easily see how Edge might have need to fall back on something more familiar. On the other hand, he's also pretty sure that few of the ponies currently present (at least of those who are naturally ponies) would have been too put out at being called something else.

"It certainly can't hurt," he answers. "Although I can't imagine they would have been particularly bothered by it."

[onehandsomeslickninja]

"I think it just confused them!" Edge laughed again, then turned his attention to important matters like walking. He began on the wrong foot, trying to move both a front leg and a back leg at the same time, but he quickly figured out the one-at-a-time thing before he crashed to the ground again.

"Hey, this isn't so bad."

[earthshatter]

Once again Aeleus nods. It would, after all, certainly make sense. Especially if they'd never heard of eidolons before, and given it sounds like a fairly world-specific term he would hardly be surprised if the ponies hadn't been familiar with it. He hadn't been, so why expect others to be?

"Not once you get used to it, no."

[onehandsomeslickninja]

"I guess it wouldn't be! Rarity and Luna get around just fine." Whether his cheerful failure to acknowledge that they were born that way is boneheaded or an inspiring statement on them all being the same despite the outer shells they wore was pretty much up to Aeleus.

He lowered his head, sort of hesitantly lurched forward, then stopped. "I think running may have to wait till I find softer ground..."

[earthshatter]

For his part, Aeleus was perfectly willing to assume the latter. He might have been wrong in that regard, but that was certainly no reason to not at least initially assume that Edge was simply making boneheaded statements. Instead, he turned his attention to Edge's other comment.

"I may be able to help with that, although we might want to move away from the entrance to the place first."

[onehandsomeslickninja]

"Help with that? You can still do stuff as a pony?"

Edge hadn't considered it possible, mostly because his main supernatural talent, ninjutsu, relied so heavily on finger motions. Needless to say, it didn't translate.

[earthshatter]

"I can, yes. It might not be quite as easy in this form as my normal one, but it'll do well enough."

After all, the earth would answer one way or another if he asked it to. That he wasn't in quite the same shape that he normally was didn't really come into play much.

[onehandsomeslickninja]

"This I gotta see!" Edge began carefully walking away from the Ponyville entrance, off to the side towards a grassier area.

[earthshatter]

Fortunately for Edge, Aeleus was more than okay with practical demonstrations. Especially after he'd basically offered to use them to make things easier anyway.

There's no great fanfare to it either, once they get to the grassier area. He can already feel the earth under his feet - under his hooves? - and that's all he needs. He does tap ones of his hooves against the ground but that's hardly anything at all, at least comparing to the fact that a scarcely a moment after he does so a boulder quite literally tears itself out of the ground.

[onehandsomeslickninja]

Edge let out a whistle, which actually surprised him when he considered he could do it as a pony. "Hey, how're you still able to do that as a pony? I guess you don't actually have any finger gestures involved in the magic, huh..."

[earthshatter]

"Not in this sort of magic, at least," Aeleus answered with a nod. "There are schools of magic that require more specific gestures, but geomancy is not one of them."

[onehandsomeslickninja]

"Geomancy, huh? Never heard of that..." Edge pawed at the broken ground again curiously, trying to compare the pattern of its emergence to the sort of damage caused by ninjutsu, or comparatively, that technique Lin used which he hadn't seen in a ton of detail.

[earthshatter]

Generally speaking, it appears to be more like Lin's earthbending than anything else, although Aeleus is not precisely familiar with any of the techniques that Edge might have been inclined to use.

"It's not very common, even where I'm from."

[onehandsomeslickninja]

He prodded one particular stone as if it told him something. It... didn't, despite his optimism. He couldn't learn anything meaningfully useful from this residue.

"Same thing with ninjutsu. They say it's like a variant of Black Magic, though -- same deal?"