There is, dear reader, a point where equine knowledge should seek no further expansion. But, this is not to say we have reached this point. I am Twilight Sparkle, the protege of Celestia, the heir to her bountiful anals. So many students of hers were satisfied with nought but studying her available theorems and incantations, and finding paltry discrepancies, learning about the anatomy of other species, creating streamlined versions of spells long since crafted. Am I to do the same? Is that the cruel joke of my existence, to have all of our collected knowledge, and yet for it to be so incomplete? My mentor told me that knowings for the sake of our comprehension is a fool's errand, and that there are some things that can't be known , or worse, shouldn't be. How am I supposed to accept this when we as a species are standing in a small sphere or illumination, and at all sides the infinite expanse unseen is engulfed in the darkness of superstition and unknowing? It is maddening, if madness were ever so cruel. Thus, I have chosen to learn about it all. I will give unto ponykind my life, and my soul, and my sanity and body, so that I may teach us all what we know nothing of. I will one day be remembered as the bringer of knowing to all of Equestria and beyond. I will be known as the harbinger or knowledge, as Celestia's greatest achievement. While that shrew will live long after the meat rots off my bones and even those wither to dust, she will never be able to destroy my work, there is my immortality, and it is far greater than to lie about for all of time as she does.
What laid before me, as I stood in the basement of my dwelling, was not a horror, but an opportunity. They spoke you understand. They spoke to me. In my dreams they told me. They told me how. They told me why. They told me things I don't understand. BUT I WILL. That's why they choose me, they choose ME because I have the required strength to do what must be done, to bring knowing to the pony folk. My first experiment would be one of purely scientific nature, anatomy of the Unicorn. There is such an idiotic law against such actions, a fear perhaps to see what is beneath the skin, a reverence for life that is ill placed. The squirming writhing form before me, twisting in a sickening bid to escape the march or progress. Like the rest of them. They have no reverence for what matters, what we must do to advance the species. Am I evil for being willing to do what they won't? Perhaps. Perhaps they are evil for their inaction.
Taking the knife to the subject was… it… it… it pains me to think of. His writhing and screaming, I shan't forget it. Not until I die. Not until my soul fades from this place, and I am no more. He shall be eternal in my nightmares. I have no stomach for torment, I plunged it through his temple, and he fidgeted and let out strange screaming noises, but did not die. Fascinating. Truly. I left the blade in for a while, and observed, and he twitched and screeched, but I needed to know if he was still with us, or had his body simply malfunctioned in a desperate attempt to cling to life and function as normal, after the cool metal pierced his whole world and filled it with nothing but steel. I called his name. His eyes focused on me, his foreleg attempted to move in what most have been the first deliberate motion he had made the whole time, and he spoke! It was not comprehensible, it was a gibberish, really. It droned, his tone changing randomly, he had no control of volume or tonality, he spoke no words, until finally, in the middle of a fit of horrid gibberish, the words came again,."Kkkkkkjjjjj, mnnh, Twi, hhhgggjjj lihhhhttt." Was he trying to say my name? I knew him from town of course, was he trying to beg me? Was he even there!
"Nmmmm Twi Hjgigijnf" came out of his lips. He spoke my name! He knew! He was still lucid. "Are you still with us?" I asked. He nodded his head, before convulsing as the blade moved ever so slightly. "What is it like?" I asked. He started, his eyes dilating, his voice wavering and coming in even stronger, in a series of terrifying noises that could not be done justice by the written word. "Ghusdgujedgbjdbgjdjgdgbd, ghghhghghghhgg, ghghhghghghhg, I ghghghghg, ssssssssssssssss…" He trailed off than, his head fell to one side, his eyes took on a glossy look to them, and his eyelids fell over them. "No no no no no no!" I yelled, I ran to him, I shook him, I twisted the blade, nothing but involuntary spasming. He was gone. He had lived with a knife in his brain for a full 20 minutes. It was invaluable data.
His body was not wasted, he was opened up, and I saw the innards. Within my final manuscript, there will be a diagram of the full unicorn anatomy. There were really no unexpected discoveries, I mapped the veins and arteries, found the correct placement of the innards, and other such mundane things. Yes they were important, but they were not worth killing a pony for. However, what I found in the horn was. I removed it from the base of the forehead with a straight forward slicing of it, but when I went to remove it, there was something attached that made it stay put. I tugged harder. It stayed firm. I grabbed on with all my magical strength, and finally, it budged a bit. Underneath the horn, I could see something, it horrified me to my core. There were these tangled knotted masses connected within the head, it seemed as if they were entwined within the horn, out of sight. I carefully attempted to extract them, but my tugging wasn't pulling them from the brain, but pulling the brain forward. I was forced, regrettably, to sever the many tangetical connections between the brain and the horn.
Than, I removed it with no hassle. What I found! There are massive clumps of nerves I believe, in the horn going down to the brain! But what's more, there is a reservoir in the horn, protected by a layer or thin bone, only penetrated by a few twisting threads of pale red nerves and veins. There is liquid at the tip of the horn, and what's more, it was the same color as his coat. I extracted it into a vial, and will be using it for tests soon enough. I have made a rudimentary map of the nerves and the brain, how they connect an to where. The nerves go into almost all parts of the brain, I believe perhaps that different parts of brain are used for seperate spells. I have answered some questions, I suppose, but yet, there are so many more still! This is why I was chosen, I have alone will persevere for the final answers, lest we spend all of time in this stagnant quagmire.
(The coming passage is a letter of Twilights, sent to Celestia shortly after her experiment.)
Dear Princess Celestia, I have a question if I may. You and I have talked before of the many phenomena that we are not allowed, by the code of StarSwirl, to observe. I needn't another lecture on why we follow it, nor why we musn't break it. I have come to agree with you. However I am curious, what happens to those who break it, and perhaps make a discovery of some relevance? Do they get taken into consideration, or do we discard their work? I know you told me of the necromancers of Canterlot, back in the days long before Luna was banished. How Luna found them, and how she chained them to large rocks, and left them in the everfree. How a few of that horrid cult escaped, and lived out their days there, experimenting on the Pony folk who wandered to far into the forest. How the things they discovered were so foul that we cast them away, that they may never reveal to the good folk the horrors of it all. Is this what we do with all the forbidden knowledge? I am simply curious.
Your Faithful student
Twilight Sparkle.
(The response to Ms. Sparkle's questions)
Dearest Twilight, I am glad to hear from you. It has been to long, weeks now. Your friendship studies, go they well? I sent you a letter just last week but you seem to have not gotten it. Dragons are usually reliable, but perhaps there was some mistake, the system isn't foolproof by any means. You are still young, you still haven't seen the things that I have warned you of. When you became an alicorn, I feared you may have certain adverse side effects, it seems I may have been right. You have all of time now Twilight, an eternity, and this can be daunting. I know in my youth, I still had trouble understanding. We as alicorns, must keep Equestria safe, and moreover, a good place for our kind to live out their days. The knowledge that would be acquired through inquiry into forbidden subject matter would not be worth the price my faithful student. The knowings offered would be devoid of purpose or place in our society, they would be of a nature that we must avoid if we are to be a civilized society. To answer your question, it depends on which statue of the code was broken, but most that are broken are of a nature that is far to abhorrent for us to forgive the perpetrator enough to see any form of merit their attrocities may have had. Please, go back to your studies of friendship, and stop with this morbidity.
Your friend and teacher
Celestia.