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#Post#: 3427--------------------------------------------------
Onyx Lotus
By: Onyx Lotus Date: November 26, 2017, 4:49 pm
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Name: Onyx Lotus, goes by “Nyx”
Race: Unicorn
Gender: Mare
Age: Mid-twenties
Physical Description: Nyx’s coat is a dark red, accented by
dyed, brighter red swirls that decorate her legs and neck. She
has a sleek black mane and tail that fall in loose waves, and
golden eyes. Her cutie mark is a black symbol of the orbital
paths in an atom, representing energy. She also has precisely
seven piercings along the outer edge of each ear, though she
only wears earrings on formal occasions. Jewelry she can
tolerate, but she greatly dislikes any type of clothing and
often goes undressed to even the fanciest of parties.
Special Talent: Energy absorption and construction
Bio: Born in a small town on the outskirts of Equestria, Nyx had
great ambitions from Day One. She matured unusually quickly,
learning to talk and read much sooner than most foals. She knew
she wanted to do great things, and she knew she was smart enough
to do them. She wanted to be a unicorn mage that every
Equestrian citizen knew the name of. And she was right, in one
aspect. She did have the intelligence.
But she lacked the power. She picked up levitation quickly, but
didn’t seem to be able to lift anything heavier than a few
pounds. She could easily change the color of an orange with her
magic, but only to its neighboring shades: red or yellow. She
was summoning storm clouds as a filly, but they never lingered
for more than a few minutes.
And as she grew older, she tried harder and harder. Her
classmates earned their cutie marks one by one, while Nyx’s
flank remained blank. But Nyx didn’t give up. She just told
herself that if she practiced enough, the power would come. She
practiced and drove herself to exhaustion every day, not that it
took many spells to do so. She entered her teens, and still, no
cutie mark.
Then… there was the fire.
Nyx’s hometown was nestled deep in a large, dense forest. Nopony
knows how it started; it could have been anything, a camper’s
fire not put completely out, a freak lightning bolt hitting a
tree… Either way, if somepony caused it, they never came
forward. The fire started in the middle of the night, and spread
frighteningly quickly, starting in the southern part of the
forest and steadily heading towards the town. As it drew nearer,
the smoke was finally spotted. Authorities were alerted, and
teams of pegasi took to the sky and tried to gather enough storm
clouds to douse the fire. But it was too late.
The fire had grown too large, too powerful. The town, unused to
such disasters, was far from prepared, and even though they were
evacuating as quickly as they could, it wasn’t fast enough.
Nyx was woken by her parents, and not even taking the time to
take any belongings, the family fled North. It was dark, and
smoke filled the air. The panicked cries of ponies rang out,
filling the forest with cries of terror and anguish. The noise’s
echo off the tree trunks distorted ponies’ locations, and many
ponies were accidentally separated from their groups.
Nyx was one of these. She lost track of which dark, fleeing
shapes were her parents. She pressed on, but she was still
young, and very frightened. Not being able to find her family,
she came to the conclusion that she must have gotten ahead of
them. She started South, but the smoke and the smells and the
fear confused her, making a familiar forest into a deadly maze.
She kept going, even as she knew she was drawing nearer to the
fire. She had to find her parents. They were all she had. Having
travelled more to the East than she intended, she missed the
town entirely and kept going towards the blaze. Shadows do
strange things to a pony’s mind, and she wasn’t even aware she
was right in the fire’s path until the trees around her caught
fire. She turned and ran, but she knew the flames were faster.
She could feel oppressive heat behind her, and gathering all the
courage she possessed, she turned and faced the fire. Only one
coherent thought went through her head…. survive.
The trees behind her suddenly seemed to be shining, the trunk
and branches dripping pure green light. But Nyx didn’t turn. She
closed her eyes, and suddenly an energy filled her like it never
had before… and she knew what she had to do. She crafted a
shield from pure energy, the magic flowing from her horn a mix
of unnatural green and her usual gold aura.
Some rational part of Nyx’s brain was still operating, and that
part told her that it would not be enough to form a dome of
protection around the town and the forest that had not been
consumed- she had to kill the blaze itself.
And so the shield grew, both meeting the forest floor and
flowing upward, eventually starting to curve away from her. The
wall of energy grew faster and faster as more power flowed
through her. The curving wall reached it’s apex, above even the
tallest flames, and started to curve back down. The far edges of
the powerful gold and green dome slammed against the ground,
sealing the fire off. This was no magical protection that merely
limited what could breach it. This was pure power, and nothing,
not even the innocent air, could bypass it.
Cut off from oxygen, the fire died as quickly as it started.
When not even an ember remained, the dome vanished and Nyx’s
magical aura faded. She felt more energetic, more powerful than
she had ever felt in her life. But... where had that strange
green power come from?
She turned, and her jaw dropped. At least thirty trees behind
her, previously full and green, were completely dead. Their
trunks were rotting, their leaves brown and tattered as if the
trees had been dead for years. Filled with the clashing emotions
of exhilaration and numbness, Nyx headed North to find her
family. With such strange events happening so rapidly, it wasn’t
until hours later that Nyx realized that amid all the strange
magic, a symbol had appeared on her flank.
She was hailed as hero when it was learned what she had managed
to do. A week letter, her parents sent Nyx to Celestia’s School
for Gifted Unicorns. Even though she was significantly older
than the average age that most unicorns were admitted at, she
was accepted. She tested out of class after class, until she had
caught up with the others her age, in just a little under a year
after she was admitted.
Fast forward several years, and Nyx had become one of the most
talented mages in Equestria. Her publications on the nature of
magic and energy gained her a following that she called loyal,
while others called it cult-like. She was particularly popular
among the young blood in the magical community. Everything from
the dyed swirls in her coat, to her many piercings, to her
laid-back nature and forward-thinking theories endeared her to
ponies that had tired of the traditionalists that dominated the
scientific and magical community.
Of course, those very traits made her many enemies in academia.
Though few were brave enough to confront her directly, many
rumors were whispered behind her back, rumors claiming that she
was everything from a scam artist to a real-life psychic
vampire.
This mostly stemmed from the practice of “Energy Donation” that
Nyx used to fuel her research. Nyx had developed a process for
not only drawing energy out of her environment, but out of other
ponies as well. She only took a very small amount out of each
pony, claiming she never took more than five percent of the
pony’s current “raw power”. It started with just accepting
donations from other unicorns, but Nyx quickly broadened her
focus and process, and started to accept the innate magic of
pegasi and earth ponies as well.
She became an expert in detecting, measuring, and extracting
energy. The process, she was constantly reminding the media,
was, “Completely safe, painless, and helps support research
that, given enough support, could virtually solve any problem
that arises in the future due to lack of natural resources. Each
pony’s magic will naturally replace all the amount of energy
that they have donated. In most cases, this will occur within 24
hours after the donation, making donation a simple and noble way
to help build a better future for everypony.” She had such a
loyal following that, even if a donation did somehow go wrong,
they would never draw the media’s attention to such a fact.
Through these donations, and extractions from natural sources,
Nyx slowly built up a store of magical energy. Just as she had
promised everypony that had helped by donating that it would go
towards research, she did keep a subtle “back-up” store. Fearing
that one day she would lose support and go back to the talented
but weak unicorn she had been in her childhood, this storage
served as her insurance. Since Nyx was really just transferring
magical energy from others, not generating it herself, the color
of her magic varied with whose energy she was currently using.
Plants’ energy tended to be green, other organic but non-living
sources, such as the wind or a river, could have any hue of
magic. And of course, the energy she gathered from ponies were
different for each individual. With so many colors of magic in
store, they often blended together and made Nyx’s aura a
veritable rainbow.
So now, Nyx’s days are filled with research, donation
collection, and writing and speaking to draw support from the
public and her fellow mages and scientists. She loves her life
and work, and wouldn’t trade it for anything.
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