The morning felt… suspiciously peaceful.
I was sitting by the front window, silently sipping my orange juice, watching as the breeze barely stirred the leaves on the nearby trees. The sky was clear, not a single cloud. Too perfect. Too… stable.
Pinkie Pie hadn't shown up. Which was already strange. Lately, she'd been showing up with any excuse, from delivering "atmospherically blessed cookies" to trying to smuggle whatever it was into my house like a hyperactive squirrel with questionable stealth skills.
But not today. Today, peace existed.
And it lasted exactly until something gray fell from the sky and crashed into my mailbox with a dry THUD.
I blinked. My juice stopped tasting like oranges and started tasting like inevitability. I leaned closer, setting the glass on the windowsill. As I focused, I spotted a pair of hind legs flailing in the air, a trembling blonde tail, and then… yep. It had to be her.
Ditzy Doo.
Her head was firmly lodged in my mailbox, like it was part of the original design. Her entire body hung backwards, balancing in anatomically improbable ways while trying to wiggle free.
And of course… she couldn't.
I stood up abruptly.
"Hold on a second, Ditzy!" I shouted, pushing the door open with my telekinesis as I rushed down the steps.
From inside the metallic mailbox, her voice echoed muffled and confused.
"Hey! Mail's here! Special magic-mailbox delivery! Happy mail service! Ow, my wing!"
I wasn't sure if it was a complete sentence, a hidden spell, or just pure panic talking.
I found her flapping her wings as if that would change her current fate. Still, she was smiling. She always did. A blend of hope and imminent chaos.
"I'm fine! Just… a little… stuck," she said with a sigh of resignation, her voice reverberating in the metal.
I used my magic carefully to grip her from the back and pull. There was slight resistance and then—pop—her head came out like a cork from a bottle.
She landed on her hooves, because of course she did, and handed me a letter with her smile intact. The envelope floated to me before I could even ask what it was.
"Delivery complete! With almost perfect precision!" she said proudly, one eye looking at me and the other searching for her imaginary hat.
"Ditzy… why is it always like this with you?"
"Like what?!" she asked, with such honest joy it hurt.
I sighed and took the envelope. The purple seal with Mayor Mare's official mark shimmered faintly.
"Thanks… I guess."
"You're welcome! And don't forget to check your mailbox tomorrow! There might be another Ditzy hiding in there!"
And with that, she took off. Slightly tilted, as if flying straight was merely a suggestion, leaving behind a swirl of loose papers fluttering like confused butterflies in the calm air.
With a resigned sigh and a precise flick, I cast a simple spell. All the letters floated in the air, suspended by a charm anchored to the area. They weren't going anywhere. Ditzy would be back for them… eventually. Better they didn't end up in a puddle.
"Static-anchor aerial suspension spell... functional," I muttered to myself.
I returned to the fresh comfort of my house, letting the breeze slip gently through the still-ajar door. I closed it with my magic without even looking and watched the envelope now floating before me, slowly spinning. The purple seal from Mayor Mare still gleamed with that odd formality I'd never liked.
I sighed.
"I should enchant it..." I muttered as I dropped onto the couch. "Something to make it soft. Impact-resistant. Anti-Ditzy. Or at least make it bounce."
"What could the mayor possibly want from me…?" I murmured, letting my body sink into the couch, still carrying that sense that something was about to change.
I stretched the letter in front of me, breaking the seal with a soft touch of my aura. At the same time, I summoned my juice with an [Accio], and the glass returned to my side without spilling a drop.
I took a sip as I unfolded the scroll and began to read. The words were written with neat penmanship, too careful to have been dictated in a rush. Which only made it more suspicious.
The scroll unrolled smoothly… or so I thought at first. In reality, there were three, perfectly rolled over one another and tied with a ribbon of purple silk.
I frowned and separated the outermost one, which had a simpler seal—clearly written by the mayor herself. It still carried a faint scent of fresh ink and magical wax, a sign it had been written not long ago. The handwriting was precise, each letter carefully formed, almost too elegant to belong in Ponyville. I began to read softly, eyes scanning each line with growing curiosity.
"To the attention of Her Royal Highness Princess Celestia,"
"With the utmost respect, I write to present a request I believe to be of growing importance to the Ponyville community."
Huh, this wasn't originally written for me… this was sent directly to Tia.
"Our school, the Ponyville Schoolhouse, has proudly fulfilled its educational role in the basic areas required for all foals in our community. However, we have identified a specific gap which, until recently, posed no real issue: the lack of formal magical education for young unicorns."
"Historically, this gap was covered by the small number of unicorn families in the region. The few horned foals would usually receive basic magical education from their own parents. But this situation has changed."
Yeah… I'd noticed that too. The town's magical density had increased. I felt it the day I arrived.
"In recent months, Ponyville has welcomed several unicorn families, many of them with school-aged foals. These young ones currently attend school without any structure to help them understand or channel their magic safely. We've started to notice minor accidents, spontaneous magical instability, and a worrying lack of compatibility between the young ones and their magic cores."
I swallowed. Not because it was serious, but because I imagined a classroom of unicorn foals casting random spells during math class. Pure chaos.
"We understand this deficit doesn't usually affect the functional development of an average unicorn. Not all follow the path of magic. But… what if one of them wants to? What if there's untapped talent, a heart willing to study, but no guidance?"
The tone was proper. Formal, yes. But beneath it… there was real concern.
"Therefore, with all due respect, we ask your permission to invite your apprentice, young Wizbell Star, to consider a temporary position as a magic teacher at our school."
I froze. My glass floated a little closer, like my magic instinctively sought comfort.
"We understand his talent may seem, perhaps, wasted in such a humble role. But we also believe no one else in Ponyville has the level, discipline, and knowledge to guide these foals. Only him… or your other apprentice, Miss Twilight Sparkle, whom we have already appointed as librarian, a role she fulfills with admirable dedication."
I closed my eyes for a moment. Was this real? Did they want me to teach?
"We hope for your blessing, Princess, so we may present this idea directly to your apprentice. We understand the final decision is his, but we want him to know he has our full support and would be more than welcome in this new educational stage of Ponyville."
"With respect, responsibility, and hope,"
"Mayor Ivory Mare."
———————————————————————————————————————
I stared at the letter and set it down on the table, taking a deep breath before reaching for the next scroll.
It was short, just a formal reply bearing Tia's golden seal, confirming she agreed with the mayor's request. Nothing more. But just as I was about to set it aside, I noticed something different: a small scrap of parchment stuck to the back, sealed with wax, still unopened.
I blinked. I figured the mayor had respected the message's privacy… so I opened it with a simple magical sliding spell.
The handwriting was unmistakable. Fluid, elegant, slightly slanted to the right. Personal.
Dear Wizbell,
I hope you're having a pleasant morning… and not staying up all night again, reading this letter in the afternoon only because you spent the entire night doing magical experiments or playing with mysteries that, frankly, are already beyond my understanding.
Well. This message is to ask you something.
To accept.
To leave your lab for once. To jump—not literally—into an opportunity that you may not think belongs to you, but one that needs you.
I know you might not be interested. Or maybe you are… just not enough to act on your own.
Even so, you need to go out. Breathe fresh air. And I don't mean the magically purified air of your lab.
Truly go out.
Take a walk. Let the sunlight touch your coat. Let others see you… and let you see them.
I would hate to see you become a magical hermit who, without warning anyone, ends up altering the fundamental laws of magic just because he locked himself away too long in his own world.
It'll be good for you to interact with other ponies. And even more so… with foals. They don't yet have a fixed view of the world. No internal limits stopping them like we do.
Maybe… by teaching them, you'll find ideas you yourself would never consider within the walls of logical thought.
You're not obligated, Wizbell.
But it would be for the best.
Not just for them.
But for you too.
And you know it.
—Tia
A small laugh escaped me. Not mocking—more like the kind of laugh that comes when you imagine something ridiculous and, at the same time, dangerously possible.
A version of me blowing up the lab in a mini black hole due to a poorly channeled magical compression experiment… or worse, ending up stuck in a time loop just for tinkering with the idea of short time jumps. An innocent investigation on scheduling efficiency that results in me repeating the same morning a hundred times just to perfect the ideal way to make coffee.
Yeah… definitely something that could happen. Tia knew me too well.
I looked at the letter again and reread the final lines.
"You're not obligated, Wizbell. But it would be for the best. And you know it."
I sighed, sinking a little deeper into the couch. The sun had started to move through the window, barely touching my front hooves.
The idea of being a teacher…
I had never considered it.
Not even once.
And yet…
…it sounded interesting.
But going out… having to go out every day in this summer heat…
I sighed again, this time deeper.
Just imagining the sun baking my back mid-morning was exhausting. Every day, trotting to the school, breathing hot air, trying not to melt like a magical flan under the sky.
…It would be hard at first.
Well, not like I couldn't solve it with magic.
An environmental cooling spell, a personal thermal barrier, a couple of heat-dissipation runes etched into my horseshoes and done. Problem solved.
I set the second scroll down atop the first and picked up the third.
It was a different kind of letter. More direct, less formal, written plainly by the mayor herself. She was kindly asking if I'd be interested in taking up the position of magical instructor at Ponyville's Schoolhouse.
Magical instructor. Sounds like the title of a storybook.
The proposed schedule was simple: two hours daily, from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m., Monday through Friday. No afternoons, no weekends. Flexible. Comfortable, even.
The salary, according to the note, would be determined by Tia directly, who would also be financially supporting the school during my time there. It was obvious this had been pre-approved.
At the bottom of the scroll, there was a blank space with a single line drawn for my signature. No additional forms. No fine print. No space to renegotiate details.
Ponies…
There was so much room to discuss, review, question… but no. Just a line. Sign here and that's it.
Ugh, I won't overthink it. I'm not on Earth.
I signed it without too much thought.
Money wasn't an issue for me. I earned more than enough from the sales of my book "Basic Magic for Curious Foals," a collection of simple and fun spells designed to teach and entertain at the same time. And if that wasn't enough, I could always take private commissions or collaborate on magical research.
The truth was…
…I did it more for Tia than for anything else.
I'd rather be a teacher… than be forced into some even more outdoorsy activity. Something with hiking, forced nature walks through the forest, or—worse—spontaneous social interaction without magical pre-planning.
And I know Tia.
If I didn't accept this, I'd probably end up "coincidentally" involved in some community river-cleaning initiative or magical gardening classes for elderly ponies. She'd say it was optional… right until she flashed that diplomatic smile that actually means "you already agreed, you just don't know it yet."
Yeah. This was better.
Being a teacher gave me structure, control… and a legitimate reason to keep my magic occupied with something useful.
Besides… I couldn't deny that the idea of teaching magic intrigued me.
Signed. Fate sealed.
Now all that was left was to face a small stampede of unicorn foals bursting with energy and lacking any sort of arcane filter.
And do it every day… in the sun.
With luck, none of them would try to summon an explosive piñata on the first day.
I took a long sip of juice. One of those sips that should empty the glass completely.
But it didn't.
Of course… it's magical. Like everything else in this house.
Modified by me, optimized to avoid interrupting thought flow with mundane concerns like "oh no, the juice is gone."
The magic refills it as it empties. Doesn't taste as fresh as the first pour, sure, but it does its job: keeps me comfortable while I overthink everything.
I left the glass floating at my side, spinning slowly as if it too were processing all of this.
Being a teacher…
I sighed. Again.
Not something I had ever planned. Or even considered.
But now it was done.
And if I'm going to do it…
Well, at least I'll do it my way.
I needed to organize materials and tools if I was going to start this with a minimum level of professionalism.
Chalk.
Paper.
Lots of crayons.
Low-voltage magic crystals.
A few soft balls—for magical projection experiments, not for playing… theoretically.
Quills, heat-resistant ink…
And of course, a well-thought-out list of simple spells that any foal could perform without the risk of arcane self-detonation.
I jotted it all down carefully on a scroll, using an auto-sorting rune in the margin. The plan was to get whatever I was missing from the Ponyville bazaar. I already had some supplies in storage, but I preferred to have extras. Nothing ruins a class faster than having six hyperactive foals share one broken crayon.
While I was at it, I'd drop off the signed letter directly to the mayor. Maybe grab a snack too.
Strawberry magic jam buns… or something with less sugar. My stomach didn't do well with excess.
I glanced at the clock in the living room.
7:37 a.m.
Very early.
Normal.
"Stella! I'm going to the bazaar!" I shouted, not seeing her anywhere. Her energy usually filled the house like some hyperactive feline spirit. But this morning, she'd been oddly quiet.
My doubt lasted about three seconds.
With a violet flash and a sprinkle of glittering sparks, Stella landed unnecessarily precisely on my back, wiggling like a living blanket of miniature stars.
"I'm coming too! I can feel you're going to buy snacks!" she sang cheerfully, pushing me with her tail to get me moving. "And I want to pick the colors! The fruit-scented crayons are mine, okay?"
"We're not using scented crayons," I muttered while stepping out the door.
"I bet we are! Foals love enchanted grape scent!"
I sighed.
"Yeah… whatever."
Stella didn't even bother to respond. She just kept cheerfully listing her favorite crayon scents like a seasoned connoisseur of school fragrance magic.
"Enchanted grape, of course… sparkly lemon, cinnamon-apple pie, cotton candy cloud, old parchment… oh! And that magical bubblegum one that smells like childhood nostalgia even if you never had one!"
Without stopping, she floated briefly in the air as if browsing an invisible catalog of scents, and then, with graceful ease, slipped into my magic bag like it was her natural habitat.
"Ahh! Much better. Less sun in here," she murmured from inside, her voice distant but content. "If I see something I like, I'll scream."
"Of course you will," I said quietly as I closed the house door behind me with a soft magical pulse.
My bag vibrated slightly. Probably an early warning.
Off to the bazaar.
Signed letter in my pocket.
Shopping list floating ahead of me.
First step toward a new routine… crayons and all.