With the guidance of the others, and after his tireless efforts, Spike finally opened the box containing his gift.
The moment he opened the box, the light shone onto the gift's crystalline surface, reflecting a glare that was almost blinding.
Everyone leaned in to look and discovered that inside the box was a long, high-quality sapphire.
As soon as Spike saw it, his biological instincts couldn't wait to grab the gem and stuff it into his mouth.
The six-month-old dragon had already started teething; although only tiny crescent shapes had emerged and his bite force wasn't enough to crush the hard sapphire, it was perfect to use as a teething toy at this moment.
"Whoa, that must have cost a pretty penny, right?"
Sunset Shimmer exclaimed.
Although Equestria was rich in gemstone mines, making gems relatively inexpensive here, some rare, high-quality specimens could still fetch a significant price.
"It's alright, the markup wasn't too high; I bought it with my pocket money," Aurora said nonchalantly.
It wasn't that Aurora was deliberately humble-bragging; after all, her financial standing was clear for all to see. Plus, having recently closed a deal with Iris, as long as Equestria didn't suddenly fall into a financial crisis, she likely wouldn't be short on money for the rest of her life.
"This gift is a huge help! You don't know, ever since he started teething, almost all the wooden furniture in my room has tooth marks, and wood shavings are everywhere, especially on my headboard."
Watching Spike happily gnawing on the sapphire, Twilight Sparkle, as a mother, felt that she could finally catch a break starting today.
"Poor Twilight... but look at it this way, wouldn't a 'battle-damaged' interior design style for your room be a new kind of living experience?" Aurora said, trying to tell a joke to cheer up Twilight Sparkle.
"Even though he gnaws on wooden furniture, at least he isn't gnawing on a 'Twilight-head' piece of furniture."
"..."
"..."
"What's wrong? Not funny? The logic of this joke is—"
"Shut up! Winter is cold enough as it is; after hearing your 'joke,' my heart feels ice-cold now."
Unable to listen any longer, Sunset Shimmer blocked Aurora's mouth with a hoof, interrupting her "cold joke magic attack." Under Aurora's somewhat resentful gaze, she allowed the gift exchange to continue.
Because Spike was so satisfied with the sapphire teething toy Aurora gave him, he refused to let go of it. Therefore, he would probably have to open the gifts from Sunset Shimmer and Twilight Sparkle later.
This time it was Twilight Sparkle's turn to open gifts. When she noticed that the packaging and shape of the gifts from Aurora and Sunset Shimmer were essentially identical, they couldn't help but exchange glances.
"Could it be...?"
"You also...?"
Sure enough, Twilight Sparkle unwrapped two books from the two gifts. One was "Detailed Explanation of Star Swirl the Bearded's Spells" organized for her by Sunset Shimmer, and the other was "Daring Do and the Sapphire Adventure" gifted by Aurora.
"Wow! This is amazing!" Twilight Sparkle, who loved books more than life itself, clearly couldn't resist the temptation of the two new books and held them, unable to put them down.
"I thought you would give her a magic book as well."
"Magic books are great, of course, but Daring Do novels are also very good. Even though it's a newly released book, I believe it will definitely be a hit."
Originally, Aurora had intended to give Twilight Sparkle a rare magic book as a Hearths Warming Eve gift, but while browsing the bookstore, she saw the release poster for the first Daring Do adventure story, so she decided to buy it immediately, and that settled the gift for Twilight Sparkle.
"Now it's Senior Sister's turn! Open it, open it, I've been waiting for a long time!"
Sunset Shimmer looked speechlessly at Aurora, who was even more excited than she was, and for a moment couldn't tell who was the one supposed to be opening gifts.
She first opened Twilight Sparkle's gift and took out a crystal ball from a small box.
Aurora compared it with the gift box she had received and, unable to contain her curiosity, opened her gift as well, discovering it was an identical crystal ball to the one in Sunset Shimmer's hand.
"They are beautiful. But I thought you would give books as gifts."
"You guys think books are better too, huh?!"
From Twilight Sparkle's tone, it wasn't hard to tell that the idea of giving crystal balls wasn't entirely her own.
"Princess Cadance and I made these together! Look, I have one too."
Twilight Sparkle also took a crystal ball out of her backpack, and now the three ponies each had one.
If one looked closely at the scene inside the crystal ball, one could see it was the look of The House of Academic Studies, with a heart-shaped fire of friendship dancing above the roof.
"Twilight, you are so thoughtful."
"Thank you, Twilight, I will treasure it."
The small crystal ball was like a symbol of the three ponies' friendship, commemorating the deep bond between them. Just like that fire of friendship carved from crystal above the house in the ball, it would burn forever.
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