I found this difficult to pull off in pencil, mostly due to how I limit myself with the shading by just having one kind of pencil which can’t cover bigger area smoothly. This as good it gets, I guess.

Anyways, just a long overdue fresh piece of Solar Fusion, I have so many OC’s I need to draw more to avoid them just being left forgotten in the abyss.

As mentioned in his ref, Solar Fusion takes a few notes from Tirek’s rampage (through history books, that was before he was born), fascinated with the power growth from stealing the magic of ponies.
Solar himself is a rather weak unicorn, which he takes after his father. Not much skills in most spells and low magic reserves. Along with staying a blank flank for years while desperately trying to earn his family’s respect. It’s a heavy duty resting on him being the firstborn in a family line of pure unicorns, with such low skills.

If only he could… borrow magic from others. Most unicorns barely ever use their full potential, really. They won’t miss it.
Turns out the spell he began experimenting with was a bit more complex than expect, tough to control. His first victim was a random encounter, a nopony living on the street. Promised them a few bits for a quick magic experiment. Things went out of hoof, he didn’t knew how to hold back or cut off the spell. It didn’t kill the pony, but the drain had left them with extreme fatigue. Making sure to hide the body ensure the pony never got the help needed to save their life.

As horrified as Solar Fusion had been from this experience, it was never his intention to let it go so far… he couldn’t deny the rush and thrill from the energy transfer. The new magic reserves lasted him for weeks, finally able to pull off spells which usually took all energy out of him. But he ran out of the fresh magic too soon. I still took a while for him to muster the courage to try again. Each time it gets a little easier to control the spell, though. Learning its limits and how hard to push or pull to control it. How to be discreet, how to go full on greedy yet still in control. Today he can control it enough to snatch little bits of magic here and there from ponies in public without anypony noticing. But he still needs the rush of draining somepony completely now and again.

Mastering this new skill earned him his cutiemark. Of course he can’t be honest about it, just letting ponies think he was just a late bloomer in unlocking his true magic potential and that’s that.

Fun to dive more into this OC for once.

Enjoy!