No

    Truffles bounced on her hooves, watching eagerly as her mentor sampled the first of the fresh batch of muffins she'd baked that morning. Granny Smith's home-style muffins were tricky to pull off, but Truffles had always had relative success with the delicate, finicky recipe.

"Do you love it?" The little filly beamed up at Cupcake, eyes practically glittering with anticipation.

"Hmm." Cupcake paused, thinking.

"No."

Truffles blinked, taken aback. "But...But Miss Cupcake," She tried, fumbling, "I've never met anypony who doesn't like Granny's famous recipe-"

"Dry." Cupcake interrupted, turning stern eyes on Truffles. "Bland. Burned on the bottom, yet undercooked in the center. The texture is too rough, because you sifted your ingredients poorly and baked at too high a temperature. The apple pieces aren't fresh, there are pieces of eggshell left in, and there is an overall lingering taste of liquid dish soap." Cupcake let the muffin fall to the ground. "Unacceptable, Truffles."

Truffles' ears pinned back, and a childish waver entered her voice. "I-I...I'm sorry, I tried my best-"

"You failed." Cupcake took a step forward, looming over her apprentice. "In baking, each bite is a conversation between the baker and the pony eating. An infinite amount of silent sentences can be expressed through taste alone. In your work, all I taste are insults." Cupcake clopped her hoof against the linoleum floor, making Truffles jump. "And I will not be insulted in my own kitchen."

"I...I..." Truffles cowered under her mentor's glare. When her lower lip began to wobble, Cupcake's stern expression finally fell away, and she sighed.
"Don't cry." She ordered, lifting Truffles' chin with her hoof. When she spoke next, her voice was soft, gentle. "Making mistakes is necessary to learn how to avoid making them again, Truffles. Since you've failed so spectacularly, there's obviously a lot we can learn here today." She sent Truffles a rare half-smile, and Truffles shakily returned it, sniffling.

"Now, you can sit there and be content with mediocrity-" Cupcake gestured at the fallen, splattered muffin, "Or you can let me teach you how to be great."

A blazing fire had roared to life in her mentor's eyes, and Truffles felt an answering passion burst into her heart. "Yes, ma'am! I'll do my very best, ma'am!" She snapped her hoof in a salute, only stumbling a little over her own hooves.

"Excellent." Cupcake smiled serenely at her tiny apprentice, before weary chastisement entered her voice again. "We'll start with learning how to properly wash out all the dish soap from our muffin tins before we bake..."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Baking is serious business to cupcake you guys
sometimes the fact that cupcake is ex-military trickles into her personality and she is very, very stern
she loves her doofy little apprentice tho, truffles just needed to stop sucking at baking first

funfact, this is the first time i've reduced paint tool sai's line stabilizer to median level to do lineart. It feels a lot more natural and organic, but I obviously still need practice. I was concerned with how stiff and lifeless my lineart's been looking lately
i should rlly be sleeping wow

always remember to clean all the soap out of your bakeware or you'll fuck up your muffins and miss cupcake will be mad