Chapter 1: The Beginning

By: NotanImportantPony

Adventuring in Equestria was generally unknown despite the allure of that nation's mythos. It was unfortunate then that those who chased after rumors or plowed through conspiracies were abandoned by the greater aspects of society. Those few brave individuals who dared to question, who dared to dream, formed their own groups of likeminded individuals. Some time after that Equestria saw the rise of small bands or partnerships of twos or threes who would roam across Equestria in search of ruins or temples. Those small groups spent most of their time carefully paging through ancient dust filed tomes in some nearly forgotten stack in the Canterlot Archives. When a discovery was made, it would be cross referenced then verified. If the information was accurate then that small fellowship would send letters to other groups. The letter would usually contain the time and place for a meeting as well as a brief summary of the discovery and who it was made by.

When the time would come for the meeting all interested parties would follow the letter’s directions and arrive at the designated spot. A conference would be held in order to see if any more information could be garnered and if none could be found then plans would be drawn up, contacts would be contacted and the expedition would be underway as soon as possible. In many instances there were no ‘undiscovered’ ruins of yore because as time passed so did progress and the old bones of Equestrian civilization would be broken and plowed under by the rise of expansionism. Nowadays the ruins of ‘old’ Equestria, before the rumored banishing of Princess Celestia’s sister, could be found buried under the hard asphalt of city streets or beneath the mansions of Nobles. The ‘undiscovered’ ruins those adventurers so desperately sought were rarities indeed thanks to Daring Do.

The famous Pegasus explorer was revered and hated by many in the exploration community. While Daring Do had started out as one of them, an outcast, a loner. She had been ostracized for her amoral actions and militant beliefs. Her tale was thought to end when she was picked up by the crown for grave robbing, she disappeared for months. The next time anypony saw her she was leading an expedition into the Everfree Forest in search of several artifacts for Princess Celestia. Her former companions did some research and as they found out, Daring Do made a promise to Celestia; the young Pegasus would lead a royal expedition into the Everfree Forest for Princess Celestia and retrieve anything the Princess wanted. In the end Daring was given a commision, a crew, and a new life. She went into the forest with twenty ponies from the Canterlot Nobility yet she was the only one who made it out.

Only two ponies knew what happened in that dark forest, Princess Celestia and Daring Doo, they never elaborated on the incident. A small eulogy ceremony was held for the nineteen ponies who, as Celestia put it, “perished from unforeseen and devilish traps”. Daring did not appear at the ceremony. In fact, the actions of those two ponies created a schism in the adventuring community. Some saw the loss of the Nobles as an attempt by Celestia to cull the nobles, others saw it as a group of inexperienced Nobles who wanted to go ‘adventuring’ just like how they went ‘slumming’. The problem was, while slumming you always had a nice clean household to go back to, while adventuring there are no clean beds, no running water, no five-star gourmet meals, the Noble’s would be out of their element and would perish just from looking at the dirt. As it was, many viewed Daring’s contract as a virtual imprisonment, others saw it as an opportunity. Very soon a market with untapped potential was found, one in which obscure explorers could very easily make a name for themselves.

Books; fiction, action-adventure, historical-fiction, and many more soon flooded marketplaces and bookstores. There were well written novels, short stories, and series’. Among the most popular series were A.K. Yearling’s ‘Daring Do’ adventure books. Pretty soon the fillies and colts of Equestria got to read and experience what their newfound ‘heros’ did. They cried and laughed with their favourite heros or booed and hissed at the dastardly villains, though everything was always perfect in the end when Daring Do daringly swept her prize from her foe's grasp. Unfortunately, just like any other market there were fakers; ponies who had never stepped foot in an ancient ruin before, ponies who wrote about beautiful ruined cities at the edge of civilization which housed a people who mysteriously perished; a people and cities that never existed. Sadly, many of the real adventurers failed in the market while several of those who sat in an office and wrote fantasies of faraway lands with fantastical beasts succeeded. However, none of the other authors could even approach the cult popularity of Daring Do.

Soon after the smashing debut of ‘Daring Do and the Trek to the Terrifying Tower’ the first fanfictions started trickling in, a couple of months after that a small group of Daring Do themed ponies gathered in Las Pegasus to celebrate their favourite Pegasus adventurer. In no time at all the popularity of the grey maned Pegasus exploded across all of Equestria. Some amatuer adventurer’s spawned from that niche with many of them wanting to be just like Daring Do, those wannabe adventurer’s met with failure on nearly every front, several of them were injured and after a public announcement from Daring Do telling her fans to, “leave the adventuring to me or else I’ll be out of a job” many of them quit the adventuring lifestyle. Many, but not all. That was a year ago and now one one those foolhardy ponies, an Earth pony from Vanhoover named Snow Shoe, was making his way into the Frozen North in search of the Ancient Crystal Empire and its crystal king.

Author's Note:

23/31.

Now, I know this is a really short intro. I know it could've been done better yada yada yada... Anyway it is going to be a short story probably one or three more chapters. heck, I might even go back later and rip this thing to shreds and make it into an actual story but for now I hope ya'll enjoyed the taste ya got of this story so do your thing and follow, comment, favourite whichever.