//------------------------------// // Amethyst Star and the Hill // Story: Amethyst Star Isn't Prepared For This // by MagicS //------------------------------// Traveling through the jungle had been easy thanks to the path that someone else had made through it long ago. The ground was level and the dirt path hadn’t been retaken by the plants of the jungle at all. Instead it gave her some pretty nice scenery to view as she walked through, since there were all kinds of pretty flowers to her sides. And just like she thought there was fruit everywhere. The only big problem to her was how humid it was, the moisture in the air and the sun above her made sure she was covered in sweat most of the time she walked through the jungle even if the physical exertion wasn’t extreme in the slightest. What Amethyst Star couldn’t really tell thanks to how slight it was, was that the path actually curved and twisted quite a bit in the jungle and didn’t take her straight to the rest of the landscape she had seen up on the cliff. So she wasn’t entirely sure how she ended up where she was now but she knew for a fact that she didn’t cross any huge river or grasslands. All she knew now was that she was at the base of a very large and steep hill after coming out of that jungle. Just a big dirt and grass covered hill, it didn’t even look halfway tropical like the jungle just a few steps behind her. Weird. “Well whatever,” she furrowed her brow in thought as she looked up at it. The gravel and dirt that made it up looked pretty loose and there wasn’t any easier path she could see other than just going straight up it. She’d have to be careful to keep her hooves planted firmly so she didn’t slide down or fall if anything came loose. She took two hoofsteps up the hill… and promptly slid back down as the dirt underneath her gave way. “Okay, that’s great,” Amethyst Star frowned and tried stepping up again only to slide down some more, the dirt slick beneath her hooves. “Ugh, it’s like trying to climb up soap or a big mud pile or something!” The unicorn took a deep breath and planted a stronger hoof into the hill, it sunk down slightly but it still gave her purchase. Seeing that as a small success she lifted another, and another, and so on until she was very slowly but surely moving up the hill. Her knees wobbled at times and she almost lost it but she kept up a decent pace as she progressed. The problem now wasn’t just the looseness of the dirt but the steepness and size of the hill. And with no level spots or rocks or trees for her to take a break at she had to just keep charging up it until she made it to the very top. But if she became impatient and tried to speed things up she was likely to disturb too much dirt and start a mini-landslide, and something like that could take her all the way back to the bottom. “This is so dumb, I can’t believe I’m having so much trouble with a hill...” Amethyst quickly realized that she was actually starting to sweat, and it wasn’t from the temperature or anything this time either. Just her attempt to make it up this hill was tiring her out. Being a unicorn that didn’t do much physical activity her pools of stamina were somewhat shallow. Still she was somewhat annoyed, at herself and the hill, to realize this. She really didn’t think something like this would be so much trouble for her or that a relatively light workout could get her to sweat so easily. Thoughts of her possibly not being quite so capable as she had believed almost entered her head before they were quickly shooed away. Amethyst Star was not about to lose confidence in herself. Regardless of whether or not that confidence was misplaced in the first place. When she placed her hoof down again a large clod of dirt was dug out with it and Amethyst lost her balance, her legs buckled and she started to slip back down the mud-like dirt. She gasped as her legs all went sliding different directions until she fell spread eagle onto the ground, which had the dual effect of getting her covered in dirt but also slowed her sliding down until she came to a complete stop thanks to the added friction. So now she was flat on her stomach a quarter of the way up the hill and her lower half was smeared in dirt. “Sweaty, dirty, and tired. Feels great,” Amethyst Star sarcastically said to herself. She hauled herself back to her hooves, carefully so as not to fall any further, and stared up to the top of the hill. “Why’s this dumb hill have to be so big?” She narrowed her eyes and started climbing back up it. “Well I’m not losing to a hill. I’m going on an adventure and I’m proving that I can handle myself perfectly well out here. There is absolutely no way a big pile of dirt is beating me, it shouldn’t even be an obstacle!” She couldn’t help but imagine how easily Twilight Sparkle or any of her friends would have it making it past this thing. “No adventurer struggles with a hill!” She stiffly planted her hoof into the dirt and pulled herself along. This was a somewhat embarrassing event that she probably wasn’t going to tell any of her friends about when she got back home. The hill unfortunately still proved a difficult opponent for Amethyst Star, the softness and slickness of the ground made every foot up a hassle. Sometimes she would start to slide back but every time she felt the dirt even start to shift beneath her she dug in her back hooves, who cares if they got filthy? She was already filthy. With this slow process she was pretty much at the halfway point of the hill now. It was just as steep as always but the end was in sight now! Her exhaustion was really getting to her now though. She tried to ignore it, tried to fight the reality that climbing up a hill was taxing her this much, but the truth was she was dripping rivers of sweat and breathing heavily and her legs were getting sore too. The dirt might as well have been mashed potatoes that she had to crawl through and by the time she made it to the top her hooves would probably feel like lead. She planted her hooves to make sure she wouldn’t slide anywhere and took a short break, looking up at the sky. Blue and bright with only a few white clouds drifting on by. You really couldn’t ask for a better day and if Amethyst was just walking through the grass somewhere or taking a drink of water from a meandering creek she’d probably really appreciate it. As it was she could only sigh and try to catch her breath as best she could. Appreciating her good fortune with the weather would have to come some other day. When she wasn’t exhausted and struggling to just keep from falling down a hill. “Come on...” Amethyst got back into motion to complete the latter half of her climb. The unicorn just had to pretend she wasn’t exhausted, or play through it as best she could. Her body was betraying her though and she could already tell the second half of the hill would be far worse than the first. By the time she got back into her groove her muscles were screaming in protest and her lungs were burning with each gulp of air. “Who expects a unicorn to do stuff like this?” She said to nobody. “I mean seriously, I’m not even out of shape… I think.” At three-quarters of the way up the hill, Amethyst Star took another short little break. Maybe she could blame her poor physical showing on the saddlebag she was carrying? It wasn’t super heavy but it still added some weight. Yeah, that was it. It’s the saddlebag’s fault. She definitely wasn’t this beat up just from climbing a hill, it was all the saddlebag. Because she only had one it made her unbalanced and put undue stress on her back and side. That was totally the reason and Amethyst Star was going to stick by it one hundred percent. It was then that the ground beneath her hooves came loose. Not just small bits of it, the entire bar she was standing on just fell away from the hill and began sliding down the mountain with Amethyst Star riding it like a surfboard on a wave. “Nooooo!” She yelled as she tried to dig in her hooves to brace herself and even used her magic to attempt to stop the dirt from moving. “I’m not losing to a dumb hill!” Much, much later, Amethyst Star pulled herself to the top of the hill on her belly. The mare was frazzled, hot from sweat and activity, and covered horn to hoof in dirt. But she had made it. Top of the world. The shimmy up was incredibly slow going but at least it had kept her from falling down again. Her first enemy on her adventure had been conquered. It was embarrassing but at least nobody else had to know about it. She stood up on shaky legs and caught her breath, panting heavily the whole time. Amethyst dropped her saddlebag to the ground and grinned. “Yes! I win! I knew I could do it!” She shouted up to the sky and raised a hoof in triumph. “I, Amethyst Star… am… celebrating… that I walked up a hill. Ugh, this is so dumb.” She pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head. “Oh well, at least I can move on from here,” she said as she peered down to the land behind the hill and what lied beyond. A foresty and temperate area much like the land around Ponyville greeted her. Green, green, and more green with rivers and lakes running through it all. And it was flat, thank Celestia. With such a pretty looking place down there it brought a real smile to Amethyst Star’s face. Good weather, good scenery, she was sure it would be a pleasant walk for the near future at least. As she squinted her eyes though she could see something else a bit closer to the horizon. Buildings? It looked like there were houses and other structures not too far away from this hill. A day’s travel maybe. Either way it was exciting to the unicorn. This was her first sign of civilization in the Undiscovered West! It would be her first time meeting ponies, or perhaps even some other creatures, that actually lived out here, she couldn’t wait!