Compared to the lush and verdant land she had been traveling through in the previous few days the yellow savanna she was now in was relatively drab. The grass of the plains came up past her knees and tickled her underbelly, it was uncomfortable but there was nothing she could do about it. There weren’t anymore roads or paths out here so she just had to wade through it all while she continued traveling westward.
Honestly she didn’t really care though. She wasn’t thinking about that kind of stuff too much. Her thoughts were still dwelling on the humiliation she had suffered recently, first the hill and then being denied the chance to compete in the tournament right after. It did a lot to shake her confidence and Amethyst Star had been melancholic ever since she ran out of Hacksaw. She came out here to prove she was special and could go on epic adventures just like any of the other amazing ponies she knew, but so far the world seemed to be treating her like a joke just for trying.
She still wasn’t giving up though. She would have her adventure no matter what. Everyone else was wrong about her and what she could do, she wouldn’t live in the shadows of bigger ponies anymore. Not meant for something like this? Hah! Amethyst Star just needed a good opportunity to prove herself. A real adventure or quest or fight she could partake in. That would stifle any of her own doubts and the voices of any critics back home when she returned and told them about it.
Things had just been discouraging lately.
But she knew there had to still be plenty of opportunities out here in the Undiscovered West. In fact, Hacksaw was pretty much proof of it. There were ponies from gangs and fighting schools all over the west gathered there, right? That must mean there were more towns and places and probably all sorts of craziness just over the horizon. There was even plenty of that kind of stuff still in Equestria, and the rest of the world outside its borders was even more wild.
Amethyst Star shook her head, she was done thinking about the difficult stuff for now. Better to just focus on the world in front of her.
Aside from the tall grass the plains were dominated by thin and nearly leafless trees that weren’t particularly tall either. They looked dried out and unhealthy, a place like this must not get that much rain. Now that she thought of that she noticed she hadn’t seen any streams or watering holes at all out here, good thing her canteen was full but she should probably get through an area like this quickly until she found some water. The yellow grass extended near as far as she could see this direction though, if she kept going straight west she might be stuck here for days. To the northwest were some mountains, maybe it would be better to go searching along their feet.
“Is water more likely to be found by the foot of a mountain or here in the plains?” She wondered out loud to herself. The unicorn then frowned. “I have no idea… should’ve brought a wilderness survival guide.”
Whatever was the right thing to do was irrelevant as she made her choice to go towards the mountains. The grass started thinning the closer she got to them until it was replaced with dry dirt, which meant still no sign of water or anything else but there was nothing she could do about that. The weather was still pretty favorable for her so she wasn’t tired or thirsty yet even though it was the middle of the day, things were still temperate out here.
“It’s so boring out here...” the unicorn couldn’t help but think. It was true that there wasn’t as much to do or look at out in this savanna compared to where she had been recently.
The clouds were drifting by slowly overhead too, she sighed loudly and kept up her pace, now she was pretty much walking parallel to the mountains. She didn’t want to start climbing through or up those yet since that would take her the wrong direction but if she didn’t see any signs of water soon she might have to.
She started singing a little tune to herself to pass the time. “Winter wrap up, winter wrap up...”
The fact that she was singing the work song to a job she was never able to do correctly didn’t occur to her.
While she was walking along and not paying attention to anything else she felt the ground slightly rumble beneath her hooves. Amethyst Star paused and glanced down at the dirt. “Earthquake?”
But it didn’t rumble again so she shrugged and kept on walking.
There was a slight crescent-shaped indentation in the mountains up ahead, like a shallow scoop had been taken out of the rocks. She wondered if it was natural or not and picked up her pace to check it out. Rounding the last little boulders on the ground of the mountain right before the indentation she looked in to see what was up with it. The sight surprised her quite a bit.
“Wow, that’s pretty cool,” Amethyst Star looked on to see a town carved into the side of the mountain itself. The sandstone was smoothed and chipped away to create individual homes, pony made caves, doors, and shadowed windows that peaked further into the mountain. All of it was connected together since it had started from the same rock and there were probably innumerable passages behind the exterior wall leading from building to building. Parts of the cliff-side were cut into more than others and stairs were carved right out of the stone as well, leading up to other levels.
“I’m definitely checking this out,” she said to herself and walked towards the mountain town. Or maybe cave town would be technically more accurate?
As she got closer though she realized something very important: There were no ponies that she could see.
Was the town abandoned? Was it some ancient home that no one had lived in for years?
“Whatever,” she shrugged, her curiosity still getting the better of her. Amethyst Star had never seen a town like this carved right into a mountain, there could be something cool in there.
The ground underneath her rumbled again but she paid it no mind as she walked to the nearest of the carved out homes. It was more like a stone hovel than anything, she poked her head in to say hello and see if anyone was there but it was all empty. When she walked in though she had to think that it couldn’t have been too long ago that ponies lived here, there was plenty of furniture and it didn’t look that old, it looked like it was made from the wood of those trees she had seen out in the savanna too. Besides that there were “cabinets” and other things carved out of the walls. Still no sign of any ponies though.
She stepped out of that first house and walked up the stairs next to it, heading up to a ledge where the entrances to more houses and some deeper caves sat. She didn’t want to try going into those caves just yet, she might get lost. That was clearly a bad idea even to her.
“Hello?” She said again in case there was anyone up here who didn’t hear her earlier.
But there was still no response.
Something came to her nose instead. A stench made its way to Amethyst Star, wafting out of one of the homes up here. She wrinkled her nose at it, that was a smell she would recognize anywhere: Rotten fruit. The unicorn sniffed a few times, walking down the stone walkway and trying to find the source of the smell. It must be coming from one of the doorways up here.
“Smells like… apples?” Yeah, she was sure it was rotten apples. Anyone who lived in Ponyville knew what every kind of apple smelt like.
Amethyst Star followed her nose and it took her into one of the little hovels, this one had a bunch of wooden furniture in it too, but also one more thing that the first home she entered didn’t have. A bowl of fruit was placed on its table, the apples inside now a brown and mushy mess and the source of the foul smell. She stuck out her tongue in disgust at them.
“Bleh,”
But now that she thought about it, these apples being here meant someone was living in this place just recently. So what happened? Where’d they go in such a hurry? Ignoring the smell of the apples, Amethyst Star walked into the room and took a seat at the table to rest her legs for a second. If anything she might be able to find some water around here. She could look around for a bit longer and then start heading west again.
As she stretched her back and neck that same rumbling started up again and surprisingly she could even feel it despite being above ground level by a bit.
“What is that?” She asked, puzzled.
It didn’t stop either, in face it got much stronger, enough that the furniture in the room was shaking. Amethyst Star heard a large cracking sound and she rushed out of the house to look down at the ground below. She arrived at the ledge just in time to see a huge claw break out of the dry dirt, followed by another that pushed the ground away and allowed the creature behind the claws to climb out and howl at the stone carved buildings in front of it.
It was some sort of gigantic mole monster, blue furred with huge teeth and a very angry expression on its face.
And it saw Amethyst Star looking down at it.
“Uh oh,” the unicorn gulped.
The huge mole roared again and raised one of its claws, Amethyst Star jumped away towards the direction of the stairs she had previously climbed up right as the claw smashed apart the carved stone that made up the ledge beneath her, the mole big enough in size to easily reach up to the level she was on without needing to climb up at all. She stumbled and fell down in her attempt to avoid the monster, the stairs still a ways away. And even if she reached them where would she go? That thing was big and she couldn’t really run past it back to the plains, and she probably couldn’t outrun it at all in the first place. She could try her luck at the tunnels or go up to a higher house and try to hide…
No. Wait. She suddenly thought. This is just what I’ve been looking for, a monster to fight. This is the kind of thing that happens on adventures! The hero defeats a monster and saves the day! Okay, I’m taking out this mole!
Amethyst Star got a self-assured grin on her face as she stood up. The mole looked at her and roared, getting ready to attack again. Amethyst acted first though, she grabbed some of the loose rubble that had been made by its first attack in her magic and threw it right between the eyes of the mole creature as hard as she could.
The rock bounced off its face, doing no damage. The mole did pause though and blinked a few times but it seemed more confused than anything.
“Huh… well… uh...” Amethyst Star was expecting that to do a lot more.
The mole screamed at her again and smashed apart more of the level she was on, sending debris and shards of rock at her in retaliation. She raised her forelegs to defend herself but the force of the blow still sent her careening down the stairs where she came to a stop in a crumpled heap at the bottom.
“Ohhh...” she groaned in pain but the sound of the huge mole behind her got her to shoot up as quickly as she could. She looked over her shoulder to see it coming right for her so she yelped and jumped inside that first house she had looked through that was by the stairs.
The claw smashed through the front wall of the house and almost made the whole thing collapse on top of Amethyst Star. But she ducked under the table and was relieved that the thing managed to hold up. And now Amethyst Star was angry after getting hounded like this, she peaked up from under the table to see the mole standing in front of the destroyed home and she shot him with a blast of raw magic in his chest.
It again did nothing.
“Oh come on!” She yelled and kept firing blasts of magic at the unperturbed mole monster. She knew she couldn’t just keep doing that though, she didn’t have the magical power of Twilight Sparkle or Starlight Glimmer. As a last act of desperation she grabbed the table in her magic and flung it at the mole.
The mole effortlessly batted it out of the air, tired of being hit with so many things even if it didn’t hurt. It then raised both of its claws high overhead, preparing to smash them down onto Amethyst.
Any fight she had in her disappeared as pure fear overtook her. She clenched her eyes shut and covered her head, waiting for the end.
But instead of the feeling of being crushed she instead felt someone’s hooves wrap around her body and pull her away while the sound of the mole screaming in pain reached her ears at the same time. Amethyst had a feeling of weightlessness as she was carried in the air for a brief moment before coming to a stop on the ground.
“What the-” she opened up her eyes to see herself being held by another pony. It was an earth pony mare wearing a green cloak. She had a midnight black coat and a long and straight sparkly white mane that covered her left eye but left the stern frown on her face plain for Amethyst to see.
“What are you doing here? Why didn’t you evacuate from the Maulworf with the others?” The black mare asked her.
“Maul-what?” Amethyst Star was too confused to be coherent, she looked at the mole monster to see what was going on with it.
And her jaw dropped in shock.
There was another pony fearlessly facing off with it. A gray stallion with a short brown mane that was wearing the same green cloak as the mare. The Maulworf, as opposed to when it had been chasing Amethyst Star, looked wary. And Amethyst Star could clearly tell why: its right claw was shattered. Did the stallion do that? How?
“What’s going on? Who are you two?” Amethyst Star asked the mare holding her.
The mare let her go and Amethyst Star stood up next to her. “You’re not from Escarn?”
“I have no idea what that is,” Amethyst Star shook her head. “I was just passing through.”
“I see,” the mare sighed. “Well that’s alright, at least you’re okay. Please don’t try to fight a Maulworf in the future though. They’re practically impervious to external attacks.”
“Uh, if that’s the case shouldn’t you be worried about your friend?” Amethyst Star looked over and in the next few seconds immediately changed her mind.
The Maulworf swiped at the stallion with its still functional claw but he deftly ducked under it and lightly tapped the Maulworf’s left arm as it passed over his head. At first it seemed like that did nothing but then the Maulworf’s arm and claw abruptly started to fiercely vibrate and the beast cried out in pain, shaking its arm in the air as if trying to get the vibrating to stop, cracks started appearing in its claw before suddenly the entire thing shattered into a million pieces.
The Maulworf whimpered in agony and turned to flee, the stallion letting the creature go, not bothering chasing it down.
The cloaked stallion watched it go for a moment before turning to the two mares and beginning to walk towards them. “It won’t return here after that, it’ll be too afraid to.” He said to them. As he got closer Amethyst Star could see that his face was covered in dozens of thin scars. But that didn’t put her off.
“That was awesome!” She screeched in exaltation. “Who are you two? How did you do that? What was that thing?”
She was fully on an endorphin high after getting rescued and narrowly avoiding death.
The stallion raised a concerned eyebrow at her as he stopped beside his comrade. “You aren’t-”
“No I’m not from here,” she cut him off. “My name’s Amethyst Star, I’m on an adventure!”
“I see,” The stallion said, calmly. “Well my name is Quartz and my friend here is Obsidian.” He gestured to the black mare. “We’re just a couple of traveling do-gooders, and that thing was a mole-like monster called a Maulworf. A number of them were plaguing Escarn but that was finally the last of them we just drove off.”
“You guys are like real heroes! That’s just the kind of stuff that I’m trying to do out here!” Amethyst Star bounced up and down on her hooves.
“Excuse me?” Quartz tilted his head in confusion.
“Hey, what was that thing you did to make its claw explode? Can you teach me how to do something like that?” She continued, looking back and forth between him and Obsidian and ignoring their befuddlement.
“That was simply a special ability the two of us posses,” Quartz answered slowly. “And I’m sorry, but no, only earth ponies can learn it in the first place and we aren’t in the business of teaching others anymore.”
“Aww,” Amethyst Star whined.
Obsidian shrugged apologetically. “We really have to go tell the citizens of Escarn that it’s safe again now. Sorry, but we should be on our way.”
They went to walk past her but Amethyst grabbed onto Quartz’s cloak. “Hey wait! Maybe I can tag along with you for a bit, it sounds like you do this kind of stuff all the time and I came out here in the first place cause I wanted to prove I could do it too! Don’t underestimate me, I can handle myself.”
Quartz frowned and shot an awkward glance to Obisidian before responding. “Miss… I appreciate the offer and it’s nice you seem to have your heart in the right place, but we do serious work. We can’t have a helpless pony like you tagging along.”
Amethyst sharply inhaled and then angrily narrowed her eyes at him. “Helpless?!”
“Please,” Obsidian patronizingly looked at her and put a hoof on her shoulder. “We’ve been doing this a long time, all over the world, and seeing how you acted back there alone against the Maulworf told us all we needed to know.”
“B-But!” Amethyst Star could see it happening again, see her chances slipping away. She couldn’t stand more ponies treating her like this. But at the same time she couldn’t think of anything to say in her defense. Especially if they had seen her poor showing against the monster.
“I suggest you go back home, or at least get on your way again,” Quartz told her and shrugged her hoof off his cloak as he and Obsidian began walking towards one of the dark caves carved into the mountain. “You won’t have to worry about any more Maulworfs.”
Amethyst Star fell back on her haunches, sitting there silently as she watched them go. Why again? Her hopes to eradicate doubt about her physical capabilities, her hopes for an awesome Twilight Sparkle level adventure, her hopes to prove she wasn’t a background character in her own life, they were all walking away and she couldn’t do anything. In a minute they were out of sight. And a minute after that Amethyst Star despondently picked herself up and started heading west again.