The dirt road was long, and I did not make it to Ponyville, which was supposedly ahead of me, for a very long time. By nightfall I was still walking down the road.
“Really? It’s already dark… ugh, hopefully I’m close.”
I kept walking and after a few hours I finally saw lights off in the distance. I began to run and soon found myself in a small town; it dawned on me that I had never left Canterlot before and that I now found myself in a small backwoods town in the middle of nowhere.
I was hit with this sudden feeling of calm, the world was quiet, and the stars were bright, I felt a lot better than I had in a while… but then I realized that I had nowhere to stay.
I walked around for a while, looking for something like a hotel, it took a while but I did find one.
“Hello, welcome to the Ponyville Inn, would you like a room?” A stallion greeted me inside the Inn.
“Yes please. Can I have your cheapest room?”
The stallion looked at me a little oddly; I guess most ponies didn’t ask specifically for the worst room, “Sure, that should be fine, that will be 200 bits.”
“For just one night?”
“Yes.”
“In the worst room?”
“Mhm.”
“200?”
“That is what I said sir.”
I was a little ticked off, though maybe that was partially due to having been walking for twelve hours, “Okay fine,” I gave the stallion the money and he gave me the key to room 42.
I sleepily entered my room, it was nicer than I expected, but I didn’t have much time to take it all in since I almost immediately collapsed onto the bed and fell asleep.
***
When I woke up it was already late afternoon. I got up quickly and went out. I had no specific plans; I just wanted to look around and see what there was in this town.
Ponyville was pretty much just like how I had always imagined small towns; there was a large farm that grew apples, a lot of small family businesses, and that general neighbourly kindness you can’t really find in the city.
Nothing much of interest happened while I looked around the town except for this odd earth pony who broke out into song, and seemed very determined to make me smile, which she managed to do, but that was about all that happened.
As I headed back to the inn that evening I felt surprisingly defeated; I guess I had expected to get some sort of answer about where I was supposed to be, where I was supposed to go. I suppose I was expecting too much from my first day out of Canterlot.
As I entered the inn I paid the stallion at the front desk for one more night, I planned to leave in the morning so I asked for a wake-up call.
In retrospect it probably was not a good idea to give up on the town so quickly, but at the same time if it weren’t for that wake-up call I may have never met her, and subsequently never have gone where I went to next.
***
When I was given my wake-up call I instantly regretted asking for it, simply because I was tired.
I got my stuff and went out; still tired I accidentally bumped into a mare outside the inn and a bunch of my stuff, which was mostly books, spilled out of my bag.
“Oh sorry,” I apologized immediately and levitated the books back into my bag.
“That’s a lot of books you have there,” the unicorn I bumped into stated bluntly.
“Yeah,” I nodded, “I love books, I used to work in a library actually.”
“Isn’t that funny, I actually live in a library.”
“That’s quite the coincidence,” I said. I was about to continue on my way, but the unicorn continued.
“You used to work in a library? What happened?”
“I left, everypony told me it was my destiny, but I didn’t really fit the job.”
“Having problems with destiny I see… you should go talk to Serenity.”
“Who?” this bit of advice caught my attention.
“She’s a unicorn from Las Pegasus, she studies magic related to fate she's apperntly the best, they say she'll help out most people with problems about their future; I read about her in The Future Sciences: Universal Predictability.”
I thought for a moment, I didn’t have any plans on where to go anyway.
“How do I get to Las Pegasus from here?”
“Just head South-West, you can take a train but it only goes halfway there.”
“Thanks,” I nodded and left.
***
I bought a train ticket since apparently the full walk there was not very easy; this was another hit to my wallet, I was going to have to try and earn some money soon.
I wondered what Las Pegasus would be like, it was a big city, I knew that, but nothing like Canterlot. This was the home of all the big celebrities and was a city that basically lived off of tourism. I knew they had a lot of hotels so I was set for somewhere to stay, though I had also heard that the rooms were outrageously priced.
On the train ride there I imagined ways in which this pony Serenity could help me, of course I knew absolutely nothing about her, but that didn’t stop me from imagining. In my mind it seemed like it was going to be so simple, that Serenity would just know what I was supposed to do. I was still young and naïve I suppose. Of course nothing about my journey was ever that simple, if anything things always seemed to be getting more confusing and difficult.
The train stopped and I got out and found myself on another long dirt road heading to another place I had never been. I wondered if my whole journey was going to be like this, just going from place to place at random and hoping for the best.
Which I guess was more or less right.
Suddenly sompony grabbed me.
Things were about to get a lot more difficult.