Daring Origins

Adventurers have always been around in Equestria. Although Everfree is the most well known forest, it certainly wasn't the only mysterious forest around. In fact, there were tons of freaky forests twice or even three times the size of tiny little Everfree. And in all of those forests, there were secret tombs hidden inside of them.

That was exactly why I came here to be an adventurer myself. All that excitement. All those adventures. Not to mention, all those adventures were in different places! Not just one tiny town on the side of a mountain.

I wasn't a foal though. I knew that it wouldn't be easy to be an adventurer. That's why I trained the second I wanted to be one!

The first thing I had done was teach myself to fly longer than any pony else. It helped that I was a great flyer to begin with, not to mention that I was the fastest in my class. So with both of those combined, I could probably fly across half of Equestria without breaking a sweat!

That wasn't the only thing I was good at either! I had trained myself to fight too! No matter what it was or how many there were I could take them all! Granted, I had only spent the last two years learning how to fight off everything. So maybe I was a little green with taking down whatever came at me, but that didn't matter. My speed was more than enough to cover up my strength and technique.

On top of all of that, there was one last important thing. Me and the rest of my family had always gone out on hiking trips around the boring peaceful forest that surrounded our hometown. And even though it got boring, I learned plenty of stuff about survival. First aid, lighting fires, what and what not to eat, I even knew how to take care of creatures! Like a Timberwolf for example!

So knowing that I'd easily get to be an adventurer, I finally came here. To the one and only place where adventurers go to be...Well, adventurers. And that was The Equestrian Museum of Ancient History!

Just looking at it was amazing! It had a giant staircase, four large white columns in the front, giant double doors! And what made it so important was that it was-

"Hey lady! You gonna move it or what?!"

"The sidewalks big enough! Walk around me!"

"How much?! You expect me ta pay that for a measly ticket?!"

"I ain't got all day!"

"For the last time, I told you to pull it out!"

"OW! Get off my tail!"

"HEY! I'm walkin' over here! Learn ta drive!"

"You talkin' ta me?!"

It was in the center of Manehatten...

Sadly this was the only museum in all of Equestria. Meaning that I had to adjust from being in the quietest most peaceful town, to the loudest and most nonpeaceful town in Equestria. Still, it was worth it.

This place was where everything that adventurers found, stayed up for display. So the artifacts, pictures, even little bios ponies see on those tiny plaques in front of each exhibit were all because of the adventurers that worked for the museum.

But because of how dangerous it was, there weren't that many ponies that worked for the museum. In fact, I heard that there were only a hoof full of ponies that became adventurers. And even fewer ponies come back as adventurers.

What was so amazing about that though, was that one of those few adventurers was my sister, Tomb Rider. She always told me all about every one of her adventures that she had. And at the end of each of those, she always told me how she came back with a really cool artifact from each of them. She couldn't keep them though and had to give them to the museum. All because 'The Study of History Demands It' or something like that.

So maybe I couldn't see any of the cool stuff that came from her adventures, but I didn't really care about that. All of it was way more than enough to make me want to be an adventurer too. I mean, it couldn't really be that hard anyway right?

All that Tomb said was challenging was the 'bad guys' and traps set all over ancient ruins and caves. And I never believed either of those lies for a second! Please, what kind of "ancient" ruins still had traps that worked nowadays? As for the bad guys, they'd have to be pretty lucky to find you and all the hidden ruins, wouldn't you say sis?!

So not counting those two dumb stories, there were only two problems that sounded real enough to be careful about. The first was getting lost in the dangerous jungles and caves. Now, that wasn't much of a problem for me though with my super awesome talent that my Cutie Mark showed off. The talent was that I could read maps without a problem, by just spinning in a circle I could make a map of wherever I was. Add to the fact that I could fly above the forests and straight to the hidden stuff, and I had no problem getting lost.

Then the only other issue left was the old ruins and caves themselves. Because with how long they've been around, the slightest step could cause a wall to collapse! I was sure that I'd figure out a way to get past any problems like those whenever they came up. So it wasn't anything to worry about...

But getting back on track, I looked over the front of the building once again and quickly made sure I had everything I needed. I had packed really light to make sure that I could bring back whatever I found. A small pack with me that had a canteen, bandages, some paper, pencils, and a journal. You know, the usual survival stuff ponies took on life-threatening, dangerous trips in the forests.

I also had my sister's old, green adventurer's vest on. She outgrew it, but kept it for nostalgia reasons. Which was probably why she's going to be pretty ticked when she finds out I took it while she was out on an adventure of her own.

I was going to return it after I did this first adventure of mine, but it was important that I had one. They were thicker than the average vests and helped whenever you had to crawl through thickets or march around cold weather. And I didn't have any money to have one made for my size. These kind of vests surprisingly aren't cheap at all.

Still, I didn't plan on keeping this forever. Mostly because I don't think the 'green' vest thing would ever catch on.

Knowing that I had everything I needed, I took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. Feeling ready to take on anything that came at me. All I had to do was walk inside and ask to be an adventurer.

"Okay Daring. You got this." I said to psyche myself up before walking forward towards the giant set of steps that were at the entrance of the museum. "Just play it cool, and look like you know exactly what you're doing."

As I started to go up the steps, I could feel my heart pounding twice as fast as it should have been. Behind the doors that stand directly in front of me was my first chance at becoming everything I ever wanted to be.

Not wasting any time, I put a hoof to the double doors, pushed one of them open, and finally started stepping through. Once walking in, it was already so much to take in. Just in the main room was a giant, thousand year old statue of Princess Celestia on the right, and a similar giant statue of the younger sister of Celestia, Princess Luna, on the left.

Everything that was dated within the age after Nightmare Moon was in the hallways that were on Princess Celestia's side. While everything before the age of Nightmare Moon, was on the left side with the other statue. Directly across from the front doors was where all the real interesting stuff was though. It was everything that adventurers had brought in. Anything that ranged from a wooden hundred year old kazoo, to a fifteen hundred year old bamboo spear that once belonged to the chief of an ancient Iroquine tribe which was stored in the old ruins of The Stables of Old.

Just being in the lobby was already amazing though. The colorful glass windows, the hundred year old mahogany front desk, the opened managers office that was just off to the side, the sound of some pony yelling-

"I'm not telling you where the shield is! Now let me go, right now!" An annoyed low-pitched stallion's voice demanded.

"Well then, I guess we're not letting you go either. No pony's coming into the museum to save you. No pony's even so much as looked in the window when we put that "Under Maintenance" sign out above the front doors." A younger voice had calmly remarked.

"Maintenance?...Oops." I said in a hushed whisper. Not thinking about that too much, I got refocused. Obviously something was very wrong right now. Why was the head of the museum being threatened? Who was the other pony inside of the room with him? None of this sounded right at all. I mean, this was the museum for all of Equestria! How did some pony get in here and make the museum manager their hostage in his own office?!

"For the last time, it's not in here. It must be some other hallway." An annoyed mare's voice spoke from Celestia's hallway.

"Well it wasn't in either of the other two hallways." A low-grunt sounding stallion voice responded in an annoyed tone. "So where else would the shield be Shade Wisp?" Shield? What shield?

"Didn't he tell you to look in the storage room?"

Those voices were only getting closer. Reacting quickly, I dropped my bag down beside the front desk and flew up to the ceiling. Hiding above the fancy candle chandelier that was dangling above.

"Uh...I thought he told you to do that." The stallion answered pathetically. Wow. I didn't even know these two, and I could already tell that he was a horrible liar.

"You idiot." The mare, whom I was assuming was Shadow Wisp, said with a facehoof. "It's probably still in storage because it's new. Now let's hurry, the next guard's probably going to come into the museum and find us if we don't find it and get out!" She reminded the stallion before the both of them ran off in some random direction.

I didn't get a good look at them. In fact, I didn't even come out from behind the chandelier. I didn't need to know who they were right now. What I did need to know, was just why these ponies were apparently trying to rob the museum.

So only coming down when I knew for sure that the coast was clear, I quickly turned towards the door and saw a silhouette of some pony standing directly behind it. With the door still opened a crack, and whoever was in charge of this robbery, I smirked confidently and dive-bombed straight for the door. Speeding up as fast as I could in the small amount of room I had.

Once I got close enough to the door, I repositioned myself to kick the door with my back leg and use the momentum I was building up. To which I successfully flew straight through the doorway. Going so fast, I couldn't even slow down as I made direct contact with my kick. Dealing some pretty big damage to my target.

Which just happened to be the wall.

When I had been flying towards the door, the pony I was aiming for opened it up that moment and stood off to the side as I flew by. And with so much speed behind me, I tripped and face planted into the wall opposite of the door. Landing right beside the manager of the museum, who was tied up and gagged besides me.

Somehow, I was still conscious enough to roll over and lean on the wall. My nose was bleeding, and my head was ringing louder than it had ever done before. Not to mention, my jaw wasn't feeling so great either. I wasn't able to feel much pain in any of it right now, but that didn't really matter to me.

"Who the hay are you?!" What did matter, was the pony who was standing directly in front of me. It was a brown unicorn with a darkish blond mane and tail that were done up in a prestigious way. Added with the fact that he was in a very expensive white suit with a black trim and a small sunflower boutonniere in the lapel, and I could tell that this stallion was very high class. And probably really stuck up too.

He then shut the door and locked it with his magic, which had glowed a bright yellow color, and walked towards me. "I thought I told them to keep an eye on the doors. Some pony's getting fired for this."

"What's...What's going..." I tried to ask what was happening, but all that came out was a barely audible mumble. I was about to black out any second, but I couldn't let that happen. I was in front of some pony that had broken into a heavily guarded museum in broad daylight without any pony noticing. Sleeping was not an option.

"I'm sorry miss, but I'm afraid I'm not sharing. Have a nice nap." He said, stopping directly in front of me. My eyelids were starting to get heavy, but I managed to stay awake and watch him raise his hoof just above his head.

"Huh?" I asked in drowsy confusion. However, in no time at all was I answered by a swift smack to the head. To which I closed my eyes and fell to my side in defeat. Passing out seconds later.

"Now..." The pony started, turning towards the manager. "I believe that you were telling me where the shield was."