Menu

Menu
Prompts
Contests
Stories
Blog
Featured stories
Activity feed

Discover weekly, the best short stories

Looking for a steady supply of adventure short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

8550+ Adventure Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. From riding the high sea to climbing behemoth mountains, there isn’t any action that’s out of reach when it comes to adventure stories.

Adventure Short Stories – Page 2 of 570

The Mapmaker's Orchard

Submitted to Contest #300

The orchard was not on any official map, though everyone in the village knew where it was. Tucked behind the old granary and the crumbling limestone walls of the Darrin estate, it sprawled for acres, more wild than tended. The trees bore no fruit anyone recognized. Their trunks leaned in odd directions, like dancers caught mid-turn, and their leaves hummed softly in the wind—though no one could agree on the tune. The orchard had belonged, once, to the town’s mapmaker. That’s what the oldest villagers said, anyway, their voices lowering at th...

14 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

Ancient Creatures of the Black Ponds on the World Voyages of the Destiny's Dreams

Submitted to Contest #300

A gigantic bone stuck up from the black goo like something beckoning from beneath the surface.It was the 1800s. Anya, the Storyteller of the Blue Lantern, stopped breathing and her heart pounded.Her thoughts raced. “The legends are true. It is them. Underneath. How many are there? What are they like?”The stories carrying ancient wisdom awakened deep inside of Anya. They bubbled up from somewhere beyond time.She could almost hear sounds coming from beneath the shiny dark surface of the seepage. It was neither liquid nor solid. The dark slime ...

34 likes 35 comments 35
Read story

Felis catus

Submitted to Contest #300

Humans tend to overinflate their own intelligence leading to numerous scientific claims and discoveries that the human brain is capable of complex thought and feeling, something other species have apparently not achieved. Humans are wrong, of course. Felis catus, also known as the domestic or house cat is far superior in intelligence, a well-kept secret among felines worldwide. My ancestors, Felis lybica came close but evolution will stop with me because I have perfected it. My humans have been trying for the past ten minutes to trick me...

6 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

Lone Patrol

M B

Submitted to Contest #300

The expanse of space stretched on to infinity and all that separated Kairi from the endless void was bits of metal and a forcefield in the form of a small shuttle rocket. The blue-skinned woman with the elfin ears in the Star Patrol jumpsuit regarded her reflection in the reflective crystal instrument panel, her red hair primped up. She’d gotten used to that image, but usually in the company of others on a big ship... not alone in a small shuttle on autopilot. A quick glance at the dimly glowing instruments told her she was slowly approach...

10 likes 4 comments 4
Read story

The Layover

Submitted to Contest #300

“Flight LH 1523 from Frankfurt to Warsaw has been cancelled due to weather at the destination.” The announcement boomed over the intercom. “Please see our customer service agents to be rebooked.”A collective groan echoed through the boarding area, pulling Diana’s attention from the lone stamp in her passport. Chaos erupted around her as people leapt to their feet and rushed to be first in the queue, leaving Diana and strewn luggage in their wake. By the time Diana joined the queue, half the flight was ahead of her, filling the mostly empty t...

4 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

to Other Mountains

Submitted to Contest #300

You named Rainier your nemesis. The American Everest, your mortal enemy and forbidden love. Thrice you attempted to summit its peak and thrice you were foiled. Once by hubris, once by equipment failure, and once because of that storm that never showed, but still cancelled your flight. Each time your hate-filled fascination for the mountain drove you to raving. I remember days where you’d visit me at university and with much pacing and waving of hands you told me of your next plot to, at last, conquer the mountain. You always spoke with grim...

4 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

To the lake

Submitted to Contest #300

This is a thought experiment. All that you are about to witness is purely imaginary, forms part of my imagination and produced predominantly by my subconscious, no matter what I might say otherwise past this point. I say this whenever I space out too much. Not daydreaming, nothing mundane or trivial. This is not a form of entertainment or escapism, quite the contrary, ‘tis is mental labour in its finest. When I say space out, I mean it, a kid imagining how he saves an entire school from a terrorist attack or continues a cool fight scene he t...

5 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

The Little Red Cottage

Submitted to Contest #300

The Little Red Cottage My name is Tim Slater. I am twenty-eight years old, married, and a father of two rambunctious boys, six and eight. I am an attorney working with a Syracuse, New York law firm. As the beginning of summer approaches, our family eagerly anticipates our two-week yearly adventure, preferably somewhere we have never been before. The excitement of the upcoming trip always brings back the memories of the summer trips I took as a young boy with my parents. My parents rented a two-story red cottage on Lake Erie in Dunville,...

4 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

Summoning McGuffin's

Submitted to Contest #300

When the meeting ended, Millie leaned back from her divining tablet and contemplated what she’d just committed herself to. She’d only been at McGuffin's for a week and hadn’t made much of an impact yet. Maybe her standards were too high, but this was her first job out of university, and she wanted to make a name for herself. Millie had joined the operations team at McGuffin’s headquarters, which handled the in-tavern logistics for all six thousand locations across Othwynn. Her first week had been a whirlwind of orientations and introductions...

9 likes 3 comments 3
Read story

Adjerbaj

Submitted to Contest #300

“Once upon a time, in a land very far away from here, there lived two girls named Emma and Evie. The land was called Adjerbaj. Adjerbaj was a beautiful land, full of fruits and plants and magic. It was the place every girl and boy longed to go. Everything in Adjerbaj was perfect,” a female voice started, telling a story to several young kids. “Ah, that’s bologna,” a different voice interrupted her. “Adjerbaj had some issues.” “E, I’m telling a story here!” “Sorry, continue.” “As I was saying, Adjerbaj was perfect. It was amazing there. But t...

6 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

The Mausoleum

Submitted to Contest #301

Clara’s boots crunched against the frost-covered grass, each step heavier than the last. The cemetery gate loomed ahead, its rusted iron bars twisted into shapes that seemed to claw at the moonless sky. Her breath fogged in the November air, and her hands trembled as she shoved them deeper into her coat pockets. She stopped a few feet from the entrance, her heart pounding so loud she swore it echoed off the tombstones.“Come on, Clara, it’s just a bunch of old graves,” Jake said, his voice light but edged with impatience. He leaned against th...

4 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

A Ceramics Factory

Submitted to Contest #300

A Ceramics Factory Jaqueline Kelly had been a "masked adventurer" for fifteen years— since her grandfather passed on an old necklace. It was threaded with some kind of silk, with glass beads and a copper centerpiece depicting a spider carrying a small clay wad. When her grandmother realized Jack had the necklace, long after Grandpa Kelly had passed on himself, Nana Kelly explained the significance with curt clarity: "You remember the stories about the spider I told you when you were young?" "Of course. What does that have to do with the neck...

6 likes 1 comment 1
Read story

Sunshine Beams

Submitted to Contest #300

The Marcy wagon train headed west to California from Independence, Missouri right on schedule. During the five days it took to reach Topeka, Kansas, Ford Marcy, the trail master would often visit the newly joined Potter three-wagon party mostly talking to the seventeen-year-old person in charge, Kendra. He became enchanted with her. She always looked forward to his drop-in visits no matter how brief they might be.Tragedy had struck Kendra's family and she had given up on her Pappy's dream of going to California. Trying to help her choose a n...

28 likes 27 comments 27
Read story

What lies beneath the abandoned house on Vermont St.

Submitted to Contest #300

Six days out of the week I would wake up at 5 A.M. to do the paper route for my hometown, Richmond, Massachusetts. Where I would go from block to block delivering everyone's newspaper; I’d pass by my friend Jimmy's house as he would come outside at exactly 6:05 AM everyday of the week to wave and say hi to me as he grabbed his family's newspaper that I had just dropped off that morning and hurriedly get on his bike to catch up and join me. "Man, isn't it great that we don't have school today!", "Yes Jimmy, it is Saturday after all.", as he t...

7 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

A CITY LOST TO THE WORLD

Submitted to Contest #300

Cities fall. Cities burn. Cities are lost. Cities are never meant to last. Cities are remembered. There is one city that has been forgotten. A city so grand it was made of gold. A city so beautiful it was meant to last generations. The city didn't last for generations. The beautiful city of gold disappeared. The beautiful city of gold is lost to history and the world. Many people believed the city of gold is a legend, nothing more than a myth. The city never existed. But I believe otherwise. I believe the city of gold did exist. I believe t...

7 likes 1 comment 1
Read story
RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

Bring your short stories to life

Fuse character, story, and conflict with tools in Reedsy Studio. All for free.