POKÉMON MYSTERY DUNGEON: GATES INTO SHADOW

Chapter Five: The Walking Quarry

With all the delays in the mail system from letter-carriers being too scared of the Shadow Lugia to fly a direct route over the mountains, the Star League’s response to Ambur’s inquiry on the Umbreon book arrives weeks late, and with disappointing news. Request denied. If any such book exists, it’s Star League property, for Star League researchers only. Signed, Dr. Altair.

They have other threads to tug at in the meantime, though, and peruse the library for some books on ghosts and spirits. Besides writings on actual Ghost-type Pokémon, they don’t find much, with only one book showing promise as some weird mystical occult type tome, very clearly written by an outsider with no firsthand experience on Ghost-type phenomena. Exactly what they’re looking for – they’re not exactly dealing with hard “science” here, or anything that really lines up with Ghost-type Pokémon.

Sharing the news with Hazy once they meet at Lavender’s, they decide to bring their current assumptions about the spirit inhabiting the ghost to the Charmeleon currently restrained at the inn. Honeydew looks very singed and very tired having had to deal with him for the past couple weeks, and Hazy commits to giving her at least one day off, offering to handle their guest for the night, in exchange for a chance to… question him.

The Charmeleon is mad, his eyes glowing red from within just the same as the shadow in the river under the inn, squirming against the ropes tying him to the bed and trying desperately to burn through it all. They question him on his name, his partner’s identity, their Team’s mission – and he is not having any of it, thrashing and biting and desperate to race back into the forest and burn that nest to the ground. Hazy holds him in place with his sheer weight as they press him further, gleaning that the Charmeleon was indeed dealing with the Spinarak nest in the Black Forest, that he did lose his partner in there, and that he just really wants to go back and incinerate everything.

After narrowly avoiding a Flamethrower directly to the face, Ambur decides that words aren’t helping, and fishes the Cubone club out from Hazy’s bag, dropping it directly on the Charmeleon’s chest. They hoped things would resolve themselves from there, but they don’t – “Eric” just seems very confused and scared, and he doesn’t seem to recognise the Charmeleon, who is still stuck in his blind, dark, oppressive, unresponsive rage. He starts to burn through the ropes and catch the bed aflame, so Ambur drags a bucket of water in from just outside the door, and Hazy dumps it directly over the Charmeleon’s face.

With the Charmeleon pinned under Hazy’s full body weight, Ambur lays out the whole story so far as they see it: The Shadow Lugia for some reason really needs that Ariados nest dealt with, and sent the Charmeleon and his partner to burn it down, but they failed, his partner got left behind. The Shadow Lugia then tried to deal with it itself, but again failed and retreated, with Ambur and Hazy witnessing it escape. The Charmeleon himself managed to escape some time later, found by Hazy and brought to the inn.

Neither the Charmeleon nor “Eric” seem to respond to this retelling in any way besides blind rage and confusion respectively, and they realize they’re still missing some pieces of this puzzle. Hazy stays with the Charmeleon and lights up some Herb to help calm the situation down, while Ambur leaves to try researching more on the strange dark-hearted berserker rage state he’s stuck in.

Having late-night bothered Meringue more than enough over the past few weeks, Ambur instead decides to bother Licorice, the bookworm’s library well past closing time by now. The Wurmple actually seems a little excited to be taking part in such important Guild business again, reminiscing on late-night research sessions, while Ambur lays out what they know – a blind, berserker rage, unresponsive to any external prompt that doesn’t assist them in fulfilling their urge to destroy, to burn, heart closed to any emotion besides anger, an air of oppressive melancholy and non-Dark-type-darkness, with red eyes glowing from within. Licorice says they remember reading something about that in a book on Dungeon Treasures and Oddities – one of the many books that went missing, the books that were probably among the Pirate’s stash, the books that probably burned with the airship.

Ambur apologizes for having bothered them for nothing, then goes home, reading through the book they had managed to check out. Amid its flowery prose and gothic musings are some spiritual concepts on Wholeness – if the remains are not whole, the spirit may not be whole either. Is that why “Eric” feels so confused a lot of the time? They did see a Cubone skull in the Spinarak nest, maybe if they retrieve it, they can see if “Eric” really is Turmeric. A couple chapters later they find a discussion on the Tree of Life, a large white tree with some type of spiritual properties – and from the description and illustration, it looks a lot like the tree the nest was built around!

They lay out a plan. Tomorrow, they’re going back to Streusel Hills, to retrieve some of the apparent naturally-spawning Escape Orbs there. Then, they’ll revisit the dungeon on Shallot’s farm, exploring the burnt-out ruins of the Pirate’s airship to see if any books survived Hazy’s blaze. Finally, they’ll head into the Black Forest, to steal back the Cubone’s skull, and warp back out with their Escape Orbs. Easy enough.

The gang goes on a brief supply run around town, with Hazy reminding Ambur that they do in fact need to eat and can’t just rely on Seeds and Berries and occasional treats from Lavender’s. They divulge their Escape Orb retrieval mission plan to Mike and Ike, who offer to buy up any surplus they happen to come across for a pretty decent price. Hazy also buys a telescope from the Kecleon.

They head to Streusel Hills, finding themselves, after a few minutes of wandering, in a cave with a chittering ceiling. Hazy puts out his flames and Ambur tries to dim their glows as they sneak past the blanket of Zubat, but the Typhlosion is just too big, loud metaphorically and literally, and the swarm is quickly alerted. The Zubat hit Ambur with a Confuse Ray that Synchronizes right back, and Hazy scoops them up and runs out of there while they’re confusedly Dark Pulsing at anything that moves, including Hazy’s face point-blank. Whoops.

They shake off the swarm by diving down a steep incline off the side of the path into a large, artificially dug-out cave system, Excadrill claw marks designating it as a mine, whose walls swerve and curve around the network of Onix dens within the rock. The tumbling fall shatters one of the lenses in Hazy’s newly bought telescope. Following the tunnel leads to a large cavern bearing only slight remnants of a well-harvested Orb vein, flecks of sparkling crystal embedded in the walls. A curved sloping path leads down into an identical chamber, equally well-harvested – but with some strange stone hovering around, the cracks in its meteorite shell showing a bright pink glow.

They introduce themself as Mini, a Minior working with the Star League – and Ambur immediately perks up, suddenly a lot more interested in this weird little space-rock. They’re also looking for Orbs in here, under orders from Syr Orion, a Star Knight like that rude Clefairy, Syr Rigel, they’d run into a few weeks back. Ambur offers to help them figure out where this mine’s Orb vein might originate, using some cool cartography tricks, and they spill some more info on the Star League along the walk.

Dr. Altair, Ambur already knows about – they’re the guy that signed off on the letter denying them access to that mysterious Umbreon’s Book. They’re, apparently, also the guy that makes those RKS swords that the Knights wield. The names Deneb, Tara and Sai also come up at points, alongside Orion and of course Rigel.

They eventually find the source for this particular vein, a large purple crystal pillar spearing through the cave. It’s mostly barren – obviously, since there’s an entire mineshaft built around it – but there are two Orbs that have seemingly sprouted from it since then. One is a darker purple, a crackling burst of light inside, and the other is lighter with some cloud-like occlusion at its center. Mini takes the former, and Hazy takes the latter, and they part ways, Mini heading back to meet Syr Orion and Ambur and Hazy continuing their search for Escape Orbs.

With the path back potentially still swarming with Zubat, our Explorers decide to climb up through the mine in search for another exit. After a few more abandoned floors, they encounter a trio of Drilbur – one of which recognises them, claiming they broke into his house and beat him up last time they were here. Hazy explains what actually happened: They accidentally stumbled into his cave, and he tried to trap them inside by collapsing the entrance, but ended up collapsing the ceiling down on himself instead. His buddies laugh at him and, having successfully charmed the miners into trusting them, Hazy and Ambur are given a pass through the mine, as long as they cart some buckets of gravel up to the entrance.

At the top floor of the mine they meet the boss, an Excadrill, and strike up a conversation about where all the stuff they’re digging out – not only Orbs, but some precious gems, and even some Evolutionary stones – ends up. He’s hesitant to explain too much, because, as it turns out, despite being hosted within a Mystery Dungeon, this mine isn’t overseen by any of the nearby Guilds, making it technically a little bit illegal. It mostly ends up out west, though, to the coastal town of Nori, with some shipping deeper into the mountains instead, a place called Dragonsgrave. And, disappointingly, they haven’t seen any Escape Orbs in months. That giant Gigalith has been hoarding them all.

Gravel goes in the gravel pile, buckets go on the bucket stack, and our pair of Pokémon head out through the mine’s exit – and to the next floor of the dungeon, into a complete change of scenery, rolling bumpy hills and sheer cliff faces under harsh sunlight from a sky unseen beyond the rock. Things don’t seem to have shifted that much, since they were last here – with Ambur musing that maybe rocky Dungeon terrain changes slower than more “soft” areas like grassland. They head in about the same direction as last time, keeping the cliff face to their right, and again stumble into a Trapinch sand-pit. Ambur gets spooked and tries to scramble back out, but Hazy slips all the way down and just scoops the little critter from out of its hole, flinging it over the side of the pit – with Ambur treating it like a clay pigeon and Dark Pulsing it away before it can dive back in and start the sand-traps up again.

Very quickly heading off, Ambur spots a more worn path along the hills, leading towards a cave-hole in the cliff-face, and they decide to investigate it, assuming there must be traffic through there for a reason. The walls of the cave seem scuffed by rougher stone than any Onix, definitely inhabited by something more craggly, like Roggenrola and its evolutionary family – but they only make it a few steps in before both feel a claw gently resting on their shoulders and a low voice guiding them into a little alcove off to the side.

It’s that Gligar again! From their last trip through here, and their first raid on the Pirates’ den. He finally introduces himself as Joel, and welcomes our heroes into a little hideout he’s built inside the Dungeon, looking like a more ramshackle version of a Guild’s common room – but with a makeshift kitchen too, and some bookshelves stocked with stolen library books. Oh, those stolen library books. He must’ve raided them from the Pirates before they’d even had the chance to move them to the ship. Also, there’s a Galvantula here too – her name’s Trish, and she’s the Boss’s partner.

They start striking up deals – a safe place to shelter up and rest, assistance in handling the Gigalith, and those library books, in exchange for better cooking ingredients (Hazy always brought along veggies as travel snacks) and some Herb. Joel says he better go get the Boss before he can agree to anything like that, and Hazy just chats with Trish for a bit, learning of some troubles deeper in the mountains, where the Lugia liked to roam – an epidemic of anger, of blind berserker rage, dark of heart and red of eye.

Ambur reads up on just that same phenomenon, now that they finally have a chance to read that Dungeon Treasures and Oddities book that Licorice mentioned. The Shadow is described specifically as a closing of the heart to anything but resolution, to resolving whatever caused the distressed emotional state that allowed a dark influence to take root in the first place. Explained the Charmeleon’s self-destructive determination to burn down that Spinarak nest, then.

Joel returns with the Boss. The Boss is Crash, the Beedrill that our heroes left hanging when she’d asked their help in finding her missing partner. Suppose that sidequest resolved itself, then. She reluctantly agrees to part of their deal, but asks them very politely to avoid mentioning the little hideout in their report to the Guild, and also to leave those books here, since Joel would probably go mad without them. Ambur realizes that, if all those books did just suddenly show back up at Licorice’s library, they’d probably have to mention where they found them. So they agree to both of Crash’s demands, electing to just read and take notes on what they could while the Team took a much-needed rest.

Around the hideout’s rock-stump dinner table, the combined Teams discuss potential plans. After initially considering simply distracting the giant Gigalith and raiding its stash, Hazy suggests it might be under the same mysterious power as the pirate captain had been, growing to massive size under influence of a Wishing Stone. If they could remove that Stone, it’d probably shrink to a more manageable size. Ambur accepts the theory and the gang agrees with the plan, so they all head off for the rock monster’s cave.

After an uneventful trek through the “overworld” floor, they enter into the cave – and the floor transition spits them out right at the bottom of a very tall chamber. The Team’s Defense Scarves glow pink just like they had in the presence of the other Wishing Stones, confirming Hazy’s theory. The floor’s covered in sharp spiky Stealth Rocks, so Trish and Joel get to climbing along the cave walls while Crash starts flying. Hazy says he’s fine walking on them, but Ambur is forced to begrudgingly accept the Galvantula’s offer to carry them – wrapped up in spider-silk for safekeeping, of course.

They spot the Gigalith, unmoving nearby the crystal pillar that marks its stash. Hedging their bets on it being asleep, Ambur cloaks them in Darkness for stealth as Trish carries them along the walls and up to the ceiling directly above it. They still can’t quite spot a Wishing Stone from up here, though, so she lowers them down on a spider-silk rope, suspended gently directly above the Gigalith. Then suddenly descending a lot faster as she fumbles with the silk, slack slipping from her claws leaving the Umbreon free-falling until Joel swoops in to help Trish.

The whole incident leaves them dangling directly in front of the strange pattern of rocks denoting a Gigalith’s “face”. Again, they hope and pray that it’s still just sleeping, and maneuver onto its back with help from Trish and Joel swinging the rope. They eventually find the Wishing Stone, wedged stuck between the Gigalith’s head and body, and slip out of the rope to tie it around the glowing rock instead. Standing on the rock’s shoulders, they look up at Trish and Joel, and jerk their head aside, telling them to yank it.

The Wishing Stone starts to break loose, but it’s not quite enough, and the movement and discomfort and slight noise is starting to make the Gigalith move, so Ambur takes desperate action. Climbing to the shoulder opposite the Stone, they call out a “Hello!” to the Gigalith, making it turn its head – and creating enough of a gap between its head and body for the stone to fully pop free! Instantly, it starts to shrink down, but their stealth is entirely broken, and a swarm of Roggenrola is starting to amass, and the Wishing Stone is also shrinking and it slips out of the rope and starts falling back down!

Ambur dives off the shrinking rock, caught by Crash who crashes them both to the ground, while Joel and Trish start climbing along to the exit near the top of the cave to set up some spider-silk Escape Ropes, and Hazy makes a mad dash for the falling Stone – catching it as it’s about to fall to the ground, and immediately calling upon its power.

He feels energy coursing through him, resonating with the crystal pillar spearing through the cave, and seems to understand instinctively that this is exactly the type of “leyline” that Syr Rigel was looking for back in the grassy fields, amplifying the Stone’s power – but also inadvertently inviting something else, something otherworldly, to observe and acknowledge him. The Typhlosion immediately grows large enough to risk slamming his head against the cave’s ceiling, and simply picks up the now normal-sized Gigalith and moves it a couple hundred feet aside, while Ambur races towards its stash, dodging between the Gigalith’s earthbending attacks and the shockwaves of Hazy’s bone club – equally as Dynamaxed as he is – slamming against the ground and illuminating the cave with a teal ghostly glow.

There’s a fair amount of gold here, and various other trinkets, but all Ambur cares about are the Orbs – two Escapes, loose and easy to grab, and one unidentified, pink with a swirl of bubbles at its core, wedged between two parts of the crystal spike, needing some work to break loose, all while Crash hovers anxiously nearby. Hazy runs out of Wishing Stone energy pretty quickly, and makes a break for the Escape Ropes the moment he’s normal-sized again, outrunning the swarm-wave of small rocks – while Ambur finally gets that third orb out and is immediately scooped up by the Beedrill, airlifted directly to the exit.

Our heroes regroup and dive out of the cave, back into the strange overworld area, still chased by the Gigalith and its swarm of little rocks. Crash and the Boys break off towards their hideout, but not before pointing Ambur and Hazy towards another Exit somewhere nearby a waterfall.

It takes a few minutes of running for the gaps between rolling rocky hills and cliffs to narrow enough that the Gigalith probably can’t follow them, so they slow to a more leisurely pace, collecting a few Berries from bushes growing nearby the path – a good sign that they’re headed in the right direction. They eventually find the waterfall, and carefully navigate behind it to the proper Dungeon Exit – which throws them out over on the complete other side of town, with the waterfall draining out from Lake Champagne on the cliffs above the Black Forest. It’ll take about a day’s walk to reach town again, so they decide to camp out by the riverside instead.

A few hours into their rest, Ambur awakes to a strange presence – a large dark shadow looming over them from out of the river, watching silently. It seems to notice them noticing it, beginning to slip back under the water’s surface, but Ambur calls out to it, asking who it is. Its voice, deep and vaguely familiar, tells them to go back to sleep, before it silently retreats back into the stream and disappears.

It’s a struggle, but Ambur manages to fall asleep again eventually.