Prompt 1: What was Unova's Strange House like before it was haunted? What events led to it becoming such a creepy place?
What was once a large, quaint mansion stood alone in the middle of a desert, just east of the settlement of Lentimas Town. Now, the red clay walls housed nothing but silence and the remains of the residents' furniture, unused for a decade. Three windows, forming an inverted V, were set high above the door, now gaping holes rather than shimmering glass panes that glinted like gold whenever the red sun set far across the desert. The warm, sand-ridden air blew lazily through the window-holes, and the hollow whistling sound rang through the abandoned grounds, reminding the few nearby settlers of the house's eternal emptiness.
It wasn't always like this, however.
Ten years ago, the looming structure was occupied by a couple and their daughter, as well as their Abra. It was warm, welcoming, and very beautiful. They had moved to Unova from a faraway region, hopeful to live a simpler life in an unpopulated place, but the mansion they had built was anything but simple. The foyer was occupied by a large imperial staircase, twisting up to the third floor, where there were three large bedrooms. Portraits hung from the red, papered walls, as well as tribal artwork from the family's former home region. Two staircases led to the large library in the basement, where the family would frequently sit together and read. Thick, leather bound books of various colors lined the bookshelves that occupied all four walls of the basement.
The couple's daughter was only 10 years old when the incident that left the mansion vacant took place. She had set off on her journey through the vast land of Unova, but less than a week into it, her dream of becoming the Champion crumbled into a nightmare. The young girl had entered a battle with a trainer, who had pitted his Hypno against her Herdier. In the process of using a certain move, the trainer had hypnotized the girl, who was found wandering the woods of White Forest after her family had called a search party to find her. It was widely believed that she would be fine after her seemingly perpetual state of hypnosis would wear off, and it did. However, there was of course the side effect of having constant, petrifying nightmares every time the girl slept a wink. Stories began to spread around the nearby town of the poor girl screaming in her sleep, and her health began to deteriorate by the day from her lack of energy.
Rather than using the family library to spend time together, the girl's parents used it as an attempt to keep their family together. Using a formerly happy place for a much more melancholy cause, they toiled away all night and all day researching Hypno's effects on humans, as well as how to cure their child of her constant affliction. Books were piled upon tables, research papers thoroughly read, science magazines picked apart for any missing information. After many long hours spent in the basement, their answer finally came to them. Well, a possible answer. Hidden far away in the Sinnoh region was the legendary Cresselia, who was said to be the giver of dreams. Desperate, the couple began to seek as much data as they could, as their daughter's condition steadily grew worse.
Eventually, they figured out how to summon this mysterious legendary pokémon, but it would require a lot of effort, and it wasn't guaranteed to work. The two adults decided that they would set out to Sinnoh to find the Lunar Wing, the key to summoning Cresselia and possibly ending this horrific time for their family. It was said that the girl begged her parents not to leave, but they simply told her that it was for the best, and that they would leave Abra with her.
Three weeks had passed and the girl's health had grown even more fragile, she was barely able to take care of herself. She had no idea where her parents were, as they had promised to return, wing or no wing, in one week. Little did she know that her parents had found out about the true cause of her nightmares, and were so frightened by it, they had left their poor, helpless daughter for dead in Unova. Darkrai was Cresselia's counterpart, in that it caused nightmares instead of wonderful dreams. They had spoken to a specialist in Sinnoh, who had warned them not to get involved in any sort, and that it was best for them to leave the region and move far away. At first the child's mother was hesitant, but after hearing many tales of Darkrai, she woefully resented, and she and her husband moved yet again to Alola.
Meanwhile, back in Lentimas Town, the people were growing quite frightened for the little girl's fate. It had been a month, and they all assumed that her parents had died in their quest for the Lunar Wing. They finally sent a small group of people up the hill to the mansion to retrieve the girl and care for her, but at that point she was so hopelessly weak she couldn't even get out of her bed. She was picked up, carried out, and airlifted to Castelia City Hospital, but every feeble attempt to save her was unsuccessful.
The 10-year-old child died in the hospital that night, alone except for the company of various machines fighting for her life.
Since then, only one person had gone into the mansion, and it was to acquire journals from the basement to assist in the investigation to find her parents. He was frantic when he emerged from the house, rattling on, as if he were insane, about how he had seen furniture moving itself, felt cold breezes coming from nowhere, and heard whispers floating down the stairs.
That was the last time anyone had ever stepped foot into the strange, haunted mansion, until now...
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