A/N: Hi. This is my first story so it's obviously not as good as most of the stories on this site. I would appreciate any constructive criticism.

And thank you to slycoyote for making my cover picture. I hope you enjoy.

Prologue

Small gusts of wind formed and danced around the ancient towns, scattering clusters of Autumn leaves amongst the cobble footpaths as they went by. It was an unusually chilly night and an eerie mist seemed to be hanging in the air, thickening around the central point of the region, Mt Myst. The only source of noise in the silent night was the soft whisper of the slow, twirling wind, sending out chilling vibes to the few people who were awake.

At about midnight, a blinding purple beam emitted from atop Mt Myst. The beam spread across several towns, surmounting the darkness and illuminating a third of the region in luminous purple light before retracting again and leaving the night sky as it was. This strange occurrence only lasted for about three seconds but had woken up most of the population of the region, immediately inclining them to look outside and investigate.

Meanwhile, atop Mt Myst, soft whispers could be heard echoing off the rocky walls.

"Master...", the first one stuttered. "You...You're here..."

"Yes, just as I said I would be", replied a more confident and demanding voice.

"But... How... How did you get out?"

"I have my ways", the creature said smoothly. Then angrily demanding "What have I said about questioning me?"

"Uh... Oh... I'm sorry, Master"

"Hmph". The creature snorted with disbelief before changing the subject. "I hope you remember what you have to do. Wait here until the others arrive, then direct them to the place. Do you understand?!"

"Ye... Yes"

"Good. I have something to take care of. I expect everyone will be there by morning". The creature said intimidatingly before heading into the night sky, slowly fading until it was finally no more than a speck of light in the South.

Chapter One

A bright orange Autumn leaf glided down from a huge maple tree, twisting and swirling as it went, and fell peacefully upon a sleeping Eevee's face, nestling into her fur. The Eevee slowly opened her eyes, yawned silently and stretched her small limbs. As she sat up, a blanket of maple leaves that had settled on her during the night fell off and piled up onto the ground. She stretched out her limbs and wavered her tail. She briefly sniffed the crisp morning air around her before darting off to a nearby lake.

She stared at her reflection in the crystal clear water for a while, pondering over the events last few days. She turned away from the lake and starting walking back towards that particularly big maple tree, enjoying the beautiful scenery around her. She was in a maple forest. Maple trees of all shapes and sizes were planted all around and an assortment of orange, yellow, red, pink and a few light brown leaves littered the ground. She continued walking towards the maple tree, looked up and saw a stunning golden sun right above her. It was midday. IT WAS MIDDAY?!

The Eevee bounded frantically through the forest, skidding around the slender trees and kicking up the bright leaves as she went. She gained speed as she went and her vision soon became a blur. After having several near misses with the maple trees intervening her path, she finally came into a small clearing. Her flustered expression soon became an annoyed one when she found what she was looking for.

A Pikachu and a Charmander lay huddled together in the middle of the clearing, both sound asleep, that is until Eevee startled them. They both jolted awake and looked around baffled.

"Having fun?", Eevee asked sarcastically.

"Um... Hi Jade... We were just-", the Pikachu started before being cut off by Jade.

"Save it, Sparky. We have a lot of walking to do today, especially if we want to get to Honeydew Forest by the end of today. So hurry up and find some food and LET'S GET MOVING!".

With that, Jade started back towards the - forest, her bushy tail high in the air as she marched along. Sparky and Blaze, the Charmander, exchanged glances.

Half an hour later, the trio were all set. They had fresh water from the lake stored in plastic, reusable bottles that they had stolen from passing campers, berries from another forest not to far from the maple one and other useful equipment they had accumulated from their various journeys. All their possessions got stored into a beige colored canvas bag, also stolen from campers. Jade had calculated that it would take approximately three hours to reach Honeydew Forest by foot. She took the crinkled, musty map of the region out of the canvas bag and lead the way.

The walk was long and tiresome. Each Pokémon had to stop to catch their breath at least once during the walk, and in Sparky's case, eight times. Being a Pikachu, Sparky wasn't as fit as the other two. "Can we stop and have some food?", he kept pleading, but got the same response each time, "NO". It was just as well they didn't have a Snorlax along with them. Apart from this and Jade's occasional warnings about upcoming obstacles such as a ditch or a lake, there wasn't much conversation going on between the three of them.

The temperature got gradually cooler as they moved away from the maple forest, dropping to 10 degrees celsius at one point. The change of weather didn't affect Jade and Sparky as they had thick coats of fur but poor Blaze could feel his blood freezing into ice. This was one of the problems of having three different species of Pokémon in their group, they all had different weaknesses and it was rare to find a biome that suited them ll. On the plus side, the all had different strengths as well.

They knew when they were getting close to the rainforest. An overwhelming feeling came over them, emanating from their hearts and spreading through their bodies right to their fingertips and making them feel excited and warm, despite the cold weather.

"What was that?" requested Jade.

"Apparently this forest is magical" replied Blaze, yawning.

"Meh" said Jade, disbelieving.

The trio didn't even make it completely into the forest before they collapsed onto the wet ground, fatigue-ridden and starving from the walk. The rest of the day was a spent sleeping while waking up periodically to eat some berries or drink some water, then collapsing into sleep again.

The all awoke early the next day to find not a single berry or droplet of water remained. They realized they would have to split up and go exploring for food, especially before lunch time or some annoying campers would come and take it all. Jade searched by a river a quarter kilometer away. She prowled along the riverbank, her eyes darting back and forth as she warily looked for anything that seemed edible. She continued along the river bank until she came across a small, rocky cave. Although it was in perfect condition with a a sturdy roof and entrance, it had an isolated feel, giving Jade the impression it had been abandoned for centuries. It had a silver plate bordering the entrance, with bright jewels like rubies and sapphires and emeralds stuck into it and the inside was dimly lit with a set of torches outlining the walls. She whistled out to Sparky and Blaze and, when they arrived, showed them her finding.

"Should we go in?" she asked excitedly.

"I don't know...", Blaze replied with a worried look on his face. "It looks unstable and...".

Jade cut him off. "Only one way to find out!" said Jade as she adventurously leaped into the cave, ignoring Blaze's shouts of concern emanating from behind her.