Draco: Progress in Galar as I start this chapter - just got the Fairy Badge. This quiz is so much less reasonable than the Cinnabar one. First question is about type matchups - they hand you that one, neither answer is wrong. Second question is the previous trainer's name - not something the average Trainer pays attention to, but no biggie. Third question is "what do I eat for breakfast" - what the actual frick? And then Opal's questions in the stadium are just random out-of-nowhere Mulch that is NOT mentioned on her League Card, or else expects you to give the WRONG answer for no reason whatsoever!

On a less hate-speechy note, I feel so stupid for seeing Cinderace's name and looking at the design and assuming "track athlete" despite the obvious ball-kicking animation for physical attacks in the evolutionary line. I didn't realize the intention was "association football player" until I used Pyro Ball.

Pokémon and protagonist © Nintendo. Character designs © Koei. Ransei © somewhere in the middle.

Ultra Kingdom - Infested Wood: Hideous Inside

"Delicious. Absolutely delicious. So good."

When Kabuki Okuni had joined Oichi, Ranmaru, and Gracia for camp, her only request for a meal had been 'anything but berries'. As soon as Oichi had dished her up, she'd seized the platter and started eating bare-fingered before she had even started dishing up the others; Volcarona wasn't quite so hasty, but definitely seemed to be enjoying the Ponigiri more than they expected. Oichi's only hope was that the Pheromosa wouldn't come to them at the top of the hill with the spring.

"Alpha," Okuni cursed around a mouthful, "you never know how good something is until it's gone. Is that Moomoo Milk?" She seized the bottle when Oichi offered it and drained half in one go before setting it back down and returning to her plate.

Ranmaru shook his head. "The way you eat," he mused, "one would think you've not eaten at all these past four months."

"Nothing but berries and water in this forest. A couple is fine, but if there's anything else to eat you have them sparingly. So glad to have someth-"

She paused mid-word and mid-bite; slowly, her gaze drifted upward. Oichi awkwardly shuffled, forseeing the unpleasant question coming as Okuni swallowed her mouthful and asked, "Did you say four months?"

"Evia went missing from Ransei about that long ago," the healer explained. "When we sent word out to everyone about suspicious happenings, Nō mentioned you left for Valora and never showed up."

Okuni set her plate down. "You mean... I'm not the only one to end up here?"

"You're not the only one to have left Ransei," Ranmaru corrected. "This place will be isolated - as I'm sure you've noticed."

"Um... not exactly," Okuni admitted, fingering the handle of her folded parasol awkwardly. "I haven't been doing a whole lot of exploring."

Gracia hummed. "Well, we came looking for everyone about two months ago, give or take," she explained. "And this is the third place we've been to. There were these weird Poison-types in a sticky forest, then there was these giant Rock/Steel boxes in a huge maze... and now this place and it's Fighting/Bug kickboxers."

Ranmaru sighed, looking up at the still-bright skies; it wasn't that there was a sun above them so much as just an ambient light that seemed to have no source. "With the way some of these otherworlds lack day or night, I don't blame you for failing to notice how much time had passed."

"...Yeah," Okuni agreed halfheartedly. "That must've been it." She looked up. "So, if these places are isolated, how have you guys been traveling between them?"

The Cosmog popped up from behind Gracia and gave cheerful cries.

Okuni's mood brightened in an instant. "Holy Gratitude, where did you guys come from?" she squealed. "So cute!"

"Aren't they?" Oichi had a smile on her face. "Meet the Cosmog. They're not much in a fight, but they can open these strange gates - that's how we've come to these otherworlds."

One floated towards Okuni, offering a 'hand' for her to shake; she tried to take it, and Oichi recognized the uncertain grasp of discovering they weren't quite solid. "So weird," she murmured, releasing the hand. "If you guys can open the gates, does that mean you can take me back to Ransei?"

The mood darkened around the camp. "...Not exactly," Gracia admitted. "They don't have a lot of control over where the gates go. And it takes a lot out of them to open one. So, the best we can do is get you out of this place in about a month."

"A month isn't much of a wait if there's company," Okuni observed. "And getting me out of this place is already an Alpha-send."

Ranmaru's gaze went upward. "You've not had the most pleasant experiences here?"

"There's nothing but berries," Okuni proclaimed.

Oichi turned to her. "That's not-"

"So," Okuni said quickly, changing the subject, "I take it you guys only got the three tents?"

"We weren't expecting quite so much difficulty finding everyone," Ranmaru mused, "so we hadn't expected the need for an entourage of tents."

"In that case," Okuni contemplated, "who should I double up with?"

Ranmaru chuckled. "I assume I'm out of the question."

"Only if you don't want to," Okuni assured him, and giggled when the Dragnoran blushed. "I mean, if you're comfortable..."

"You can sleep with me," Gracia insisted. "I don't take up so much room."

It was Oichi's turn to giggle when Okuni glared at Gracia. Ranmaru quickly nodded. "Yes, that sounds ideal."

"Spoilsport."

+x+x+x+

The next morning(?), Oichi gave Okuni a com-crystal bracelet and earpiece; after stocking up their drink supply from the font, the group elected to follow the streams, to see how many of them were host to the Pheromosa.

"So you're saying those things are 'beasts'?" Okuni observed. "Meaning what?"

"We're not certain yet what exactly that means," Ranmaru admitted. "But when I tried to Link with one in the bog, it seemed to... refuse the Link, somehow."

Okuni hummed. "Well, how many times have you Linked with Poison-types?"

"Twenty-six."

"What."

Oichi shook her head. "In our youth, Ranmaru made and broke Links more times than I care to remember, trying to find his perfect partner." She giggled, turning to him. "I never did see you Link with a Riolu. You squeed so hard when you made a Link with a Dratini."

Lucario gave a growl of protest as Ranmaru shook his head. "That was the first time the Link was any stronger than 'fine, I'll fight with you'."

"Fair."

Gracia was at the fore of the group, and she gave a quick "Stop" as the stream reached its terminus, causing the march to halt. Unlike the expansive, shallow lake where the Pheromosa had been bathing, this one had ended in a rather deep, narrow pool. "What's up with this?"

Ranmaru shook his head. "Don't drink from anything that's pooled," he warned. "We have no way of knowing what the Pheromosa have washed in and what they haven't. Don't even wade into it if you can avoid it."

"Good call," Okuni praised. Then, uncertainly; "They don't spend a lot of time out of the trees, you sure you wanna leave the hill?"

"We need to supply," Oichi insisted. "We can fight off the beasts in small numbers - and with you on our side, I bet we can take a pair, at least."

Okuni fidgeted awkwardly as the others started to step around the pool; Null ended up having to nudge her from behind to get her going. "So, what's the story with this one?" she asked.

"No idea, yet," Oichi replied. "He's man-made, he's called Type: Null, his mask is inhibiting something, and he was put into cryonic stasis with a box of discs for something called Type: Full."

"Stasis?" Okuni echoed. "That's... not something that can happen in Ransei."

Oichi nodded. "That's what I said."

"Okay, but wait..." Okuni shook her head. "How did you get him out of stasis?"

"Father knows the Winterbird," Gracia replied.

"What?" Okuni seemed offended. "How come Lady Nō never told me about this?"

"Because Father never told Lady Nō about that," Gracia explained. "In fact, I don't even think he told Lord Nobunaga about that."

Okuni crossed her arms. "Why the secrecy?"

Gracia hummed. "He was being way too overcareful," she admitted. "He didn't even know if a Legendary Pokémon would wanna help with Null or not."

"After Lord Nobunaga had two of them help conquer Ransei?" Okuni wondered.

"That's what I said!" Gracia agreed.

Ranmaru shook his head. "The Black Yang only aided him once Lady Evia had taken enough for him to be defending kingdoms rather than taking them," he insisted. "And the Sky Demon only for the battle atop the Tower of Infinity."

"And to get him back to Ransei in time for the wedding," Oichi observed.

Okuni giggled at that. "Still," she mused, "they were willing to help him do that, the Winterbird wouldn't say no to helping save a Pokémon from-"

A tree branch shifted to the group's left, leaves brushing against each other for a noise that could only be heard in a forest, and the entire entourage came to a halt. Null took an aggressive stance and was about to charge in the direction of the sound when another shift sounded, in the opposite direction. The group fell back-to-back before two more shifts were heard - and they promptly took a four-point formation, desperately hoping they were wrong.

Ranmaru sighed. "And I thought a wall lined with beasts was too much to handle," he muttered.

"Lined with them?" Okuni echoed.

"Lined with heavy, slow-moving Stakataka," Ranmaru elaborated, "that prioritize rate of fire over power, against whom we had a type advantage, in a labyrinth whose passages could only facilitate two side-by-side, where one hit would cause a cascade that slowed down the lot."

The branches in four directions shifted again as the beasts leapt from them, and four Pheromosa landed around them.

"I didn't know when I was well off."

Null roared, charging at the beast straight ahead of him; the other three promptly charged him while his back was turned, and no sooner had his Crush Claw struck his target than the rest were bombarding him with Triple Kicks. Gracia bashed her bracelets together as Gothitelle used the opportunity of so many enemies gathered close together; Oichi drove her staff into the ground, causing a soft light to wash over Null and tend his wounds. Okuni stepped into a brief dancing turn, and power welled up around all the gathered Pokémon as Lucario leapt into the air and hurled an Aura Sphere at the Pheromosa that Null had struck, throwing it clear and giving Null passage to dash out of the kill zone.

Volcarona leapt into the center before they could gather, and flames gathered around her; then she twisted left and right, and her Fiery Dance scattered flames into the three Pheromosa around her. No sooner had the blaze started to subside than Gothitelle's Future Sight struck the beasts - including the one that had been forced back in the meantime, which promptly found itself thrown deeper into the woods when Null slammed another Crush Claw into it. He quickly decided against chasing after it and charged back at the gathering; one of the Pheromosa charged at him in return, and another approached Lucario as he landed, slamming a Triple Kick into him rapidly before he could try to evade.

The last made to do the same to the Aura Pokémon - and found its leg caught on something.

"Enough of you!"

Oichi yelped when she realized Okuni had charged up to the beast and hooked her folded parasol on its ankle; she promptly seized the body of the parasol and dragged it into a skyward swing that flung the Pheromosa into a painful-looking backflip. Volcarona promptly leapt close to blaze it and the one that had attacked Lucario with another Fiery Dance; Null was trading dreadful blows with the third, and managed to finish it off before it did the same to him. Oichi held him back from joining the melee as Volcarona finished off the one that had been knocked down; the last realized it was outmatched and made to dash away, but Okuni opened her parasol and threw it at a tree with such trajectory that it ricocheted back and bashed the beast in the face, leaving it reeling backwards.

It bounced off another tree and back to Okuni, and she caught it, folded it, and slammed it angrily into the beast's torso, knocking it to the floor.

Everyone save for Volcarona was watching dumbfounded as Okuni glanced around the clearing; satisfied that the beasts had all been knocked out, she opened her parasol and hooked it over her shoulder, turning away with an irritable air. "Good riddance to those beasts."

She started deeper into the woods, and the group traded glances before making to follow her. Ranmaru came up at Okuni's side quickly. "That is... most unlike you," he observed. "Have they given you some grievance?"

"Spending any amount of time around those things makes your senses dull," she declared. "They exploit that."

Gracia angled her head curiously. "What do you mean?" she asked. "Exploit it how?"

Okuni turned a very deep red very quickly. "Nothing."

"But you just-"

"I said it's nothing!"

"Okay."

Oichi glanced back at the fight zone before stepping up. "How exactly does it 'make your senses dull'?" she asked.

Okuni shook her head. "I'm surprised you haven't noticed," she insisted. "They give off some kind of pheromone. The first time I saw one, I was awestruck."

"We, um..." Oichi hummed. "They're not the first beasts we've encountered," she admitted. "Maybe that preconception means it didn't affect us quite so much."

"Your preconception was accurate," Okuni proclaimed. "Horrible things, these ones. The beasts you've described so far don't sound nearly so dreadful."

Ranmaru turned to her. "Little devils who attack Warriors that try to Link, and formations of minute bricks with eyes, don't seem so dreadful as a beast that happens to look lovely?"

The blush returned to Okuni's face again. "No, they don't."

Draco: Progress in Galar as I end this chapter - just watched Opal cart off Bede. It's like that fricker doesn't even understand what he did wrong. I hope to discover being that old hag's successor means he suffers long and hard.