Gin was pretty silent throughout the morning when we were getting ready to go. When I asked if everything was alright, she assured me that nothing was wrong... But I'm not stupid. Something was definitely bothering her. Unfortunately, I couldn't try to get it out of her, because we needed to get going back to the place where we were before. Since yesterday wasn't exactly productive, today was the day that we would get things done rather than not.

After landing and being shot out of our cockpits, it was time to get going. Gin made her way over to the red Onion while I approached the hologram. Once the screen had materialized, I thought about how many purple Pikmin would be good for today... Five would be enough, right? Glancing over to Gin, I could see that she had already taken out a decently sized army of... How many? "Hey, Gin? How many didja take out?" I asked her, which caused her to jump a little bit. Taking a look at her group, she replied, "Um... Sixty-five." "And is Chili there?"

Gin just gave me a stare as a single red Pikmin separated from her crowd and made a cute little squeak. By the looks of it, Gin was surprised that Chili even remembered that he had a name. After snapping out of it, she cleared her throat, "How many are you taking out over there?"

"Just five. So, that'll put us at seventy... Think that's good for today?"

"Yeah."

With that exchange, we grouped up with our Pikmin and headed to the wall I had taken down yesterday... However, the berry plant things seemed to have shrunk in the time I was gone. Did these things grow in the sunlight and shrink in the nighttime? Weird. Looking to me, then to the plants, Gin asked, "Did you harvest any of the berries yesterday?"

"No, I spent the day looking for you," I replied, which seemed to make Gin flush slightly in embarrassment. "Y-Yeah... Well, before anything else, we should get the berries."

Hm. Yeah, that seemed like a good idea. We were running out of ingredients, so gathering up some gigantic berries to prepare for some nice tarts would definitely be nice. Or maybe to make them into juice, given how big they are. Juicing them would lead to more possibilities for recipes and—

"Tori, they aren't edible," Gin sighed as the plants had a huge growth spurt. I just looked to her, then gave her a sly grin, "You doubt my skills?"

"No, they're really not made to be cooked or anything—"

"I'm not gonna cook 'em. I'll use the juice to make a nice beverage to go with tonight's dinner!"

"That's accurate to what they're used for, but I really don't think it's a good idea to drink them."

I only needed to hear that my plan was similar to their purpose. Once the berry plants went through another major growth spurt, I was pretty sure that they'd get their berries soon. Well, probably. I wasn't sure how much it took for them to be berry-ready because I didn't arrive in the area until later to bring down the wall... It was at this moment that Gin approached the left side of where the wall used to be, which caused the floating fish thing from yesterday to appear with a happy little noise. Its sudden appearance caused Gin to jump, but she recovered and watched as it floated along.

"Oh yeah! That little guy kept me company while I waited for the wall to come down. It floated around like that and disappeared for a few seconds after a while and kept appearing and disappearing like that," I explained, which was returned with a nod from my partner. "Yep. Those are called honeywisps. The egg-things they carry around have stuff that help Pikmin," Gin replied as she watched it float about. Honeywisps, huh? That's a pretty cute name. Fitting for something like that. As the honeywisp disappeared after a while of floating, Gin looked right at me. "You do know that we're going to have to knock its egg down if we want our Pikmin to get powered up..."

I returned with a concerned look. "Wait, we aren't going to kill it... Right?" I asked Gin, who hummed to herself as she seemed to be thinking of a response. "Well, um... We aren't exactly killing it. At least, I don't think so... Does knocking its egg down kill it..? I think it does, but... Hm..."

Well, that didn't give me a clear answer. Looking back up to the honeywisp, I could tell it had no idea just what we were considering. That cute face... That cute, innocent face... With a sigh, I looked over to Gin, who was still trying to remember if knocking its cargo down kills it, "What exactly happens to make the Pikmin powered up?"

"They get a permanent boost to everything... Well, unless the flower gets blown off."

I didn't have a damn clue what she meant by 'flower', but having enhanced everything would really help with getting out of here. With that thought, I turned to the army of Pikmin, "Alright, let's knock the egg down. After all, Chili would look good with a flower if that's what they get."

At the mention of his name, Chili ran up to me happily only to trip onto his face as soon as he was in front of me. Once he got up from the ground, he made a happy noise, seemingly assuring me that he was okay. This made the thought of killing the honeywisp more tolerable, because I know that I would be helping my little carrot buddy out. And even though the honeywisp was cute and relatively beautiful, 'bros before hoes' was one of the mottos I went by. Gripping Chili's stalk, I took a glance at Gin, who had grabbed ahold of a purple Pikmin. Looking back to me, she gave me a nod, "Ready, Tori?"

"Yep!"

Chucking Chili right at the honeywisp, I was surprised that I had actually landed the hit on it. With a yelp, it dropped the egg and faded away, leaving us with the contents. I had expected the egg have a yolk or something in it, but once the egg shattered... "OH MY FUCKING GOD WHAT THE ARE THESE THINGS?!" I screamed as a HUGE clusterfuck of bugs popped out, making these freaky gnawing noises as they skittered around. The Pikmin were apparently thinking the exact same thing I was, because they were scattering everywhere, nattering in their little language about how GODDAMN FREAKY THESE THINGS WERE. I could hear Gin trying to whistle to the Pikmin in order to keep them together as she threw both the purple one she was carrying and a red one that managed to stay still long enough to be thrown. Yet despite her efforts, nobody could keep it together.

The Pikmin she had thrown managed to kill two of them, but that was the only accomplishment due to the fact that the rest of our squad was busy flipping shit to really get it together. The rest of the bugs finally burrowed into the ground, leaving all of us with two corpses and some juice stuff that came from them.

It was a while before I could finally say anything. "What the ever-loving FUCK?! WERE THOSE THINGS BABY HONEYWISPS?!" I asked Gin frantically, who was also coming out of her own daze. Staring at me wide-eyed, she answered, "U-um... Those were mites... I think? Pikmin hate how they smell and... Uh... That."

"THAT DOESN'T ANSWER IF THEY WERE BABY HONEYWISPS OR NOT!"

"I DON'T KNOW MAN, I'M NOT A TOTAL ENCYCLOPEDIA FOR THIS SHIT! ALL I KNOW IS THAT A BUNCH OF GIANT PARASITIC LOOKING BUGS POPPED OUT OF AN EGG AND JUST CRAWLED EVERYWHERE WHILE MAKING CREEPY ASS NOISES!"

After taking a few deep breaths, Gin seemed to try to regain her composure as she took a look at the yellow juice that had been knocked out of the dead mites. "That's what'll power up the Pikmin," she told me, then began to gather the scattered Pikmin with her whistle. After all of them were accounted for, Gin directed the army over to the droplets while I watched to see just what was going to happen. As soon as the Pikmin made contact with the juice, they surrounded the droplets and began to slurp it up, leaving nothing behind... In other words, our Pikmin just drank up bug fluid.

... Ew.

Once they were done, the leaves at the end of their stalks began to shake until the little soldiers sprang into the air with a twirl, flowers now in the place of where the leaves were. Chili, now with a distinct white flower on top of his stalk, ran up to me, squeaking happily as he showed me his cute new flower. It was at that moment that I heard the familiar buzzing from the ship. "The Pikmin that drank the yellow nectar instantly matured into flower Pikmin. It appears to have enhanced motor skills. What a wondrous nectar!" it announced as Chili took up one of the mite corpses and began to quickly carry it away to his Onion, followed by another red flower Pikmin.

"How intriguing... Like plants, Pikmin mature from leaf, to bud, to flower. Captain Olimar! You must share the information you have with your subordinate, Louie!" the ship scolded Gin, who in return flushed pink and shifted uncomfortably. I had to give it to the ship there. While Gin was technically teaching me, she had a problem with being too vague about details. Snapping herself out of her embarrassment, Gin made her way over to the Onion to pluck out the Pikmin that were going to be made. Naturally, I followed her with the mix of our flower Pikmin and few remaining leaf Pikmin that didn't get to the juice quickly enough.

Once Gin had pulled four brand new Pikmin out of the ground and whistled Chili and the other Pikmin to her side, she approached me. "Okay, we have seventy-four Pikmin out here now. There's a cave we need to go to today, but harvesting the berries is also important. I'd go ahead and get as many berries as we can before going into the cave, but what do you want to do?" she asked, which made me think. Going into a new cave right away would be fun and would help with getting out of here faster. But Gin had said that the berries were important in some way. If that's the case, then maybe waiting a little bit before going into a cave would work better for the long run. Finally, I just shrugged as I said my response, "You're the expert here, bud. Up to you."

With a smile, Gin nodded and proceeded back to the berry plants, which now had their berries appearing on them. After she swarmed some of the Pikmin onto one plant, I noticed the ground around the plants begin to shake... At first, I was expecting the stubby worms from yesterday to pop up again... But what appeared instead were two large, yellow grub things. As soon as they surfaced, they began to inch their way to the berry plants themselves with every movement from them resulting in a loud rubbery sound.

Okay, now things were starting to get weirder than usual.

"Gin, what are those things?" I asked as she turned to face the freaky grub-things. Once she got a good look at them, she began to throw Pikmin at like crazy. I... Honestly felt kind of sorry for the things as the Pikmin began their attack. "Those are whiskerpillars... Well, I think that's what they're called. If we don't kill them before they get to the berries, then they'll start to eat them and leave us without any to harvest," she explained while one of the 'whiskerpillars' squirmed around on the ground as the Pikmin successfully killed it. Afterwards, it was taken off to the red Onion... But it still seemed to squirm violently while making the same rubbery sounds as the Pikmin carried it off. I just looked to Gin, wide eyed, "Is that thing still alive or some shit?!"

"I really have no idea, but that's what happens when they get carried. They make that... Really weird sound all the way to the Onion," she replied, watching as the second whiskerpillar was taken down and inevitably carried off in the same fashion as the first one. Yep, I'm definitely going to avoid taking those things back to Onions after killing them. They're too weird sounding for me to listen to.

Plop!

Already, one of the red berries was knocked down and in the process of being taken to the ship by one of the Pikmin left over from fighting the whiskerpillars. Now that I had a better look at it, it really did look like something I could experiment with in my cooking. Yeah, maybe I'll set one aside... They might be poisonous though.

I'm sure we'd be fine if a grub-thing is fine with eating them... Right? Nonetheless, it'll be a learning experience!

After all berries were successfully knocked down, the ship had gotten the first one. What resulted was a buzz in our helmets as it reported, "Astounding! This red berry contains an ultra-spicy essence. It does not appear to have any monetary value, but I shall research potential uses for it. Bring me another specimen."

Ultra-spicy, huh? I could easily come up with something to cook with it, so I'm way ahead of the ship when it comes to finding uses for these. However, I could see Gin giving me a funny look as I thought about the possibilities. She just crossed her arms as she tried to stand tall. "I love spicy food, don't get me wrong, but the berries aren't for cooking with," she told me sternly, which I returned with lightly jabbing my index finger into her chest.

"Admit it, you're curious about just how spicy these things are!" I accused, "If you let me experiment with one of these, we'll both see what the ship means when it says 'ultra-spicy'."

Gin opened her mouth to retort, then stopped herself and began to think. After a few seconds of silent mental debating on her end, she sighed, "Fine. If you can bring a berry by yourself by the end of the day, then it's yours. The berries burst after a while, so you'll have to do it when it's almost the end of the day."

I could just tell that Gin was regretting this development. But hey, I would take a berry even if she said otherwise. We were almost to the point of having to eat those instant noodles that were packed in the kitchen. I don't doubt that they tasted good, but I could imagine us getting sick of them after a while. And having only those to eat would make our time here even worse.

It wasn't long before the ship buzzed in my helmet once again, addressing Gin specifically, "Captain Olimar, my research on the red berries you discovered has yielded a powerful potion!"

As that was said, the ship's support pod flew down to the both of us and dropped a small spray containing a bright red liquid from the bottom of its pod to the ground in front of us. "Behold the ultra-spicy spray! Although untested, I believe it will have spectacular results. Simply spray it on all of your Pikmin for it to take effect," the ship explained as Gin retrieved the small bottle, "When necessary, I can make one spray from ten berries. Press and hold the communications button to contact me if you wish to confirm your berry count."

After putting up the spray in the pack on her suit, Gin turned to me. "Okay... Let's head over to the cave. Our team should be good enough for it, but are you ready?" she asked, which I responded with a thumbs up. With a smile, she returned my gesture and headed to the front of the ship to whistle the stationary Pikmin to the group. "Oh, Tori? Can you take care of the Pikmin in the ground and get the ones by the Onion together?"

"Already on it!"

Approaching the red Onion, I could make out four sprouts that were awaiting to be plucked. So, the grubs made two Pikmin like the freaky bugs apparently did? Nice. Once I had pulled up the Pikmin from underneath the Onion as well as call the ones standing by there, our army now was at seventy-eight. Yep, we were ready for whatever was in the cave.

Bringing my squad over to Gin to group up with the rest of the Pikmin, we all headed past the berry plants and onward to wherever the cave was.

— —

As we went on, I couldn't shake the fact that I was forgetting something... We had gotten the spicy spray, made some of our Pikmin flowers... But for some reason, I felt as if I had forgotten about something that I should be on edge about. Tori could see my unease and decided to ask about it, "Hey, man. You okay? You seem a bit anxious or something."

"I just feel like I forgot something that I should really be remembering right about now," I admitted, which got me a firm pat on the back as Tori reassured me, "It can't be too bad if you forgot about it. Might not be as important as you think, yeah?"

"Yeah, maybe. But it's really eating at me..."

Continuing down, I looked up to the paper bag blocking the right path. Tori was about to throw our purple Pikmin onto the bag when I stopped her. "We don't have enough right now. The cave is on the left," I explained, then motioned over to the left path. Nodding in confirmation, she set the Pikmin down and followed me past the three gigantic yellow daisies...

Wait.

Hold on...

There was something about these flowers that—

Before I could react, Tori and I were forcefully knocked forward as we were ambushed by the so-called 'flower'. As the two of us got up from the ground, we turned to see a giant plant-monster making its way to the Pikmin that were now recovering. "WHAT IN FUCK'S NAME IS THAT?!" Tori demanded as I was failing to find my words to answer her question. Instead, I could only stare in horror as the monster chomped down and proceeded to eat four or five Pikmin at once. The sounds of the Pikmin crying out as they were eaten seemed to snap me out of my daze, because I began to whistle all of the other Pikmin that were knocked aside in an attempt to get them away. This made the creature miss its second lunge and instead smack itself in the face. With a roar, it fell to the ground and begin flailing around as it tried to prop itself up again.

If this were in-game, I'd use this opportunity to attack with my Pikmin. But right now? Right now, I wasn't going to even attempt that. Instead, I managed to shout out a single, universal word that was enough for Tori to understand what to do.

"RUN!"

Now with our army, we retreated away from the monster before it could recover and make a more successful attack. After reaching the end of the path, we all took a hard left and hid ourselves from the plant-monster. I could feel it approaching with the tremors it made, but just when I thought that it would find us, the heavy steps seemed to stop for a few seconds, then fade as the creature seemed to give up the chase and return to its hiding spot. After checking to see if it was still there, Tori slowly turned to stare right at me. "G-Gin... What the absolute FUCK was that?!" she demanded to me once more. Fortunately, I had finally found my voice to properly reply. "It's-it's a creeping chrysanthemum... Th-they hide as flowers to a-ambush prey..." I answered, shivering as Tori took another look to see if the coast really was clear.

After confirming that it wasn't hanging by our hiding place, she plopped herself the ground with a deep sigh, "Holy shit... That had to be one of the scariest things I've ever seen... Gin, it didn't hurt you too bad, right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just really going to feel it later..."

It was silent as the two of us quietly recovered from the near-death experience. After a few minutes passed, Tori got up and dusted herself off. "Okay... Are you good to go to the cave or should we just wrap up early for today?" she asked. I shook my head, "No, I'm fine. Let's get to the cave. After all, we're already here. Might as well get some progress done treasure-wise."

With that, I whistled all the Pikmin around us—seventy-three in total now—and approached the hole that was adjacent to our hiding spot. What resulted was a buzz in my helmet.

"Kzzrt! Bzzzrt! Biological sensors are reacting violently. The readings are ominous. A beast of unknown power lurks in these depths. A large Pikmin group would be reassuring."

Yep, I'm sure seventy-three is more than enough for this voyage.

"My sound sensors are picking up hostile roars of many beasts. Expect dangerous encounters. Sensors are also showing extreme heat pockets. You may need flame-resistant Pikmin... But my records indicate no such data! Are my records incomplete?"

At the mention of heat-resistant Pikmin, Tori gave me a questioning stare. This was simply returned with me pointing to a nearby red Pikmin, then facing the edge of the cave's entrance. I really wasn't looking forward to this, but I didn't really want to have Tori push me in again.

Closing my eyes, I jumped in, though I couldn't really help myself from screaming all the way down.