Starlit Grove

1F

A small layer of fog swayed as Ethan set foot into the room the archway led to, a relatively small and square clearing of trees and vines with what appeared to be exits in front of and to the left of them. Quickly glancing behind him confirmed his suspicions; he could only see Fennekin, not the arch he just came in under, so they were in a mystery dungeon. Arbitrarily choosing a direction, he started walking straight ahead of him.

"If only this dungeon came out during the day," Fennekin yawned. "After a long day of exploring like we had, I was looking forward to hitting the hay." A single laugh came from her. "Hey, that rhymed."

Fennekin's yawn extended to him, as he took a quick second's pause to yawn deeply before continuing on. "Yeah, I didn't realize how late it was. Or maybe we just tired ourselves out today, not sure which. I wouldn't have complained too much about going to sleep, but I'm a little glad we don't have to sleep on the ground again…"

"I don't really mind it, but I got used to it when I was traveling. I'd still rather prefer a bed." A happy, tired sigh came from behind Ethan. "This has been fun, but I can't wait until we get back to Pokéopolis. I want to get a nice, hot bath, then go get some tea and a double chocolate donut at the café before going to our room and falling asleep in a real bed looking at the stars. Doesn't that sound incredible?"

The hallway emptied into a long, narrow room with exits near each of its four corners; they appeared to walk into the bottom right of the room, so Ethan continued on forwards with Fennekin taking a short delay to grab a pecha berry. "Honestly, I feel like I'd just want to go to bed and sleep. Not that all that doesn't sound fun."

Fennekin whispered something under her breath, then started...giggling? He peeked back at her, and sure enough, she was laughing. Well, 'was'; as soon as he looked, she pursed her lips together and tried to stop. Well…'tried'. "What's so funny?" he asked, trying to now hold back laughter of his own.

"It's…" She giggled again, turning as red as the hair in her ears. "Nothing."

"Sounds almost like you said...I don't know, 'boys'? 'Void'? 'Noise'?"

"It was…'boys'," she coughed out. "I was talking with Helioptile and Emolga once, and they were talking about...well, I don't know, whenever they come back from being away for a while they want to relax and indulge in everything a city can offer that the wilderness can't, and their partners never do; they just head straight to bed and get to work the next day. They think it's a boy thing, I don't know."

Ethan coughed out a quick laugh, feeling his own face turn a little warm. "Guess you'll have a story to share with them too when we go back, huh?"

They entered a small room, an exit directly ahead of them and some Poké off to the side. "You just keep going," Fennekin said, "I'll get the money. And yeah, I guess. Would feel weird to just walk up to them and say that, though."

"Well, next time you're with," he dramatically cleared his throat and prepared to raise his voice an octave, "the girls."

"Stop!" she laughed. "It wasn't like that, we were just talking."

The hallway entered back into the long and narrow chamber they had previously come from, this time in the top left, so Ethan kept walking straight to take the one exit not accounted for. "Just teasing you, doesn't make any difference to me." He had to refrain from saying it, but he felt...proud of her? Certainly an odd feeling. Regardless, he was at least happy for her; it had sounded like she didn't really have anyone there for her growing up, and he was glad that was no longer the case.

The hallway they entered quickly had a branch off down the left side, down which a Pokémon was flying; it looked almost like three small, angular ones all connected. A Combee, if he was not mistaken. Upon seeing him it sped up and started charging him at a fast speed, causing him to instinctively brace for impact.

"Whoa!" Fennekin yelled behind him. "That's so cool!"

The Combee flew in close and went for a bite, completely missing him before he let out a Thundershock, sending it back down the hall as quickly as it had approached them. "How did you do that?" Fennekin asked, awe clear in her voice.

"What?" He turned around only to be met with her smiling face. "That was Thundershock, you've seen me use that a million times before."

"Not that," she said with a shake of her head, "what you did before. That looked like Double Team!"

"Double Team?" he echoed. It was in Luxio's list of moves he would learn eventually, he supposed. But how did he know how to do it? He didn't know he was even using a move, let alone Double Team. "I don't remember learning how to use that."

"Moves are weird. Moves that you learn by getting stronger just...happen sometimes. Like I wasn't born knowing to use Ember, I just kept trying and one day it worked. The day I met you, actually."

"Didn't you say you had just woken up a few minutes before you woke me up? So it was in the mystery dungeon you actually managed to learn how to use it?"

"Yeah," she laughed. "Probably good I didn't learn it earlier, honestly; if I could use it against some of the grass and bug types there, I would've made it to Pokéopolis and wouldn't have met you!"

"Well, uh." He cleared his throat, not exactly sure how to say what he was thinking. "Thanks for not being able to make it through the forest, I guess?" An unsure smile grew on Fennekin's face, so he turned down the hallway the Combee had flown down and started walking. "Let's just look for the stairs."

"I know that came out as ruder than you meant it," she laughed. "It's fine. And you're welcome."

The hallway hooked right after a while, continuing on before turning right again and eventually coming to a T. Ethan looked right; was that where he had fought the Combee? The hallway continued straight and only had one branching corridor before opening up into a room, so it seemed so. Well, if he didn't believe that mystery dungeons were random and made no sense, he did now.

Going left, the hallway came to another T; he went right, this time out of spite. The hallway went on a long way, before turning right and quickly exiting into the stairs room. There were no items, but a Tranquill was flying near the stairs while a Butterfree lay resting right next to them.

"We can get to the stairs without waking that Butterfree up," he whispered back to Fennekin, bracing himself and preparing to do whatever it was he had done to use Double Team earlier. He knew he'd be able to replicate it if he knew the move, but had to try and remember what he had done. He had gotten the hang of all his other moves, but now learning to use a new one? That would probably take some time.

Ethan let out a Quick Attack before the Tranquill could get to them, and then used Double Team as it closed in and hit him with a Wing Attack; well, no move was perfect, he supposed. It was close enough for a Thiundershock, and combined with Fennekin's Ember coming soon after, it flew up and over them and fled instead of deciding to attack again. The Butterfree was still thankfully asleep, so the two of them continued onto the stairs.

Starlit Grove

3F

The room Ethan and Fennekin entered was small, a quickly-looted pile of Poké the only feature besides the four exits, one on each wall. He chose the exit on the right wall at random, then doubled back after seeing that it lead to a dead end room.

"What do you think is in the Grove that's so valuable?" Fennekin asked as they walked across the room to the left hallway. "Most treasures you read about aren't just Poké, they're something else."

"Haven't really thought about it," he responded as he walked into the hallway, quickly turning right with it.

"What do you mean you haven't thought about it?" The way she said it, you'd think he just said he didn't think the sun was real. "You haven't thought at all what's in here?"

"Well, treasure and a map, right?"

"Tre—" She cut herself off, almost as if she didn't even know how to respond. "Well yeah, but what kind of treasure? Gems? Artifacts? Knowledge? Something else? Come on, you had to think of it a little bit!"

"I don't know, I just thought of it kinda as an abstract, 'there will be treasure' sort of thing. What did you think it could be, if you've spent so much time pondering it?"

"Well…" Her voice trailed off, as she did when she was embarrassed to admit whatever she had been thinking. "I don't know, I was thinking since Espeon said it was a place of healing, maybe there are some really rare berries there. Some explorers pay a lot of money for very strong berries, some Pokémon will buy them for their taste, and apparently a few are just collectors and want to own rare ones just to say they own them. Vibrava was once telling us a story about finding a small Apicot Berry tree, and she sold them to some collector for over a thousand Poké each! Those aren't healing berries, but there might still be some rare ones at the end of this dungeon."

He had to admit, that did make a lot of sense. He briefly wondered why Fennekin sounded embarrassed, before just shrugging it off. For some odd reason, she always sounded that way when giving input or her thoughts. Nervousness about being wrong or something like that, he suspected.

The hallway ended in yet another dead end, sleeping Pidove in the corner, causing him to frustratedly turn around and go back to the initial room. At least they were only short detours to the dead end rooms, right? Only two more ways out to pick from; one on their left and one on their right, so he chose the left. An L bend sent them left not long after going down it, eventually opening up into a larger, long room with an exit at the end.

There was what looked like a small glass bottle in one of the far corners, to the right of the exit, so Ethan started walking towards it, keeping an eye out for any Pokémon that may appear. None seemed to, and whe—

Before he knew it, the ground slipped out from beneath him; he was flying! Only briefly, however, for just as he processed the fact it ended abruptly with the impact of his body against a tree trunk at the edge of the room.

"Are you okay?" Fennekin cried out, rushing up to him and helping him put his head up.

"Yeah," he moaned. "Hurts, though. What happened?"

"Must've been a trap," she thought aloud. "Some mystery dungeons seem to manifest traps in them; nobody knows who built them, and they only work once, but we'll need to be careful."

"Great." He stood up, Fennekin instinctively putting out a paw to catch him should he fall. He must've impacted the tree at his shoulder blade, since that was where it hurt the most, but nothing seemed broken. Not fun, but not serious, at least.

"Here," Fennekin said after taking a few steps around him to grab the glass bottle nearby. "I don't know how long this dungeon is, so we'll want to make sure we keep this handy."

"Ether," he read from the label. "Ether for Ethan, huh?"

"It's an adventuring item," she giggled. "It restores some of your PP, your energy, for a single attack. Resting outside a dungeon will bring it back normally, but this is helpful for long dungeons or if we learn any really powerful moves that exhaust us quickly."

"Good to know." He opened their bag and placed it in, slightly shuffling some of the other items around to avoid the glass breaking and spilling everywhere. Broken glass plus a wasted item, both things he wanted to avoid if possible.

Ethan walked to the exit of the room, carefully watching his feet the entire time to avoid any additional traps, then relaxed slightly in the hallway once being informed that traps inexplicably only formed in large rooms. Just what were mystery dungeons, and why did they seem to have such odd rules?

Eventually the hallway emptied into a small room: another dead end, but this time the stairs were on the far wall! A Pidove was on their right and a Budew the left; after briefly making eye contact with Fennekin through just the corners of their eyes, he started going towards the Pidove and her the Budew. He was a little proud of their wordless coordination, if he was being honest.

A Quick Attack as he was closing in on the Pidove let him soften it up, and it had the same idea. It didn't seem to deal a lot of damage, so he didn't worry; strangely enough, after it landed its attack on him, it seemed to start flying slower and more erratically, like when he would paralyze Pokémon. No time to stop and think about that, though, as he moved in closer and landed a Thundershock on it, causing it to turn and shakily fly away.

"All done!" he heard Fennekin say from behind him, causing him to turn around and see her standing over a fainted Budew on the ground. "Let's go."

He quickly threw his hands up as she started stepping. "One question. Can Quick Attack paralyze a Pokémon?"

"No, why?"

"The Pidove got paralyzed, but I didn't use any moves to paralyze it. We were just trading Quick Attacks."

"Trading Quick Attacks?" she repeated. "So it was using it on you, as well?"

"Yeah, why?"

"And it hit you with it?"

"Uh-huh."

"Static." The two just stared at each other for a few quick moments. "You know, your ability?"

His ears and tail perked up. "Oh, right! We…were supposed to study those, weren't we?"

Ethan could swear he saw Fennekin roll her eyes slightly as she sighed. "All Pokémon have abilities, which are innate things to them. Your ability is Static, meaning Pokémon that attack you sometimes get paralyzed. Mine is Blaze, which makes my fire moves stronger when I'm hurt."

"Thanks. Where would I be without you?"

A devious smile grew on Fennekin's face. "Wondering why that Pidove got paralyzed."

Starlit Grove

5F

"How do you think everyone else is doing for the competition?" Ethan wondered aloud as he surveyed the area, a small rectangular room with exits on opposite walls, both ahead of and behind them. There was a pecha berry right next to his feet, which he bent down and picked up as Fennekin came up behind him.

"No clue. We kinda headed out pretty quickly, I didn't really hear much else of what everybody was planning."

As he was already facing the direction, Ethan decided to go straight ahead down the narrow hallway. "I bet Emolga, Aipom, and Yamper are doing pretty well. They're all really good at doing these kinds of explorations."

A single uneasy laugh came from her. "Yeah. I'm kinda glad we're being judged on what we find, to be honest. I feel like it gives us a way better chance, since we came so far for this."

"Fennekin…"

"I believe in us!" she protested. "I'm agreeing with you, sort of. I know it sounds bad, but I'm really kind of hoping everyone else gets unlucky. I hope they still find some things, of course, but I think if we get a bit lucky here and everyone else doesn't really find much, we could win this."

"No, I get what you mean. You want them to do well, just not as well as us."

"Yeah. They're still our friends, after all. It's a friendly competition!"

The hallway banked to the left before quickly opening up into a larger rectangular room, this time two exits on the right and one dead ahead of them on the far wall. A Tranquill was sleeping in the far left corner, not far from the single exit; they could probably make it around it without waking it up and having to fight, but with nothing else in the room to use as a guide, he went right out of safety. He had no way of knowing what moves that Tranquill knew, or what could happen if they fought it.

The hallway he chose, the closer one, went straight as an arrow for quite a ways before turning left. After a short walk, it went left again, back towards the initial room. After a few steps a small Pokémon — a Paras, if he was correct — began walking up to him, and he could swear he heard movement behind them, as well.

"There's a Tranquill coming!" Fennekin yelled as he heard her ears begin crackling with the telltale sounds preceding Ember. "Switch with me, we'll do better that way!"

Without even a word of confirmation, Ethan quickly pivoted on one foot and turned, Fennekin swinging her three other legs around the opposite way as to not hit him; the ability they had to already understand what the other was going to do stunned him.

Ethan's admiration of their unspoken understanding quickly left his thoughts as a Quick Attack landed straight in his face, nearly sending him staggering back into Fennekin. He heard flames from behind him and the frightened cry most Pokémon made when hit with a super-effective move; Paras were doubly weak to fire moves, if he wasn't mistaken, so he figured she was handling it about as well as it sounded. His Tranquill was too far away to use Thundershock, so he settled for a Quick Attack of his own and prepared himself to cast Thundershock when the time came; the Tranquill, however, hit him with another Quick Attack.

"Get closer!" Fennekin ordered from behind him. "It's going to try and stay far away from you, you have to get close to it!"

A quick nod of his head, then Ethan moved up; instead of Quick Attack, however, the Tranquill lunged at him, burying its beak into his side. It was a flying move, based on the fact it didn't hurt as much as he thought it did, but it…started rummaging in his bag?

Before he even knew what was happening, he saw a bright blue oran berry in the other Pokémon's mouth before it chomped down and ate it. That was one of theirs! He felt insulted; why was he insulted? It certainly wasn't purposeful.

He was close, now, allowing a Thundershock to hit it square on; that, combined with Fennekin's Ember hitting true a split second later, caused it to fly away, tiny bits of oran berry littering the ground as it did so.

"It ate one of our oran berries!" he exclaimed, much more frustratedly than he anticipated. "What kind of move even is that?"

"Pluck," she answered without missing but a beat. "Hurts you, and gives them an opening to reach into our bag and grab something to eat. We're lucky it only ate one of our berries, honestly; Vibrava told me a story once of a Pokémon doing that to her and eating a blast seed, causing her to faint right after! Losing an oran berry isn't really great, but it's better than what it could have been."

"I suppose." He turned back around, and sure enough, no Paras to be found. "Double weakness?"

"Yeah," she giggled. "That's why I said to switch. One Ember did it, it didn't even get an attack in on me."

"Looks safe now," he said after quickly looking both ahead and behind him. "Hopefully we didn't make too much noise that we woke up that other Tranquill."

"We should be fine." She hugged the wall to try and switch places with Ethan again, though he had the same idea; it was amusing, he had to admit, that they were better at changing places with each other in the middle of a fight than they were outside of one.

The short trip back to the large room they had come from thankfully was uneventful, with the Tranquill still sleeping beside the exit they intended to take. Watching his step, both metaphorically and physically so he didn't step on any twigs or lose his feet, he slowly walked over and into to the hallway, stopping once inside to make sure Fennekin was there. She was: more importantly, Tranquill was not.

A short walk later, they emerged into a small room, exit to the right of them; the stairs, however, were smack dab in the middle, so he beelined for them and walked up.