Pannen, Elijah, Leah, and Ishmael walked side-by-side, going down the road together. Pannen took the lead, still maintaining determination to move forward. The others trailed behind her, Elijah at the back.

It was early in the morning. They have been traveling for so long that they had to setup camp to sleep the night away along the road. The lands were safe near the guildhouse as no criminal dared do their activities so close within the guild's vicinity. Leah reminded them of such, but that also meant that things would get more dangerous the further out they went.

None of the four had a particularly strong nose they could use to track Aika with, but Pannen still felt confident that this was the way Aika was going. They were on the right track, now it was just a matter of catching up with her.

"Aika got a headstart on us of about ten hours, possibly more," Pannen thought aloud. "If she had stood still, we would've gotten to her by now. But she's moving as well… It'll be hard catching up with her."

"Is it even possible for us to catch up?" Elijah asked.

"There are many possible things that could slow her down, if we speak realistically," Leah said. "She should be aiming for Evelyn Forest. In that case, she'll either stop there or spend time scouring the area instead of going directly forward, so we can catch up then."

"Well, that's good," Elijah said.

"Besides. The longer the journey, the more renown we'll get once it's complete," Leah said. "If it's just a short one-day excursion, then that isn't too remarkable at all."

"We're after my sister, Leah. I want that to be done as soon as possible," Pannen responded.

"Well, maybe that's what you're after, but I have my own goals," Leah smiled to herself.

"What do you mean?"

"I don't outright hate Aika, and I most certainly don't wish her to die, but for me this is more than just helping get back a friend of a friend. I'm in this for the prestige," Leah said, spreading her arms out. "Don't forget that I've become a registered member of Nidoking's guild. Once we get Aika back, I'll be remembered as the guild member who stepped up to get that done. That'll show me as capable, and that will just be one more step towards me rising up the ranks and becoming the guildmaster."

"Seriously?" Pannen said. "THAT'S what you're focused on?"

"Well, we've already embarked, I might as well say it now instead of keeping my motivations a secret for the whole journey," Leah shrugged. "You'll need me along anyways, I've got much more experience and insight than you do."

Pannen was annoyed at that, she wished Leah could just do the right thing because it was right. Yet, what she said was true: Pannen couldn't just dump her off the side of the road.

"I'm in this more for the adventure," Ishmael admitted. "I've never gotten to go on a long adventure before, I wanna do what my parents do."

"We're after Aika," Pannen reminded.

"I do hope we get her back, but I'm wanting to have fun," Ishmael said.

Pannen softly signed to herself. It was then that she turned to Elijah. "How about you, Little Eli? Why are you coming along?"

"Well…"

That question wasn't an easy one for Elijah to answer. The truth was that he didn't want to come, he wanted to stay home doing the same sort of things he usually did. His legs were getting tired from all the walking, and he was missing home already. He only came along because of how Pannen pushed him to do so. "...Same reason you are," he said.

"Alright," Pannen put her head forward again. "It shouldn't be too much longer until we reach our first town. Let's keep pushing forward, and we can take another break there."

"I had the same thing in mind," Leah said.

"I'm going to play my flute in the meantime, if people don't mind," the mienfoo said as he pulled his flute out from his bag.

Elijah remained quiet.

Rounding another hill, they came upon the town of Kiritown. None of them had been there before, so seeing it was a nice sight for them. Pannen gestured to Ishmael for him to put his flute away.

They continued to look around at the buildings- all new to them- as they walked in.

"What's this place called again?" Ishmael asked.

"It's Kiritown. Not a large town, but it's a landmark to be sure," Leah answered.

"Does anyone see a bench? I could really sit down now," Elijah complained.

"We need to search this place," Pannen said. "I'm sure she's been here before, let's ask around for if they've seen a minccino pass through."

Pannen continued to advance forth, prompting the other three to follow. The time for walking at a brisk pace had passed, she needed to find where her sister was.

They came towards the town's center, approaching the two statues. As they did, they noticed a large gathering of people surrounding one of the nearby buildings. Even though the town was foreign to them, they could still tell that something off was going on. Pannen approached the tavern, once more making the other three obliged to follow.

While there was a crowd to weave between, Pannen was still able to peek inside the building. Inside, massive tables were pushed aside as a collapsed totem pole split the room in half. The odd few sat at their tables and drank their booze as if nothing was amiss, but the rest were fixated on the fallen object while discussing what to do.

Yet when Pannen entered, eyes seemed to quickly turn towards her. First in surprise, then in a look of more general confusion once they realized this was a different minccino. Pannen felt the eyes on her. "Umm, hello? Could I just ask something?"

Their eyes were already on her. "What is it?"

"Have any of you seen another female minccino pass by this town? She's my sister and I'm looking for her."

The group went back to being surprised. "You mean the one that led to this totem pole collapsing?!" one asked.

"Wait, what?" Pannen asked.

"Last night, a minccino came to this tavern to spend a night here. And this morning, she knocked down our treasured totem pole of Ichiro n' Kiri before booking it out of this town!" a rough sceptile pokemon yelled.

"A drunken pokemon from this town got aggressive towards her and attacked her. She ran up the pole to avoid him, so he grabbed the pole to shake her off, and he broke it in the process," a morgrem corrected, speaking in a much fairer tone "The drunk has sobered up and he's in a jail right now. But we'd really like to find the minccino again, she shouldn't have been climbing up that in the first place and that did lead to it being broken."

"Oh, I am so sorry, I promise she didn't mean to do that," Pannen said apologetically.

"She's unfortunately got a history of causing trouble. The fact that she's not home right now is proof enough of that," Leah added on.

"Is there anything we can do to make up for what she did? Please, I don't want her to be remembered for this, I'll fix it on her behalf."

The morgrem looked curious. Even from a distance he was still looking down on the four, but he clearly wanted to humor Pannen. He stepped closer.

"The damage to the upper parts of the totem pole is rather negligible. It hit the tavern tables and that broke its fall, and the wood of the pole was much stronger than the tables so it didn't chip when it hit those," the morgrem explained while pointing to parts of it, his body facing the four while his head looked back. "Problem is the base. It's crudely broken off and splintered, there's no way we can re-attach it to the original base without it sticking out."

"So does that mean you could fix it with a new base?" Pannen asked.

"Smooth out the bottom to remove the splintered part, place them on-top of each other, get a metal ring to hide the seam where the two pieces of wood connect… yeah, we could do that," he continued explaining. "Problem is getting the right kind of wood. As I mentioned, this isn't made of the same stuff our tables are made out of. This wood is far stronger, just short of stone. And it's a lot rarer, you see. Some here go as far as to call it 'sacred', but I'm not getting to that myself."

"If there's a way we can get more?"

"You're really set on this?" the morgrem asked.

"Absolutely," Pannen said.

"Yeah!" Ishmael backed up.

"This could be a serious time waste. We should think this through," Leah said.

"Are they with you?" the morgrem asked Pannen.

"This is my brother, and these two are my friends," she explained, pointing to Elijah and then Leah and Ishmael.

"And you're really set on fixing what your sister caused?"

"If I can clear my sister's name, then yes," Pannen placed her paw over her chest, showing a resolute expression.

The morgrem's eyes widened in interest, intrigued by Pannen's strong determination. "Well then…"

They were all brought to the edge of the town, on the other side of a strong fence. They were given extra bags of tools and supplies. Ahead of them was an entrance to a forest, but looking down it was completely surreal and uncanny. In places where they should've been able to see the sky through the branches and leaves, they saw a green blurriness. The light seemed to be swallowed quickly down the unusual path, then remained constant without fading further. Pannen, Elijah, Leah, and Ishmael all stared down the path to try and make sense of it as the morgrem stayed next to them. Other residents of the town watched from behind the fence.

"The totem pole was made out of a surdwood tree, a tree which only grows within the depths of a mystery dungeon. Like this one right here," the morgrem explained to them. "I've got you some saws in those bags, sharpest in the town. If you find one and bring it back, then all will be forgiven."

"How will we know which tree is a surdwood tree?" Leah asked.

"The bark looks way more orange than all the other wood there, and the leaves are square."

"That sounds very unnatural," Pannen said.

"That's mystery dungeons for you. Trust me, I've seen stranger things in the few times I've been shown them," Leah said.

"How far deep in are we talking?" Pannen asked the morgrem.

"Well…" he needed a moment to think of a form of measurement that could be used in a place which wasn't linearly laid out. "Thirty minutes?"

"That short?" Ishmael sounded disappointed.

"Very well then," Pannen checked her own bag again, and the bag she was given. She picked up her canteen and gave it a small shake, feeling that it still had a good amount of water within it. "Let's do this."

"Wait," Elijah said.

"What is it?" Pannen asked him.

Elijah felt like everything was going so fast. He'd never been in a mystery dungeon before, now he was suddenly being asked to go into one to get a tree for a town he'd never known. And right beside him were his friends and family completely going along with it. Elijah already didn't want to embark on this journey in the first place, he most certainly didn't want to delve into a mystery dungeon. Not this young.

"I don't want to go in," he said.

"Eli, it's fine. Everything is okay," Pannen said.

"No, it's-"

"It's okay, Eli. We'll just go in, get this tree real quick, get back out, and then continue our journey. It won't take long at all, it's okay."

"Well…" he was still nervous. "Okay."

At the end, Elijah found himself more nervous to refuse Pannen than he was to go into the dungeon.

Pannen nodded, and moved forward. The other three followed. The morgrem stayed by the fence, watching from a safe distance.

There was no threshold, no singular point where reality felt like it had shifted. Instead, the change was gradual with every step they took. The atmosphere was subtly different; subtly wrong. Pannen still walked forward with determination, but felt herself slow down. It wasn't just a walk across clean roads anymore.

"Hmm. Maybe we should've packed some flares with us. I didn't anticipate on us going into\mystery dungeons, especially this early on," Leah thought out loud.

"Leah, you've been to mystery dungeons before, right?" Pannen asked, keeping her volume lower.

"A few times, not in ones that were particularly dangerous," the espurr answered. "The guild is still cautious about sending me on more dangerous missions because I'm young. That should change once I get back from this journey," she smiled.

"What do you think of this dungeon?" Pannen asked.

Leah took another glance around the area as they continued walking forward. "Shouldn't be anything seriously difficult. If we keep our wits we should be fine."

"Really? How can you tell?" Pannen asked.

"Well, applying logic: this town wouldn't continue to exist if it was literally right beside a deadly mystery dungeon," Leah said.

"Well… that makes sense," the minccino conceded.

"Where's the action?" Ishmael asked.

"That will come to us, don't look for it please," Pannen said in a half-scolding tone.

They continued walking down the straight path. The light level still remained impossibly constant, but other features of the dungeon became more evident: offshooting paths and unusual flora. Most concerning of all was the sounds which they heard: skittering, growling, and other sounds which weren't so easily identifiable.

Eventually, the clean path they were following came to an end, forcing them to stop. The tree was still nowhere to be seen.

"Well heck. Looks like we gotta take an offshoot path then," Pannen said. "Probably should've expected that, people don't choose where trees grow, they grow in random places."

"Well, people do choose where trees to grow sometimes. That's called a garden," Leah responded. "It's not uncommon for people to choose where to grow decorative trees."

"We aren't in a garden, Leah," Pannen said.

"I know, but you're still incorrect in saying that people don't choose where trees grow," Leah said. "The implication of your statement was that people never choose where trees grow, not just that people don't know where they grow within the bounds of mystery dungeons."

"Okay, I get it," Pannen was annoyed. "But we do need to be searching other corners, come."

The four turned around from the dead end to begin backtracking. Shortly thereafter, trouble revealed itself. Three bidoof came from the sides and stood in front of them, blocking the way back. Their eyes looked downright delirious and savage, and their mouths formed into intimidating expressions that seemed to stretch what their muscles were capable of forming. The four stepped backwards.

"I was wondering when they'd finally show," Leah said.

"Those are dungeon pokemon, right?" Pannen asked.

"Well they ain't…" Leah began a sarcastic response, but stopped short as she couldn't figure out a proper way to finish that sentence.

"A-are they going to hurt us?" Elijah asked.

"Not if we're careful. We just need to stick together and-"

Ishmael the mienfoo sprinted forward at full speed towards the bidoof, swinging his arm forward to deck the bidoof with all the strength he had. The pokemon was launched across the room, prompting the other two to attack Ishmael.

"Oh shoot- quick help him!" Pannen said.

Pannen, Leah, and Elijah rushed forward to join Ishmael. By the time they were ready to intervene, Ishmael had knocked out another bidoof by slamming it onto the ground, and he was about to punch out the last bidoof before Leah took care of it with a psychic attack.

Once the skirmish was done, they all looked at Ishmael to see if he was alright. He had a few scratches and bite marks on him from the bidoof, but he still gave a good smile. He was proud of what he'd just done.

"Good job, there," Pannen said.

"Thanks!" the mienfoo replied.

"There will be more to come. Let's keep moving. And try not to get lost, of course."

Taking an offshoot back, they continued exploring around. Witnessing Ishmael's strength was reassuring, but that didn't mean the dungeon was without fear or peril. More wild pokemon pounced on them, like rattata, ledian, more bidoof, and others.

Every couple of minutes, they had to stop to look at a slightly unusual tree and discuss if that was the type of tree they were looking for. This repeated for essentially every tree that has a slightly more orange tint or had slightly different leaves. They figured out they could knock on the wood to feel if it was any stronger than the others. Every time they had to move on.

For Pannen, it was an important obstacle they needed to overcome to find Aika again. For Leah, it was just another mission like she had done before. For Ishmael, it was a wonderful adventure. But for Elijah, it was a nightmare. His fur was standing up, his head was darting around to search all around, and his heart was filled with worry. The fear he had when he faced the first three bidoof was immense, and it had only amplified further. He resisted completely losing it and trying to run away, perhaps only because his sister, his friend, and his ally were right beside him.

Thankfully for them, Pannen was able to keep her bearings straight and guide them around the winding, branching pathways of the forest and keep them from getting lost. With her pathfinding, they were finally able to reach a clearing which made them stop.

Close to the center of the clearing was a tree, unlike what they had seen before. Within the brown bark were streaks of an unusual orange, making it look fake like some cardboard prop. The tree was slightly less than a meter in length and didn't quite extend to the forest's roof. It was separate from the other trees, not contributing to the forest's dense walls. But was most clear of all were the leaves: square and rectangular. A few leaves appeared like pentagons, but not a single one looked like how a leaf would normally appear.

"That's it, that's absolutely it," Pannen said.

"Oh thank goodness," Elijah let out a relieving sigh.

"So does this mean we won?" Ishmael asked.

"Once we get this back, then yes," Pannen said.

The four all approached the tree, some more cautiously than others. Nothing happened as they reached it. Leah extended her paw to grab a lower stick from the tree to break off. She had to exert more strength than she anticipated to get it to snap off. Afterwards, she felt and held it. "This wood is strong, but it's surprisingly light," Leah said. "I wonder if this was the stuff they'd make weapons out of."

"Good that it's light, since we will have to be carrying this out, unfortunately," Pannen placed down the bag the town had given her to pull out a saw from it. "Ishmael, you're the strong one among us. Could you cut the tree down for us?"

"Of course!" he happily agreed.

"Hang on one moment. Those saws look like they're designed for two people to manage. They've got a handle on both ends," Leah pointed at the tool.

"Oh, you're right… I'll help you out then, Ishmael."

They both grabbed different ends of the saw and put it onto the tree. Ishmael pushed forward, then Pannen pushed forward, then Ishmael again, then Pannen again, and so forth. Always pushing sideways on the saw, they gradually made their way through the tree's bark and then through its living wood.

Elijah and Leah watched them work at it. Elijah was younger and Leah was just a psychic type, so neither of them possessed the strength to really help them out. But as they watched, they began hearing sounds from around them, and they turned around.

More wild pokemon slowly walked into the clearing, still possessing the same savage expressions. Their eyes wandered, it was difficult to tell who exactly they were focusing on.

"Shoot," Leah took on a battle stance. "Come on, we'll have to fight them while they cut the tree down," she said to Elijah.

"But I-"

"You don't have much of a choice right now, Eli," Pannen said as she continued working with the saw, hastening how fast she cut. "Use your tail to fight like I do! You can do this!"

Elijah was still reluctant, but the dungeon pokemon didn't care. They began moving forward again to close the distance. Leah uncurled her ears and began using psychic attacks to fend them off. Elijah was still reluctant to act, but it came at a time when every second matters.

"Eli!" Pannen shouted again.

That finally forced him into motion. He rushed to join Leah, striking a bellsprout as hard as he could. It wasn't enough to down it in a single hit, it didn't do much at all. The bellsprout continued fighting, and Elijah needed to strike at it several more times.

As the minccino managed to finally down it, he felt a sharp pain come to the back of his left shoulder. A rattata had bitten him. He flailed backwards to try to get it off, but it was Leah using another psychic move which actually got it off.

There actually wasn't that many dungeon pokemon at all there. But not having Ishmael and Pannen to help them made everything all that much worse. Elijah wasn't able to do much himself, so Leah was essentially having to take care of it all herself. She had skill and power to pick them off one-by-one, but each one left her feeling a bit more mentally exhausted. The fight continued until:

"ELI!" Pannen screamed loudly.

"W-what?" He asked.

"GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

The tree fell down, falling in the direction of Elijah. He narrowly dodged away in time as the wood fell on top of the last dungeon pokemon in the clearing, instantly knocking it out. Elijah sat on the ground as he breathed heavily, shaken by how close of a call that was. Leah had a headache which was not helped by the tree hitting the ground, and Pannen panted from how much quickly cutting the tree had tired her.

"Alright… let's take five and then lift this tree out of here together," Pannen said.

Being young, lifting the tree out was no easy feat. They had to saw off some additional branches to further lower its weight and allow it to be taken around more narrow parts of the dungeon. Leah used telekinesis to help lift the tree and take weight off of it, but that made it so the group needed to take frequent breaks to let Leah's mind rest.

Getting the tree out took longer than it took to find it. But eventually, Pannen navigated them back to the entrance. They saw the same morgrem waiting for them, who was killing time leaning on the fence, and then became surprised when he noticed the four approaching the tree. He ran towards them to put his own arms on the tree to help carry it the final stretch, easing the weight on them.

They got out of the dungeon completely, finally under the natural sky again. They laid the log down and then all sat down, finally resting.

"Well, I'll be, you really did get that done! You're certainly dedicated to fixing that problem your sister caused. Inadvertently, at least," the morgrem said.

"It's… no problem," Pannen said, still tired.

"I really can't understate how important this type of tree is to me- to all of us. I am really thankful you did this by yourselves," the morgrem said, continuing to inspect the wood. "Truly, thank you."

Leah raised an eyebrow at that. "Hang on, back at the tavern you said you didn't see this type of tree as sacred. Why do you have such a love for it all of a sudden?"

"Well, just because I don't buy into the mysticism doesn't mean I can't appreciate tradition," he said with a smile.

Leah found that sentiment odd, but didn't find it right to argue with it.

"Why is this 'surdwood' so important to this town, anyways?" Pannen asked.

"The legends say that Ichiro and Kiri used this exact kind of wood, venturing into mystery dungeons to collect it so they could make weapons and fortifications in it in their major battles, and that Kiri always wore a talisman made out of surdwood. They say the two of them fought off hundreds together with no one else helping," the mogrem smiled as he recounted. "The exact numbers are probably exaggerated."

"I see. Sounds like they were some pretty epic pokemon!" Pannen said. "We're heroes too. So were our parents! Although we're probably not going to be fighting off an army anytime soon."

"That's nice to hear. Say, I don't think we ever properly introduced ourselves to each other," he said. "You can call me Tobias. Who are you four?"

"Call me Pannen."

"Call me Eli."

"Call me Leah."

"My name is Ishmael."

"Great names for you all. We'll get the totem pole remade with this, and you can stay the night here. Afterwards, you should carry on with your journey, your sister can't be too far from here."

Pannen and the others nodded their heads, then turned their heads to the north-east again. Their little side-mission was now over, now they had to return to the quest of getting Aika back.

End of chapter 7