Chapter 5: Learning by burning

The trek through the arid landscape had lasted for almost two hours, though Slate's lack of mobility was mostly to blame for it taking so long. The others just hadn't kept that in mind when they said it was a one hour trip. Finally, a hut next to a ravine came into view, where Dart had stopped and waited. When the two slower teammates caught up, they all headed towards the edge.

"What the hell is that?" Slate exclaimed as he backed away from the edge. Of all the things he had expected to see, a wall of fog was not what he expected. An unnaturally thick veil, just a few meters down, made it impossible to see just how deep the ravine was.

"That is the entrance to a mystery dungeon." was Latenna's answer. "A space where the laws of reality have become distorted."

"Wha…" was all that Slate managed to say to that. Thought Latenna had took his dumbfounded look as her cue to explain further.

"It's bigger on the inside, and the layout changes. Time flows differently. Fake lifeforms roam around, and even death might not work inside."

"And we're going in there?" Slate finally managed to say "This can't possibly be safe."

"This is probably the wimpiest dungeon in Oldega." Dart responded "The Husks are weak, the time flow is barely different, and you can't die in there."

Once again, Latenna stepped in to clarify. "Husks are the lifeforms found inside. They look like regular Pokemon, but their eyes have no life in them. They will, with very few exceptions, attack on sight. As for the Distorted Death, it means dying in there will drop you unconscious by the entrance."

"It's the part about going berry picking where creatures attack sounds insane to me." Slate said, really not warming up to the idea of entering that thing.

"Come on. It's fun. I promise." Dart pleaded to his hesitating teammate.

"There is even a cabin here for explorers who get stuck here late. Every safety net one could possibly need is in place here." Latenna argued.

Slate looked a the cabin in question. I was a round clay hut, with a door and chimney. A small amount of smoke hinted at it being used recently. There was one part of him convinced that this was a normal thing in this world. However, the more dominant part still though entering a rift in reality to pick berries was ludicrous. And as it would seem, his face betrayed his thoughts on the matter.

"We're really not going to convince you, are we?" Latenna sighed, nodding at Dart. The houndour responded in kind.

Slate didn't even get a response ready, before Latenna shot a tiny rock out of her foreleg. It landed right under the poor trapinch, causing a cluster of large rocks to burst out of the earth. The attack didn't hurt nearly as much as something of that size should, but it did knock him airborne towards the edge. Arena Trap clearly didn't have time to activate as the screaming Slate's teammates dashed towards the edge to tackle him over the edge alongside themselves.

As the team fell through the veil, Slates vision was immediately covered completely in fog. He didn't know how for he fell, nor exactly when he stopped. He simply blinked, and suddenly he was standing on the bottom of the ravine. Except things didn't look quite the same. Now the ravine was a lot longer than before, splitting into different paths further down. The whole place was shaded from the sun, causing a comfortable temperature. And above them was a blue sky, showing no signs of the fog veil. The patches the sun reached, was covered in green plants and vines, and a small steam flowed through. Judging from the harsh landscape around it, nobody would expect to find such a lush place.

This train of thoughts was quickly when he saw the two backstabbers approach him from behind. As decently sized rock flew towards him, his vision went red. A power surged towards his jaw, causing him to shatter it with his mouth. The surge felt… off somehow. Like it was driven by a genuine will to cause harm. But right now Slate was too angry to really care.

"This is getting really old." He spat coldly towards the other, once again feeling Arena Trap come into effect.

"Yes, it is!" The usually calm Latenna snapped back, causing even Dart to flinch. "But if I need to anger you to make some progress, I will beat you up as many times as it takes."

This remark surprised Slate, and the malicious weakened with his anger.

"This little stunt made you enter the dungeon you feared, and caused you to use an actual aura-infused attack on reaction." Latenna stated before her voice softened. "I am sorry. About the attacks, and everything you are going through. But as long as anger is the only thing that pushes through your doubt, I won't apologize."

"Please. You're fighting your own body. Work with it." Dart added, not being able to keep a strict tone like his partner could. Slate had to concede to their points, but still hadn't quite forgiven the second surprise attack.

"Fine. I'll play along. What even happened there when I crushed that rock. I felt this chilling energy flow through me. Almost felt malicious." Slate asked.

"You enhanced your bite with dark aura. It's one of the simplest dark-moves." Latenna answered. "I've heard a lot first-timers describing that feeling when using dark aura. Some people used to call the element evil back in the day."

"Didn't you say I was ground-element? Why do I suddenly have dark powers?"

"Yes, but just about everyone can use other elements than their natural ones. I carry a ground move, despite being rock and steel. While Dart, who is Fire/Dark, can use poison. They won't be as powerful as our natural ones though." Latenna clarified.

Slate looked over towards Dart fiddling with his googles. He immediately smiled and wagged his tail when they locked eyes. How someone that friendly could be of the dark element was beyond him, when just a short surge readied him to attack his teammates.

"Anyhow. If you could replicate the channeling, try throwing sand at that rock while doing it." Latenna ordered. Slate knew better than protesting at this point, and tried doing as she said. With his stubby legs, the only thing he could use was his head. So he dug his jaw into the ground, and jerked it up. To his surprise, a large cloud of sand shot up, covering the area for several seconds.

"Nice, you got Sand-Attack down." Dart cheered. "That and Bite is probably enough to handle anything you meet in this dungeon."

"To clarify, Sand-Attack won't harm anything, but could give you a vital opening. Dart is fast, and can fight at range. I am durable enough to trade hits and be fine. Meanwhile, you're gonna need to find a way to get close to opponents without those advantages. Sand-Attack could give you such an opening if used wisely."

"Remind me why we have to fight over fruit again…" Slate sighed, still not sold on the entire dungeon idea.

Latenna was not pleased by Slate's lack of passion, but luckily Dart was willing to give another explanation as they walked. Though the fruits and berries could be found outside, the ones from the dungeon gained special properties from the distortion. First of all, dungeon-fruit just about never spoiled. Second, the different kinds gained properties just as magical as everything else in this world.

"OK, so these blue Oran's magically heals your wounds?" Slate asked.

"Yup! And the apples fills you up for way longer than normal ones. And Pechas cures poison." Dart responded.

"Damn, these things actually be worth risky picking."

"Actually, they are some of most common loot you canSTOP!"

Slate stopped immediately, and once he focused ahead, he saw a giant spiderweb right in front of him. As he back-stepped, he saw a green spider half his size descend where he just stood. Dart's mouth started flaring up, just to find Latenna holding a foreleg in front of him.

"Wait, let him handle this one." She said coldly.

Slate gave a quick glance towards his teammates with a betrayed look.

"The Spinarak here are weak. Even a complete beginner should be able to handle a single one." Latenna explained, pretending like she wasn't ready to step in.

"Guess it's do or die then…" Slate mumbled for himself, before launching a Sand-Attack against the Spinarak. The blinded spider, had unfortunately already lined up it's shot though, and managed to shoot a silky thread at Slate. With the sand cloud still obscuring his opponent, Slate decided to move in closer. The string made moving more cumbersome, but with how slow he was already it hardly made a difference. But when he reached the sand cloud, he hesitated when he didn't see his opponent.

This hesitation was punished by the Spinarak leaping out of the sand, and striking with its fangs. Through a stinging pain, Slate managed to shake the spider off, and respond with a bite of his own. He felt the dark energy flow through him again as he relentlessly thrashed the Spinarak, before throwing the non-moving body away.

"You did it!" Dart cheered from the sideline.

"Not bad, but you could've easily finished it off without taking a hit like that." came from Latenna.

Once the adrenaline from battle had died down, Slate simply stared at his fallen opponent as it faded into fog and disappeared.

"Did I just kill it?" he asked his companions.

"Yes and no. This is the distortion of life and death I told you about." Latenna answered "The Husks are born of the distortion without the blessing of Xerneas, and leave nothing for Yveltal to collect when they die."

"They don't have souls." Dart shot in, when he saw Slate's confused stare.

"As for their bodies. They simply disappear. If we die here, we will simply reappear at the entrance thanks to distorted death, so there isn't much to worry about even if the worst came to pass." Latenna finished.

"Hey, look over there!" Dart shouted, interrupting the conversation as he dashed towards another one of the blue fruits they had been collecting.

"Does the weirdness of this world stop with reality distortions, or is there a pantheon of gods behind this as well? Slate questioned Latenna.

"Well… yes."

Aside from the rundown of this worlds gods from Latenna, the walk through the dungeon had proceeded as uneventful as a trip through distorted space could be. Latenna decided to let Slate do most of the fighting, with Dart intervening the one time 2 husks attacked at once. As he went, he also memorized the names of the species they encountered. There were Spinarak, Sandshrew, Rockruff, Ekans and Cacnea. The latter having attacking with needled that hurt more than anything else he had been hit by, before Dart torched it.

Shaded Canyon

A Mystery Dungeon in the Southern Badlands. The canyon is surprisingly lush for the harsh landscape surrounding it, and shields it's inhabitants from the sun for the majority of the day as well. The resources found inside mostly consists of basic berries, making it the best source in the badlands for such items. Since the husks found inside are on the weak side, it's often used to give aspiring explorers their first taste of a dungeon.

During the travel he also saw more of the fog walls they entered through, which apparently was the only way deeper in, and also a safe way out. Slate was beyond even wondering how that made sense. The collecting went well for five floors, when they reached a room with a smoldering campfire, and another fog wall on the other side.

"Hmm, someone has been here recently." Latenna commented.

"And this isn't some kind of distorted time or something?" Slate commented.

"This is a stable pocket. No distortions here." Dart responded.

"Had almost given up on anything being normal here." Slate half-chuckled.

"It is true that time flows differently inside dungeons, but for most of them it's too small of a difference to notice." Latenna supplied. "But that's probably one of the reasons Master Treck still packs a punch. He was born 83 years ago."

Slate remembered the look of that Tauros well. The bull had offered Slate somewhere to stay in this new world. A bundle of pure muscle, with graying hairs the only obvious sign of his age.

"So these stable areas are mostly resting stops?" Slate asked.

"Yes, but some places mons have rigged them up with all kinds of stuff." Dart responded.

"Also, if you get into a fight here, death is permanent." Latenna supplied "So watch out for that."

'Duly noted' thought Slate.

"You ready to go on?" Dart asked slate.

A nod was the response.

"Let's go then. Only three more floors."

"By the way. Expect slightly stronger husks from now on." Latenna added.

Not the best news, but handling the previous ones had gone well enough.

Latenna wasn't lying. There was a small, but noticeable jump in strength after the stable zone. Aside from the previous ones, they met foes such as Gligar, Bramblin and Silicobra. Nothing that would require more than brief intervention from Dart to beat though. But that was until they reached the last floor.

"Come look at this." came from Dart, who had ran ahead of the others again. This time thought, his voice didn't carry the usual jolly tone. The others caught up to find the exoskeleton of a metal ant.

"Durant, those are rare here." Latenna mumbled. But the most worrying part was the hole melted in its belly, and everything inside was missing.

Slate could barely bring himself to look at the scene. Meanwhile Dart sniffed around, and found a few glass shards. Latenna had been serious the whole time, but her voice was extra cold when she ordered him to keep watch behind them.

"Shards from an orb, probably an Assassins Orb." Dart told his teammate.

After mumbling back and forth a bit, they decided to share their conclusion with Slate.

"What happened here is someone used an Assassins Orb to dispel distorted death here temporarily. He then used the opportunity to kill this Durant and eat it. Probably a Heatmor judging from the damage." Latenna explained.

"This must be some kind of outlaw." Dart supplied.

"I really hope this was a Husk, but then the body will disappear when the orb effect wears off. Which again means whoever did this, was here very recently. If this was a conscious mon, there was someone we really don't wanna meet here recently." Latenna concluded.

Slate didn't like this at all. There was a potential killer around, and judging from his teammates sudden serious tone, it was not something they were prepared to deal with.

"That was a Husk, I'm not a monster." said a fourth voice from behind them.

The team turned around to see a red anteater round the corner. In his right hand was a skull shaped orb which he held in front of him. The group slowly backpedaled away, and saw the Durant fade into fog as they retreated.

"HOLD IT!" the newcomer shouted. "As I said, I'm not a monster. That is why you have the choice to surrender your supplies to me, and simply be knocked out. If not, I might be forced to activate another Assassins Orb in order to get it."

Their assailant stopped just a few meters away from them. Upon closer inspection, he looked like he hadn't slept for a while, and his bag looked as heavy as it was tattered.

"If your bag is as full as it looks, getting a murder charge on you cannot possibly be worth it Heatmor." Latenna responded to the threat.

"Maybe not" the supposed Heatmor answered, his eyes narrowing "But then again, I have been through a lot lately, and you really don't want test me right now."

Suddenly, a whip engulfed in fire emerged from his mouth, hitting the ground between Latenna and Slate. The crack made Slate flinch, while Latenna held her ground. In just a second, she shared a look with her teammate confirming an unspoken agreement. Dart flecked his teeth and let out a low growl towards their assailant.

"I'll take my chances. You're in no fighting shape, and a stronger team could be here for you any second now." Latenna stated defiantly. "In the name of the Badlands Rangers, you are hereby under arrest. Don't make this worse for yourself now."

The sound of the Heatmors orb shattering was the response. Everyone felt a chill down their spine as the distortion of death was dispelled. The realization that their berry picking mission just turned deadly made him tense up.

"We'll see about that." Heatmor said as he launched his Fire Lash towards Latenna, only for Dart to jump in front of her. Despite a clean hit on his side, he didn't seem to take any damage from it.

"Remember, no fire." Latenna shouted to Dart.

"Copy."

Despite the initial shock of the situation, Slate was the one to take initiative with a Sand-Attack. As the anteater was engulfed in sand, Latenna followed up by firing her Rock Tomb into the cloud. A loud rumble was heard from the inside.

"Did we get him?" Slate asked.

When the dust settled, the answer presented itself. The Heatmor held a green barrier in front of him, which had protected his from the rocks. In his anger, flames started gathering around his mouth again.

"It's all wrong!" He yelled. "I crossed those mountains to find some backwater dump to lay low in while the dust cleared. Not to have kids playing police chase me!"

This monologue was rudely interrupted by Dart appearing from seemingly nowhere, smacking his head and landing next to him. This caused his Fire Lash to completely miss, as Latenna followed up with a quick blast of mud in his face. As Slate tried to close the distance for a stronger attack, Dart spewed out a purple smoke towards his foe.

"Good, poison will wear him down." Latenna told him.

However, what they didn't notice in time was the beam of green energy shooting out of the smoke, and latching onto dart. A stinging pain went through his whole body, as it felt like he was being drained og life. Latenna put up her own protect in front of him, severing the beam, and leaving Slate on the ground gasping for air.

As Latenna fished through her bag for an Oran Berry, she realized Dart was also looking at them. This distraction proved fatal, as he was blasted by Scorching Sand, launching him straight into the canyons wall. After this brutal attack, Dart was left on the ground barely being able to make a soft whimper.

The Heatmor emerged from the cloud looking sicklier and angrier than ever. The poison had clearly done a number on him, but he was not ready to throw in the towel yet. Latenna placed herself protectively in front of Slate who was getting up again after eating the Oran Latenna gave him.

"You might be able to protect one of your teammates" the Heatmor taunted. "But what about this one?"

He readied another sand blast while facing Dart, clearly intending to deliver a lethal blow.

"NO!" Latenna shouted and fired a Rock Tomb in its path, causing the rocks to make cover for Dart. However, the Heatmor saw this coming, turning last second to fire at Latenna. The attack didn't launch her as far as Dart, but afterwards she was also lying on the ground, with her armor glowing a faint red.

"Always so predictable these hero types." Heatmor muttered as he stared down Slate. But as he was readying another attack, a coughing fir started.

Slate didn't know what to do. All of them had fallen so easily, and now he was standing alone. What chance did he have to win, or even survive this. In his panic, he decided to cover himself with another Sand-Attack. And so, his mind went blank, and he put his entire heart into the attack.

The result, was a wave of sand slamming into the Heatmor. His coughing fit made him unable to react, and he was caught by the wave. Slate couldn't quite see the result of his attack through the sand, but just as a precaution he launched another, and another, and another. He lost count over how many he fired, but when he was done, he could barely stand with the energy he had left.

"Nice try…"

Slate watched in horror as the dust settled to reveal the Heatmor behind yet another green barrier.

"...a moment later, and that Bulldoze might have knocked me out. However…"

The outlaw once again fired his green beam at Slate, and this time he did not have Latenna to protect him. When the beam latched on to him, the pain once again surged through his whole body.

"...now I think I'll heal myself using you. Save an Oran for later and all that." the Heatmor said mockingly, but with fury behind his eyes.

The distinct feeling that something important was being taken was the only thing that Slate felt through the pain of the continuous Giga Drain. After what was probably seconds, but felt so much longer, his consciousness started to fade. Then the outlaw halted the attack to taunt his victim one final time.

"All you had to do was surrender some measly supplies." He said, with the green glow of Giga Drain once again building up in his mouth. Slate could only look as the finishing blow was charging.

But it never came.

Instead, the ground burst under the outlaw, knocking him airborne. He didn't have time to do anything before a spiked creature burst out from canyons wall to deliver a finishing blow. Though his consciousness was rapidly fading, Slate remember a large purple creature picking him up before he passed out.