Chapter 29 - Chronicle
In den frühen Jahren nach dem glühenden Blitz gab es in unserem Land Pokémon, die versuchten, das Wissen der Menschen zu bewahren, die einst unter ihnen gelebt hatten. Diese ersten Schriftgelehrten sahen sich mit der Aufgabe konfrontiert, Wissen zu bewahren, das nicht mündlich überliefert werden konnte und bei dem schon kleine Unstimmigkeiten dazu führten, dass es für immer verloren war.
In den frühesten Aufzeichnungen unseres Landes wird berichtet, dass unsere Vorfahren zuerst versuchten, die Weisheiten ihrer plötzlich verstorbenen Gefährten in menschlichen Schriften zu archivieren. Zu ihrer großen Enttäuschung erwies sich das Schreiben mit solchen Schriften für Pokémon wie uns als mühsam - sie waren das Werk von Wesen, die ihre Bedeutung nicht wie wir Pokémon aus Unterschieden in Rhythmus und Intonation, sondern aus Veränderungen des Klangs ableiten konnten. Selbst Versuche, menschliche Schriften in ursprünglichen Schriften wiederzugeben, wie die Icognitorunen, die wir heute zur Wiedergabe von Wörtern mit unbekannter semantischer Bedeutung verwenden, erwiesen sich als unzureichend, da ein umfangreiches Training erforderlich war, um die Bedeutung solcher Wörter aus ihren einzelnen Glyphen zusammenzusetzen.
Etwa zur gleichen Zeit begannen die ersten Zivilen dieser Welt, ihre eigenen Runen zu bilden, die besser für ihre Zunge geeignet waren. Sie fertigten Glyphen für einzelne Ideen und Konzepte an, die sie aus den Pfoten und Krallen ihres Körpers formten und die sie „Fußabdruckrunen" nannten. Diese Runen verbreiteten sich von ihren Ursprungsorten aus stückweise über ganz Wunder, und selbst die erbitterte Feindschaft zwischen den Ländern der Wahrheit und der Ideale reichte letztlich nicht aus, um ihre Zivilen daran zu hindern, einen großen Bestand an gemeinsamen Runen für ihre Schriften zu verwenden.
Solche Fußabdruckrunen waren zwar für Wesen wie uns leichter zu verstehen, aber ohne Druckerpressen oder die fleißigsten Schreiber nur mühsam wiederzugeben. Daher begannen die Pokémon, diese Runen im Alltag in Kurzschrift wiederzugeben, und vereinfachten sie zu Strich- und Punktfolgen. Mit der Zeit erreichten diese Praktiken die Höfe der Monarchen dieser Welt, die zu verschiedenen Zeitpunkten in der Geschichte ihren Segen dazu gaben, dass die Kurzschriftformen für ihre Reiche standardisiert wurden.
So umständlich diese alten Runen auch zu interpretieren sein mögen, viele Weisheiten vergangener Generationen sind ausschließlich in ihnen wiedergegeben, zusammen mit Details und Nuancen, die in der modernen Schrift verloren gehen. Für Gelehrte, die versuchen, die Wahrheit über die Vergangenheit unserer Welt aus der Ferne zu ergründen, ist eine gute Kenntnis dieser Schriften auch heute noch unverzichtbar.
- Auszug aus »Das königliche Lexikon der Wissenschaften und Künste«
Dalton thought that after a long day being run ragged, somehow managing to steal all the books on Igna and Ansel's list, and just barely avoiding capture by the scales of their teeth, that sitting down with a stack of books would've been a welcome reprieve. Perhaps it'd still have been one had he not constantly had his attention drifting towards the door or windows overlooking the alley for any sign of Igna and Ansel's arrival, or worse still, of snarling Pokémon in green plates who were coming for them.
He and the rest of Team Forager gathered around the copy of The Explorer's Handbook to Mystery Dungeons that they'd stolen—an unabridged edition from how visibly thick it was. Those mythology tomes they'd stolen were lying on the side for if they managed to get the chance to look at them, while Irune was snout-deep in some sort of weathered brown book that she'd peck at with a small nub of charcoal.
Except not even ten minutes after they'd settled into their room at the Möbius and started plotting out their course, the wounds he'd picked up from their fights earlier that day started catching up with him. Judging from their occasional winces and uncomfortable squirms, his teammates were in similar straits themselves. Maybe the adrenaline from their earlier escape and then the incident with those spies down the hall had finally worn off. Or perhaps getting thrown around in that human ruin by that Earthquake from Lacan had done more damage to his broken arm than he'd expected. Either way, the Heliolisk found himself flinching from every little shift or movement through his splint and could barely hold his attention to the pages in the book.
It was a sign that it was time to treat his arm again, and before he knew it, the Heliolisk was stooping in front of a low-slung cabinet just opposite the beds and rooting through their bags for a healing berry or two with his teammates. The items that they fished through had a way of blurring together between the places they'd gone to and marks they'd robbed to get them, but one thing that stood out was that there was a worrying lack of anything to heal themselves with. There were Seeds and an odd Max Elixir or two, but much to Dalton's alarm, the Oran Berry he'd applied to his arm in the morning before leaving the Möbius had been the last one in his bag.
The others' reactions said it all. Lyle and Irune both looked just as taken aback as he was, while Kate paused and stiffened up briefly before the Sneasel pulled her head out of her bag with a quiet grimace.
"I don't suppose any of you also have any Oran Berries to spare?" she asked.
"You're also out?" Lyle asked. "What happened to all the stuff we stole from those two soldiers?
"Well, they had some berries, but..."
Kate pulled her paw back, revealing a pair of Oran Berries in her grasp. There was a moment of blank silence, before the Sneasel shook her head with a low sigh.
"They're not enough for all of us right now," she said. "The Berries and Seeds were the main thing that we didn't get around to stealing from that market the other day, and you have been using quite a few to treat that arm of yours since it broke, Scales."
Dalton quietly sucked in a breath and traded looks between his teammates. They didn't exactly have any broken limbs, but between the scrapes flecking their bodies and the occasional sway in their gait, they were obviously worse for wear themselves. He noticed Lyle briefly hesitating and staring down at the berries with his teeth visibly on edge, before he shook his head with a low sigh.
"We'll just have to make do with what we can, then."
Dalton opened his mouth to ask just what Lyle was proposing, only for the Quilava to cut him off by passing one of the berries over. He pushed Kate's paw away, and motioned back at the bag.
"Let Dalton do what he has to for his arm. The rest of us are better off trying to sleep off what we can of our wounds," Lyle said. "We're better off holding onto that last berry for if we need it on the way out of here."
The Quilava looked visibly hesitant, and it was frankly hard for Dalton to fault him. They didn't have a firm idea of how they were going to get out of this city, and it was hard to imagine that after everything that had happened earlier that day, that they'd get another chance to steal supplies from their surroundings on the way out.
"You did say that we were tight on time, Scales. Patch yourself up a bit here. Lyle and I will look over that map in that handbook a bit more," Kate said. "Shame that the book those Hunters had didn't have this version of the map in it. Those drawings make it a lot easier to understand what's going on!"
Dalton sighed and turned his attention to the berry in his hand. Yes, he supposed time was a precious commodity right now, and if he was feeling unwell to the point that he couldn't stay focused looking at a map, he probably wouldn't be in any shape to run around again. He grabbed a linen left out on the top of the cabinet and made his way over to his bed, settling down on its mattress as he fumbled with its rind. He tried to wedge a nail from his good arm's hand under it, only for the fruit to roll out of his grasp.
"Ach, um Himmels Willen…"
He tried again, but the Berry was surprisingly hard to manipulate with his non-dominant hand. He gouged at the rind with fits and starts, as he heard Lyle narrating the map to Kate in the background.
"It's just like in that Handbook we stole earlier from those Hunters. The dotted lines point out Links between Mystery Dungeons, and the arrowheads let you know which directions they go in between them…"
Dalton looked up just in time to see Lyle trace his paw along the pages of the Handbook as Kate looked on. There was something almost childlike about the way the Sneasel watched him at rapt attention. It was almost like when his parents would read to him back when he was younger, or those times when Dieter—
He caught himself and pushed the thought from his head.
He didn't want to think about Dieter right now. Not while his broken arm was throbbing and the world around him felt like it was pressing down on him. The conversation between Lyle and Kate in the background blurred together as he turned his attention back to the Oran Berry, but for the life of him, he couldn't get this damned thing to—
"Here."
Green scales suddenly appeared at the corner of Dalton's vision. He briefly stiffened up and turned, where there was Irune holding the Oran Berry in her hands and staring up at him.
"You looked like you were having trouble peeling the berry," Irune said. "Let me help you apply it."
Dalton held his tongue in reply, before narrowing his eyes with a low huff.
"I thought you were helping Lyle and Kate look over Mystery Dungeons for a route to the Divine Roost," the Heliolisk said. "And since when did you care so much about the problems of a 'repulsive leech' like me?"
The Axew briefly flinched under his gaze as the Heliolisk idly shuffled his tail against the mattress. He wasn't sure why he was letting that comment of hers from Primordial Woods stick with him so much, especially when it was utterly trivial compared to his broken arm bones he was still grappling with.
… Perhaps it was because it sounded an awful lot like what a part of him would've said about himself. One that he'd long since tried to ignore.
"I suppose I have a way of doing things that I wind up regretting. Especially if I really am this Dyad," Irune murmured. "I… should've been more gracious about things back then. Since I'd probably be on a ship on the Sundered Sea right now if it weren't for you three."
Dalton briefly hesitated. It was a roundabout and evasive apology, but it seemed earnest enough. The fact that Irune hadn't turned into a stuttering mess while saying it was a good enough sign she wasn't faking things. He watched as the Axew averted her gaze briefly, before looking up with an almost pleading expression.
"I was serious when I said I needed help to make it to the Divine Roost earlier," the Axew said. "You were already hurt before Lacan hit you with that Earthquake earlier, are you sure you don't need me to help at all?"
Dalton felt the ends of his mouth start to curl down. Irune was fairly obviously trying to butter him up right now. Probably because she was afraid that he and the others would see her as a liability and cut her loose.
He supposed that there was some sense in them doing so, but he didn't know if he'd be able to stomach following through on it. He certainly wasn't back in the library. It also didn't change anything about the throbbing pain in his arm, or how much trouble he'd been having trying to treat it.
He sighed, before holding out his good arm and holding it out for the Axew to grasp.
"I suppose that I'm not really in a position to say 'no' to a helping hand right now," he sighed. "Just try and keep the berry juice on the linens, since I'd like to not sleep in sticky bedding tonight."
Irune nodded and took his good arm's hand, as Dalton helped her up onto the mattress. The Axew made her way around him from left to right, peeling back the rind of the Oran Berry before raising it above the top of his right arm's splint. She wedged the fruit up against a tusk and pressed down, bleeding blue juice down that worked its way down under his splint and stung as it passed the break in his bones.
Dalton briefly fought back a wince and steadied himself. He breathed in and let his eyes drift to the floor as the stinging sensation faded, when he noticed Irune hesitating with the fruit and staring at him.
"Why did you do it?" she asked.
"Do what?" Dalton replied, tilting his head.
"Attack Sophia back in the Royal Library," the Axew said. "She was going to let you go if you'd just let her take me. How come you didn't even consider her offer?"
Dalton held his tongue. He didn't know if he would go so far to say that it was worth running into Irune on that fateful night just outside Waterhead Cave, but knew the way the army worked. With Sophia's insistence on top of it that they needed to draw out Irune's power at the right time and place, it all seemed to be pointing towards one thing:
"Because they were going to make you fight. And I'd rather have gone down fighting than just accept that."
A long silence followed afterwards. Much to Dalton's surprise, Irune didn't look as startled as he was expecting her to be. He doubted she understood why, but perhaps she'd already suspected that that 'offer' hadn't sat well with him.
Even if Irune was somehow some sort of primordial god, or trio of gods, or however this 'Nameless Dragon' was supposed to work, something about the idea of the army sending a little child like her off to war just made his scales crawl. Perhaps it was just sentiment that he'd just inherited from his parents. Much like them, he'd always felt uncomfortable hearing stories about youngsters tagging along with the Trosse that followed after army units and their encampments. There were no shortage of tales about them meeting unfortunate fates when their wagons and caravans wound up being less safely behind the front lines than their members thought.
He could only imagine how much worse it'd be to actively throw one into the same maelstrom that'd stolen Dieter away from him.
He snapped to attention after feeling another dash of juice run past the break in his arm. The Oran Berry was looking fairly spent now against Irune's tusk as she bled it, probably a sign that it was time to eat its leftover pulp. He saw it resting on the linens and reached out for it, as Irune took the linens just afterwards to try and wipe off the juice from her tusks. Dalton raised the pulp to his mouth, only to pause when he noticed Irune briefly wincing herself. He spotted a patch of damaged scales on her hip and briefly hesitated… when the Axew's voice broke the silence.
"Is… that what happened to your brother? And why you're always so bothered by the Grünhäuter whenever we run into them?"
Dalton snapped to attention and saw Irune giving a curious glance up at him. Her eyes briefly widened, which from how sharply he could feel the ends of his mouth curling down, he supposed was a sign his reaction had startled her.
"You shouldn't go prying into things that don't concern you, Irune. But no, he was about my age when he entered the army, not that it helped him much," he harrumphed. "Though do you really expect me not to be bothered by Pokémon who have ruined the lives of more friends than I can count? Ones who would at best stuff me into some cramped cell for years?"
"No, no, I understand that part," the Axew replied, flusteredly waving her hands. "But you're bothered by things that they do like the way they take bribes, and…"
She trailed off and pawed at her arm with an evasive glance aside.
"It just seemed a little strange for an Outlaw to care about that," she said. "I was just a little curious if it came from somewhere for you."
There was a long pause between the two on the bed. He probably ought to have just brushed her off and scarfed down that Oran pulp, but something about the question lingered with him.
There was no logical reason for him to be so bothered. Why, the disgraceful conduct of the Gendarmen and army types in general even helped them on a couple occasions since the night they made it out of Waterhead Cave.
Maybe it was sentiment? No, Dalton liked to think it was something deeper than that. He didn't need to be a law-abiding 'mon to know when something was wrong… that it wasn't just… that it wasn't as it rightfully ought to be.
"I suppose that it's just force of habit from before I became an Outlaw," he replied. "I grew up in a world where soldiers and Gendarmen were supposed to be there to protect others. To be loyal to king and country even when it was difficult. I guess there's always been a part of me that's never gotten over the disappointment of seeing the Pokémon I was raised to look up to falling so short of the ideal of who they're supposed to be."
He trailed off, shaking his head with a mirthful chuckle.
"I suppose that makes me a bit of a hypocrite, doesn't it?" he said. "When I first became an Outlaw, I thought that it'd be something temporary. That I'd just do a couple jobs and steal from Pokémon who had things coming to them before I could go back to my normal life…"
"… Not anymore than the rest of us."
Dalton cast a sideways glance towards Irune and saw her averting her gaze, looking down at the bedspread underfoot.
"It's hard sometimes, knowing how things ought to be and wanting it, while being powerless to do anything about it," she murmured. "I… don't really know what specifically made you an Outlaw, but I have a feeling that I'd understand why you did better than I gave you credit for originally."
Dalton wasn't really sure what to make of that. Would Irune be able to understand him? Yes, she had been on the run from the Gendarmen and that Fähnlein for a while now, but she was hardly a normal Pokémon. If Irune really was the Nameless Dragon as the Corvisquire alleged… would she really know what she herself wanted?
Even when not being used to speak in reference of the gods, wish and reality were often separated by a yawning chasm. And in times like theirs, truth and ideals were often every bit as much so. Could someone who somehow had the embodiment of both slumbering inside of her really not just swing from one yearning to its opposite?
"Scales, not to be rude, but how long does it take to apply a berry? You're the one who was worried about us running out of time before Igna and Ansel came back!"
Dalton back at the table and saw Kate and Lyle staring with puzzled flicks of their ears. He supposed that was a sign that things had been dragging on long enough. He slid off the bed, passing the remains of the Oran Berry over back to Irune.
"Here, you should have the rest," he said. "You're not exactly in great shape yourself, and you'll need your health for the sort of journey we're facing down."
The Axew stared back befuddled for a moment before taking the berry pulp and scarfing it down. As she slid off the bed and followed after him, Dalton had the feeling that there were other things Irune had going on with herself that she still wasn't telling them.
He supposed that now wasn't the time to try and suss them out. They had a general idea of where they needed to be going, they just needed to settle on a route… and somehow make it out of the city in good enough shape to take it.
Kate flicked her ears and glanced over at Dalton and Irune on the opposite side of the table. A part of her felt a little bad for cutting short whatever those two were talking about on the bed, but it surely could wait until they were out of this city and with a head start over those Grünhäuter that were currently searching for them. She turned her attention back to the pages of the 'Explorer's Handbook' and the map in it.
It wasn't quite the same as the one in their old handbook. For one, there were a bunch of artsy-fartsy drawings on the map, especially on the locations of the Mystery Dungeons themselves. She still couldn't read most of the writing even if they were definitely all Varhyder Runes and not whatever Torchic scratch those Hunters from Team Pathfinder or whatever it was had scribbled into the margins. She wasn't sure why their copy didn't have these drawings, since they made it easier to get an idea of what the places looked like. She was able to identify Newangle City in its place towards the center of the kingdom, along a river that ran east of what Lyle told her was the Lesser Mist.
"So… we're down here right now," she said, pointing a claw at a little illustration of a ring wall fencing in a set of towers. And the Divine Roost we need to get to is all the way over there in the middle of the sea."
Kate traced her claw along the page to a floating hunk of earth, which unlike most of the other Mystery Dungeons on the map, wasn't wreathed with whitish mist, but by a haze that was black almost like smoke. She'd vaguely remembered hearing stories in the past of how Mystery Dungeons whose presence and openings to the outside world would shift around by noticeable distances and were supposed to be more treacherous and unpredictable to travel through.
It was strange, since she could've sworn hearing in the past that Mystery Dungeons with black fog like that were usually either ones that had just formed or else were ones that were on the verge of dissipating. The Divine Roost was supposed to be a place that had been around since at least the time of the Great Flash. How had it lasted for over a thousand years in such a state?
Her ears swiveled at the sound of something rubbing against paper and glanced over. Lyle and Dalton were looking over at Irune, while the Axew poked her head out from behind that worn-out book of hers with charcoal nub in paw. 'To help take notes', as she'd insisted.
Kate didn't know how much she believed that, but after the way they'd soaked that first handbook they'd stolen, it probably didn't hurt to have a spare of some sort.
Except a spare of nothing was still nothing. Even with the lines sprouting off from the Divine Roost, most of them were dotted—which Lyle said were a marker that the Links they were depicted were known to be seasonal or else appeared only erratically. None of the Mystery Dungeons that weren't that way were anywhere close to them right now, and she had a bad feeling about how none of those Mystery Dungeons with a stable Link to the Divine Roost were wreathed with a normal whitish mist.
"I don't think we're going to get away with hopping a boat and floating down the river to get there, and I doubt Lacan's just going to let us go touring the countryside like some apprentice on a Wanderjahr," the Sneasel said, shaking her head. "You're the 'mon who seems to knows these Mystery Dungeons out in the middle of nowhere the best, Scales. How exactly do we narrow things down here?"
"By looking for other Mystery Dungeons that will get us as close as possible to one that connects to the Divine Roost," Dalton replied. "Just from a casual glance at this map, I think we already have a few choices to pick from."
She watched as the Heliolisk moved his uninjured hand out over Newangle City and brought it up towards a set of fog-shrouded woods off to the north.
"If preparedness wasn't an issue, the route which would minimize our time going about the countryside would be to go north and go through Newmoon Wildwood and then take the Link inside to Great Icefield to reach the Divine Roost," he explained. "We'd only need to travel overland for about a day to reach Newmoon Wildwood, and the Links between them are stable and would take us to the Divine Roost without touching the surface."
Kate blinked at Dalton and saw Irune pick up her charcoal nub ready to write down something. That was the route that had caught her and Lyle's eye earlier, and the way Dalton described it made it, it sounded perfect for a route! But with the way that Dalton was hesitating right now and nervously pawing at his splint…
"Alright, what's the catch, Scales?" she asked. "Since you're looking a lot less excited than I thought you'd be about a route where we only have to travel for a day before getting off in the clear."
"Both Newmoon Wildwood and Great Icefield are supposed to be fairly grueling Mystery Dungeons to traverse," he explained. "I'm not a Hunter, but back in my hometown, the Pokémon from the Exploration Guild would tell stories of how even Gold-Rank teams would get overwhelmed by the Wilders there."
Everyone around the table froze as soon as the words left Dalton's mouth. Irune dropped her charcoal nub and shot a wide-eyed stare over, while Lyle abruptly lit up.
That… was one hell of a catch there. Though Dalton clearly wasn't always on the wrong side of Hunters if that comment was anything to go by. Kate thought to ask further about what that was all about, only to dispel the thought after seeing Lyle flatten his ears with a tense shake of his head.
"I don't think that 'grueling' is really something any of us need right now after we got chewed up in one forest full of angry Wilders," the Quilava muttered. "Is there another route we can work with that you know won't put us through something like that, Dalton?"
"That's all very relative since we're talking about Mystery Dungeons here," the Heliolisk harrumphed. "Short of leaving things to fate, all the ones that have known consistent Links to the Divine Roost will be challenging to get through. But…"
The Heliolisk looked down at the map and put a finger on the pages, moving it off eastward towards a set of fog-shrouded falls as he mused aloud to himself.
"We could go through Sunset Falls and take the Link inside to Blue Bluffs. Once we came out the other end of it, it'd just be a brief detour overland, go through Shivering Sands, which has a Link to Blacksteel Ruins that starts forming around this time of year and lasts through to the end of winter," the Heliolisk said.
Kate watched as the Heliolisk followed a set of lines up to a set of human ruins that seemed to poke out of what looked almost like a pillar of dark clouds and black fog and frowned. Could that place have been any more obviously less inviting?
"None of those Mystery Dungeons aside from Blacksteel Ruins should be much worse to get through than what we dealt with to reach our hideout in Waterhead Cave," Dalton explained. "It'd also give us plenty of opportunities to forage for supplies along the way, too."
That didn't sound like a half-bad idea either. The Sneasel was about to speak up in favor of the idea when she noticed that there was a large gap between Newangle City and Sunset Falls, and an even bigger one between Blue Bluffs and Shivering Sands that looked almost as far apart as Moonturn Square and Toya Square were on the map.
She wasn't going to hold her breath on them being able to hire another Carrier again, so…
"Wait, Scales. I thought you said we should be trying to find ways to get around by Links."
"We are, but some of the alternative routes aren't traversable entirely through Mystery Dungeons," the Heliolisk said. "There'd be stretches where we'd have to spend two or three days traveling over normal land and find places to hunker down in whenever we needed to rest."
… Two or three days? When they'd been struggling to keep Lacan and his damned Fähnlein off their tails for more than one? Gods, Dalton was not making these choices easy. Kate stared down at the map when she noticed that just a little ways north of that 'Shivering Sands' Mystery Dungeon was another with lines sprouting off of it, including one which lead up to a town with a wedge-shaped tower along the coast just on the other side of the Lesser Mist from where they were. There were at least two other Mystery Dungeons in its general vicinity that looked like they couldn't be much further than the journey from Waterhead Cave to Moonturn Square and they both had all sorts of Links sprouting off of it to other Mystery Dungeons up and down the Lesser Mist!
"Wait a minute, Scales. What about these Mystery Dungeons next to this seaside town down here by 'Something-or-Other Port'?" the Sneasel asked. "There's Links between them and a whole bunch of Mystery Dungeons this side of the Lesser Mist! I'll admit that just getting to the first Mystery Dungeon to reach that place looks like it could get a bit dicey, but we'd never need to be out in the open for more than a day at a time before making it to Shivering Sands."
Kate flicked her ear feather briefly and looked over at her teammates as they all seemed to visibly pale at the suggestion, with Lyle coming alight with a start and staring at her with his mouth hanging open.
"Kate, 'Something-or-Other Port' there is Port Velhen!" the Quilava exclaimed.
"Yes, and?"
"Th-That's the same place that Lacan is Graf over!" he spluttered. "What do you think the 'Wellenhafen₁' in his title refers to?!"
Kate bit her lip and stiffened up. Now that she looked at the runes by the town with the wedge-shaped tower, she supposed the drawing was right by the sea and the one in front of 'port' did kinda look like 'waves'... which would explain the 'Wellenhafen' from that name for the town in Hightongue.
… But was that necessarily a bad thing? Even if it meant sneaking through the home of their scaly pain-in-the-ass who was hounding them, it wasn't as if he was there right now to push the local Grünhäuter around, right?
"Wait, but couldn't that work out for us?" she asked. "We managed to get into Newangle City just fine since nobody expected us to be here, so-"
"It'd be a suicidal idea even if it weren't Lacan's Grafschaft," Dalton harrumphed. "Port Velhen's one of the main ports where the military dispatches ships from and deploys soldiers off to Edialeigh. It'll be crawling with them, especially now..."
Nevermind then, going towards Port Velhen really was a bad idea. Kate quietly sucked in a breath and made a note to herself that she'd have to get around to finishing learning how to read her runes one day… maybe sooner rather than later with that irked side-eye that Scales was shooting at her right now.
"I can't think of any reason for going there other than to worsen our odds of making it to the Divine Roost," Dalton harrumphed. "The Riparian Raiders quit that general area a couple years back for a reason, and there's no reason to assume…"
Dalton trailed off briefly and Kate flicked her ears as she heard something sliding loudly against paper. She turned her attention over towards Irune where she saw her scribbling up a storm. The Sneasel cocked a brow, before turning over to her Axew teammate with a befuddled frown.
"... Irune? What are you doing?"
"Making a copy of the map, of course!" the Axew insisted. "That way if something happens to it, we'll have a spare of it!"
Kate and the others traded looks with one another as Irune brought out her book and set it on the table, dutifully holding down the edges of the pages. Wasn't that her diary? She was surprised Irune would be so open about showing—
The Sneasel suddenly noticed Lyle and Dalton double-take with expressions that briefly made her think she somehow saw sweat rolling down the sides of their heads. She tilted her head to get a better look at the pages, and saw what'd made them so unimpressed:
Irune's "map", if it could be called that, was a mess of crude and childish scrawls. She supposed the coast kinda resembled the ones on the atlas' map and it was labeled with numbers she guessed were related to distances, but the Mystery Dungeons were all over the place. Newangle City looked closer to Toya Square than where it was supposed to be, and the less said about the confusing mess of lines between things that were probably supposed to be the Links, the better.
She shot a sidelong frown at the Axew and stared briefly… At least she seemed to write down some sort of notes about where to find the Links in each Mystery Dungeon? Maybe? Though with how messy and tiny Irune's writing was, she'd be surprised if even Dalton could read them.
"Yeah, don't go quitting your day job there, Shiren," Kate snorted.
Irune flushed a flustered red and snatched back her journal, clamping it against her chest with a quiet grumble under her breath. Back with the handbook, Lyle ran a paw over the pages between Newmoon Wildwood and Sunset Falls, with a look over his face that reminded her of times she'd remembered seeing the Quilava when he'd had to walk past deep water.
"Do we have any other options that would be about the same difficulty as if we headed for Sunset Falls?" Lyle asked. "We really shouldn't push ourselves after what we went through in Primordial Woods, but us traveling over normal land for days at a time with all those soldiers after us…"
"There isn't, unfortunately. Everything else I can saw from a glance on this map would either require going through more dungeons, more difficult ones, or through more exposed distance on land," Dalton said, shaking his head. "Unless you see another route that really catches your eye, the one through Newmoon Wildwood and Sunset Falls are the only ones really worth considering."
Gods, what a choice there, and with Dalton's arm still busted, no less. At least they could pace themselves by hiding out in Pockets and moving around? If it were just her, she'd be confident with their chances going through either route even if it meant going overland since whether in a Mystery Dungeon or outside of it, she'd always had up a leg on sneaking around on their old crews. But Lyle had a tendency to quite literally lose his cool when under stress, and with Dalton still injured…
The Sneasel glanced at her teammates as they looked down at the atlas' pages uneasily. She followed their eyes, and from the way they drifted northwards of Newangle City on the map, she gathered that they'd made their choice.
"We were lucky just to make it back here tonight," Irune murmured. "I know that Primordial Woods wasn't easy on us to get through, but Lacan and his soldiers are surely looking around for us right now, and I'm not sure how well we can stay ahead of them outside of a Mystery Dungeon. Especially one they wouldn't be worried about going into…"
"That's another vote for Newmoon Wildwood, I guess," Lyle murmured. "I just wish we had more than a night to plan this out."
"Meh, beggars can't be choosers," Kate remarked. "What about you, Scales? You're the injured 'mon, do you have any objections to going through Newmoon Wildwood?"
The Heliolisk looked down at his splinted arm briefly and seemed to visibly wrestle with his thoughts. For a moment, Kate thought that he was going to protest, only for him to sigh and close the handbook and push it aside with his left hand.
"I suppose we don't need to make a firm choice until we actually get past those city walls. Since for all we know, the process of getting out will make it for us," he said. "Though I think I can manage either way as long as we have a chance to get some actual healing items on the way over and pace ourselves in the Mystery Dungeons."
Kate watched as Dalton tucked the handbook back into his bag when she felt a yawn come over her. She was normally pretty good about staying up later into the night since her kind was supposed to adapt easily to nocturnal life… but the day's chaos was starting to catch up with her. The Sneasel yawned and pawed at her ears, before getting up and turning her gaze for the beds.
"Well, I'm bushed," she said. "I'm going to go and crash for now. Wake me whenever Igna and Ansel come by for their kiddie book-"
"Wait."
Kate's ears pricked up at the sound of Irune's voice and the Axew's seat grinding as she scooted it back along the floor. The Sneasel looked back just in time to see the Dragon-type beelining for Dalton as he and Lyle were in the middle of getting up, when Irune pulled a tome from the table right as the Heliolisk was about to take it.
"Irune, what are you-?"
She gave no reply to the Heliolisk other than to push the book out into the center, revealing an apple-colored cover with what looked like footprints on it in lines.
"I know it's late," she said. "But didn't you say that we'd look at that book Lacan was trying to find if we had a chance?"
Kate looked down and frowned after seeing the book looked visibly thick, and the only runes on it that looked normal were tiny enough that she had to squint to see them under the footprint-looking ones.
"That was Lyle that said that," Kate replied. "And can this really not wait until tomorrow? You can't seriously expect us to get through that tree-killer in a night, can you?"
"This is one of the books we have to hand over to Igna and Ansel, remember?" Lyle said. "Though I don't think we have read the entire book. It's called 'The Collected Legends from Wander', remember? Wouldn't Lacan only be interested in a pawful of them at most?"
Kate blinked at the Quilava's explanation. She supposed it wasn't as bad as she was worrying, but…
"Fair point, I guess. But what sort of legends would he even be looking for?"
"Sophia said I was a reincarnation of the 'Nameless Dragon'," Irune mused. "Wouldn't looking for legends about a god by that name or something about reincarnation be a logical place to start?"
The others on Team Forager traded looks with each other before Lyle finally stepped forward. Kate was a little surprised that it was him who jumped in to read instead of Dalton, since she'd have thought a nerd like him would be all over things. The Quilava reached out and slid his paws onto the cover. He pulled it back, musing to himself as he pawed through the first couple pages.
"There's usually a table of contents in books like these near the start that we can check-"
Lyle flipped through the first pages and then blinked with an uneasy twitch of his ears. Kate cocked a brow and walked up beside the table with a puzzled frown. She'd always thought that Lyle never had any problems reading, but he looked about as lost as she did whenever she was presented with a sheet full of runes!
"Lyle, what's wrong?" she asked. "You barely touched the book so far and-"
The Sneasel made her way forward and saw that on both the left and right pages, there were lines of what looked like little footprints broken up by small illustrations of gods and other Pokémon.
… Those were those old-style runes that sometimes showed up on plaques or Bildstöcke. They seriously made books with them? From Lyle's expression, she was guessing he couldn't read any of this Torchic scratch himself, much less Irune who stared blankly before pointing off at the page.
"I mean, there's some modern runes here at least," Irune said. "But how come they're only over some of these Footprint Runes and not all of them?"
"It's because the book was most likely printed back when it was still common to use Footprint Runes for technical writing. There were still examples of books being made that way as late as the early years of King Sansa's reign before his reforms during and after the Advent War," Dalton explained. "Those runes you see in the margins are meant to help explain runes whose meanings might be unclear or else changed with time for Pokémon less familiar with them."
Kate shot her eyes between Dalton and back down at the strange book. She should really be less surprised that an obvious priss like Dalton would read this script, but it never occurred to her that it'd actually be put out on paper like this.
"Wait, you mean Pokémon actually used to write like this?" she asked. "Since when?"
Dalton rolled his eyes and reached his left arm out for the page with a low scoff.
"Since ancient times, after Pokémon started moving on from using scripts of human origin," the Heliolisk explained. "Even if it's obviously easier to render with a printing press than as a manuscript, every 'mon who hopes to get educated past a stint at a village school has to learn how to read in Footprint Runes. There's a whole host of old books and documents pre-dating the formation of our modern runes that are written solely in them."
Kate frowned and pinned her ears back. She wasn't sure how anyone was supposed to manage writing these out without a stamp collection or a hell of a lot of time to burn, but clearly Pokémon in the past didn't have all their marbles. She noticed Irune blinking off on the side, when the Axew gave a curious glance off at the Heliolisk.
"Wait, so then these runes are related to the ones we use today?" she asked. "But they look so different!"
"That's the thing, they're actually not that different if you take time to look at them closely," Dalton explained. "Most of our modern runes actually evolved from shorthand forms Pokémon would use while writing these Footprint Runes out, and…"
Oh gods, they did not need to get into a tangent about how ancient runes worked right here and now. Kate thumped the table with a claw, narrowing her eyes over at the Heliolisk as she piped up with a sharp hiss.
"Scales, you're not at that artsy-fartsy university of yours anymore and it's getting late," Kate harrumphed. "So how about you put those reading skills of yours to use for us?"
She locked eyes with Dalton before noticing him faltering briefly. A quick glance off towards his gaze revealed Lyle shooting an unamused stare at the Heliolisk. That seemed to get the message across, as the Electric-type cleared his throat and sat down beside the table.
"... Right, anyway, let's see what we've got for chapters here."
The Heliolisk ran a claw along each line, studying each one closely as he hesitated briefly with each one and spoke his findings aloud:
"To an Unknown God: Comparative Myths of the Origins of the World and Cosmos... Order and Chaos: Tales of a Primordial Era and the Forming of Ways and Kinds of Pokémon... The Great Mediators: The Human Era and the Seeds of Our Civilization..."
Each title sounded about as frilly and pretentious as the last, and every now and then, the Heliolisk would murmur something in Hightongue under his breath before speaking up, which Kate assumed meant the book was meant to be read in it originally and Dalton needed a moment to figure out how to translate it. So it was boring and a pain in the ass to read, what a combination for a book there.
Dalton trailed off as his finger stopped abruptly on a line with a couple annotations above them and his eyes briefly widened.
"... 'Göttliche Seelenwanderungen₂'...?"
The Sneasel blinked and turned over to the Heliolisk, looking down at the mass of footprint-like shapes on the page and then up at the lizard's startled face. The chapter was something about gods from what she'd overheard, but wasn't a huge chunk of this book anyways?
"Scales? Why'd you suddenly stop?" she asked. "There's more writing further down the page from where you're at."
"It's the title of this chapter I found," he explained. "Divine Metempsychoses: Observations of the Lives and Deaths of the Gods."
A long silence hung in the air as the Heliolisk read the footprint-shaped runes aloud. Lyle should've been less surprised that a book about myths and legends would also have tales about the rebirth of gods in them, but it was still startling to see it right in front of him.
"What… does that chapter say?"
He turned his head at the sound of Irune asking the question, and flicked his ears after the creaks of wood rang out—from Kate pushing Irune's chair over for her to get a better look. The stoat got up and drifted over himself. He'd… never been any good at reading Footprint Runes beyond a pawful of really basic ones, but from the tension in the air, he was starting to think that this chapter was going to be important.
"Uh… well, I'd need to find my place first…" Dalton replied. "Lyle, can you help me turn to page 251? I'd do it myself, but…"
The Heliolisk pawed at the shoulder of his splinted arm, when the Quilava sighed and stepped forward and looked down at the glyphs on the line, and noticed a glyph that looked much like a Nidoking's footprint pointing upwards before flipping through the pages. He studied the bottom corners carefully as he flipped through the pages, slowing down as he noticed the leading glyph started to double up when he turned the page and abruptly stopped.
There, on the left, was an illustration that took up the entire page of Ho-Oh falling from the sky with bloodied wounds. He caught Kate quirking a brow from the corner of his eye and stared down at the page himself. He knew that he'd heard stories that Ho-Oh had been among the gods that had been summoned by Reshiram and come from afar to fight on Varhyde's behalf decades ago… and she was supposed to have died in battle. Even so, it still felt a little strange to see a book about Varhyde's myths and legends not talk about its patron goddess' rebirths.
Maybe he should've been less surprised that Ho-Oh would've died sometime beforehand, too. Even if it made him wonder how long ago this death had been if this was the first time he was hearing of it at all. He and his teammates turned to Dalton briefly, who ran a finger along the runes and began to read aloud in a slow, measured pace.
Throughout the ages, there have been tales of Pokémon of myth and legend that have been cut down in battle or forced to sacrifice themselves in the course of their duties upholding their domains and the order of the cosmos. It is not known how many times such a fate has befallen the gods of our world, as the age of even known younglings among their ranks can extend into the centuries. As such, the few passages of a Legendary to and from the mortal coil which have not been lost entirely to the mists of time have a tendency to quickly grow muddled by stories of their other feats.
A tense silence filled the room as Dalton reached the end of the page. Lyle knew that there were stories of Pokémon being reborn, with the gods being the ones who were known to come back as an observed reality. Even so, after decades of silence with not a single one of the gods who'd fallen in war between Varhyde and Edialeigh having been reborn… it was a bit hard to believe sometimes that any of them ever would. Or that if they did, that they'd just be reborn somewhere else in Wander with them no one in Varhyde any wiser. After all, the stories of the past rebirths of Reshiram and Zekrom always had been a bit hazy and felt more like tales his parents would tell him than actual history.
"This book must be pretty damn old," Kate mused. "Not that there's any gods that have come around in Varhyde after everything that's happened with the war. You'd think that it'd at least have more to say about the last time a god was reborn around here."
Lyle briefly bristled at Kate's comment. She was no doubt referring to the way that their patron goddess and her counterparts were reborn around Freeden Village. But for an event that happened just over a century ago, even it sure felt more like a legend than something that actually happened. There was barely anything said about the specifics of whatever had happened in books—or in general for that matter—beyond conflicting stories about why and how his hometown had been cursed by them…
The Quilava turned the page, which on its left had another page filled with those strange footprint-like runes. On the other, there was a picture of a young Pidgey awkwardly trying to fledge herself from a branch, with the wings casting a shadow of a Ho-Oh on the ground below.
He quirked a brow and peeked over at Irune and her shadow cast on the wall from their lantern. It was still the same old Axew. He supposed the book's writer must've done that for dramatic effect. Kate visibly furrowed her brow and traded glances between the young dragon and the illustration and opened her mouth to ask something, when Dalton brought his left hand up to the page of runes and began to read the passages aloud.
The afterlife and what comes beyond it for mortals remains ill-understood, as it remains unknown whether or not we too shall be as gods and someday begin our lives anew. For the gods in our midst, we know that there seems to be a rough degree of predictability for their deaths and rebirths based on the misfortunes they have had to bear in our unsettled world. Upon death, their bodies decay away much in the same fashion as those of the mortals who pay them reverence, but their souls still slumber, often for many years until they can be born anew into a vessel of mortal stock.
Irune abruptly shot upright as Lyle and Kate turned and stared at her for a long while. The Axew was visibly trembling at the text. It wasn't hard proof, but just from her reaction, he could already tell that those hopes of hers that Lacan and his goons had somehow gotten things wrong about her were just about gone.
But something about this still didn't feel right…
"A… vessel?" Kate asked. "As in that 'Nameless Dragon' or whatever is inside Irune right now?"
"Kate, she is that 'Nameless Dragon'," Dalton reminded. "Sophia even told us so."
Maybe he was overthinking things. After all, Lyle had been a Cyndaquil once, and now he was a bigger and stronger Pokémon. He'd be even moreso if he ever evolved into a Typhlosion sometime when he wouldn't have to worry about scrounging enough food to feed that still-larger body.
Did this mean that Irune would turn into this Nameless Dragon? Much like how he or Kate could still evolve?
He saw Kate blink and cast a glance over at Lyle as he stared blankly at Irune, who was visibly shrinking back. That was right, that crow had specifically called Irune the reincarnation of this 'Nameless Dragon', which somehow was related to Reshiram and the other gods she was tied to. Kyurem and…
Zekrom. The dreaded Endbringer that his parents would tell him and his brother stories about to shut them up and go to sleep.
Sophia specifically said that this 'Nameless Dragon' would beget Reshiram and her counterpart gods. What on earth did that mean? Would she somehow become all of them at once? Would she somehow stay together as some completely different being?
He heard uneasy tapping and saw Kate drumming a set of claws against the table. The Sneasel cast a wary glance over her shoulder at the Axew, before turning back to Dalton and quietly sucking in a breath.
"What… else does it say in there?" Kate asked.
Lyle helped the Heliolisk with the next page, where there was another illustration that made him freeze. There, on the drawing, was the picture of the Pidgey at the center of a ball of light in a wooded clearing with Pokémon looking on from the surrounding bushes. Her wings were spread wide, as the figure of Ho-Oh stood behind with the same pose.
It… looked like a drawing of an evolution. Not that evolutions looked like that, but little kids when attempting to draw an evolution would sometimes overlap the shapes of Pokémon's bodies like this. So did folk paintings by older Pokémon for that matter.
It is not known what power deigned for gods to re-enter our world in the bodies of such lowly, vulnerable creatures, or if they similarly did so in the ages when they shared our world along with us with mankind. Various theories have been offered by sages throughout history: that it is a fundamental part of their lifecycle, that it is a prerequisite for them to ascend of some higher form. Others believe this to be the doing of a higher being, a God of Creation who remains unknown to us: some who hold that belief say it is to impart humility, to make penance for past misuses of their power, to pass on a respect for the Pokémon that pay them reverence.
A 'God of… Creation'? Lyle wasn't sure what sort of god that could be when he'd never seen a shrine to such a being. All of the gods he'd heard of had very clearly defined domains. Just what would a god that was above them even be like…?
He briefly overheard Dalton murmur a few words in Hightongue under his breath, before the Heliolisk continued on:
Whatever the cause, a god reborn in such a fashion will retain the form of its mortal vessel until its power has fully awakened. And in a great glow of light and power, it will regain its true form and nature and reveal itself to the world, ready to use and resume its role as a god.
Lyle gaped down at the book's illustration and then over at Irune, who was looking down blankly at the table. So then Irune really was some sort of god? He knew that something had been up with her from those strange fire and electric powers they'd seen her use, but it was just so hard to wrap her mind around the idea that this was real and actually happening.
His breaths tightened and he felt his blood start to grow hot. He didn't know why the army was hunting Irune down like this. Why the army had been treating her as if she were a common criminal when even King Siegmund would be bowing and scraping to her if she'd had her true form.
… No, that wasn't right either. Criminals didn't have entire military operations set up around them. The way they were treating her was like she was dangerous, like a batch of Apricorn shot, or a Blast Seed shell.
He didn't know why any of this was the case, but he set his teeth on edge as one realization above them all crowded out his other thoughts:
"You knew about this, didn't you?"
Lyle turned over to Irune with a piercing glare and fire smoldering from his vents. He didn't know what on earth he was supposed to do being angry at a god, but the wagon, the raid on the encampment afterwards…
All of it… all of it…
"When you went along with us that night back in Waterhead Cave, you knew that you were this god and you kept it to yourself, didn't you?" the Quilava demanded. "And you deliberately hid it from the rest of us! Why?! Why would you do that to us?!"
The way that Irune squirmed and shrank back seemed all but confirmed his suspicions, and both Kate and Dalton also seemed to be on edge from the exchange. His head began to spin, as Lyle subconsciously grit his teeth and dug his paws into the table's wood.
"I-I didn't know for sure I was a god! Y-You wouldn't have believed me if I told you that I was!'" Irune stammered. "All I knew was that it'd been a year since the army put me on the run after they said I was a 'Dyad'. I just desperately wanted to believe that they were wrong, that the Psychic who helped them find me to begin with was just a crank and wasted their time…"
The words seemed to come naturally enough to the little Dragon-type. Lyle didn't know whether that was a sign she was telling the truth or if she'd gotten better at lying. Either way, he felt a pit in his stomach as uncomfortable questions started rising to the surface.
What else had Irune been hiding from them? Did she even see them as teammates? Or as scum that she just had to put up with while she was stuck in this body that wasn't even really hers?
His mind turned to the treasure that she had said was out there at the Divine Roost. The slim reed of hope they'd been clinging to all this time, the one that Irune insisted that she get first pick on when they got there.
He got up and loomed over the Axew with a fierce scowl. They all knew that Irune couldn't tell a convincing lie, so maybe it was time to just have her spit things out about why they were going through all of this.
"What is the treasure that you're looking for at the Divine Roost?"
Her eyes visibly widened in response and Lyle could've sworn that she was starting to visibly squirm right in front of him.
"H-Huh?"
"The treasure. The one that is so important that you want it before any of the rest of us," Lyle insisted. "The one that we've been sticking our necks out to help you try and get and have been hiding from us. The treasure our friends got captured over. What is it?"
He waited for a reply as his teammates stared at the two of them, with Kate pinning her ears as she must've realized where this was going. Alvin… Artem… all those other Pokémon who had been there at Waterhead Cave… had Irune knowingly doomed them all over that little jewel or whatever her pendant was a lookalike to?
The Axew didn't say anything and looked away. Lyle set his teeth on edge and felt his vents start to heat up. It occurred to him that his vision was starting to grow fuzzy and the corners of his eyes were starting to feel damp.
"Look, I don't care what you are or if that damned Graf is right about you or not. But I need to know. Why?" he demanded. "Why do you need that treasure so damn badly?"
There was a lingering silence he trailed off a moment, and let his eyes fall towards the ground with a low murmur.
"And why us?"
Still silence. From what he could see of Irune from the corner of his vision, she looked much like a child caught stealing sweets by her parents. Like he did when his parents confronted him right before kicking him out of the house. The Axew wavered and brought a hand shakily up to her face, and opened her mouth to speak.
"I-I-"
Tak tak tak
Lyle sprang back from his seat and crouched poised with fire pouring out of his vents, his teammates similarly jumped to their feet with a start at the sharp knock. His eyes quickly turned alongside theirs for the door, where a low, rumbling voice called out from beyond it.
"Are you all enjoying yourselves?"
His heart briefly stopped from how similar it sounded to Sheriff Mack's only for it to dawn on him that it was probably that Aggron receptionist from the playhouse—'Wye', or something like that. Kate brushed past him and made her way over warily to the door. She opened it and sure enough, just past it and taking up most of the space beyond the doorframe, was that red-eyed Aggron and his teal hide, staring at them with an unamused scowl that made Lyle's fur stand on end
The hell was he doing up here? And why did Lyle have the distinct feeling that this was bad news right now?
"We… weren't making too much noise, were we?"
Lyle briefly cocked her head to see Irune pawing at one of her tusks with an ashen expression and quietly grimaced himself. Had Wye heard them arguing earlier? He didn't think that they'd been that loud earlier, but…
"Hrmph, I didn't hear whatever you were talking about if that's what you're asking," the Aggron scoffed.
Thank gods. It took all of Lyle's willpower to not breathe out a sigh of relief right then and there as the receptionist turned in the hallway, and placed a claw on a pull-cord to the door outside..
"I just wished to inform you that your associates sent word that they wish to meet you at dawn in the Playhouse," the Aggron said. "Ecks is currently preoccupied with some other matters right now, so it fell to me to pass word along."
Lyle blinked in reply. At dawn? That wasn't what they'd agreed on with Igna and Ansel, so what was going on?
"That's later than what they told us this morning," Kate harrumphed, folding her arms. "If they were able to tell you to pass word onto us, why can't they make it now?"
"Because they informed us of their state of affairs by letter. It seems that you four caused a bit of trouble while conducting your business with them earlier tonight," the Aggron said, narrowing his eyes with a sharp huff. "They say that it won't be viable to conclude whatever deal you had between each other tonight, and dawn is the soonest they can manage."
Lyle bit his lip at the receptionist's explanation and saw flashes of unease go about his teammates. He hoped that Igna and Ansel weren't seriously planning on trying to smuggle them past the city walls during the daytime. He knew they said there was a passage to the Undercity at the back of the Playhouse, so maybe things could work out that way, but Dalton had mentioned that the Gendarmen still made use of them sometimes. Would it really still be smooth sailing going through that place when Lacan was surely tracking down every green-plated leech here in Newangle City to try and hunt them down?
The Quilava hesitated and briefly glanced at his teammates, who seemed every bit as uneasy as he was. He shook his head, before looking up at the Aggron with a stern frown.
"... Tell them we'll be there. We're sure they want us out of their fur by now," Lyle said. "We don't have the means to stay here past tonight even if we wanted to."
"So be it, then," the Aggron harrumphed. "Don't keep them waiting tomorrow."
Wye pulled the door shut with a forceful thump, leaving Kate to go up as the Aggron's thudding footsteps went further and further down the hallway as the Sneasel went up and kept her ear against the door. Lyle dropped back to all fours and turned his attention back to Irune, who avoided his gaze before she grudgingly spoke up.
"About the treasure I was looking for. I… I'll tell you all about it when we make it to the next Mystery Dungeon."
Lyle felt the corners of his mouth droop as the Axew turned back to him and his teammates. She had a pleading gaze, along with an expression that made her look like she was stuck out in a morning frost.
"J-Just please trust me that all of this is for an important reason."
Damn it, why was she just refusing to spit things out right now? Was this because she didn't trust them? Because she was afraid of how they'd react? He opened his mouth to press on, only to notice Kate eyeing the books on the table.
"So… uh, were we going to read the rest of those books to see what was up with Irune right now?" Kate asked. "Since just saying, it was over an hour past midnight when we set foot back here and dawn's not that long from now."
Lyle turned his attention to his teammates and saw that everyone looked tired and uneasy, and must've surely been as exhausted as he was. They'd all had a harrowing day that he still wasn't sure what to think of after everything that had happened, and tomorrow was bound to be no less of an ordeal.
There was a long silence, before turned away from Irune and walked past with a sighing shake of his head.
"... Fine, I suppose I can wait a little longer. It's not like Igna and Ansel asked for that other book about that Nameless Dragon anyways, so we can look at that later," he said. "Let's just get some rest. Since I can already tell that tomorrow's going to be one of those days where we'll need whatever energy we can spare."
He headed off for his bedding and settled in as his teammates did likewise. As Lyle sank into his bed, he stared up at the ceiling. He briefly stole a glance from the corner of his eye at Irune as she settled in, who didn't bother to get out her baubles to sleep with that time.
Were Lacan and Sophia right? Was Irune really a god of some sort? If so, how did she ever get into this situation with the army? Why had she hidden all of this from them?
… And most importantly, why had she trusted them to help her?
Author's Notes:
Words and Phrases
1. Wellenhafen - "Port Velhen", lit. "Wavesport"
2. Göttliche Seelenwanderungen - "Divine Metemphsychoses", lit. "Divine Soul-wandering". More commonly rendered as "Göttliche Metemphsychosen".
Teaser Text - Special Thanks to TorchicBellow for Translation
In the early years after the Great Flash, there were Pokémon in our land who attempted to preserve the knowledge of the humans that had once dwelt amongst them. These first scribes found themselves faced with the task of having to preserve knowledge that could not be passed down orally, where even minor discrepancies would doom it to be being lost forever.
In the earliest records of our land, our forebears are recorded as having first attempted to use human scripts to archive their suddenly departed companions' wisdom. Much to their dismay, writing with such scripts proved burdensome for Pokémon such as us—they had been the work of creatures who didn't discern meaning from differences of rhythm and intonation as we Pokémon do, but from changes of sound. Even attempts to render human writings in more primordial scripts, such as the Unown Runes we presently use to render words of unknown semantic meaning, proved insufficient as extensive training was required to piece the meanings of such words together from their component glyphs.
At roughly the same time, the first Civils of this world began to form their own runes better suited for their tongues. They made glyphs for discrete ideas and concepts, fashioned from the paws and claws on their bodies, which came to be called 'Footprint Runes'. These runes spread far and wide through Wander in piecemeal fashion from their places of origin, with even the bitter enmities between Varhyde and Edialeighᵃ ultimately being insufficient to keep their Civils from eventually using a large body of shared runes for their writings.
While such Footprint Runes were easier for beings like us to comprehend, they were troublesome to render without printing presses or the most diligent of scribes. As such, Pokémon began to render those runes in shorthand in their daily lives, and simplified them into sequences of strokes and dots. With time, these practices reached the courts of the monarchs of this world, who at various points in history, granted their blessing on shorthand forms to be standardized for their realms.
As cumbersome as these ancient runes can be to interpret, much wisdom from bygone generations remains rendered solely in them, along with details and nuances that are lost in modern writing. For scholars seeking to tease out the truth of our world's past from a far distance, a healthy knowledge of such scripts is indispensable even to this day.
- Excerpt of 'The Royal Lexicon of Sciences and Arts'
a. In the original text, this is more accurately translated as "the Lands of Varhyde and Edialeigh"