The Island Mystery: Into the Shrine

First topic message reminder :

Akuroma groaned as he walked into the shrine, still feeling sore from the fight he had just experienced with the Ursaring back in the Fallen Leaf Copse. Good thing someone paid off the gang of Pokemon guarding this place. Akuroma was in no shape for another fight, whether he'd admit it or not.

The Gallade stretched as he looked around the shrine, eventually finding himself facing the tablet with a candle on top. The Gallade kneeled down, peering at the strange letters on the tablet. "Unown letters? That hasn't been used in a long while. Oi, Cracker, you wouldn't happen to know Unown, would you?" the Gallade said, looking back for the Aipom.

With a frown the Aipom stood up straight again, adjusting his backpack. Though disappointed that Skylar didn't want a ride, he had to admit her size might've posed a problem. Not that he wasn't willing to try anyway, but if the Vaporeon and Gallade thought it was a bad idea, he was willing to submit. He only wanted to help, after all. "Fair enough," The Aipom replied, replacing his frown with a fresh grin. He was willing to just leave it at that, but then Sova chimed in, explaining that her size was not the only reason for her refusal. Cocking his head to the side he said, "Tell me what?"

As Sova left the two, Cracker divided his attention between the Vaporeon and the glowing shrine. Akuroma had placed the leaves and the rocky formation seemed to be responding unlike last time. The Aipom's grin broadened further as it seemed the Gallade's new plan had worked. This made the monkey excited to rush over and see what had appeared on the shrine, but his excitement quickly drained away as Skylar spoke. His grin dropped into a surprised frown and he turned back to face the Vaporeon.

"He's... testing you?" he inquired, tilting his head slightly. "I... guess that makes sense but... aren't Guild members supposed to rely on each other for help? That's what being a team's all about. Why would he fail you if you need help? That sounds really harsh..." Suddenly the nature of Skylar's pairing with Sova seemed less exciting. She'd told him she was applying to join the Glaceon's team, but he had no idea the terms of pass or fail were so strict. And to make matters worse, she didn't seem to be taking this test well at all. In fact she seemed almost embarrassed about it. Well... if I know you, you'll pass with flying colors, Sky," he continued, putting on another grin. "So keep your chin up!"

The Aipom pat Skylar on the head with his beefy tail-hand and promptly used it to fling himself over to Sova and the Gallade just as Akuroma's stone was cracking open to reveal a shiny orb inside. Cracker landed and was immediately star-struck but the colorful sphere. "Wooooow," he said in awe, before dropping his gaze to the other bags on the shrine. He immediately assumed one of them to be his and snatched it up to dig around in eagerly.

With a shrill squeal the monkey extracted the Joy Ribbon and held it aloft. "Oh wow! I can't believe it! I've been looking for one of these for ages!" Without another word, he yanked off the Special Band he wore around his head and wrapped the ribbon around his neck like a bandit's scarf. Next he dug around more inside the bag. The weird little stone he placed on his head as he poked through the remaining contents which were just coins. Once he was finished, he stuffed the bag and the rock into his backpack.

Akuroma grabbed a hold of one of the bags immediately after they appeared, blinking as he looked inside. Hm, there's some money, that's always nice, a Joy Ribbon, already got a couple of those, and a...rock? the Gallade thought to himself, picking the stone out of his bag. However, just as the Gallade pulled the stone out of the bag, the stone began to crack and glow! Akuroma blinked as he watched the dull, outer shell of the stone crumble away in his hand to reveal the glowing orb within.

"It looks like an evolution stone," he mumbled to himself as he closely examined the colorful orb. He could definitely feel something coming off of the stone, as if the stone itself was grabbing a hold of the Gallade. Akuroma's eyes narrowed, the Gallade quickly placing the stone in his bag, finding himself strangely reluctant to let it go.

Akuroma shook his head, as if attempting to shake off the strange feeling coming from the stone as he finally released it. It was then that he noticed neither Cracker's nor Sova's stones were reacting to them like his did to him. Would they only react to certain Pokemon? Does that mean that they were indeed evolutionary stones? Akuroma had never heard of a fourth evolutionary stage, and the strange sensation he got from the stone was nothing like when he came in contact with the Dawn Stone.

The Gallade stayed almost deathly silent, scratching the hand he held the stone with, his hand feeling as if it were numb. "Ahem... So, you two both get a joy ribbon and some money?" the Gallade asked as he tried to distract himself from the stone.

Sova watched as it was proven to him that everyone got a stone.  However, Akuroma's stone seemed to do a stone's equivalent of evolving, turning into a much shinier and more colorful stone.  So his own stone was just defective....  Apparently Cracker's was too, from what he could tell.  Too bad, he would have liked to have a less.... rock-y looking rock as a prize.  But just the money was enough for him.  The Joy Ribbon wasn't a big deal to him, but he knew someone who could use it.  "Yep, ribbon and money....  I mean, we've got stones too, but it looks like ours are broken.", he replied to the gallade.
It wasn't a big deal to him that he didn't get a shiny rock though.  He hadn't come here to solve the mystery, he just wanted to test Skylar.  This whole scenario was honestly just a bonus to him.

Skylar sighed as the aipom left to go join the others.  She was a bit saddened by his words, due to the fact that they made sense.  She knew the test was to make sure she wouldn't get too badly hurt being on the glaceon's team, but still....  She'd felt she was being given harsh treatment the whole time.  But he'd saved her life, so she knew he wasn't just doing this for fun.  Sova had a reason, certainly, she just wasn't completely sure what the point of all this was.

The vaporeon decided to get a move on and catch up with the rest of the group to see what the prize was up close.  Money, a Joy Ribbon and.... a rock, for each team.  However, Aku's rock had turned into a prettier rock.  It probably had some significance considering rocks didn't usually just turn into pretty stones out of the blue.  She contemplated what the use of them could be for a moment before a Joy Ribbon was shoved in her face.

Sova had gotten his share of the money and his useless rock into his own bag, but not his ribbon.  He draped it over his paw and outstretched the paw as Skylar approached, offering it to her.  "Here.", he offered.

Sky hesitated for a moment before accepting the ribbon and draping it over her neck for the time being.  "Uh.... thanks.... but don't you want it?"

"Nope, I've already got one.  Besides, since you're gonna be joining my team, you're gonna need to get a bit stronger and this'll help.", the glaceon replied.

Skylar tilted her head in confusion at what'd just happened.  Then her mind finally comprehended it.  "So I pass!?", she questioned.

Sova nodded and smiled in response.  "You kept up with me well the whole time and you listened to me.  You've been complaining about wanting water for the past few hours - which I still don't get since you're pretty much made of water - but you kept up and I said you could join if you did."