Big Sister, I Wanna Fight The Big Thing!

The caves were dark, but it was no problem for a certain lucario. It was easy to tell what was in the nearby vicinity thanks to the near echolocation the sensing of aura allowed her. Kira stared into the abyss of darkness, her eyes open though they saw nothing. Wait, over there, a stick. That could be useful for the one that...was not so good at the whole aura thing.

The lucario's eyes glanced in the direction of the stick, walking off track of the current path to take a hold of the stick. She swiped it up in one precise swoop of her paw before lifting a leg and placing the stick near it. Her leg quickly caught fire and set the branch ablaze, "Here," she passed it to the midget-ized version of herself.

They would need to see for what they were about to do. For they believed that there was a mighty opponent within these walls, an opponent that needed to be converted to the path of Arceus...or persuaded. She was not exactly sure which. Kira closed her eyes as she focused on the aura around the area, waiting and searching. She had spoken little on their journey back, though the story of Lincoln said otherwise....


Deeper within the caverns, a dark shape moved through the tunnels with ease despite the lack of lighting. Step by step, she moved forward. This was the caves, this was also an incredibly dumb idea. The zoroark was already covered in her battle scars from the previous scrap, and this time around she did not even have Sova. This was a very, VERY dumb idea. But hey, she was in it to win it. She may have been an outlaw, but even she knew that a world of absolute freedom was not to be allowed. Maybe her from a month ago would have been working to help, but due to certain...events, she now had a different mindset.

No longer was she convinced that she was to be "bad" because of her typing, now she simply had to be "bad" to actually survive but only as a last resort. If she was able to afford food, she'd buy it. If she was attacked, she would defend herself. Although, if the police started after her...well, she's not about to spend an eternity in a cement cellar with plenty of pokemon that would probably have a bone or two to pick with her. She was here to make up for all of her past...misunderstandings...that were entirely her fault. She had already tried to do that with helping Sova with the being known as Genesect, but they had failed horribly...so maybe this could help?

Lincoln wrung his paws nervously as he and his new big sister Kira approached the cave that they had heard the rumors about. Lincoln was completely enthralled that she had let him come along with her! She had seemed so quiet, and.... cold..... but at least she was letting him join the adventure! The episode in the Copse had been far, far, far from Lincoln's mind ever since the episode at the mansion.

Once inside the cave, Lincoln could feel a certain aura of tranquility. It was slow and winding, kind of like how a snake moved after it had finished a meal. He could almost see it... but not quite. Lincoln could do some visualization, but seeing aura and seeing tangible things with aura were to very different things. As they walked, he couldn't help but feel relaxed, even while walking in the dark. Which wasn't a great idea. Lincoln learned that pretty quickly the second he walked into a rock and fell on his butt.

"Oww...." Lincoln grumbled, rubbing his sore nose with a paw. Suddenly, there was light and he could actually see. He stood up and shielded his eyes while they adjusted to the concentrated light source. He accepted the makeshift torch from Kira, and they made their merry way on through the cave.

"Sooooo....." Lincoln remarked as the tunnel started to get narrower around them, "Got any ideas of what we're looking for? I don't know a lot of stories about rare pokemon."

Lincoln the Riolu - 2 Energy

Meanwhile, outside the cave's entrance, a white figure pawed up to the great maw of the cave. She squinted at it, unconvinced that there was really anything.... especially special about this particular Mystery Dungeon. Not that she had been to this Mystery Dungeon before. Still, if what she had heard around the guild was true... then something had cropped up here. Some cryptic riddle was pointing to this place as some kind of haven for some kind of.... beast. Izumi wanted to find that beast. She had a feeling that that beast would have an item she was interested in, if Proteus's item from so long ago was any indication.

Izumi inspected the mouth carefully, sniffing all around the rocks. She didn't exactly know what a "Mon of War" was supposed to smell like... but she highly doubted it was going to smell like dank sedimentary rock and clay. She crept into the cave silently, trying to avoid a disturbance.

The cave was very dark, and Izumi had come unprepared. She wasn't exactly the intrepid explorer that her sister was, and Izumi was prone to misjudging things about Mystery Dungeons. Like, how dark caves were. And how hot the Desert was. Up ahead, a sudden blossoming of light caught Izumi's attention. They certainly didn't look like ferals to Izu, and she saw a silhouette she thought she might recognize in the distance. She was used to approaching and being approached by other pokemon at this point, so she just went ahead and started jogging to catch up with them. "Hey! Hold on a second there!" she called, trying to get the two figure's attention.

Izumi the Absol - 10 Energy

"Don't know," Was Kira's blunt response to the curious little riolu. She had no clue what they were after, what it looked like, or if it was even here or not. The lucario sensed something ahead, and was not all that surprised to see a certain red absol trotting up to them. She recognized the figure and the red coloring immediately as the horned beast approached.

It was Izumi, the box appraised within the guild. A sour look came upon Kira's expression, but it was immediately suppressed as she tried to reason with herself. Izumi was simply a shop owner up-keeping a fair and decent life, it was not her fault that her most common business clients were with guild members. "Greetings Izumi," she spoke to the absol, "What brings you here?" she spoke with a calm tone.

--

Voices, and light. She could hear them from afar, and see the light once she drew closer. She spotted them, a Lucario and a riolu...along with an absol from the guild. Crap, there was no use in hiding her form in an illusion with the lucario around. Were they after her? Arceus she hoped not, she had come here to do one good thing in her life, and the very god she was helping was going to take it all away just like that?

She'd better get moving, she didn't want to be caught here with those three...

Suddenly, Lincoln could hear a stranger calling out in the distance, and his ears picked up the sound of paws padding closer against the cold stone floor. He turned his his head around and- Oh good LORD, is that a demon?!? Kira knew this pokemon?!?! It's light blue eyes shone sharply, and the red color only made them stand out that much more. After exchanging some words with Kira, the thing that Lincoln assumed was an Absol that had been pulled straight out of his nightmares looked down at him and grinned. He felt his heart jump into his throat.

"Is this one yours?" the Absol asked.

Lincoln could feel his own pulse choking him. Still, he wanted to look brave in front of Kira. He certainly didn't want to ruin her reputation or anything like that though; what if he embarrassed her and she didn't want to hang out with him anymore?! If he was hanging out with someone as cool as Kira, he had to be cool too.

"Uhh- I," Lincoln choked, "-I mean, I'm Lincoln! Kira's teaching me how to get stronger and use the aura and adventure and stuff, she's like my awesome big sister!"

The Absol smiled at him. "Aww, that's very nice."

Then she made a face that looked like it came straight out of an Emo Dusknoir's night terror.

Spoiler:

"That's alright. I was thinking he was looking a little small to by up on my trophy wall, anyways. Don't go running around at night by yourself, though; just in case I don't recognize you."

Lincoln's heart stopped beating and plummeted into his stomach, and he lost feeling in his entire body. He nearly dropped the torch.


Izumi noticed a flicker of something sour in Kira's face as she approached her, but it was only a brief glimpse. Izumi questioned if it had even really been there, as she hadn't really been paying that close of attention. The Absol stopped at a comfortable distance away from the Lucario, and nodded at her greeting.

"And the same to you. It's been a while; nice to see you again!" Izumi responded. "I have a feeling we're here for the same reasons. I mean, that riddle that's been going around town is just to enticing not to look into. If it's true, and there's something here I want to see it." Izumi leaned in a bit, and began speak in a more hushed tone. "You remember that item that Proteus got, right? The one linked to the legend that was in the Submerged tower? I have a hunch that that item isn't the only one. I can't imagine just one god-like creature having an item. So if the rumor is true, and there is something of legend here, I want to confront them about it. If it's possible for me to get my paws on one, I want to do some research on it."

With the end of her spiel, Izumi straightened back up and relaxed. She then looked down at the Riolu that was with Kira. She could tell she was intimidating him, because he was looking at her with the eyes that prey gives they're predator. She chuckled and turned back to Kira.

"Is this one yours?"

"Uhh- I," the Riolu choked out on his own, "-I mean, I'm Lincoln! Kira's teaching me how to get stronger and use the aura and adventure and stuff, she's like my awesome big sister!"

Izumi smiled at the kid. He seemed nice. Yep, just a kid having an adventure with his role model, trying in earnest to get stronger and learn more about the world. Such a commendable, motivated child. "Aww, that's very nice," she commented with a friendly tone.

The only correct decision here was to troll the kid.

Izumi drew he face up into the most terrifying visage she could and bore down on the kid with her eyes, grinning wildly. "That's alright," she rasped, "I was thinking he was looking a little small to by up on my trophy wall, anyways. Don't go running around at night by yourself, though; just in case I don't recognize you."

She saw the Riolu child go limp and she knew her had done her job. Izumi was positively beaming with satisfaction. "Hee hee hee, kids are wonderful things," She laughed.

Just then, Izumi's peripheral vision decided to start agitating her. Her smile dropped away and she whirled her head around, her eyes cutting through the dark and revealing to her another dark (and amazingly poofy) figure shuffling around among the dank cave rocks. "Hey, who's over there?" Izumi called, looking for the figure's reaction.

The foul look from Kira only grew more and more as the absol continued to speak to Lincoln. The absol seemed to be quite the talker all of a sudden. Kira raised an eyebrow at the absol as she mentioned the item Proteus spoke of, only for it to lower back into a glare as the absol continued to traumatize mini-her. A paw reached out and grabbed the absol by the horn before pulling her in close and kneeling down, "Keep this up and I might get myself a nice little wall mount," she whispered to the absol with a venomous tone.

The absol had lost her benefit of the doubt in that very moment it had decided to mess with mini-her. She was now on the sh*t list. Kira pushed the absol away before sending a pulse of aura to check the figure. It was a large pokemon, bigger than anyone in the group. It had froze in the spot, and was looking towards them. She narrowed her eyes in preparation of a fight.

--

Mirage froze, having been caught by the group. Crap. She had wanted to get out of there before she was noticed, too late. She had the intense urge to say, "Nobody" but she figured if they were in league with the guild they would not take that so well. She would have to play her cards carefully. She approached the group slowly, her large form coming into the light to reveal the plenty of scars that covered her body along with her torn ear where her earrings used to be.

"Hello..." She spoke, "I'm Elvira," she lied, "I mean no harm..." she explained, opening her arms to show that she was unarmed and had no intention of pulling any tricks.

0Lincoln wasn't buying the Absol's ploy; he was certain that she was just trying to get Kira to be distracted so that she could snatch him and run. It certainly looked like Kira wasn't buying it, either, and for that Lincoln was incredibly thankful. He looked up at her with big, gracious, tearful eyes and whimpered, "Kiiiirraaaaaa," as the best thank you he could possibly muster in that moment.

"Alright, alright. I took it a little far," the Absol chuckled. "Took what a little far?" Lincoln thought as he watched her shake her horn away from Kira's fist. The Absol smiled at him again and said, "Don't worry, little guy. I'm an item collector, not a corpse collector. That and I've been on a vegan diet since I left Blackmist. My name is Izumi."

Lincoln was still entirely leery of the Absol as it leaned down towards him. Then, with a "Here," she handed him something out of her bag. Lincoln looked down at the box, then up at her.

"That's a little something out of my inventory. Consider it an apology for terrorizing you," the Absol smiled at him. Lincoln looked at the box. She sold... boxes?

"Oh, and let me get that for you," she said. Lincoln flinched as she stuck her claw into... the box, and twisted it. The top popped off, and Lincoln saw that there was something inside of it. He set the box down, reached inside, and pulled out the little ring resting of the bottom of it. He looked up at the Absol, questioning replacing the fear in his eyes.

"Keep that safe," Izumi nodded, "It's called a Ravage Ring. It's incredibly rare, and only you and Kira can use it. It's got a special power that'll make you immune to Psychic type moves."

Lincoln was awestruck. He was still a little suspicious of the Absol, but... he really wanted it to be true! He supposed he could trust the Absol for now. He held the ring up so that Kira could see, beaming brightly. "Kira, is it really true?! That's so cool!!!"

Lincoln the Riolu: 2 Energy

FoxFireAlchemist carried out 2 launched of one Serene Cave :

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Izumi grunted as her attention was turned back to Kira forcefully when her horn was yanked by Kira, who was seething from the joke. Apparently, Izumi had underestimated how invested Kira was in the tiny kid, and had pissed her off. That was fair. Izumi admitted that she had kind of been being a little bit of a sh*t.

"Alright, alright. I took it a little far," Izumi conceded with a chuckle. "Don't worry, little guy. I'm an item collector, not a corpse collector. That and I've been on a vegan diet since I left Blackmist. My name is Izumi." It occurred to her that she had a box that she had not yet put in her sale case at the store. She dug into her bag and pulled it out, handing it over to the Riolu. He accepted it with some apprehension, which Izumi couldn't blame him for. "That's a little something out of my inventory. Consider it an apology for terrorizing you," she said sheepishly as the Riolu looked at the box somewhat dumbfoundedly. "Oh, and let me get that for you," she added, sticking her claw into the lock before the Riolu had time to react and wrenching it open. The top fell off, and Izumi was impressed and a tiny bit thrilled to see that there was a Ravage Ring in the bottom of the box.

"Keep that safe," she explained, "It's called a Ravage Ring. It's incredibly rare, and only you and Kira can use it. It's got a special power that'll make you immune to Psychic type moves." The child's joy upon hearing this made her smile wider. Then, she turned her attention back to the figure, which Izumi now made out to be a fairly beat-up Zoroark. "...Sorry about that, had to take care of a few things." She heard it mention that her name was Elvira. "Hey there, Elvira. I'm Izumi, I open boxes at the guild. I'm gonna take a wild guess and say you're here about the rumors, too?"

Izumi the Absol: 10 Energy

FoxFireAlchemist carried out 5 launched of one Serene Cave :

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