Steeling Resolve

{Energy: 29-10 = 19}

Jet had been through terrible times ever since his teammates had disappeared and practically abandoned him. He had spent day after day trying to keep the team Mizuchi together in their absence, but failed at each attempt. He was lucky to even finish the one mission that he did. And even then, he only managed to succeed there because he had found some other Pokémon to help him out when he was in trouble. Had he been by himself, he would have been not only defeated, but robbed as well. He...he needed to change that. Even if he decided to quit the Guild and remove his team from the records completely, he would still need to be stronger himself. If he wasn't, then the whole reason he had left his home in the first place would be completely moot.

That said, ever since he had left his home, he had faced just one disaster after another. Plentiful beatings, beset by villains, humiliation, and even abandonment. Needless to say, he had had nearly no progress since arriving in Grassveil Town. He needed to fix that. He had to get stronger. He had to get braver. He had to become more self-reliant. If his encounter with that Sableye from before was any indication, he needed to be able to better protect himself, not just rely on others.

That was why he found himself here, in the Pricklemist Hill. Here, it was rumored that Ghost Pokémon lived and floated about. The environment was rather creepy, giving credence to the rumors. This, he had decided back in his room at the Guild, was where he would go for some training on his own. His goal? To make it to the house at the center of the hill and return home without getting knocked out or scared off. A simple enough goal...but should this place hold the kinds of surprises that he expected it to, he figured that it would be a challenge for a Pokémon as weak and normally-cowardly as himself.

'I-I just hope I don't get eaten alive out here by a feral or something...' he murmured to himself in his thoughts. "Oh man, why did I have to think that...?" he whispered aloud, giving himself shivers. As he mumbled to himself, he continued forward, stepping further into the thick mist, timidly keeping both eyes and ears peeled for any sign of any potential threats.

[energy: 19-9 = 9]

Mist settled over the area that was Pricklemist Hill. Nearby, there was a pawniard walking through the fields that went by the name of rook. Rook had heard rumors that ghost pokemon lived in pricklemist, especially in the house on the top of the hill in the center of the area. Rook had heard the rumors and, since he was already looking for a certain ghost pokemon, decided to take the chance to check it out.why couldn't this house be in the middle of a forest, or at least somewhere near grassveil, rook grumbled. He had been walking towards the house for a while, or at least he hoped he had been. the mist surrounding him had made things hard to see, not to mention the fact that the night sky made things worse. But as unhappy as he was about the concept, the silence was rather soothing, and being away from all those people was rather nice "and if these rumors were true," rook said to himself, a sly grin creeping onto his face, "then that means there might be a small chance that HE was there." There was a gengar that he had been chasing for a while now, and as small as that chance was, it was still a chance, and that made things all the more reassuring.

After walking for a few minutes, rook could finally see the faint outline of a broken-down house. Rook gave a tired smile before he collapsed onto the ground seems like walking for half a day took its toll on me, rook thought to himself. As luck would have it, however, there was a small branch, with what looked to be oran berries attached to it. Rook smiled to himself, getting off the ground as he did so. "well what'ya know. looks like luck is going my way after all," Rook said, even though oran berries were quite common. A few feet behind him, there was a furret, which compared to the oran berries, were pretty rare. After seeing the oran berry branch and the pawniard, he couldn't help but play a trick on him. As rook bent down to grab one of the berries, a brown streak raced past him, carrying the branch in his mouth. Rook gave the furret a glare and threatened with "you can either put the berries down, or i can give you one hell of a beating." instead of replying back, the furret simply smiled back and took off. Rook, being unhappy with having to walk all the way there, was not going to give up the berries that easily. Ticked off as hell, Rook bolted towards the furret.

The chase lasted for a few minutes, before making a small stop at the edge of the hill where the house lay. The furret was at the edge of the hill, with a rather tired but defiant pawniard staring back. Not wanting to end his little trick, the furret ran down the hill, continuing the chase. Rook, hellbent on taking his berries back, and also planning to kick the furret all the way to grassveil, hadn't noticed the indent on the side of the cliff. Rook ended up tripping over said indent-

-and sailed straight towards a buizel.

Jet continued to cautiously make his way through the deep mist, keeping his senses tuned to the environment to pick up any sign of movement or other potentially threatening figures. Suddenly, as he was finally starting to approach the house, thanking his lucky stars that he managed to find the place at all...he stopped. There was a soft thud sound, as if there were a Pokémon running around not far from him. He stopped, completely paralyzed in sudden fear as he considered all of the possible Pokémon that could be ready to jump him from the fog. However, after a moment, the thudding faded and silence returned.

Had the Pokémon left him alone after all? Maybe they had merely been passing by? Or perhaps the Pokémon had deemed him prey unworthy of their time. Whatever the case, it seemed like he was safe for now. He let out a small sigh of relief and took his first step forward again, hoping to get to the house as quickly as possible so that he could leave just as quickly. However, just as he took that second step, something appeared in the mist. Some kind of shadow, approaching from the air. The sight quickly drew his gaze. But before he could react to it, it crashed through the mist.

"Wha-!?" he exclaimed, but much too late. The strange, metallic figure blasted through the mist like a missile and his body crashed into him. A flash of steel made Jet realize that whatever it was, it had blades on it, pointed dangerously close to his body. "AHH!!" he screamed, trying to avoid the blades as best he could while he crashed to the ground. Before he knew it, he was on his back, the metallic blades sticking up in the air beside him, apparently having landed on its back as well.

Jet took several deep breaths, trying to recover from the potentially near-death experience that he had just had. He cast his gaze over to the blades beside him and finally realized that they belonged to a Pawniard. The Pokémon must have fell down somehow, and they had crashed into each other. "E-excuse me, w-would you please watch where you're going next time...?" he mumbled, trying to sit up again.