After finishing his train of thought, Lance manipulated his character and stepped into the desert ruins.
The light on the screen instantly dimd, as if jumping from day to night in a single mont.
Everything around was pitch black. He imdiately had his character use Flash, and a soft, bright glow emanated from his Dottler's body, barely illuminating the surrounding darkness and revealing a small area ahead.
What ca into view were ancient, nearly weathered stone walls covered with mottled, difficult-to-decipher ancient symbols and faint traces of murals.
This place clearly hadn't seen visitors in ages.
What really gave him the creeps was how quiet it was—deathly silent. Apart from the faint sound of footsteps when he moved his character, there were no other sounds at all.
Not even the usual rustling of wild Pokémon common in the ga. The BGM was particularly eerie and tense too.
This abnormal silence made Lance instinctively more alert, and his controls beca more cautious.
The internal structure of the ruins was much more complex than he'd imagined, with many branching paths like a maze.
He could only rely on his instincts to randomly pick a direction and move forward.
Several tis he ended up in dead ends with nothing but so particularly large rocks and empty walls.
Occasionally he'd find so scattered items in corners—picking them up revealed Star Pieces or PP Ups.
These finds were quite disappointing.
Lance curled his lip. While these things could be sold for so money or had so use, they weren't at all what he'd traveled all this way for.
He even started wondering if Cynthia had rembered the wrong place, or if the ruins he'd co to weren't the sa ones she'd visited.
She'd ntioned the Regi stone tablets and symbols, but after wandering around all this ti, all he'd seen were broken rocks—not a single proper stone tablet in sight.
But having co all this way, he wasn't willing to give up. He continued manipulating his character through the maze-like passages.
Finally, after climbing a particularly long ascending staircase, he reached the top floor of this tower.
The space here suddenly beca much more open, looking like an ancient ceremonial hall with an aura of antiquity.
The mysterious symbols on the surrounding walls were carved much more densely and seed more complete. In the center of the hall stood an obviously man-made, raised stone platform that looked extraordinary!
Finally found it!
Lance's heart stirred, and he imdiately moved his character closer.
Sure enough, the mont his character approached the platform, a ga prompt appeared in the center of the screen: [There seems to be an ancient device here. Do you want to activate it?]
Bingo! Lance perked up, his earlier disappointnt swept away. He quickly pressed the interact button.
The stone platform slowly revealed several faint beams of light connecting to several particularly thick stone pillars around the hall. Each pillar had a symbol on it—lightning, water droplets—seemingly representing different types.
At the sa ti, a simple interface popped up, indicating that these pillars needed to be lit in a specific order.
A puzzle? Lance tried randomly selecting an order and clicking.
No response.
Wrong? He tried another common type advantage sequence.
Still no response.
The stone platform remained quietly inactive, showing him no rcy.
Lance was sowhat stumped. He manipulated his character to rotate the view and carefully observed the densely packed symbols on the walls.
After looking for a while, he suddenly noticed that the outlines of several symbols seed sowhat similar to features on Dragon-type Pokémon he was familiar with!
For instance, one symbol looked very much like the crystal on Dratini or Dragonair's neck, and another resembled the arc of Salance's majestic wings.
Could it be arranged according to Dragon-type related symbolism?
With a trial-and-error ntality, based on how strongly these symbols gave him a "Dragon-type" feeling, he attempted to arrange a lighting sequence.
When he lit the last pillar, the entire stone platform suddenly trembled, then emitted a soft but dazzling light!
The light gradually converged, and in the center of the platform, a small pedestal rose up.
On the pedestal lay two gems of different colors, both containing wonderful brilliance inside. Though only marble-sized, they radiated an astonishing aura.
At this mont, before Lance's eyes, accompanied by cheerful music, ga prompts appeared in succession:
[Obtained "Salancite"!]
[Obtained "Gyaradosite"!]
ga Stones!!
And two of them!
Lance nearly jumped out of his chair, his heart surging with trendous excitent.
Having had previous experience, he understood very clearly how valuable these things were.
He quickly opened his bag and selected the sharper-looking Salancite with red and blue patterns inside, checking its description.
[Salancite: A stone containing special power that can resonate with the corresponding Pokémon, triggering power beyond evolution. It is proof of the bond between Trainer and Pokémon.]
Reading this description, Lance could already envision his Salance transforming into ga Salance under the glow of the evolution stone.
Though he didn't know what it would look like after evolution, it would definitely be a more powerful form surpassing ordinary evolution!
He could barely wait to try it imdiately.
Excitedly, he selected the Salance in his party, then found the option to equip the evolution stone. Just as his finger was about to press down, he suddenly froze.
Wait—
Sothing seed off?
The smile on Lance's face stiffened. He suddenly rembered sothing very, very crucial.
ga Evolution not only required the Pokémon to carry the corresponding ga Stone, but also needed sothing else, right?
Uh... what was it called again?
Lance recalled the scenes he'd witnessed before.
Right! The Key Stone!
The thing called a "Key Stone" that the Trainer themselves needed to possess!
He only had the ga Stone for the Pokémon, but not the Key Stone the Trainer needed to activate evolution and create resonance.
Having just the ga Stone now was useless...
Lance rubbed his forehead, sowhat speechless.
So he'd gotten excited for nothing.
This broken ruin—why give only ga Stones without the Key Stone??
Co on, don't you know what it ans to go the extra mile? If you're going to give sothing, why not give everything together?
So now the problem circled back.
Where on earth was he supposed to find a Key Stone?
At the sa ti, on another side, Cynthia was looking at the [Gracidea Flower] in her bag that emitted a faint rainbow glow.
The effects of this flower were nothing short of miraculous, but beyond that, there was another related matter.
After thinking it over, she decided to contact Iono, who had given her the seed.
She opened her contacts, found Iono's number and called. The phone screen switched to the call interface and was quickly answered.
"Hello? Cynthia?" Iono's lively voice ca through.
"Yes, Iono, about the Gracidea Flower seed you ntioned before," Cynthia said, "I've grown it."
"?! Didn't you say you needed to find sowhere really cold? Where did you grow it? Quick, tell how you did it!" Iono's voice imdiately rose with excitent.
"The seed was obtained from a flower-loving lady in Mauville City," Cynthia explained simply.
"As for the planting location, it requires extrely low temperatures.
I planted it in Shoal Cave. Sothing special happens inside there, and the temperature is very low."
"Shoal Cave... okay, okay!" Iono sounded very excited. "Thanks, Cynthia! I'll figure out a way to get one right away!"
"You're welco. If you encounter that Pokémon again," Cynthia paused, then added, "this flower's healing effects look very strong.
It should be able to heal its injuries and improve your relationship with it."
"Got it! I'll keep an eye out!" Iono answered seriously, then returned to her cheerful tone.
"By the way, Cynthia, how far have you gotten? Have you cleared the seventh Gym yet?"
"I just arrived at Mossdeep City and am preparing to challenge the Gym here," Cynthia answered truthfully.
"So fast! It'll probably take a while to reach Mossdeep City... Can't fall too far behind you guys..."
"I'll contact you later then, Cynthia!"
With that, Iono hurriedly hung up.
Cynthia had just put away her communicator and was preparing to head toward Mossdeep Gym when another call request ca in—from Lance.
She pressed the answer button.
"Cynthia!" Lance's voice sounded sowhat urgent. "Let ask you sothing. How did you get your Key Stone?"
"Key Stone?" Cynthia found the question a bit strange. "An NPC naturally gives it to you in the ga's story. Don't you have one?"
"No!"
Lance's tone was full of helplessness.
"No one's given one! And I just went to the desert ruins—I didn't see any Regi ruins at all, but I did get two ga Stones!"
He added, "Salance and Gyarados ones."
"Hm?" Cynthia raised an eyebrow slightly, thinking it over.
"From the looks of it, the storylines we're triggering in the ga are indeed different.
Perhaps players who chose a starter and those like you who didn't face different storylines and obtain different items."
She paused, feeling this was actually a good thing. "This is fine too. We can pool together more different information and get a more comprehensive understanding of various aspects."
"True," Lance seed to accept this explanation, though his tone still carried so frustration. After all, having ga Stones he couldn't use was quite stifling.
"By the way," Cynthia rembered the important matter, "speaking of which, have you heard of an organization called Team Plasma, either in the ga or outside?"
"Team Plasma?" Lance paused, thinking carefully. "No, never heard of it. Is it a new organization in the ga?"
"Yes," Cynthia's voice beca more serious. "I've already compiled what happened at Shoal Cave into a report and submitted it to the League, suggesting they investigate thoroughly.
After all, it involves Ultra Wormholes—we can't be careless. I hope the real world can dig up so useful intelligence."
"Understood, I'll keep an eye out." Lance replied, then as if rembering sothing, reminded her, "Oh right, if you want to catch Dragon-type Pokémon, you can check out teor Falls.
That's where I caught my Bagon. Goomy seems to spawn there too—though it's low level, its final evolution is also Dragon-type."
"teor Falls? Okay, I've noted it. I'll consider it."
Cynthia responded.
"Though I've been trying to build a Rain team... Anyway, I won't keep you. I'm about to challenge Mossdeep Gym."
"Mossdeep Gym?" Lance froze for a mont, imdiately recalling his trauma of being dominated by those siblings and their ga Gardevoir. Unpleasant mories flooded back.
"Cynthia, let warn you—that Gym is extrely difficult to challenge, completely different from all the previous Gyms.
It's a Double Battle, and they have great coordination and strategies, plus..."
Lance roughly explained the Gym's setup to Cynthia.
"I see... I understand."
Cynthia listened and seed sowhat surprised, nodding.
"I'll go try first. We'll talk later."
With that, she hung up and turned her gaze toward the distinctively designed Mossdeep Gym ahead, manipulating her character and walking in without hesitation.
A new Gym challenge had begun.
anwhile, in Team Rocket's secret base, Giovanni had just finished a grueling battle.
He leaned back in his wide chair, the screen displaying [Challenge Victory].
But his face showed little joy—instead, he wore a thoughtful expression.
His starter Pokémon was Weedle. Many might look down on this common Bug-type Pokémon, but Giovanni saw its trendous potential and fearso offensive capabilities.
After so ti training and evolving, his Weedle had successfully evolved into the far more formidable Beedrill!
Sharp stingers, a streamlined body, incredible speed and attack power, Giovanni was very satisfied with this Beedrill's performance.
In the Gym battle just now, he'd relied on it to directly crush his opponent's Cradily and take out more than half of Archen's HP.
Finally, with the Pidgeotto and Shroomish he'd caught in the forest, he'd successfully ended the Gym battle.
The difficulty of this Gym was indeed high. Even his first few attempts had failed, and he'd only cleared it after multiple tries.
"From the looks of it... it's still sowhat interesting." Giovanni muttered to himself.
He reached out and gently stroked the back of the Persian lying at his feet. Persian comfortably closed its eyes, purring contentedly.
Moreover, he'd discovered that this ga called "Erald", its internal Pokémon ecology, type advantages, move combinations, even the vague "bond" setting between Trainers and Pokémon, all bore a high degree of similarity to the rules of the real world.
This was definitely not a simple entertainnt product conjured from imagination.
The knowledge system behind it was astonishingly vast. Even so details were things he, the titan ruling Kanto's underworld, had never heard of...
Honestly, he was now considering a question.
Should he have Team Rocket's mbers... also invest themselves into this ga?
User Comments
0 comments from readers