Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: The Forest Temple (Ch2)

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Corrupted Forest Temple
B1F


	“W-what just happened?” asked Clefairy. She had been going down the stairs, surrounded by darkness, but as soon as she blinked, she found herself standing on a floor of dirt in a rectangular room barely illuminated by a few small torches set high on stone brick walls. The ceiling was of smooth stone, and stood a dozen feet high. Clefairy noticed that Cyndaquil and Skitty were also in the room, currently standing in front of a corridor at the other end of the room. The corridor had a few more torches on its walls, and stretched into the distance before turning in one direction. Clefairy hurried towards the two Delvers, getting their attention.

	“Oh, good—you’re here,” Skitty said.

	“We were hoping you didn’t leave us,” Cyndaquil added. “Anyway, it looks like there’s a mystery dungeon inside the Forest Temple after all. Those stairs were its entrance.”

	“A-a mystery dungeon?” Clefairy stammered. “Seriously? I didn’t think we’d have to go into one!”

	“We came here to find out if a mystery dungeon had spawned in the temple,” Cyndaquil noted. “That was the main reason for us coming here. It was a very real possibility that we’d have to enter one.”

	“Still… I was hoping we wouldn’t find one,” Clefairy said, stepping back, her voice shaking. “I don’t think I can go through one of these. If you two want to, go ahead, but I’ll just go back up the stairs and wait for you.”

	The Fairy-type turned and returned to the stairs. Or, she would have if the stairs were there anymore. Instead, she found herself looking across an empty room, completely devoid of stairs, and she stepped back in confusion.

	“T-the stairs are gone!” she cried. “We’re stuck in here!”

	“That’s how mystery dungeons work,” Cyndaquil explained. “Once you’re in, you’re trapped until you reach the end or faint.”

	Clefairy turned and looked back and forth between her companions fearfully. “You mean we have to go all the way through this place to make it out?”

	“Yeah, but don’t worry. We’re professionals,” Skitty said reassuringly.

	“Actually, we’re still in training,” Cyndaquil pointed out. “That's why we're still in the guild.”

	“Details, details,” said Skitty, waving a paw dismissively. “Still, we’ve gone through countless dungeons before. We know what we’re doing. Having to go through another one is no big deal. We’ll make it through this, Clefairy. Just stay close, and we’ll all be fine.”

	Despite Skitty’s words of encouragement, Clefairy was still frightened. She had heard enough about mystery dungeons to know that they were very dangerous, and difficult to navigate. And even though being a Watcher in this day and age meant that it was a real possibility that she would eventually be required to enter a Temple that had turned into a dungeon, she had been hoping that such a thing would never happen to her. She was afraid of what would happen in this dungeon, and she feared that she might not make it out in one piece. But despite all these fears, as she looked at her companions, something in her changed. Their prior experience with mystery dungeons caused them both to exude an air of confidence, and their courage reassured her, making her feel more determined herself. So long as she stayed with the two Delvers, she felt better about her odds in this place.

	“Okay… I’ll do it,” she said. “I’ll go with you.”

	The Fire-type smiled at her. “Good. We’ll be fine. Trust me. Now, this corridor is the only way out of this room, so let’s see where it goes. I’ll lead the way.”

	Cyndaquil began to walk down the corridor of the mystery dungeon, carefully igniting his back to provide some light, and the other two Pokémon fell in behind him, staying enough steps behind him to avoid getting hurt by the flames. Down the corridor they went, taking a few right-angle turns. Skitty and Clefairy had their ears perked up, listening intently for any signs of trouble. The dungeon was mostly silent, however, the only noise being the quiet crackling of the torches, the sizzling of Cyndaquil’s burning back, and the echoing footsteps of the trio.

	Soon, though, they began to hear something else: a strange rattling sound echoing down the corridor. They slowed down, unsure of what could be making that sound. Cyndaquil extinguished the flames on his back, not wanting to draw attention to himself and his companions, even though that meant they now had to rely on the dim light of the wall torches. They proceeded down the corridor, and went around one final turn to find themselves looking into another room. They approached it and stood in the corridor, a few paces away from the room itself. Skitty and Clefairy peeked around Cyndaquil to examine the room, and the first thing that the three Pokémon saw was that the room was occupied. A single Maractus was hopping about in the middle of the room, and with each motion, it emitted the rattling sound they had heard earlier. The Pokémon had its back turned to the trio, having not heard their approach, and Cyndaquil’s flames flared up higher as he slowly snuck into the room.

	“I’ll handle this,” Cyndaquil said to his companions. He took a deep breath, and then opened his mouth and launched a blast of fire from it at the Grass-type, hitting it in the back. The Maractus reeled from the attack, but recovered surprisingly quickly and spun around, wasting no time in charging at the Fire-type. It hopped along the ground, sending out a cacophonous rattle as it bounced along, and Cyndaquil prepared to launch another Flamethrower attack as the Maractus closed in. However, the Maractus used Pin Missile before he had the chance, hurling a series of spines from its body at Cyndaquil. Though the move was not very effective, it made Cyndaquil wince and hesitate as the spines both grazed him and stabbed into him, and his Flamethrower fizzled out before he could use it. The Maractus closed the distance further, swinging its spiky arms wildly in preparation to strike Cyndaquil with a Needle Arm attack.

	Seeing the danger, Skitty leapt into action, jumping past Cyndaquil with Fake Out and hitting the Maractus in the head, narrowly missing its arms. The Grass-type fell over backwards, flailing its arms and crying out. It landed on the ground, unconscious and unmoving. The Normal-type exhaled, calming herself after the close call, and turned to look at Cyndaquil, who was struggling with his stubby arms to pull out a pin that was stuck in his shoulder. Skitty walked over and bit the pin, yanking it out for him. He winced as she did, but she used her long tail to open one of her bags and knock a blue Oran Berry out of it towards Cyndaquil, in order to heal him. The Fire-type caught the berry in his mouth and ate it, and the wound on his shoulder, as well as several smaller cuts from the pins that grazed him, healed up in seconds.

	“Are you okay?” she asked.

	Cyndaquil nodded at Skitty. “Yeah, I’m fine. It’ll take more than that to stop me. You know that.”

	“I know,” Skitty said. “But still... I...” Her voice trailed off into a whisper. "I just hate seeing you get hurt.”

	“Aww,” Clefairy suddenly cooed from nearby, making the two Delvers whip around to look at her in surprise. “You really do like each other.”

	“Well, yeah. We told you that already,” Cyndaquil said. “We might argue sometimes, but we’re a team. And we look out for each other.”

	“But don’t get too mushy,” Skitty said to the Fairy-type before turning to her partner. “Anyway, Cyndaquil, let’s get going.”

	With Cyndaquil in the lead, the two Delvers and the Watcher walked to another corridor leading out of the room they fought the Maractus in, and proceeded down it, listening for any more enemies. They did not hear any more rattling like the Maractus had given off, but that did not confirm that the hallway was devoid of enemies. Clefairy, taking up the rear, felt that this was especially true, considering the strange feeling of being watched that she was getting. She perked her ears up, listening intently. She could have sworn that she had just heard something.

	Quickly, she spun around, and her gaze fell upon a pair of glowing red lights hovering in the air right behind her. An instant later, the shape of a Pokémon materialized around the red lights, which became its eyes. Clefairy recognized it as a Misdreavus, and jumped back as the Ghost-type let out a shrill screech. The two Delvers turned around at the sound, and saw what was going on. Thinking quickly, Cyndaquil jumped past Skitty and breathed a Flamethrower attack past Clefairy, striking the Misdreavus in the face before it could attack. The Fairy-type stumbled to the side to avoid the flames, shouting out in surprise as they barely missed her on their way to the Misdreavus. The flames did not touch her, though, and only hit the Ghost-type. The attack did enough damage to make it faint, and it wailed as it floated down to the ground, unconscious.

	“Looks like there are Ghost-types here, too,” Skitty noted as the Misdreavus, in a decidedly ghostly fashion, faded away into nothing. “Cyndaquil, try to remember what types of Pokémon we encounter here. It’ll be important to include in the report back at the guild.”

	“Thanks for reminding me,” the Fire-type said. “I almost forgot that we’ll have to write a report about this place. This is a new dungeon, after all—it’ll be important to record how long it is, and what Pokémon are found here, and all that. But we can take care of that later. For now, let’s just focus on getting out of here.”

	The trio continued down the corridor, which seemed a lot longer than the last one they had taken. As they walked, Clefairy spoke up, to break the oppressive near-silence of the dungeon. “You know, Cyndaquil… I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m a little surprised to see that you know Flamethrower. That’s a strong move, and you’re still unevolved. You must have trained a lot to learn it, huh?”

	“Exactly,” Cyndaquil said with a grin. “You go into dungeons as much as Skitty and I have, and you learn some strong moves with all the experience you gain. And speaking of moves: out of curiosity, what moves do you know, Clefairy?”

	“Pound, Defense Curl, Growl, and Metronome,” the Fairy-type said with a smile.

	“Of course,” Cyndaquil groaned. “You can use Metronome. That’s good and all, but please don’t use it unless the situation can’t possibly get any worse, okay? I don’t want you to end up using Self-Destruct and taking us all out with you.”

	Clefairy gave the Fire-type a quick nod. “Got it. I won’t use Metronome unless it’s a real emergency.”

	“Which, hopefully, we won’t be faced with anytime soon,” Cyndaquil said. He and his two companions entered another room, complete with dirt floor, stone brick walls and ceiling, and torches on the walls, just like the other rooms of the dungeon. The room appeared to be empty, save for a small blue berry on the ground. Cyndaquil scurried over and grabbed it, tossing it back to Skitty, who opened one of her bags and let the berry fall in.

	“Was that an Oran Berry?” Clefairy asked.

	“Yeah,” Cyndaquil replied, as Skitty closed up the bag again. “I guess that makes up for the one we had to use after fighting the Maractus.” He examined the room along with his companions, and pointed out the two corridors branching off from it. “Anyway, it looks like there are two ways to go—left or right. Skitty, which way should we take?”

	“Let’s go to the right,” Skitty replied, taking the lead. “That way, even if it’s wrong, I can still say I picked the right path.”

	Clefairy giggled, but Cyndaquil just sighed. “Do you really have to say that every single time you choose to go to the right at a junction?” he asked. His partner did not answer him, however, and just continued going down the corridor. Her two companions followed closely behind her, moving single-file down the dark hallway. They felt relieved when the corridor turned and revealed another room straight ahead. They hurried towards the room, looking forward to getting out of the cramped hallway.

	But as soon as Skitty stepped into the room, all three Pokémon became much less enthusiastic about the room.

	The instant that Skitty set a paw on the dirt floor of the room, a veritable legion of wild Pokémon appeared out of nowhere as if on cue, crowding the room. They appeared to all be Ghost- and Grass-types, but there were so many of them in the room that, combined with the dim light of the room, it was difficult to tell their exact species. What the trio could tell, however, was that every single wild Pokémon was glaring at them menacingly. Skitty and Cyndaquil stared in stunned silence at the room, while Clefairy took a step back in shock.

	“What is this?” Clefairy asked, clearly terrified. She was frozen in place, her gaze darting back and forth between the many wild Pokémon gathered in the room.

	“It’s a Monster House!” Skitty announced. “Apparently I picked the wrong path after all.”

	“You think?” growled Cyndaquil in annoyance.

	“There must be dozens of wild Pokémon here! What do we do?!” Clefairy cried, looking at the angry mob of wild Pokémon swarming the room.

	Skitty glanced back behind her at her two companions with a somewhat nervous look on her face. “Um… okay, just stay calm, everyone. It may look bad—”

	“Yeah, it does! It looks terrible!” Clefairy shouted. “I’m getting out of here!”

	The Fairy-type turned and was about to flee, but Cyndaquil shouted at her to wait, and she did, looking back at him confusedly. “What do you mean, ‘wait’?” she asked. “We need to get out of here before they attack us!”

	“Trust me, just stay put,” Cyndaquil said. “If you don’t do anything, the wild Pokémon won’t either. As soon as one of us makes a move, it’ll become a brawl. So, if you just stay still, we have all the time we need to think about what to do.”

	“That’s right,” said Skitty.

	Clefairy looked at the two Delvers and sighed. “I guess I trust you… but instead of running, what should we do?”

	Skitty opened one of her bags, fishing around inside of it with her tail in search of a particular item. “First, I’ll use a Petrify Orb to paralyze all these Pokémon, and then Cyndaquil can jump into the fray—”

	“I hate this plan already,” Cyndaquil grumbled.

	“Let me finish, Cyndaquil! You should jump into the fray and use Lava Plume. That’ll do damage to any Pokémon close to you, and hopefully, you’ll get a few of them to faint. It’s the only area-of-effect move any of us know.”

	The Fairy-type raised a finger, and slowly waved it back and forth. “You know, I might be able to call up an area-of-effect move if I used Metron—”

	“Please don’t,” said Cyndaquil, cutting her off. “That’s way too risky. I think it’s best that you and Skitty stick to using your single-target attacks. And as for me: Skitty, I’m not sure if using Lava Plume is the best idea. Yeah, it hits multiple targets, but if I miss with it, all the Pokémon I missed will stop being petrified.”

	“Then don’t miss,” Skitty said bluntly. Seeing Cyndaquil’s frown, she continued. “Look, I’m trying to conserve our energy. This dungeon is brand-new—nobody knows how long it is, or what enemies we might have to face. If you can take out several enemies with one attack, that will help out a lot. We only have one Elixir between all three of us. We need to be careful about how much energy we use, and make sure we don’t run out of power for our moves.”

	“Alright, let’s just get on with it,” Cyndaquil said, looking at the gathered enemies in the room as Skitty finally located the Petrify Orb she was looking for. With a flick of her tail, the orb flew out of the bag and into the room, landing amongst the crowd of wild Pokémon. The instant it struck the ground, a bright flash of light filled the room, and as it faded, the trio saw that all of the wild Pokémon were now completely immobilized, aside from twitching every so often.

	Skitty walked into the room, passing between various wild Pokémon, who did nothing to stop her. “Looks like they’re all paralyzed,” she noted as she examined the wild Pokémon. “That’s good. Cyndaquil, find a good spot to use Lava Plume. Clefairy and I will start looking for Pokémon to attack ourselves.”

	The Fire-type nodded and disappeared behind a group of wild Pokémon, while Skitty and Clefairy went a different way and looked for a good Pokémon to start fighting.

	“This is a bit surreal,” Clefairy noted as they walked amongst the paralyzed wild Pokémon. “They’re all just standing there. Even though they’re hostile, they can’t do anything.

	“They’ll be able to as soon as we damage them, though,” Skitty said, “so be careful.”

	“As soon as we damage them, huh?” Clefairy suddenly stopped walking, a thought having struck her. “Hang on, Skitty.”

	The Normal-type glanced over at her. “What’s up?” she asked.

	“I just realized: we can’t do any damage to the Ghost-types in here, can we? The only attack I have is Pound, which is Normal-type. And you’re a Skitty, so if you have Normalize, all your attacks will become Normal-type too. So, what do we do about all the Ghost-types in this room?”

	“Oh, let’s just let Cyndaquil take care of them,” Skitty said. “We can focus on the Grass-types instead. He always takes care of ghosts whenever we find any, because I do have Normalize, like you said. Speaking of which… watch this.”

	Skitty turned to a nearby Bounsweet, frozen in place due to the Petrify Orb, and opened her mouth. A ball of pulsing blue energy formed in front of her, but it quickly turned white and then flew at the enemy, morphing and splitting into a series of pulsing rings as it flew. The Bounsweet was struck dead-on and fell over, unconscious.

	“That was Water Pulse,” Skitty explained. “I learned it from a TM. As the name implies, it’s usually Water-type, but as you might have noticed, it looked different from a usual Water Pulse. That’s because I have Normalize, which means it’s a Normal-type attack for me. And that means it’s not resisted by Grass-types, which is useful here.”

	“It’s unlucky because of the ghosts, though,” Clefairy noted.

	“Well, hey, at least I get STAB off it,” Skitty said. “So I’ve got that going for me, which is nice.”

	As they spoke, they approached a Carnivine who was hovering motionless in the air, staring straight forward. Clefairy and Skitty walked to opposite sides of the Pokémon, and prepared to attack one after the other. Skitty began by pawing at the ground, then she unleashed a Tackle on the Carnivine. The Grass-type drifted back from the impact, and shook its head vigorously before glaring at Skitty and whipping its vines at her, the attack having undone its petrification. The Normal-type dodged the Carnivine’s Vine Whip as Clefairy jumped up and swung her tail at the back of the enemy’s head. The strike made it collapse to the ground in a faint, and Clefairy floated down to the ground, landing softly and hurrying after Skitty as the Normal-type made her way towards the next closest Grass-type.

	“See? We can do this,” Skitty told her companion reassuringly. “Just focus on the Grass-types, and Cyndaquil can finish the Ghost-types for us.”

	“I just hope he’s okay on his own,” Clefairy said.

	“He’ll be fine,” Skitty said. “He always is.” But after a pause, she added under her breath, “Usually.”

	While his two companions were busy walking around the room and battling the wild Pokémon one-by-one, Cyndaquil snuck between a pair of Grass-types, getting into a position surrounded by enemies to use his attack on. He turned about in a circle and observed the various Grass- and Ghost-type Pokémon around him. There were five of them surrounding him: a Tangela, a Dusclops, a Cottonee, a Phantump, and a Bounsweet. They all stood (or hovered, in some cases) motionless. Even their eyes were paralyzed, and they all stared off into the distance, not able to look at the Fire-type who had walked among them. It was a bit unsettling, but Cyndaquil ignored it. He needed to focus on using his area-of-effect attack, Lava Plume.

	The Fire-type took a deep breath and let it out, steeling himself and concentrating on summoning up enough power to use Lava Plume. The orange patches of fur on his back glowed brightly, and after a few moments, flames erupted from them. Cyndaquil hunched over, and a huge column of flames burst out from his back with a loud roar, rising to the ceiling and falling back down like rain over the enemy Pokémon gathered around him.

	Cyndaquil looked up, panting slightly from the effort of using the powerful move. And he immediately wished he hadn’t when he saw all five enemies he had tried to attack glaring at him, having avoided the Lava Plume completely.

	“This is why I hate following your plans, Skitty,” he muttered as the five Pokémon lunged for him at once.

	His screams reached his two companions, who turned to see the Cyndaquil running as fast as his short legs could carry him around the room’s perimeter, chased by a quintet of wild Pokémon.

	“Cyndaquil!” Skitty shouted, rushing towards her partner. “We’re coming!”

	Clefairy jumped into the air and hovered after Skitty, and the two of them ducked and weaved through the crowd of petrified Pokémon to reach Cyndaquil in moments. They got between the fire-type and the five wild Pokémon chasing him, standing in their way and causing the gang of five Pokémon to stop and glare at them menacingly, yet warily. Cyndaquil turned around and jumped between his companions, lining up with them to face the five enemies.

	“Thanks,” he said breathlessly. “That Lava Plume missed all of them. I really wish that move was more accurate.”

	“Well, it does have the potential to hit multiple targets, so it’s not too bad of a move,” Skitty said. “But let’s focus on taking out these five Pokémon. Cyndaquil, you take the ghosts. Clefairy and I will focus on the Grass-types. Let’s go!”

	Cyndaquil and Clefairy nodded, and as the five wild Pokémon watched them warily, the three Pokémon split up, Cyndaquil staying in place while Skitty and Clefairy moved to the sides to surround the wild Pokémon. The quintet finally lashed out at the trio, hurling a combination of Ghost- and Grass-type attacks, but the three companions were able to avoid or withstand the attacks and retaliate with their own.

	Cyndaquil’s back ignited, and he breathed a Flamethrower at the Phantump, dealing super-effective damage and making it faint in one hit. Before it had hit the ground, Cyndaquil had turned to the Dusclops and launched another Flamethrower attack. As they fought, Clefairy flew forward and swung her tail at the nearest enemy, the Bounsweet, causing it to stumble. She followed up with a second Pound to knock it out.

	Meanwhile, Skitty had engaged the Cottonee. She lunged at it with Fake Out, taking a Razor Leaf in return before a second Fake Out made the Grass-type faint. Despite having suffered a cut on her cheek due to the Razor Leaf, she wasted no time in turning towards the last Pokémon, the Tangela, preparing to use her Normalized Water Pulse on it. But she hesitated when she saw that its eyes were closed in concentration, and it appeared that some of its vines were going into the ground. An instant later, she understood why, as several thin blue vines abruptly shot out of the ground around her, arced over her, and plunged back into the ground. They then slammed down, and she let out a cry of pain and surprise as the vines tightened into a net that pinned her to the ground in a Bind attack.

	Cyndaquil heard her, and looked away from his Dusclops opponent to see what was wrong. As soon as he turned away from his foe, however, the Dusclops hit him in the back with a Shadow Punch. The attack launched him into a paralyzed Misdreavus, and the Fire-type bounced off of it and landed with a grunt on the dirt floor of the room. The Misdreavus was knocked out of its paralysis, and looked down at the Fire-type on the ground below it, glaring and launching a Psybeam at him. He grunted as the pink and purple beam struck him, squinting his eyes even harder than usual as the psychic assault dealt damage to his very mind.

	Meanwhile, Clefairy, the only one of the three companions left standing, glanced nervously back and forth between her two comrades. Cyndaquil was unable to get to his feet, as the Misdreavus was striking him repeatedly with Psybeams, and Skitty was crying out as the Tangela tightened the vines around her, pushing her painfully into the dirt ground and restricting her breathing. And meanwhile, the Dusclops that Cyndaquil had not had a chance to defeat was slowly advancing on Clefairy. All three Pokémon, especially the two Delvers, were in serious trouble, but Clefairy couldn’t help both of her companions. None of her attacks could hit two enemies at once.

	Unless she got lucky with a Metronome.

	She sighed. Cyndaquil had told her not to use Metronome, but he also said that only applied if the situation could not possibly get worse. And she couldn’t think of a plausible way that this particular situation could get worse. If she tried to help one of her companions, the other would be defeated—assuming the Dusclops didn’t reach her first. She looked at the approaching Ghost-type, which was moved very slowly, and realized she was running out of time. She had to try to summon a move that hit multiple foes. And even if she summoned a move that hit just one target, at least she would be able to use it to help one of her companions. The chance of Metronome letting her hit multiple foes was worth the risk of it potentially giving her a bad move, and so she waggled a finger and hoped for the best.

	After a moment, Clefairy began to glow yellow, and the name of the upcoming move came to her. “Discharge!” she shouted. As she did, a shockwave of electricity shot out from her, striking the Dusclops, Tangela, and Misdreavus alike. The Dusclops fell over backwards, the attack having knocked it out after all the damage it sustained from Cyndaquil earlier. In contrast, the Tangela was not knocked out, but the Discharge damaged and distracted it enough for its vines to loosen from atop Skitty, and she was able to squirm out of them and fire a Normal-type Water Pulse at the Grass-type, dealing enough damage in conjunction with the Discharge to knock it out. Meanwhile, the Misdreavus drifted away from Cyndaquil as it was wounded by the Discharge, and the Fire-type finally had the chance to flare up the flames on his back and unleash a Lava Plume. This time, the attack hit, knocking the Misdreavus out. The ghost slowly dropped to the ground and faded away, defeated.

	Cyndaquil and Skitty got to their feet, and looked over at Clefairy. The Fairy-type was beaming, and grinned at her companions.
“You’re alive!” she said.

	“What did you just do?” asked Cyndaquil, confused by what had just happened.

	“I used Metronome, and that let me use Discharge, which hit both of the Pokémon that were attacking you!” Clefairy explained. “I’m just glad Metronome let me use a move that hits multiple targets. That was a lucky break.”

	“Wait, you used Discharge?” Skitty asked. “But that means…”

	A low and ominous growling echoed throughout the room, coming from myriad distinct voices. The three Pokémon fearfully looked about, and realized that every single enemy in the room that had been rendered immobile by the Petrify Orb was now back to normal. And none of them looked very happy.

	“Discharge damages every enemy in the room,” Skitty explained, speaking slowly and shakily. “And like I mentioned before: if an enemy paralyzed by a Petrify Orb takes damage, the paralysis wears off.”

	“And we didn’t pack a second Petrify Orb,” Cyndaquil muttered. “So we need to fight every single one of these enemies… at once.”

	The two Delvers glared at their Watcher companion, who looked back and forth between them nervously. “But I only used Metronome because I thought the situation couldn’t possibly get worse! Just like you said earlier!”

	“Well, guess what?” Cyndaquil shouted at her. “It just got worse!”


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