Chapter 3: The Test

Gracedia Fields Floor One

The moment Jeana and Lina entered the dungeon, everything immediately shifted. Hills rose up on all sides, making it impossible to go back the way they had come. The sun, though it beat down hotly and provided plenty of light, was not visible in the sky, and there was an absence of clouds in the sky as well. The air was very still, without any trace of a breeze.

Jeana squinted her eyes. A haze of pollen was visible drifting all around the two Psychic types, and the sickly scent of flowers choked the air. Flowers of all varieties grew in clumps that dotted the bright green grass. Bird Pokemon chirped in the distance, and the hum of insect wings was audible as well.

It was the epitome of the perfect summer day. But something in Jeana’s stomach twisted, telling her there was something about all this which was fundamentally wrong.

Jeana rarely trusted her gut instincts, and considered logic and reason to be the only good things to make decisions based off of. She found her thoughts drifting back to Eona.

Lina turned to Jeana with her braids on where her hips would be. “So! Have you ever been in a mystery dungeon before?”

Jeana blinked, Lina’s voice drawing her out of her thoughts. Jeana shook her head.

“Guess I’ve gotta go through the tutorial lecture thing, then,” the chingling sighed. “Right then, so first thing to know: mystery dungeons are fricking weird. We’re still researching them. But we know that mystery dungeons are places where significant events involving Legendaries happened. Like, their Legendary-energy started leaking all over the place and seriously messed up time and space and reality itself, basically. Or something. I don’t do the research.”

Jeana nodded. “...That’s interesting background information, but how does it help me with the mock job request?” she asked.

“I’m getting to that,” Lina huffed. “Anyways! Time is warped. So time passes by way faster in here. You heal faster, you tire and grow hungrier faster. Space is warped, every time you enter a mystery dungeon it looks different. And reality is kind of… broken. Mystery dungeons get in your head if you stay in them too long. These illusionary Pokemon that don’t really exist, we call them a dungeon’s ‘Puppets’, will go after you and try to attack and kill you. If you attack a puppet long enough, though, it’ll vanish. Then there’s feral and civil Pokemon that wander in here. If you stay in a dungeon for too long, it gets in your head and makes you attack other Pokemon who wander in. The Puppets’ll ignore you, though. If there’s a Pokemon that’s spent a particularly long amount of time in the dungeon, that Pokemon might become the ‘Mouth’ of a dungeon. Basically they’re the big boss of the dungeon, they’re the strongest dungeon inhabitant, sentient and they can create and control the Puppets. Basically they’re that dungeon as a single Pokemon.”

Jeana nodded. “How long until the dungeon starts getting into someone’s head?”

“It takes a few weeks,” Lina said. “And in some cases a Pokemon is strong enough to resist that, in that case if the puppets, civils, and ferals can’t beat that Pokemon then this weird wind called the ‘Breath of the Dungeon’ kicks them out.”

Jeana nodded. “And… Solaris mentioned floors?”

“The dungeon changes in appearance subtly from area to area. We call those areas ‘floors’,” Lina said. “And you get from floor to floor through the stairs.”

Jeana blinked. “Um… Thank you for the information.”

“If you are going to get into the Guild, and you know nothing about dungeons, then you’re going to be really useless,” Lina said.

Jeana frowned slightly.

“...So you should probably start moving. If that’s going to be a thing that you want to happen,” Lina prompted.

Jeana nodded, and started padding forwards, down a stretch of the floor where two hills rose on either side of her, like the walls of a corridor. Soon the hills opened up into a more spacious area. There was one other exit to this part, a corridor similar in appearance to the one she and Lina had just left. In front of the corridor, however, was a problem.

There was a Pokemon sleeping directly in front of the second corridor. A small off-white creature with a red and white poke ball colored cap on its head was using the cap as a sort of pillow. It leaned against one of the walls of the corridor, but most of it was in the room Jeana and Lina had entered. The little Pokemon’s chest rose and fell, and it made a ‘foo… foo…’ kind of sound as it exhaled.

“It’s an enemy Pokemon! Oh nooooooo!” Lina gasped, clutching her stubby little limbs at her face.

Jeana chose not to react to the chingling. Instead she frowned slightly, focusing on the Pokemon.

She recognized this species. It was called a foongus, and was both Grass and Poison types. It was unevolved, and fairly weak.

In theory, it should have been no problem for Jeana to defeat the foongus. She had the superior typing, and all advantages sentient thought granted her.

In practice… She was unsure of how to use moves. She had been a human for most of her life, and only very recently become an espurr, after all. Jeana sighed, looking down at her paws in the stirrings of frustration. How could she fight like a Pokemon if she…

...Wait…

Jeana silently crept up to the snoozing foongus, Lina shuffling behind her. The feline then raised her right arm, flexing her wrist slightly, before swiftly swiping downwards, across the foongus’ face.

The foongus jolted awake with a squeaky “FWOO!”, before it narrowed its eyes at at Jeana. A cut was prominent on its pudgy face now, dripping green sap of some kind. The foongus inhaled sharply, “FWOOF!”, and suddenly increased in size by several inches.

Jeana did not flinch when the foongus used Growth. It was slightly bigger than her now, but it was still completely incapable of looking frightening. Jeana simply slashed the foongus with another Scratch attack, causing another dripping green cut to appear on the mushroom, this time on its forehead.

“Foo-eeee!” the foongus whined as the green sap dripped into its eyes. It squeezed its eyes shut, and furiously rubbed at them with its stubby little arms.

Taking advantage of how her foe was distracted, Jeana used Scratch one last time.

“Feep!” the foongus yelped, before breaking apart into red and off-white dust, and crumbling before Jeana’s eyes.

Jeana stared incredulously at the pile of dust lying atop the bright green grass.

“That one was a puppet,” Lina told her. “Wait a couple hours, the dust will reform it into another Pokemon. Maybe a different species next time, maybe a hoppip or a sentret or starly.”

Jeana nodded, before she started padding through the dust, and down the corridor. After she got through the pile she stopped for a moment, shaking the dust off her hindlegs and paws.

Once the Psychic types got through the corridor into the other room, Jeana rubbed her eyes and stared at the room again in confusion. There was a literal set of stair, just three grey slate steps leading up into nowhere, dusted with pollen and cheerful flowers growing out of the cracks in them.

“...I said there were stairs, didn’t I?” Lina said, upon seeing the source of Jeana’s confusion.

“But… I didn’t think there’d be literal…” Jeana shut her eyes and shook her head, before making her way to the stairs.

Lina had said reality was messed up and broken in mystery dungeons. Reason and logic, while they still had some dominion, would not help her out as much as she would like them to.

She began climbing up the stairs, Lina bounce up right behind her. Every time Lina hit the stone step, the bell Pokemon made a pleasant chiming sound.

One. Chime. Two. Chime. Three. Chime

Gracedia Fields Floor Two

Jeana believed she was getting slowly more adept at navigating mystery dungeons.

Corridor. Walk. Room, one apple inside, two corridors branching off. Pick up apple, right turn, corridor.

Jeana saw the caterpie a few moments before Lina dead, and so had time to place her paws over her ears.

“Oh sweet Mew it has a type advantage!” Lina shrieked.

She had not been kidding about loving being overdramatic when the opportunity arose.

Jeana stopped, glaring at the caterpie. The small bug’s sectioned body wripped as it inched forwards, stopping a few feet in front of Jeana, just out of the feline’s reach. It fired a line of sticky white silk, which immediately stuck to the fur on Jeana’s arms and hindlegs, with seemingly no intention of coming off.

“A String Shot! My escort’s been slowed Whatever shall she do next?” Lina asked, clasping her braids together like hands.

Jeana ignored Lina’s antics, instead taking a step closer to finally be within striking distance of the caterpie. She drew back her right arm, preparing to use Scratch, but before she had a chance to strike the caterpie nibbled on her left hindleg.

The caterpie’s bite, while not especially painful, simply put felt very, very wrong. Jeana instinctively jerked away from the caterpillar, which caused her to lose balance and fall over onto her side. The caterpie inched closer, nibbling her left arm this time with another Bug Bite.

The distinct feeling of wrongness returned, and all sensation in her left arm an leg was swallowed entirely by pins and needles. The was a ringing in Jeana’s ears. She wanted to get away from the wrongness, from the caterpie. It, it didn’t hurt. But she hated it, and that confused her. She should have a reason to hate it, beyond just ‘it feels wrong and weird’. That didn’t make sense.

She lashed out against the caterpie, finally managing to land a Scratch attack.

“Ee!” The caterpie reared up, and landed, its first few pairs of legs on Jeana’s chest. It leaned forwards, nibbling on her ear with another Bug Bite.

Panic flooded through Jeana’s chest, unexplainable and uncontrollable. The ringing in her ears intensified.

nononononoNONONONONO get away you stupid bug get away get away GET AWAY drop dead i hate you i hate this NO GET AWAY

And the next thing she knew the bug was off of her, disintegrating into green dust.

The ringing in Jeana’s ears was fading, and the panic had subsided. But it left behind a dull ache in her head, and an uneasy feeling.

“Uh… Jeana--”

“What,” she responded too quickly.

Lina seemed… Impressed? Unnerved? “Just wanted to say, that was a… really impressive Psychic attack. And… are you okay?”

Jeana scowled. “Yes. Do not mention that… episode again.”

Lina looked like she wanted to say something, however before she could Jeana swiftly moved down the corridor, into another room.

They traveled in silence, barring the occasional chimes which emanated from Lina’s body, until they found the stairs.

Gracedia Fields Floor Three

Hmmmmmmmmmmmm…

The thrum of insect wings was louder on the third floor of Gracedia Fields than it had been on the previous two. Jeana was unsure of what Pokemon was making the sound, but it was fairly easy to guess it was a Bug type, possibly fully evolved as few unevolved Bug types had wings.

It would almost definitely be best, Jeana decided, to not fight whatever was making that noise. The only move she could use at will was Scratch, and she didn’t want a repeat of the incident with the caterpie.

Picking a corridor in the opposite direction from the humming sound, Jeana began stalking down it. Her sensitive ears picked up Lina’s occasional chimes following her at a distance of a few feet.

The emotion Lina had been feeling about Jeana’s outburst had… probably been fear.

That was okay. Maybe Lina would stop being overdramatic and annoying if she feared the espurr.

...No.

Jeana stopped. Lina nearly bumped into the feline.

“I’m sorry for scaring you,” Jean said, quickly and breathlessly. She did not turn around to face the small bell Pokemon, simply continued staring straight down the corridor.

There was silence from Lina. Then, she spoke “It’s okay. Just… wasn’t expecting you to be that strong. Honestly, you look kind of weak. And you fight like a newborn, all physical.”

“I have not had very much training in Psychic attacks,” Jeana admitted.

There was a chime from Lina, sounding similar to a human tsking. “What? That’s not right. If you want, I can take you to Chesnaught’s place. He can’t tutor Psychic moves very well, since he isn’t Psychic, but one of his assistants and I can help you work on some moves.”

“...I’ll think about it,” Jeana responded.

If she did want to join a team, having full access to the moves an espurr was supposed to learn would certainly prove useful.

They continued walking in silence. But the silence was less heavy and awkward, now.

In another room, Jeana found and picked up a small seed.

“Hey-- that’s a blast!” Lina said, catching a glimpse of it. “Don’t drop it.”

“What does it do?” Jeana asked, turning the seed over in her paws.

“If you crack the shell, it reacts with the air and makes an explosion. Really useful against Pokemon you have a type disadvantage against,” Lina said.

The corridor that they then chose to venture down, unfortunately, brought them closer to the humming sound. The two Psychic types peeked into the room, and their eyes were immediately drawn to the small, glinting stash of glass orbs and metallic thorns that caught the light. Again, Jeana instinctively felt that there was something very wrong in this room.

“It’s a Monster House,” Lina spoke. “It’s an area where the messed up-ness of the dungeon is even stronger than usual. It’s… it’s like gravity, it pulls puppets, items, and the civils and ferals caught up in the dungeon towards it, like a black hole almost. It’s a bad idea to go into one, you’re bound to get swamped by enemies the moment you set foot in there.”

Jeana silently pointed at something else in the room, and then flinched at Lina’s curse.

The stairs were also located in the Monster House.

“...Rotten luck,” Lina muttered. “Hey. Maybe I can Teleport us both out, and then we can do some training tomorrow, and try again--”

“...No,” Jeana said.

“No!?” Lina asked, incredulously. “It’s a monster house, and you can hear the thrumming coming from inside, can’t you? Powerful Bug types in there! And I’m not really built for battling, and you fight like a freaking one-week old kit!”

“I may be unfamiliar with fighting, but I do have an idea to get us to that stairway…” Jeana said. “Lina. Can you Teleport inside the room, and then again still inside it, then run for the door?”

“...I can try,” Lina huffed, crossing her braids like arms. “But I’m Teleporting both of us out if there are too many of them.”

The chingling closed her eyes, and leaped up. With a chime she vanished, only to reappear with a second chime and land in a corner of the room visible to Jeana. There were multiple loud banging sounds, and the humming intensified. About three yanmas zipped in, two dozen caterpies, weedles, wurmples, and scatterbug crawled towards Lina in a rippling wriggly mass, several spinaraks descended on silky threads from seemingly nowhere, and even two scythers were seen leaping over the other bugs, fangs bared and scythes at the read.

As the horde of Bugs converged on her, but before they could reach her, Lina bounced up in the air again and vanished with a chime. Immediately after she Teleported away, over half a dozen String Shots blasted where she had been standing, completely coating the grass in icky white silk.

Before most of the Bugs realized what was happening, Jeana hurled the blast seed in their direction. It thudded into the ground near them, and immediately combusted with a satisfying spakk-THOOM sort of sound. The sparks and embers caused the Bug types some pain, and caused those closest to the blast the go into a panic, crawling over each other in a state of blind fear.

Jeana, however, did not stay to watch this unfold. The moment she heard the explosion, she began running as quickly as possible towards the stairs. It was a bit awkward to run as a digitigrade, which meant she had to go a bit slower than she really would’ve liked, however she managed to keep up a decent pace.

Her eyes were fixed on the stairs. Lina had arrived at them before her, and was perched on the second step, anxiously bouncing on her toes and making worried ‘chiming’ noises,

Roughly fifteen feet from the stairs, something hit Jeana’s legs. String Shot, going from ankle to floor, tripping her and making her fall on her face. She pushed herself up intending to continue running, when there was a bright green shimmering light in the corner of her vision--

Seeing the danger before Jeana could, Lina opened her mouth wide, revealing the small orb in the back of her throat which produced the chiming sounds she made whenever she used a move, or sometimes when she touched the ground. The orb chimed loudly and eerily this time, glowing a dark violet, and shot out a similarly colored orb, no bigger than one of Jeana’s paws, which trailed shadows.

Jeana managed to push herself off the ground and flip herself onto her back in time to see one of the scyther in the air above her, wings thrumming at full speed causing powerful vibrations which made the air tremble, one scythe raised high and shining brilliant green as the mantis prepared a Fury Cutter attack. The attack would surely finish the young feline.

Before the scyther could bring its arm down on Jeana, though, Lina’s Shadow Ball attack collided with the scyther’s Fury Cutter. While the Shadow Ball was nowhere near as powerful as the Fury Cutter, it was just enough to cause both attacks to fizzle out with a violent snap!! The scyther was blown backwards slightly, which in turn made it lose balance and fall back to earth.

Jeana used the time bought for her by Lina’s Shadow Ball to quickly stand up and get the String Shot off her paw. She turned to face the oncoming attackers, and was promptly tackled by a yanma using Quick Attack, which hit her square in the chest. She skidded along the grassy ground, the breath knocked out of her.

More Bug types were getting closer to Jeana. Three yanmas were now hovering about her, with a swarm of caterpillars on the way. She wildly began Scratching and randomly lashing out at the dragonflies.

An idea formed in her mind. Maybe if she used Psychic again, she could blast the Bugs away and make a break for the stairs? Unfortunately, she still was incapable of consciously using Psychic, and desperately did not want a repeat of the circumstances that had brought about its last usage.

In a matter of time, Jeana was quite literally crawling in Bug types-- the caterpillars again nibbling with Bug Bite and drowning her with String Shot, and the yanma and scyther making the air sing in a most horrendous way with their Bug Buzz. It was overwhelming for Jeana, the sheer feeling of wrongness and this time in addition to the wrongness there was certainly pain to accompany it, pain in her body and in her ears.

Her ears rang like church bells. Pure panic rose again in her mind, swamping all logical thought and leaving just pure emotion.

She was screaming, even if she wasn’t consciously aware of it. Her ears curled upwards and blasted a Psychic attack, leaving the Bugs reeling from the sheer force of it. Before they could recover, Lina leaped towards Jeana, grabbed the espurr, and Teleported the two out of the mystery dungeon.

Jeana’s mind faded from the pure emotion to blissful darkness.