Arc 1, Chapter 4: Anomalous

Map made in Inkarnate.

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“C’mon, pull your weight!” Haya barked at Amadeus, struggling to carry a basket that was barely half-full.

“I’m… trying… to… do that!” Amadeus responded, struggling to carry a half-full basket of berries with his teeth. His jaw was sore from carrying it around all day, as were his legs. Arceus, am I that weak? He spared a glance over to Haruhi, who was carrying a basket that was twice as full like it was no big deal, trotting around merrily with it. Clearly, she was much stronger physically than he was. With a groan, he placed it down next to yet another berry tree and reached up with his front paws. Picking the berries wasn’t exactly easy as a quadruped, but it was probably easier than carrying the basket around. After picking all of the good-looking berries from the tree, he moved to pick the basket back up. It was even heavier now. “Gahhhhh…”

With Amadeus completely recovered, Haya had seen fit to put him to work in the leadup to the festival. Apparently, she was expecting more from him. “You really are some rich ‘mons kid, aren’t you?” She said disapprovingly as he emptied his not-quite-full basket onto the pile of berries they had going near the table inside. “It’s plain as day that you’ve never worked a day in your life before!”

“Twist the knife, why don’t you…” Amadeus responded.

Haruhi herself looked disappointed in Amadeus. Clearly, her ‘human’ was not the legend among ‘mons she was expecting. “Man, are you really tired after that?”

“Yeah.”

“You need to work on that, dude. It’s not a good look…”

“You think I can’t tell that?”

Haya ignored the squabble they were having and looked over the field. “…I think that’s the last of ‘em. You’ve got the rest of the day off, you two, so be back by dinner.” Haya organized the pile of berries, seemingly getting ready to decide which ones to keep and which ones to sell.

“…I’m gonna rest. See you guys at dinner,” Amadeus said, heading over to what had become his room by default. Inside, he took out the quill, ink, a few more pieces of paper he’d found elsewhere in the house, as well as the calculus textbook he’d gotten from the library. Immediately, he opened up the textbook and started reading through it. He was already well-versed in these topics, as they’d been beaten into him at school, but it helped to have the book there as a refresher. Which was nice, since he was trying to beat an actually good mathematician. Integrals are always the hardest… Amadeus thought to himself. Throwing the nastiest integrals I can think up while feigning being bad at math would be ideal. If I can trick him into giving me something easy… For now, the plan was to challenge the Dusknoir he’d heard about to a game where each participant comes up with ten problems for the other, and the person who solved them all first would win. Amadeus was planning on having his opponent give him all ten problems at once before he gave his own ten problems at the same time, in order to hide the fact that he knew what an integral was. After playing around with the rules for a bit, making sure that the problems he had would not fall prey to common integration tricks, Amadeus looked down, admiring his work. Ten beastly monstrosities, which he couldn’t be bothered to actually check for solvability. They were meant as a dirty trick, after all. This Renjiro guy won’t know what hit him… He heard a knock at the door. “Come in.”

A very antsy Haruhi entered the room. “…Are you gonna do anything other than sit in your room today?”

“What are you talking about?” Amadeus half-jokingly asked. “I’ve been busy.” He gestured to the problem sheet he’d just finished.

Haruhi read the problem sheet that Amadeus had prepared, or at least, tried to. To Amadeus, it looked like her eyes glazed over as she did. “I have no idea what I’m looking at. What the hell is this?”

“Math.”

“Uh-huh…” Haruhi looked back up at Amadeus. “And why exactly did you make this?”

“I’m gonna pull a fast one on that Renjiro guy, obviously. Don’t tell him I know how to read this.”

“I still don’t get why you’re trying to scam the math guy…” Haruhi trailed off. “It’ll look better on you if you can beat him fair and square.”

“But I can’t. I probably couldn’t beat anyone in the whole town fair and square at anything. Besides, this way it’s much less serious.”

“…But you’re still playing to win.”

“You’re not wrong…”

“Man…” Haruhi stared up at the ceiling, and shot up a flame at it.

“A-arceus!” Amadeus jumped back in shock. Now that he was closer, the sheer heat of Haruhi’s flames reminded him of when a cruiser he was in drifted to close to a nearby star. 

“Relax, it’s all fireproof…” Haruhi gestured to the completely unburnt ceiling. “Mom knows how to make really good enchantments.” She slumped to the floor. “I’m so bored.”

“How do you still have the energy after working all morning?”

“It’s not that hard, dude. You’re just out of shape.”

“You’re probably right…” Amadeus admitted. He stared at the delightful gift he’d prepared for the festival. The festival… Come to think of it, I don’t know a whole lot else about the festival. If Haruhi’s got nothing better to do with her time, then… “What’s the festival even about, anyway?” Amadeus asked.

Haruhi paused. “Right, you wouldn’t know. Being from the human world and all… Alright, time for history buff Haruhi, round two.” She sounded significantly less enthusiastic than when she’d declared this the first time around. “Although… Calling it history is a little generous.” Haruhi admitted. She seemed unusually contemplative.

“…What do you mean ‘generous’? Is it a recent tradition?”

“Yeah, it is. In fact, I remember the first one ever held. Arceus, I must’ve been… Four? Five?”

“And you’re Eighteen now, right? It’s not even been fifteen years since you guys started holding these festivals?”

“Yeah, it’s not that long ago in the grand scheme of things, huh?” Haruhi looked to the ground. “How do I explain this? It’s a weird subject…” She paused again. “I think it’ll make the most sense if I start from what I can remember from back then. It all went down a year before the we held the first festival. I was playing chase with one of my friends up on the hill late in the day. We were running around, when suddenly, we saw a light off on the horizon coming from the mainland. It was unbelievably bright, like a second sun. It hurt my eyes a little just to look at. Then, after what seemed like forever, the light faded. There was a huge commotion in the town! Everyone was in a panic, trying to figure out what the hell just happened! It wasn’t for another week that we found out, too.”

“…What happened?” The description of a light on the horizon was enough to put Amadeus on edge.

“They called it The Light that Burned the Sky. On that day, the city of Háo de Xiǎo was reduced to rubble before it. Apparently, it you were far enough to be outside of the Light’s range, but still relatively close, you’d end up betting blown away from the winds the sheer force of the attack caused, and wind up with burns. There were even cases of fire types getting burns so bad that they needed treatment. Since we’re out in the middle of nowhere, not a whole lot happened for us, but I heard from Teacher that it was total chaos in places like Hakken no Machi for months afterwards. Nobody really knew what to make of it, you know?”

“That’s crazy… who would even do something like that?”

“…That’s the worst part,” Haruhi said. “All of these years later, and we still don’t know who did it! Hell, we don’t even know how it happened in the first place! It’s the biggest unsolved mystery in the world!”

“…Wow.” Amadeus paused thoughtfully. That sounds suspiciously like nuclear weapons… “Does anyone live there today?”

“There’s… not much. There’s a few people setting up shop in the ruins, but it’s a hollow shell of what it used to be. Apparently, it’s still a pretty nice place to live.”

Does that mean that it wasn’t a nuke, then? Hm… Amadeus decided to shelve the thought for the time being and continue the discussion. “So the festival is meant to be some kind of remembrance?”

“Yeah, pretty much. The idea is to emphasize the value of a life by showing what we can do with our lives, or something to that effect. It’s nice, but I think it’s a little hard not to feel like the festivities miss the point…”

There was a brief silence between them. “It’s only natural to want to squeeze some kind hope out of a tragedy like that, right?” He asked.

“…I don’t know.” Haruhi paced in place with a visible discomfort. “Maybe I’m just bitter because I never have a talent worth showing off.”

“…You’re pretty good with fire.”

Haruhi scoffed. “Yeah, like that’s gonna go over well. Did you forget what we talked about yesterday, dude?”

“Oh. Right, sorry…”

“You better be…” Haruhi looked embarrassed for a moment. “Uh, don’t worry about it. You’re fine!”

“Uh…” Amadeus absentmindedly looked around the room, desperate for a change of subject. I wish I still had my phone for times like this… His eyes were drawn to the window. The sun was still fairly high in the sky. “Do you wanna head into town, or…?”

“Arceus, yes!” Haruhi jumped. “Anything to get out of the house…” She paused. “Anywhere in particular you wanted to go, or…”

“Let’s, uh, worry about it when we get there.”

“Oookay…” Haruhi trotted out of the door, with Amadeus following soon after. Soon enough, they were nearing the top of the hill that overlooked the town. Amadeus was feeling less sore than before, but he was still taking it easier than he normally would. He still wasn’t quite used to the feeling of the dirt path beneath his feet, let alone the grass nearby. It all felt alien to him. Technically, it really was alien. He missed the ship. He missed the bright lights, the twisting floor, his sister’s smile. He wanted it all back. He wanted to go home… But I’m never going home, am I? How’s anyone supposed to find me, anyway? I’m stuck in the middle of nowhere on some alien planet, with no way to contact anyone, as well as being Arceus knows how many years into the past! I’m never gonna see home again. I’m never-

“Hey, are you okay?”

Amadeus froze. He realized tears were flowing down his face. “One, ten, one hundred, one thousand…” He muttered, taking a deep breath. “I’m okay, I’m okay…”

“…Alright.” Haruhi reached out with one of her front paws and patted Amadeus on the shoulder. “You sure?”

“It’s nothing, I just…” Amadeus, for some reason, found himself fighting to get the second half of that sentence out. “…Realized I’ll never see home again.”

“I’m sure home misses you too,” Haruhi reassured him with another pat. Despite her… misconceptions, she could at least understand this part of Amadeus’ plight. “C’mon, let’s go.”

As they continued on, Amadeus started to think. I’m in the middle of nowhere now, but… what about if I went to the Guild with Hakken no Machi with Haruhi? That’s gotta be a major population center, right? Or it’s at least a place with a ton of great connections to make. If that’s the case, then on the off chance that someone came to be from the future, isn’t that the best place to get found? If it raises my odds of going home even slightly…

“Haruhi?”

“Yeah?”

“Let’s do our best at the guild.”

Haruhi looked like she could explode. She immediately tackle-hugged Amadeus. “Let’s do it!”

“Gah! Hey!”

“Hehe, sorry, got carried away there,” Haruhi said, backing away. Amadeus felt a bit guilty about wanting to leave when he saw her earnest expression. Her eyes were full of hope and excitement.

“It’s okay…” Amadeus continued walking down the path they were on. The town below couldn’t help but seem small as he slowly approached it. “Have you lived here all your life?”

“The furthest I’ve gone is the mystery dungeon to the north of here. Even then, I never went in, and I was able to make it home by sunset. I’ve never been more than maybe half a day’s trip outside of town.”

“Really?” Amadeus asked. “Was it the same one I was in?”

“Nah, the one you were in is way closer. Much smaller, too.”

“Still seems pretty dangerous to me.”

“It’s normally not that scary. You probably just got unlucky, and ran into a stronger feral than you’d normally find in there. Then again, being an electric type in a dungeon of ground types probably didn’t help your case… hm…”

“Yeah, that probably didn’t help, did it?”

“Come to think of it, how did that go exactly?” The two were crossing the boundary of the town at this point. Amadeus, as usual, saw a few people staring at the two of them, but it didn’t bother him that much today. Partially because the somewhat scary memories of what happened that night were flashing through his mind.

“I remember just getting slammed in the back by a nasty attack after wandering into a weird cave…” Amadeus said this quietly, hoping that nobody was listening in on them. “It was raining, so I was trying to find some shelter, and maybe patch myself up a bit. Of course, thanks to my luck, the med-kit I had on hand was totally destroyed. I think I tore open the other bag I had and tried to stop the bleeding with whatever I had inside? I don’t remember what I did with the bag after that. I probably just abandoned it.”

“If you left in in there, then…” Haruhi trailed off. “Nah, it’s been way too long for that.”

“For what?”

“Remember what I said about mystery dungeons? They shift, and change. How frequently depends on the strength of the dungeon, but it’s always at least once a day. Being inside one can prevent it from changing more frequently, but that’s the hard lower limit. And anything that gets left behind when it’s changing, including anything you personally left there that you’re not carrying on you, gets scattered between the floors of the dungeon. Typically, anything that isn’t there naturally just disappears completely after a couple of shifts.”

“So after over a week’s worth of shifts… That is how long it’s been, right? Keeping track of time has been weird for me.”

“Yeah, sorry. Your stuff is probably all gone. I’m a little disappointed myself. I was really interested in what you brought from the human world.”

But you not seeing what I brought means you won’t be able to put together that I’m not a fantasy creature, so it’s all a tradeoff… “Yeah, shame.”

“I know, righ- oof!” Haruhi, without looking where she was walking, had crashed directly into a certain Leafeon, who looked a little less than amused. Haruhi, after backing away dazed for a moment, looked up. “Oh, sorry miss Sakura.”

Sakura took a moment to brush off her dress. “Don’t call me ‘miss’, ya little pyromaniac. And watch where you’re walking.” She sighed. “What brings you into town today, Haruhi?”

“I, uh…”

“We got out of working the farm early today,” Amadeus explained. “Since there wasn’t a lot that needed to get done.”

“We?” Sakura chuckled. “So it begins…” She suddenly had a playful smile. “How’d he do?” She asked Haruhi.

“He was… disappointing.”

“Disappointing? Ah, can’t say I’m not surprised…” The level of teasing in her tone was almost sadistic to Amadeus, and he didn’t have the foggiest idea why.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Amadeus asked.

“It means you gotta get stronger, buckaroo,” Sakura responded condescendingly.

“O-oh…” Amadeus looked down in shame.

“Loosen up,” Sakura responded. “You’ll get used to it eventually.”

“I understand…”

“So!” Haruhi interjected, seemingly wanting to move on from this subject. “What brings you here today?”

“I was just out on an afternoon stroll while Mayumi finished a little bit of busywork.” Sakura paused. “Speaking of Mayumi, didn’t you finally manage to use a psychic move when you were training with her yesterday?”

“Yeah! …But I haven’t been able to do it again since then. It’s really frustrating!”

“Progress is progress…” Sakura reminded her. “You’ll get the hang of it.”

“…What kind of busywork is Mayumi doing, anyway?” Amadeus asked, reflexively pushing up his glasses.

“It’s personal stuff, kiddo,” Sakura flatly responded.

“I am done now, though,” said Mayumi, seemingly appearing next to them.

“H-how long were you standing there, teacher?” Haruhi asked, shocked.

“Just long enough to hear that last bit,” Mayumi responded. “Your mother let you out early today, I presume?”

“Yup!” Haruhi confirmed. “Y’know, teacher, if you’ve got nothing else to do…”

“…Alright, count me out…” Amadeus said, seeing exactly where this was going. He was not in the mood to do anything intensive today, seeing as how he’d already been put through the ringer by Haya. He tried to walk away, but Haruhi stopped him.

“Nope, you’re coming!” Haruhi said, grabbing him by the scruff with her teeth and yanking him back over. “C’mon.”

Mayumi burst out laughing. “Glad to see we’ve got a proper comedy routine going on between you two. Alright, let’s get to it.”

Not long after, they were inside of Mayumi’s dojo, wearing the training scarves, despite Amadeus’ protests. Perhaps there were worse things to be doing today, but he really did not want to be doing this while he was sore from the morning. Is Haruhi just invincible, or am I that weak? He wondered. I guess there’s no point worrying about it, but that doesn’t make me not worry… Especially if I’m actually serious about joining the guild in the first place. I guess that means this is good for me, then…

“Amadeus,” Mayumi said sharply.

“…Yes.”

“Yesterday, when you tried a Bite for the first time, you didn’t get the hang of it. In fact, you panicked before you could even get it out.”

“…That’s correct.”

“…Do you remember what you did to try and fuel it?”

“Uh…” There was a long pause. “I tried…”

“Was it something deeply personal to you?”

“…”

“I think that’s the problem, then.”

“…How so?”

“Negative emotions can be… unstable. And the more intense the emotions, the harder it is to control. But for weaker moves, you don’t exactly need to channel the blackest angst to use them. Pettier feelings will work just fine. So, here’s my suggestion to you. Instead of trying to get at the worst things you’ve ever felt, think about the smaller annoyances you’ve felt. Like that time you stubbed a toe, or someone gave you the wrong directions… things like that.”

“So just… obsess over trivial things?”

“Don’t put yourself down like that. Emotions are emotions; just because it’s something small doesn’t make it meaningless.”

“Okay…” Amadeus took a deep breath, standing in front of one of the dummies. He wasn’t exactly sure where to begin. He understood the meaning of Mayumi’s words, sure, but he really wasn’t sure how to apply them to himself. Bite’s a move that needs me to channel that into my teeth, right? Gah, my stupid jaw is still sore from carrying that basket of berries around. Seriously, I’m probably not even gonna be fine before tomorrow! And I’ve gotta do it then, too, probably? Gah, this is gonna suck… He felt his jaw throb as he tensed it. It hurts… He found himself feeling frustrated. It hurts, but I’m not gonna get any slack on this, am I? Haya and Haruhi, working me to the damn bone! For no real reason, he lunged at the dummy, and tore off it’s head with his jaws. Gah, I- wait, since when was I this strong? It isn’t made to fall right off, is it? He realized his teeth had sunken in fairly deep into the dummy’s head. He relaxed his jaw, and put it down. That felt… kinda good… “…Did I do it?”

“Sure did!” Mayumi exclaimed. “Feels cathartic, doesn’t it?”

“…Yeah, it does.”

“Dude, you were crazy!” Haruhi exclaimed. “You looked like you got back from chugging ink!”

“D-did it actually look like that?”

Mayumi laughed. “That’s certainly one way of putting it.” She turned to Amadeus. “If you focus on the little things, it’s easier, right?”

“I’d say so, yeah,” Amadeus agreed.

“What did you think about, anyway?” Haruhi asked.

“I don’t know… I guess I was just feeling frustrated, because my jaw was sore from all the farm work, and having to now try out something involving my jaw, and I got myself worked up over that?”

“It’s petty, but it works,” Mayumi observed. “I should know. I actually first learned bite because I got kicked in the face, and I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The next time you need to use a Bite, remember that feeling.” She turned to Haruhi. “Did you try using Psybeam again?”

“I tried last night, but it didn’t really work. Every time I got close, the excitement got to me and I just lost it.”

“Well, did you try the counting trick again?”

“Yeah that’s what I was doing! I just… I don’t know, it didn’t work the second time.”

“Why don’t you try it right here?”

“…Okay.” Haruhi took a deep breath and closed her eyes. “One, ten, one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand, one hundred thousand, one million…” Her breathing slowed. “Ten million, one hundred million, one billion, ten billion, one hundred billion, one trillion, ten trillion, one hundred trillion, one quadrillion…” Suddenly, her paw started to have a pink glow, and she immediately stretched it forwards, only for nothing to come out. “Damnit!”

“Hmm…” Mayumi scratched near her ear with one of her front paws. “You definitely had it for a second there.”

“I know when I’m getting close because I remember how it felt yesterday. But when I try to actually use it, it just… evaporates.”

“Maybe the issue is that you’re treating it the same way you treat fire type moves. Instead of forcing it out the second you have it, try just…stewing in it for a bit.”

“Hm…” Haruhi started the counting process over again. By the time she reached one quadrillion again, her paw started glowing, but she kept going. “Ten quadrillion, one hundred quadrillion, one quintillion, ten quintillion…” This time, she raised her paw again, and successfully fired off a Psybeam. “I did it! …Gah, there it goes! Gone…”

“Do you think you could do it more easily next time?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. I can’t manage to do it any faster, though…”

“Well, you don’t exactly need to. You could just plan ahead and try to maintain it. Switch between using different types of moves is very difficult, after all. Even the best tend to just stick to using one type of move at a time during a fight.”

“Really?” Haruhi asked.

“Indeed. In fact, this is a perfect time to talk about that stupid, stupid symbol on these scarves. Take them off, will you?”

Haruhi and Amadeus took off the scarves as instructed, and eyed the symbol.

“This is called the Eighteen-sector chart, and I despise this thing. As you can see, it’s a circle divided into eighteen sections, with each section being a different color to represent one of the eighteen types. Let’s go though them clockwise, shall we?” Mayumi pointed to the grey sector at the top. “This grey one is normal.” Mayumi moved over to the next one. “This soft pink one is fairy. Then the purple one next to it is ghost. The black one next to it is dark, the lighter blue next to it is ice, the deep blue next to it is water, the green one next to that it grass, this bright pink one is psychic. The lighter purple next to it is poison. The rust-colored one next to that is fighting. The orange one next to that is ground. The brown one next to that it rock. The darker grey next to that is steel. The yellow one next to that is electric. The red one next to that is fire. The not-as-dark blue next to that is dragon. The sky blue one is flying. The light green one is bug, and finally, we’re back to normal. Did you get all of that?”

“…I think?” Amadeus responded.

“Okay, good,” Mayumi didn’t bother waiting for Haruhi. “However long ago, some nerd who never got in a real scrap in his life before discovered that if you use a move that’s not your own type, it’s not as strong, but not only that. For some types, certain types were not as strong as others, and it seemed to depend on your own type too. So he made this thing to summarize his findings. Basically, moves of your own type are much stronger, but even for moves not of your type, as you get further away, they become slightly weaker.”

“…So what’s the issue? Makes sense to me,” Haruhi said, seeming confused.

“Oh, I’ll tell you the issue all right. The issue is that it has nothing to do with what moves you can actually learn, and it also has nothing to do with how hard different types of moves are to learn. But not everyone realizes that, so you get shit like psychic types asking when they’ll be able to learn poison type moves and normal types refusing to learn fighting type moves because ‘it’ll be too difficult’ or some other BS.” Mayumi took a deep breath. “If I can leave you with any one takeaway about this thing, let it be this: This thing is not meant for learning. It’s when you’re actually using moves that this thing becomes important. Does that make sense to you?”

“Yes,” Haruhi and Amadeus said in unison.

“Good. Now put those scarves back on, and let’s keep going.”

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Fortunately for Amadeus, with the festival happening the very next day, he and Haruhi were afforded a rare break from working on the farm. Well, rare for Haruhi, anyway. Amadeus had only worked a single day up until that point. Regardless, they now had a completely free day ahead of them. Amadeus tried to go back to bed, but naturally, Haruhi wasn’t having it. Amadeus wasn’t going to get off scott-free like that.

“Please?” Amadeus pleaded, trying to get back to the part of his house where his room was, with Haruhi blocking his way.

“No.”

“Pretty please?”

“We gotta do something today!”

“Man…”

“Don’t give me that, Amadeus. We have extra free time, we should use it!”

“On what? I doubt Mayumi’s gonna let us in this time of day.”

“That doesn’t mean we can’t try practicing on our own.”

“…And tear up the house?”

“It’s fireproof, we’ll be fine!”

“I think you’ve forgetting I’m flammable…”

Haruhi flinched at the suggestion that she’d end up burning Amadeus. “I-I’m more careful than that!”

“…S-sorry, I didn’t mean it like- I mean…” Amadeus stumbled, realizing he’d crossed a line. “I don’t know, what did you have in mind?”

“Uhhh… I wanted to try reading your mind, actually?” Haruhi said nervously. “I mean, if you’re okay with that! It’s just, I’ve been wondering what your life was like back in the human world, since you mentioned it yesterday, and-“

“Please don’t,” Amadeus said, cutting her off. “Please don’t go digging into my mind without asking.” The longer she thinks I’m a human, the better. My only real goal for now is to get to Hakken to Machi to see if a missing persons report was filed for me on the off chance someone from the future came looking for me. And as far as I’m aware, Haruhi is the only real help I’m going to have on the way. I need her help…

“Oh! Sorry for asking…”

“It’s fine…”

Haruhi stared out of the window longingly. “I still wanna do something fun with this free time, though…”

“Do you have any board games?”

“You like those? I can never get into chess and stuff. How do you keep track of all of those rules?”

“With a rule book, obviously.”

“That sounds like a pain.”

“It’s not if you just memorize them all.”

“Fair enough…” Haruhi paused for a moment. “Oh, I know! Let’s go dungeon diving!”

Memories of what happened the night he first arrived flashed through Amadeus’ head. “I don’t know if that’s such a good idea…”

“It’ll be fine,” Haruhi reassured him. “There’s a super-easy one just outside of town. Not the one you were in. We’ll be there in like, two hours tops, and it’s only three floors, too. It’s also only really got a bunch of weak bug and flying-type ferals in it. We can take it easy.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’ve been in there with teacher a bunch of times. It’ll be fine. Go get your bag, I’ll bring some supplies in my own.”

“Why do we need two bags?”

“To carry any treasure we come across, obviously. Let’s go!”

A little bit more coaxing from Haruhi and a surprisingly short walk later, They were at the entrance to a strange patch of woods. “Here we are! I don’t think this place actually has a name, but Teacher calls it Aimai na Mori, so that’s what I call it too.”

“…Okay.” Amadeus fidgeted with his pin and pushed up his glasses. You’re gonna be doing a lot of this eventually, so time to get used to it…

The second they passed the trees, the road behind them disappeared, and there were surrounded by the strange-looking woods. Don’t panic, Amadeus, you were expecting that… Fortunately, the first floor went by without incident. They found a set of stairs… that seemed to lead to nowhere. “Is this…?”

“Sure is. Wait ‘till you climb them…” Haruhi started up the stairs, and Amadeus followed her. The second they reached the top, they were suddenly on the next floor, with no evidence that the path behind them, let alone the stairs, ever existed.

“Arceus, I am not gonna get used to that.”

“Weird, right?”

“Does anyone know why that happens?”

“I tried reading a book about it, but it made my head spin. Something about multiple realities? I don’t have a clue what that’s supposed to mean.”

“…Huh. Interesting.”

“That’s the wrong takeaway if you ask me…”

After a few minutes of silent walking, they finally ran into a problem. “Zu!” a feral zubat screeched at them from above, and dove down at them. Amadeus barely managed to duck out of the way in time. Haruhi, without hesitation, shot a Flamethrower right at it, burning it to a crisp. Amadeus could feel the intense heat of Haruhi’s flames pass right over him.

“O-one, ten, one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand, one hundred thousand…” Amadeus rattled off.

“You okay?”

“One million, ten million, one hundred million, one billion, ten billion…” Amadeus took a deep breath, and started to use charge. “I’m okay, just got surprised…”

“No biggie. I’ve got your back,” Haruhi reassured him.

Amadeus looked at the burnt Zubat lying on the ground. “He’s, uh…”

“It’s a feral. You gotta be ready to attack when they come for you.”

“Right.” Amadeus kept up the charge, ready to zap anything that moved. The rest of the floor also proceeded without anything else of note happening, as did most of the third and final floor, save for Haruhi torching a Shroomish that got a little too brave. Eventually, Amadeus spotted something on the floor. “Hey, what’s this?”

He and Haruhi approached the mystery object delicately. It looked like a ball of blue glass.

“Oooh, that’s an orb!” Haruhi exclaimed. “These things only crop up in mystery dungeons from time to time, and they have all kinds of weird effects, so they’re super valuable! Let’s take it.” Haruhi scooped it into her bag without a second thought, and looked back up. “Oh hey, there’s the exit!”

“So much for needing two bags…” Amadeus muttered.

Leaving the mystery dungeon was just as bizarre. There was a brighter patch of forest, and when they entered, they were suddenly outside, back where they started. Judging by the sun, they’d spent a good hour inside the dungeon.

“Man, we were in there for a while,” Amadeus observed.

“Not to long though, right?” Haruhi asked. “I think so, anyway. My sense of time isn’t the best.”

“Can’t you just look at the sun? That’s what I’ve been doing.”

“…Does the human world care about clocks and timekeeping that much?”

“You have clocks here?”

“Do we really need ‘em?”

“I guess not…”

“Welp!” Haruhi said after a brief pause. “That was fun, right?”

“…I don’t really know if I’m used to it enough to really call it fun, but it wasn’t boring.”

The two headed home for the time being, the rest of the day going by without anything noteworthy happening.

---

Later that night, a lone Luxray was traveling in the woods nearby town, muttering to himself. A golden medallion with a baleful-looking eye depicted on it swung from his neck, and he was wearing a rather ornate scarf alongside it. He had a number of scars running up his legs, and his observant eyes scanned the surroundings.

“This is the place, right? Shinx that dropped out of nowhere last week…” He’d traveled quite a distance to see the mysterious visitor the sleepy town of Nōgyō No Machi had received recently, and the festival going on in town provided a convenient excuse to visit. The second he’d heard a description of this strange boy, he knew he had to investigate. His powerful position as the Guild Seer would naturally lead him to all kinds of strange places, given that he was primarily a detective, but this particular case was something he was looking into for a rather personal reason.

“I can’t dismiss the possibility. I just can’t, no matter what…”

Dumas Luxray emerged from the woods. The town would be in view soon enough.

“Current objective: find out what’s happened here.”