Nine: You shall Not Pass!
- Pronouns
- He/His/Him
Flora was overjoyed at the fact that one of the extra items we received from Geodude for rescuing his teammate was yet another Grass Gummi, but I had it deposited in Kangaskhan Storage to save it for later, to her dismay.
Heh… Future motivation to do well secured.
The next morning, after assembly we get an unpleasant surprise.
"HEY, you two!" Loudred booms from across the main hall, standing next to a now uncovered hole in the ground with Diglett beside him.
For fuck's sake, this again?!
While Flora winces out because of this asshole's loud as hell voice, I waste absolutely no time marching up to him, cheeks barely sparking as a reminder; he may technically be a bit stronger than me, but I sure as hell can beat him anyway.
"What is it, Loudred?" I grit out, annoyed.
He seems to get the point, and reduces his volume a little bit. Nowhere near good enough, but the lobby's a public space, and I can't discount the fact that it might be something important he's going to convey.
"You two are on sentry duty today!" He rumbles.
The fuck? Why?
My question must've shown on my face, because Diglett looks a bit sheepish as he starts to explain.
"I'm sorry. I'm usually the one on sentry duty, but my dad Dugtrio got called away for something, and he told me to handle the notice boards for today." He explains with a short bow.
"It would be great if someone could help."
Ha! Such pitiful looks mean nothing to me-
"Of course we'll help!" Flora agrees, nodding, and it's like a record scratch in my head as I turn over to her in disbelief.
Well then, if we're going to do this, it has to at least be worth our time, right?
"Tell me, Loudred. Why are we supposed to be the ones to do this, not you? Do you really think this is worth our time?" I ask, probably cutting a hilarious figure as I try my very best to loom over a Pokémon that is nearly double my height. Jokes on them; I can see bro sweating.
"I mean, there's a reward for exceptional results?" Diglett offers when he sees Loudred floundering—wait.
Say less!
I was already halfway down the steps; free shit is free!
"Oi, Flora! What're you waiting for? This work isn't going to do itself!"
Well… This was both time-consuming and ridiculously easy for me.
"Shieldon!"
I mean, I'm one of those freaks that remembers the footprints for practically every Pokémon, and those that I don't remember, I can simply infer from what I remember they look like.
"Riolu!"
The last part that made this ridiculously easy?
"Holy shit, those bars must be strong!" I whisper under my breath as a massive form nearly blots out the light from the grate entirely.
"What was that, Watt?" Flora asks from her position closer to the only window near here, where she was relaying my 'guesses' to Loudred.
"It's nothing; Snorlax!"
The grate may be pretty fine for their tech level, and the light from above means all I'm looking at are shadows...
"That's a Chimchar!"
…But I can still kinda see who they are from underneath, ya know?
"Yep, that's Phanphy!"
Also, how are you supposed to find out who someone is by footprint? Does Loudred have some sort of eidetic memory or something? Isn't this kind of racist?
…God, why won't this day just end? It's been hours!
"*Yawn*… It's Persian." I yawn, blinking blearily from the light.
This reward better be fucking worth it, man.
When we get back out, the talking rat with wings is waiting for us, ready to 'evaluate our performance' in his own words. He seems pretty bored with the entire thing until he actually looks at my results.
"You identified everyone perfectly?! On your first try? In seconds?!" The birdbrain screeches, feathers all poofed out and eyes wide, and I preen smugly.
"You did it, Watt!" Flora cheers, giving me a neck hug, and even Loudred is simply nodding along happily instead of yammering on.
"A-According to Guild rules, we'll have to... Generously reward our top sentry!" My wonderful supervisor Chatot grits out before hopping off to rummage through the storage room.
While he's rereading the simple visitor list carefully as he goes, as if an error's supposed to materialize out of nothing—the dick—I discretely shimmy up to someone who can tell me if what I did is supposed to cause this much commotion or not.
Flora? Nah, she knows a lot, but she doesn't know about this.
Chatot? Hell no!
Loudred? Yeah, if I want to have me asking broadcast to the entire guild, that is.
With all other options eliminated, I slide over to Diglett, who's now looking at me weirdly.
"So… Am I an outlier or something? Why's Chatot freaking out over my work?" I whisper.
"It took me a few moons learning from my dad before I could do what you just did. You just blew my dad's record away!" The Ground type whispers back, slightly unnerved but even more starstruck.
"Ah, so I'm just that good. Thanks for the clarification." I huff, pleased.
"Yeah, you are... Can… Can you teach me some of what you know?" Diglett asks shyly.
"Maybe we can exchange notes on this later; Chatot's coming back." I inform.
"Oh… Okay!" Diglett agreed, nodding.
Just as I said, the feather duster returns, dropping a small sack that had the beautiful jangle of currency and a sharp, musty smell wafting from it. I quickly snatch the precious container before that bastard gets any funny ideas and take off with Flora back to our room.
When we get there, I take a deep breath, once again confirm that the door is shut to satisfy my paranoia, and then spill out our haul onto the little wooden table we had.
… A decent amount of coins, a positively vibrant seed that looks so polished and perfect that I thought it was a ceramic replica, a picture-perfect root of ginseng, and another seed that looked like it was nearly swollen with energy.
I don't know what most of this is, so I turn to Flora, whose eyes are wide with awe?!
"Give it to me straight, Flora; what're we dealing with here. I can recognize the ginseng, at least." I ask, practically unleashing the floodgates as my partner starts word-vomiting all over me.
"Ohmygod that's a Life Seed! AND a Joy Seed! I thought they were a myth! Life seeds I know about at least; they're super rare and only the hardest or rarest dungeons make them. They're really hard to grow outside the dungeon, and I don't really think those ones are ever as effective as the dungeon ones. They fill you with so much Aura and Life energy that it just makes you healthier in general. I've only seen these in a few big bazaars at the square; they were really expensive!
As for the Joy Seed?" And here, her voice slows, almost becoming reverent; "I didn't think they really existed until now; these things are supposed to be dungeon-only stuff; no-one has the slightest clue how to start growing them out of one. If anyone did so, we'd know, because while a Life Seed makes you healthier? A Joy seed is condensed life."
"Wait, so what exactly does condensed life mean?" I ask, having a tiny flicker of disbelief at what I'm hearing; there ain't no way that the Guild has access to these things, right?
"I don't really know how to explain it; there are a few stories I got from word of mouth, and I'm not too sure. Supposedly it does what the Life seed does, but with every other part of you; you become faster, stronger, more durable and such."
Sweet Alpaca Jesus the Guild has Rare Candies in stock. HOW?!
"Flora?" I whisper lowly, clutching both sides of her head, squishing her cheeks and making her look right at me.
"This will not leak; nod if you understand."
Her cheeks are too smushed to for an answer, but she mumbles an affirmative, nodding.
"We're not dealing with this now, and this thing will immediately go so deep into storage that we forget about it for like a moon, ok? Now tell me about the Ginseng." I order, trying to get the shaky look in her eyes back down to normal and mostly succeeding.
"Ehem… Yes! Ginseng's a root that also makes you stronger after you eat it; never had one before, but the garden I was talking about said that some aspect of your moves gets boosted by a lot." She explains after I let go of her, trying her best to not make eye contact with the literal holy grails lying on our table. I make things easier for her and sweep them back into the sack they came with; I choose not to comment on the little whine she made.
Fucking cultivation drugs, for Llama's sake. When did Pokémon become some kind of Xianxia where we have to down powerful roots and seeds for power?
…Wait, we kinda already do that in the games with the X-Series, stat boosters and stat berries.
And levels and evolution neatly tie in to cultivation stages...
…Shit. Was I in the wrong genre this whole time? Should I switch things up a bit? I mean, it's still early days, but foundations are really important for cultivation stuff.
"Dinner's ready!" Chimecho rings, the psychic pulse lifting their ringing across my senses.
I'll have to think more on this later; both on what this means for our training, and just how much resources this guild has to pull on.
"Well, we'll see what tomorrow brings later; let's eat!"
"Mm!"
A.N: Ah yes, Racial Profiling, the minigame! I have no idea how one guy is meant to check who is right or not; maybe he has a list on hand that he flips through by species when they make it to the gate? Maybe he uses scent cues and visual differences to know? Not my problem.
What is my problem is that I guess we've figured out where a good chunk of our money goes to—sentry prizes! The prizes for that thing are insane! Why am I getting a Rare Candy, HP Up and a permanent move booster for the simplest of OpSec?
Heh… Future motivation to do well secured.
The next morning, after assembly we get an unpleasant surprise.
"HEY, you two!" Loudred booms from across the main hall, standing next to a now uncovered hole in the ground with Diglett beside him.
For fuck's sake, this again?!
While Flora winces out because of this asshole's loud as hell voice, I waste absolutely no time marching up to him, cheeks barely sparking as a reminder; he may technically be a bit stronger than me, but I sure as hell can beat him anyway.
"What is it, Loudred?" I grit out, annoyed.
He seems to get the point, and reduces his volume a little bit. Nowhere near good enough, but the lobby's a public space, and I can't discount the fact that it might be something important he's going to convey.
"You two are on sentry duty today!" He rumbles.
The fuck? Why?
My question must've shown on my face, because Diglett looks a bit sheepish as he starts to explain.
"I'm sorry. I'm usually the one on sentry duty, but my dad Dugtrio got called away for something, and he told me to handle the notice boards for today." He explains with a short bow.
"It would be great if someone could help."
Ha! Such pitiful looks mean nothing to me-
"Of course we'll help!" Flora agrees, nodding, and it's like a record scratch in my head as I turn over to her in disbelief.
Well then, if we're going to do this, it has to at least be worth our time, right?
"Tell me, Loudred. Why are we supposed to be the ones to do this, not you? Do you really think this is worth our time?" I ask, probably cutting a hilarious figure as I try my very best to loom over a Pokémon that is nearly double my height. Jokes on them; I can see bro sweating.
"I mean, there's a reward for exceptional results?" Diglett offers when he sees Loudred floundering—wait.
Say less!
I was already halfway down the steps; free shit is free!
"Oi, Flora! What're you waiting for? This work isn't going to do itself!"
Well… This was both time-consuming and ridiculously easy for me.
"Shieldon!"
I mean, I'm one of those freaks that remembers the footprints for practically every Pokémon, and those that I don't remember, I can simply infer from what I remember they look like.
"Riolu!"
The last part that made this ridiculously easy?
"Holy shit, those bars must be strong!" I whisper under my breath as a massive form nearly blots out the light from the grate entirely.
"What was that, Watt?" Flora asks from her position closer to the only window near here, where she was relaying my 'guesses' to Loudred.
"It's nothing; Snorlax!"
The grate may be pretty fine for their tech level, and the light from above means all I'm looking at are shadows...
"That's a Chimchar!"
…But I can still kinda see who they are from underneath, ya know?
"Yep, that's Phanphy!"
Also, how are you supposed to find out who someone is by footprint? Does Loudred have some sort of eidetic memory or something? Isn't this kind of racist?
…God, why won't this day just end? It's been hours!
"*Yawn*… It's Persian." I yawn, blinking blearily from the light.
This reward better be fucking worth it, man.
When we get back out, the talking rat with wings is waiting for us, ready to 'evaluate our performance' in his own words. He seems pretty bored with the entire thing until he actually looks at my results.
"You identified everyone perfectly?! On your first try? In seconds?!" The birdbrain screeches, feathers all poofed out and eyes wide, and I preen smugly.
"You did it, Watt!" Flora cheers, giving me a neck hug, and even Loudred is simply nodding along happily instead of yammering on.
"A-According to Guild rules, we'll have to... Generously reward our top sentry!" My wonderful supervisor Chatot grits out before hopping off to rummage through the storage room.
While he's rereading the simple visitor list carefully as he goes, as if an error's supposed to materialize out of nothing—the dick—I discretely shimmy up to someone who can tell me if what I did is supposed to cause this much commotion or not.
Flora? Nah, she knows a lot, but she doesn't know about this.
Chatot? Hell no!
Loudred? Yeah, if I want to have me asking broadcast to the entire guild, that is.
With all other options eliminated, I slide over to Diglett, who's now looking at me weirdly.
"So… Am I an outlier or something? Why's Chatot freaking out over my work?" I whisper.
"It took me a few moons learning from my dad before I could do what you just did. You just blew my dad's record away!" The Ground type whispers back, slightly unnerved but even more starstruck.
"Ah, so I'm just that good. Thanks for the clarification." I huff, pleased.
"Yeah, you are... Can… Can you teach me some of what you know?" Diglett asks shyly.
"Maybe we can exchange notes on this later; Chatot's coming back." I inform.
"Oh… Okay!" Diglett agreed, nodding.
Just as I said, the feather duster returns, dropping a small sack that had the beautiful jangle of currency and a sharp, musty smell wafting from it. I quickly snatch the precious container before that bastard gets any funny ideas and take off with Flora back to our room.
When we get there, I take a deep breath, once again confirm that the door is shut to satisfy my paranoia, and then spill out our haul onto the little wooden table we had.
… A decent amount of coins, a positively vibrant seed that looks so polished and perfect that I thought it was a ceramic replica, a picture-perfect root of ginseng, and another seed that looked like it was nearly swollen with energy.
I don't know what most of this is, so I turn to Flora, whose eyes are wide with awe?!
"Give it to me straight, Flora; what're we dealing with here. I can recognize the ginseng, at least." I ask, practically unleashing the floodgates as my partner starts word-vomiting all over me.
"Ohmygod that's a Life Seed! AND a Joy Seed! I thought they were a myth! Life seeds I know about at least; they're super rare and only the hardest or rarest dungeons make them. They're really hard to grow outside the dungeon, and I don't really think those ones are ever as effective as the dungeon ones. They fill you with so much Aura and Life energy that it just makes you healthier in general. I've only seen these in a few big bazaars at the square; they were really expensive!
As for the Joy Seed?" And here, her voice slows, almost becoming reverent; "I didn't think they really existed until now; these things are supposed to be dungeon-only stuff; no-one has the slightest clue how to start growing them out of one. If anyone did so, we'd know, because while a Life Seed makes you healthier? A Joy seed is condensed life."
"Wait, so what exactly does condensed life mean?" I ask, having a tiny flicker of disbelief at what I'm hearing; there ain't no way that the Guild has access to these things, right?
"I don't really know how to explain it; there are a few stories I got from word of mouth, and I'm not too sure. Supposedly it does what the Life seed does, but with every other part of you; you become faster, stronger, more durable and such."
Sweet Alpaca Jesus the Guild has Rare Candies in stock. HOW?!
"Flora?" I whisper lowly, clutching both sides of her head, squishing her cheeks and making her look right at me.
"This will not leak; nod if you understand."
Her cheeks are too smushed to for an answer, but she mumbles an affirmative, nodding.
"We're not dealing with this now, and this thing will immediately go so deep into storage that we forget about it for like a moon, ok? Now tell me about the Ginseng." I order, trying to get the shaky look in her eyes back down to normal and mostly succeeding.
"Ehem… Yes! Ginseng's a root that also makes you stronger after you eat it; never had one before, but the garden I was talking about said that some aspect of your moves gets boosted by a lot." She explains after I let go of her, trying her best to not make eye contact with the literal holy grails lying on our table. I make things easier for her and sweep them back into the sack they came with; I choose not to comment on the little whine she made.
Fucking cultivation drugs, for Llama's sake. When did Pokémon become some kind of Xianxia where we have to down powerful roots and seeds for power?
…Wait, we kinda already do that in the games with the X-Series, stat boosters and stat berries.
And levels and evolution neatly tie in to cultivation stages...
…Shit. Was I in the wrong genre this whole time? Should I switch things up a bit? I mean, it's still early days, but foundations are really important for cultivation stuff.
"Dinner's ready!" Chimecho rings, the psychic pulse lifting their ringing across my senses.
I'll have to think more on this later; both on what this means for our training, and just how much resources this guild has to pull on.
"Well, we'll see what tomorrow brings later; let's eat!"
"Mm!"
A.N: Ah yes, Racial Profiling, the minigame! I have no idea how one guy is meant to check who is right or not; maybe he has a list on hand that he flips through by species when they make it to the gate? Maybe he uses scent cues and visual differences to know? Not my problem.
What is my problem is that I guess we've figured out where a good chunk of our money goes to—sentry prizes! The prizes for that thing are insane! Why am I getting a Rare Candy, HP Up and a permanent move booster for the simplest of OpSec?