Ash's Story (Part 5: Modern Sinnoh)

Chapter 20: Amber Castle

The Combee wall moved like the forest had learned how to breathe.

For a moment, nobody stepped forward. Cheryl held Mothim's Poké Ball close to her chest, and the Mothim himself hovered in front of her, steadying his flight whenever the hive's rhythm shifted.

Pikachu leaned forward from my shoulder, and even Aipom stopped reaching for the Honey jar in my bag. When Aipom went still near something sweet, the forest had our attention.

After Gardenia left for Eterna, Mothim kept circling the honey-scented clearing, wings trembling whenever the Combee shifted between the trees. Cheryl held her map close, but she was watching Mothim more than the paper now. The map had led her in circles. Mothim had found a living path.

One Combee hovered lower than the others, turning back every few seconds as if checking whether we understood. She seemed smaller than the wall behind her, but the other Combee opened their formation whenever she moved, which told me she mattered.

Cheryl looked at that Combee with careful respect instead of treasure-hunter excitement. That was important. We were not following a clue anymore. We were following someone home.

Lillie stepped carefully behind it. "I think this one wants us to follow."

Combee's meaning came in three small voices layered together. "Sweet path. Queen waits. Do not break the walls."

Cheryl pressed both hands to her chest. "Then we are close."

The Combee guided us through a narrow trail hidden behind hanging vines. More Combee joined overhead, forming brief walls that opened and closed as we passed. It was not a maze exactly. It felt more like the forest was testing whether we could move without grabbing, shouting, or pushing.

Eevee walked beside me instead of staying in its ball. Since Mom had given Eevee to us, it had kept watching the deeper forest with wide, thoughtful eyes. The Grass Manor had calmed it, but Eterna Forest pulled at it in a different way.

Eevee's meaning came quietly. "Old green calls. Not scary. Strong."

I glanced at Lillie. She had felt it too.

"Something here is reaching Eevee," she said.

"Gardenia mentioned forest energy," Cheryl said softly. "And old evolution places are often hidden where people stop looking."

The path sloped downward toward the sound of water. Roots crossed the tunnel like old ropes, and sweet drops clung to the stones. Eevee kept pausing near the moss, sniffing the green light that seemed to gather in cracks along the walls.

Leafeon had not happened yet, but the possibility of it seemed to walk beside us in Eevee's silence. I could feel Lillie noticing the same thing, though neither of us wanted to rush a choice that belonged to Eevee first.

We stepped through a curtain of leaves and found a waterfall spilling into a basin ringed with Combee walls. Honey scent filled the air so strongly that even I could taste sweetness when I breathed.

I stopped, turning toward a tunnel beside the waterfall. "I can smell the honey nearby. It is over there."

Dawn sniffed the air and frowned. "I do not smell anything different."

"Me neither," Lillie said. "But if you can, then we trust it."

Pikachu's ears twitched from my shoulder.

Pikachu's meaning came alert and steady. "Sweet smell under stone. Trouble smell with it."

That warning made the next sound sharper. Angry Combee rushed from the tunnel, wings buzzing hard enough to stir the moss around our feet.