Ash's Story (Part 6: Unova)

Chapter 91: Ghost Medal

The Strange House looked colder in daylight than it had in my memory.

Maybe places like that were not supposed to look normal. The broken windows, crooked boards, and swaying curtains made daylight feel like something that had wandered inside by mistake. Wind brushed through the grass around the old path, carrying the dry smell of leaves and dust.

Pikachu shifted on my shoulder, his ears twitching toward the house.

Pikachu's meaning brushed against me carefully. "This place remembers people even after they leave."

"I know," I whispered, touching his back with two fingers.

Alice glanced at me, then at the dark doorway. She did not ask if I was okay. She had learned that some places did not need that question. She stayed close enough that her hand brushed mine when the boards groaned under our steps.

Golly checked the doorway before anyone crossed it. "No one separates inside. We are not treating a haunted building like a casual shortcut."

"Who would do that?" Iris asked, already leaning around Cilan to peer through the entrance.

Cilan lifted one hand dramatically, eyes still alert. "A haunted house is a full-course experience of atmosphere, memory, and unstable flooring. I recommend we taste it with caution."

Eve looked at the warped hallway. "That is one way to make danger sound like dinner."

We stepped inside together. The Strange House answered with a long creak from somewhere above us, as if something unseen had shifted its weight on the second floor.

I had come here expecting old dust, strange memories, and maybe another reminder that Unova never let its past stay buried. I did not expect a woman in glasses to be standing near a broken desk, writing in a notebook while a candle burned beside her without melting.

Her pen moved quickly across paper.

"There is one man who wanders the world with a white dragon Pokémon to search for truth," she murmured, her voice gentle and distant. "His footprints are never alone, yet every step asks whether truth saves people or only cuts deeper."

I froze before I meant to.

Reshiram's name was not spoken, but the white dragon stood between the words like heat above a flame. Alice's hand closed around mine. Golly's eyes sharpened. Eve stepped slightly nearer to Alice, and Iris's teasing expression vanished.

The woman stopped writing and blinked, as though she had only just remembered other people could enter a room.

"Oh," she said softly. "That was part of a novel I am writing. I want to write down the event that happened on that day. Sorry. It has nothing to do with you."

I stared at her for one heartbeat too long.

Then recognition arrived. The glasses, the dark hair, the calm way she stood in a haunted house like it was a library. She was not just a writer.

"You're Shauntal," I said carefully.

She smiled, and the candle flame bent toward her. "And you are Ash Ketchum. I am the Elite Four's Ghost-type Pokémon user, Shauntal, and I shall be your opponent."

The hallway suddenly felt narrower.

I had come through the League already, facing rivals, old wounds, and battles that dragged my whole journey onto the field at once. But the Elite Four were different. Grimsley had already shown me that. They were not just strong Trainers. They understood one part of battle so deeply that facing them felt like stepping into their world.