Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Quenched Torch

Chapter 11: Amber Meadow

The light of midmorning peeked through the trees as Rye and I finished the last leg of our walk. As Rye had promised, we had gotten up at first light to groggily trudge the last ten miles to Amber Meadow. I was at least aware of what was in store for us, so it wasn't nearly as unpleasant as we had feared. We didn't really have much to talk about, seeing as the topics most on our minds were topics we preferred to keep to ourselves.

Besides, I hadn't exactly figured out how to get across to Rye that this world might somehow be the human world I had left behind. I hadn't even been able to comprehend it entirely myself. What did this mean for my past? How did this happen? Was everyone I knew dead? Had the humanity I knew died out or abandoned the region? Could it be that everything actually fine and the Gray Continent was just some massive nature preserve? Was this even my world or some parallel universe?

'Agh, my head hurts.'

Eventually, we stumbled across a large sign in the road, ahead of which the trees of the forest gradually thinned out into a meadow of tall, yellowish grass. Rye stepped forward to read the sign for me.

"Warning. The area ahead has been classified as a mystery dungeon by the Gray Proper Exploratory Society. Enter with caution," he read off it.

Swallowing hard, I ambled forth past the sign, Rye following close behind. As the trees began to become fewer and farther in between, I could almost feel the air around me growing colder, as if someone or something were watching me. Rye seemed to take notice of my unease at this, so he put a hand on my shoulder.

"D-don't worry, Beck, they all feel like this. Once you go into a mystery dungeon, you start feeling all weird. N-nothing to worry about," he said reassuringly. "It's okay, w-we'll do this together, alright?"

With a shiver, I nodded, so we continued heading deeper into the mystery dungeon.

---

Amber Meadow

1F

'Ugh, talk about deja vu.'

Unpleasant images of Quinite Woods began to flash through my head as I looked into the labyrinthine pathways leading out of the clearing we had found ourselves in. Looking over at Rye, I could tell he was uneasy about this, too, though I could infer it wasn't as bad as my untold dread, seeing as he had done this before. As such, he was the first to head down one of the paths, gesturing me to follow.

As we walked through the seemingly endless rows of grass, we stopped as a loud, challenging yowl rang through the air. Ahead, a Purrloin stared us down, its fur standing on end.

"D-don't panic, it's just a feral. Nothing to worry about," Rye muttered to himself before giving me a sideways glance. "No offense."

The Purrloin, evidently unfazed by our non-aggression, began to charge towards us, letting out a fierce yell. Looking around panickedly, I noticed the tall grass on the side of the path.

'Why don't we just go through here? I mean, surely there isn't anything stopping us, right?'

I began trying to trudge through the tall grass, only to be tangled up in weeds and briers. What was worse, more were now emerging and they appeared to be trying to pull me deeper into the brush.

"Beck! No!" I heard Rye yell.

As Rye grabbed onto me and began trying to pull me out, I desperately searched for whatever I had on hand to free myself. Eventually, I felt a hard spot on my chest with my free paw.

'My scalchop!'

Although it was small and undeveloped, I decided that would be enough. With a powerful swing, I managed to slice through one of the briers that had tightly wrapped itself around my now-bleeding leg, sending it retreating into the brush. The rest of the rogue grasses seemed to get the idea and violently threw me back onto the path. However, I didn't get much reprieve, as the Purrloin pounced on me with its claws out.