[Game thread] Skull Ruins Pokerole

[Iron]

You carry on down the yellow path. It's getting a little warmer, less icy, still chilly. It widens into a dark cavern, filled with stone pillars where stalagmites and stalactites met and merged over thousands of years.

Durant's presence does not cease. Lots of other bugs too, even ones that shouldn't want to be this deep under the earth. A Scizor flies by overhead, but you scarcely turn your heads to look at the rare Pokemon. You only trudge onward, thinking about your missing Pokemon or about an end to this cold or both. A narrow path in the bugs opens to receive you. You're seeing more of the Tricwe, Sponaree, and the occasional Firoke or swarm of Smore. However, you find yourself listlessly unable to lift your arm to toss a Pokeball.

Eyeless Yanma fly overhead, bearing smaller Bug Pokemon on their way elsewhere.

These bugs all ignore you as you ignore them. You're on your way to their home, now, following the trail of a pleasant, alluring scent.

Brutal sights do nothing to disturb you. The pieces of a Delibird go by, carried by an endless stream of Durant and Harylect. Webs are everywhere, covering little etchings or side tunnels or half-loosed rockslides. You want nothing but the sweet nectar, the illicit Honey, promised by that eternal scent.

You come to a vast palace of stone that has been chewed and regurgitated into new forms, much like the paper nests of a Beedrill. Spires rise in nearly shapeless forms, guarding the vast hollow spanned by stone bridges and infinite strands of steely silk.
The underground palace resembles a drip castle on the beach.



Within the dark hole, lit only by Firoke patrolling the surface, is a monstrosity of a Pokemon. Swollen, baglike, and slow, a massive insect rages in the dim light. She is covered in tufts of red, blue, and yellow fur, and she has gossamer Yanma wings - clearly incapable of lifting that nauseating body. Each wing is tipped with the color of a Legendary Bird, and many elements swirl in her wake. She has too many eyes and perceptive tufted antennae. An immense aura of power radiates from her. Only those she invites into her lair may come forward into her presence. Most never leave, for if she merely wishes to issue orders, she may do so without leaving her nest. So many of her visitors, the mates and the strangers and the specially bred Pokemon, end up as her food.

She is the source of the scent compelling you onward.

Slung on sticky webs, within the clawed clutches of the Bug Queen, are the missing Pokemon. Nathan sees Ralts and experiences a surge of emotion, but it's only the tiny portions capable of reaching through the cracks in the pheromone-laden fuzz infecting every mind within a dozen miles. Mr. Finder, whose sensitive nose is now swollen and red and cracked with oozing sores, is all set to walk right into the belly of the beast. Ventus' empathy is tightly closed, lest he rush right forward. The pheromones still affect him anyway. Heart, for once, is speechless. Unable to open his mouth, he flares his nostrils and inhales...and obeys the command to come pay tribute.

Desperately, Ditto's current form lets out a little howl, which only you six can hear over the rustling of chitin and the clacking of pincers. Strength flows back into you, enough to turn away from the horrendous sight and to grab Mr. Finder if you want. Herolune is pinching his nose shut.

You regain control of your characters. You recognize you are in the presence of a secret legend hidden in the bowels of Mt. Sentry.