Chương 38: Beneath Mt. Moon

Moon Mt. Moon was alive in ways aura could not simplify. Zubat colonies hung in chambers above the service tunnel, hundreds of inverted sparks crowded so closely that Rine could not separate them. Paras moved through fungal beds beneath the stone. Geodude rested against walls with their limbs tucked in, indistinguishable from rock until disturbed. And deeper still, scattered through the mountain like stars buried beneath earth, Moon Stones radiated an energy Identify could not classify.

The games had represented the place as ladders, corridors, items, and encounters. Reality had weight. Kilometers of natural cave crossed old mining shafts, shrine paths, groundwater channels, and sealed habitats. Sound traveled unpredictably. A whisper returned from the wrong direction. Cold air sank through cracks and carried scents between levels. Rine wrote nothing in the notebook. Some corrections required surviving first. Vale led with a hooded lamp set to red.

Clefairy disliked harsh light, and bright beams could scatter Zubat into a panic. Kecleon moved ahead invisibly, skin adapting to stone without needing its battle Ability. Color Change altered elemental typing after an attack; camouflage belonged to the species' natural physiology. Rine appreciated the distinction. Veyra tracked with her nose close to the floor. Gastly drifted through walls in short intervals, never traveling beyond the distance his recovering core could sustain.

The trail split at the first natural chamber. One branch descended beside an old rail line. The other climbed toward a shrine marked by faded pink ribbons. Veyra chose the rail. Vale examined the ground.

"Boot prints agree."

"How many?"

"Four people. Something heavy dragged between them." Rine saw five auras ahead. He raised one hand. The nearest wall moved. Geodude opened its eyes. Four more detached from the stone around them. Their sleep had been shallow. Lamp heat and vibration finished waking them. The largest swung one arm.

"Back," Vale said. Kecleon appeared between them and took the strike across its shoulder. Its body flashed with Rock energy. Color Change activated: Rock type The second Geodude used Rock Throw. Kecleon's temporary Rock typing resisted the impact, but three more stones followed. Veyra lunged. Rine caught her harness.

"No." Her snarl vibrated through his hand. Fire met Rock poorly. Electric attacks could affect pure Geodude only if their Ground typing was somehow removed, which it was not. A direct Ground move might send her back into critical care. Being unable to fight looked too much like helplessness. Rine understood. He still held the harness.

"Gastly, draw them left. No contact." Gastly opened his mouth and projected a Night Shade shaped like an enormous Onix. The image surged through the chamber. Two Geodude recoiled. One attacked it. The Rock Throw passed through spectral force and shattered against the wall.

"Cinder, Quick Attack!" Vale called. Fletchinder crossed the chamber in a blur, striking loose stones aside before they reached Kecleon. She climbed immediately, staying beyond the Geodude's arms. Vale threw no ball. He scattered mineral blocks from a side pouch instead. The largest Geodude stopped. Food designed for Rock types landed away from the tunnel. Cinder circled above, directing attention with brief flashes of flame. Kecleon retreated without striking again.

One by one, the wild Pokémon followed the mineral scent. The encounter ended. Rine released Veyra's harness. She glared at him.

"You would have been hurt." Her ears flattened.

"That does not make you weak." She turned away. Words could be accurate and insufficient. They continued until the rail descended through a collapsed support arch. The dragging marks ended beside a vertical shaft. Vale crouched.

"They used a lift." The mechanism had been removed afterward. Rine looked down. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. The shaft swallowed their lamp. Rusted ladder rungs remained along one wall, several broken.

"How far?" Vale asked. Gastly dropped into the opening. He returned after twenty seconds and shaped a glowing number. FORTY"Feet or meters?" Rine asked. Gastly added: YES Vale sighed. Kecleon climbed first with a safety line. Rine followed after lowering the packs. Veyra entered her ball only for the descent and emerged at the bottom furious about it.

"You cannot use ladders." She shook dust onto his boots. The lower tunnel belonged to older mining works. Drill scars marked the walls. Empty sockets showed where Moon Stones had been removed decades earlier. Fungal light replaced the lamp in patches of blue and green. Rine's aura reached ahead. Human presences flickered beyond stone. Four. Three Pokémon moving freely. Three more clustered close, their life rhythms unnaturally slow. The missing Clefairy. He signaled Vale. They extinguished the lamp.

Darkness changed the mountain. Fungal light became a map of its own, blue shelves marking damp stone and green clusters showing where Paras had fed recently. Gastly's red eyes disappeared when he closed them. Kecleon vanished so completely that even aura found only a slight interruption beside Vale. Rine took three steps and heard wings. The Zubat colony descended without attacking. Hundreds poured through the upper chamber toward an opening no human could see, leaving to feed now that surface light had faded.

Vale pressed himself against the wall. Rine did the same. Veyra crouched beneath his arm. Gastly flattened into the stone. The swarm passed around them. Wind from thousands of wingbeats carried dust, heat, and the sour scent of the colony. One young Zubat struck Rine's shoulder, corrected, and vanished with the others. In a battle, he would have thought of Electric attacks and experience. Here, discharging electricity into the swarm could stampede an entire ecosystem through narrow tunnels.

They waited until the final wingbeat faded.

"No encounter notification," Vale whispered. Rine looked at him. The hunter's mouth twitched.

"You have the expression of someone comparing this place to a game." Rine's Dark veil rose before he could stop it. Vale noticed.

"Lucky guess," he said. Too lucky.

"Explain."

"You know species details no orphanage taught. You expected the Game Corner connection before evidence. You stared at Route Seven like it offended your memory." Rine said nothing. Vale continued forward rather than demanding an answer.

"Everyone has a secret until it interferes with the contract."

"And if mine does?"

"Then we discuss it." The lack of threat made the secret heavier. They followed the rail tunnel until Clefairy markings appeared. Small handprints in chalky Moon Stone dust covered a low wall. Pink ribbons tied to mineral growth had faded almost white. Vale stepped around them. Rine did the same. The traffickers had not. A boot print crushed one ribbon into mud. Veyra sniffed it and growled. The song sounded again, closer now. Three voices began together. One faded before the final note. Sedation.

Urgency tightened Rine's muscles. He did not accelerate blindly. He marked the junction, checked the ceiling for traps, and waited while Gastly examined the wall. Slow did not mean passive. It meant refusing to let the enemy choose the shape of his hurry. Gastly scouted through the wall and returned with an illusion: a square room, metal cages, two guards, a Golbat hanging above, and a Raticate near the only visible exit. The other humans were deeper. Rine opened the psychic anchor.

No signal reached outside the mountain. The bead accepted a stored message. Located missing Clefairy. Four suspected traffickers. Eastern service mine, lower works, approximately forty units below rail junction. Request Ranger support. Whether Lyra's anchor reached a relay in time depended on distance and stone. Vale spread a paper map across the floor.

"We observe until support arrives."

"The Clefairy are drugged."

"Breathing?"

"Yes."

"Then observation." Rine disliked the decision. Vale met his gaze.

"Rescue contracts fail when someone mistakes urgency for permission to improvise."

"Sometimes waiting kills."

"Sometimes entering kills everyone." Both were true. They moved to a ventilation crack overlooking the holding chamber. The Clefairy lay in separate cages lined with dark fabric. Heavy collars covered the curled tufts beneath their ears. Tubes fed sedative into their mouths. A tray beside them contained fragments of Moon Stone. Not whole stones. Powder and chips, sorted by clarity. One guard wore a breathing mask and Rocket-surplus body armor with the insignia removed.

His partner, Raticate, showed missing fur around an old control-collar scar. The second guard carried a capture rifle. Golbat shifted above. Golbat — Level 23 Potential: Yellow — Rare Ability: Inner Focus Condition: healthy; alert Unlike Cassian's Golbat, this one showed no collar injuries. It remained because it chose to—or because coercion left no visible mark. Rine studied the chamber instead of deciding. An air duct above the cages led toward the old shaft. A drainage channel crossed beneath the rear wall.

Power entered through armored cable on the eastern side. The traffickers had positioned themselves between the Clefairy and both visible exits, but not between the cages and solid stone. Gastly could reach them. He could not carry three sedated bodies without dispersing dangerously. Kecleon could disable the lights. Darkness would favor Gastly and Golbat equally. Cinder could control the air but risk igniting Moon Stone dust mixed with mining residue. Every tactic created a different danger.

Vale wrote times beside the guards' movements. The one with Raticate checked the cages every seven minutes. The second left twice to speak through the rear door. Golbat never stopped watching the ventilation crack for longer than three breaths. Professionals, Rine decided. Not good ones. The capture rifle leaned against the second guard's right leg whenever he drank. His sidearm remained secured by a retention strap he had forgotten to close after the last inspection.

Raticate favored its left forepaw, possibly from the old collar damage. Rine's mind converted weaknesses into injuries with practiced ease. He deliberately added another column to the plan. How to end the engagement without exploiting them lethally. Capture rifle disabled. Sidearm removed. Raticate separated from Trainer. Golbat's flight path constrained rather than burned. Human suspects restrained for questioning. Vale read the notes.

"You normally plan this much?"

"More."

"You added survival outcomes."

"They may know where the buyer is." It was a practical answer. It was not the only answer. Beyond the chamber, a metal door opened and closed. One of the deeper human auras moved away, carrying a device that pulsed faintly against Rine's psychic senses. Remote trigger, perhaps. Observation had revealed it. Waiting had not been nothing. Rine waited. Minutes passed. The first guard spoke into a radio.

"Shipment moves at moonrise. Buyer increased the Direbolt offer." Rine went cold. Direbolt. The designation appeared nowhere in Doctor Sen's files. Rine did not know whether it named a project, a buyer's category, or the evolution the clinic could not identify. Someone inside the trafficking network knew what Veyra might become. Vale's head turned slightly.

"Say again?" the second guard asked.

"Black dog. Triple type. Fifty thousand down if we locate it. More alive." They had accepted two contracts. The Clefairy were profit. Veyra was opportunity. The second guard laughed.

"Thing's supposed to be headed west." Veyra heard. Her growl began below sound. Golbat's ears turned. Rine covered Veyra's muzzle a fraction too late. Golbat screamed. The chamber erupted.

"Move!" Vale shouted. The ventilation wall shattered outward as Raticate used Hyper Fang from the other side. Kecleon intercepted the debris. Gastly spread across Veyra, shielding her from stone. The first guard fired through the opening. Rine pulled the barrel aside psychically. The capture round struck Raticate instead and wrapped it in a suppression net. The Pokémon shrieked. Its Trainer swore and reached for a second ball.

"Night Shade!" Rine called. Gastly formed darkness into a many-jawed shape and drove it through the broken wall. It hit Golbat before the Flying-type could gain speed. Vale released Cinder.

"Aerial lock!" Fletchinder climbed toward Golbat. Veyra surged forward.

"No Ground types visible," Rine said.

"Bite and release." She understood permission. Gold remained contained as she crossed the chamber and struck the capture rifle from the second guard's hands. Her jaws closed around metal. Fire heated it until the mechanism warped. The guard kicked her injured side. Rine saw red. Veyra released the rifle and bit his boot, holding just below the ankle. She could have crushed bone. She waited.

"Down," Rine told the man. He looked at Veyra's teeth. He went down. The first guard escaped through the rear door. Vale pursued. Rine moved toward the cages. The drugged Clefairy did not wake. Identify found explosive triggers built into their collars. Above him, the mine alarm began to count backward from sixty.