The Coronet Mountain Range dominated the center of Sinnoh, itself crowned by the magnificent Mount Coronet that named the entire group.
All over the region one could find a wide variety of economies: Mining in the Southwestern quarter, Forestry in the Northwestern, and Social Services in the Southeast, where the economy had previously been rather lackluster.
It was still lackluster in the Northeastern quarter: a hilly region more famous for fog than anything else.
But it was often the case that the quietest regions produced the most remarkable people.
The steep slopes of the Northeastern Coronets were barren of life: it was too steep even for a Geodude to rest, and no trees grew in it's barren expanse.
It was a sharp climb, one that only the bravest would ever attempt. Most also had to have their mothers dead, or not caring, to even try it.
Of course, not telling was also an option, although one with a fate worse than death should the climber's mother ever find out.
The harsh landscape was disturbed in an explosion of stone and dirt as two objects cut through the mountain as if it were butter: a blue, un-notched fin and black bur that held onto the fin with immense determination.
The fin and blur swung up hundreds of yards of intense slope, before bursting up at the top and coming into greater focus: the fin belonging to a blue and red dragon-type and the black blur belonging to a little blond girl no older than 10, dressed in worn dark clothing that seemed damaged in a mutual state of harsh use, and lengthy existence.
The two companions were supreme examples of extreme mountain climbing, without ropes or communications gear or any sort of safe option, stared in wonder at what had awaited them: a grand, remarkably preserved temple carved from mountain stone with a masters hand, guarded by great stone Heatran and covered in fire and water imagery. A single, blue cube like shape was also dominant in the carvings.
"I knew it was here Gible!" The little girl stated with pride, "No one ever translated those Unown Runes properly: the Stark Empire always hid their tombs in high locations, not just in hot locations. The lost Stark Emperor's Tomb is here!"
"Gible!" the little creature cheered.
"Now," the little girl grinned as she pulled out a sketch pad and pencil, "Let's document this place, then take all the treasure within!"
"Gible..." Gible seemed less enthused about that part.
Or, she just was wondering how they were going to get back down from the Lost Stark Emperor's Tomb with all the treasure. Either or really.
...
It was the third time she and Gible had come to the next ancient ruin they had uncovered in the Coronent Range: and it had been stumping her for far too long.
The Kricketune Temple, according to her research, had been founded by an ancient civilization who were famous for their high quality musicians. It wasn't as grand as the Tomb of the Lost Stark Emperor, but the overgrown temple was even more obscure, and was said to be home to a variety of ancient treasures.
Ocarinas, Batons, Harps, Flutes...many made of valuable materials like Gold, Silver, Rubies, Sapphires, Emeralds, Diamonds, and Pearls.
However, getting through the Kricketune shaped doors was proving to be tricky. Digging under it, or breaking through the wals, had done nothing but make her poor Gible feel self conscious.
However, this time she was quite sure she had figured out how to get the temple open, and it didn't involve harassing explosive Geodude.
DEEDLE DEEDLE
The wind blew through the temple, creating a sound pattern. One that was quite important, if the Unown Runes she had recently translated were of any indication.
Taking up the Harmonica she had pilfered for this task, her Gible looked up to her in anticipation as she began to blow.
VEEKLE VEEKLE
Frowning, she removed the device from her mouth and waited.
DEEDLE DEEDLE
The temple provided her the melody again, and with a resolute nod she put the harmonica back in her mouth.
VEEDLE VEEDLE
Close, she nearly had it.
DEEDLE DEEDLE DEEDLE DEE
The song lengthened, causing her gray eyes to widen in surprise.
Or perhaps, she already had it.
"Gibe!" her Pokemon cheered her success.
Putting the harmonica back in her mouth, she played once more
VEEDLE VEEDLE VEEDLE VEE
The sounds of turning gears shattered the air around the two. The doors were starting to react. Now, according to the runes, there was only one more...
DEEDLE DEEDLE DEEDLE DEE WHOOP!
VEEDLE VEEDLE VEEDLE VEE! WHOOP!
Removing the harmonica from her mouth and shouting the last note herself, the door to the Kricketune Tempe clanckered open, revealing a passageway within.
"Gible!"
"I agree." She grinned as she pocketed her Harmonica and walked into the temple, followed closely by her Dragon.
The treasure was hers.
...
The Brotherhood of the Medimen were a religious order of well trained warriors who were inspired by the Fighting-type Pokemon Meditite and Medicham to better themselves with stringent training and severe discipline.
They had been a powerful force in Western Sinnoh in ancient times, partaking in many wars and conflicts in centuries past, though they vanished about 600 years ago after they had been slain in battle down to nearly a man: the last members dying from their injuries and age caring for this very temple.
They had done a fairly good job at it too: the marble statues of meditating Meditite were quite intact, the cobblestone path was surprisingly free of plants, and the roof of the monastery had yet to cave in.
Of course, the stairs were a little less spared the ravages of time, rain, and rockslides.
Collapsing on the ground and panting heavily, the young girl looked like she never wanted to move again.
"Gible?" the less exhausted looking dragon questioned her friend.
"...The ancient scrolls of the Meditite... Kung Fu style, the 46 remaining...Coronet Lances, and the Ruby Sandals of the Master have waited for 600 years...they can wait...5...10...20...a ton of minutes."
The wind blew in the elevated ruin, even as the little blond girl laid there still as a log.
The only sound in the ruins other than the wind...
GERR GERR
The growling of her stomach.
"...Gible." the dragon reprimanded.
"...Would you believe me if I said I was just emulating the monks who lived here?" She suggested unconvincingly.
Gible just glanced at her unconvinced.
"...Yeah yeah, I should eat more. I should eat my 5 course meals of steak and potatoes and those strange fruits called Avocados I've heard people talk about..." she muttered sarcastically.
...
"Hey Cynthia...you done climbing around the rocks like some hair-brained Aipom!?"
"My mother says it's not appropriate at all for young ladies to be trapeezing around the woods like some hooligan."
"If you want to look for old things, there is Old-man Ben down the street!"
Cynthia ignored the teasing and mocking calls of her peers as she waked down the weed and pot-hole littered streets, bordered by detritus and other waste of man, no longer phased by their juvenile insults.
This town, her home town, a place found in the middle of nowhere, was a place that was going nowhere.
A town of the poor, the lost, and the desperate: nestled in the misty and unwelcoming hills on the mountain's slopes.
It was a town where there were three types of people: those who wanted to get out, those who fought to live, and those who wallowed in their miseries.
In such categories, one could find trainers (Something she considered) and writers (she lacked the penmanship) and treasure hunters (basically just her), farmers and storekeepers and mechanics and thieves, and alcoholics and other such drug abusers.
She was only 10 years old: she couldn't become a Trainer until she was 15. By then though...she hoped to have found a way to make the treasures she found into a way out of this place.
Where she'd do so was anyone's guess though...she had never heard anyone say anything good about the pawn shop, and the moment she showed off anything valuable she'd have to deal with thieves.
She may respect thieves more than drug users, but that did not mean that she wanted to deal with them.
There was a reason she kept her treasures in Gible's cave out in the woods: a small dragon who could chew someone's leg off was a bit more imposing than she was.
"Are you listening to us!"
Cynthia felt someone grab her shoulder, and was quickly and violently turned around by her harassers: a gaggle of dirty, hungry looking 12 year olds with nothing better to do than harass little old her.
"You should respond when people talk to you." One growled at her as she merely rose her nose up and stared down at him, as she had read people did at those who they saw as beneath her.
"I would respond, but I doubt you'd say anything worth listening to."
"What was that, you little..."
Squirming out of his grip, she took a step back and violently reached for her pocket.
The gang hesitated, thinking she was reaching for a weapon of some sorts, but what she took out was far more harsh.
A granola bar.
In front of the gang, she ripped off the tin covering of the snack and ate it, with exaggerated bites, chews, and 'mmm this is good's.
The gang watched, disbelieving as she stuffed her face with food when the last time any of them ate was two days before. Soon, disbelieve turned to anger, and they lunged with every intent to teach her a lesson (and steal any food off of her).
One fight scene later, and a slightly bruised Cynthia walked away from the underfed gang, lying on the street in pain.
Her parents may often be out of town looking for work, leaving her for weeks at a time, but they did always manage to bring home the bacon, as she believed the saying was. Plus some granola bars.
That was more than could be said for many parents around here.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
...
The little blue dog Pokemon was jumping up and down at the front of her next conquest: the Light Stone Temple.
"RAh! RAh! RAruuruba! Graa-raaaaaaa! Roh-Roho~-Rohohohoho! Rolmmmmmmmm!"
Glancing to her Gible, the two seemed oblivious as to what Riolu was trying to say. Though the way the Pokemon was spassing out made the two think of a pink, easily scared dog in a farmhouse freaking out about barbers, Kalosian Psyducks, and mummies for some reason.
"Well, sure...I guess. Now, to the treasure!" Cynthia declared as she walked towards the ominous arched entrance, Gible in tow with similar eagerness.
"Rol!" Riolu whined in despair, before darting after them without hesitation.
ONE HORRIFYING TEMPLE LATER
"Well, that was fun!" Cynthia grinned as she held a large treasure chest to her chest, completely oblivious to the fact she was missing her shoes, had a nasty cut on her arm, and her left eyebrow was gone.
"Gible!" Her partner declared as Riolu collapsed to the ground behind them, panting like mad.
...
Riolu had returned again, this time freaking out in front of the Tomb of the Ice King high up in the mountains.
Cytnthia and Gible, adorned only in Wholly hats (Cynthia's red and white and Gible's green with a egg on it) to deal with the icy conditions, blinked in confusion.
"Wow, you are persistent. I can't believe we met each other again!" Cynthia smiled, "You must really want to be my friend!"
Riolu jumped up an down, motioning a variety of hand signals for 'death', 'crazyness', and most oddly of all, 'slip and fall'.
"Don't worry about it, I know how to skate!" Cynthia declared as she and Gible strolled on into the tomb guarded by carved, imported Snorunt statues without a care, before quickly being followed by a whining Riolu.
ONE ALGEBRAIC TOMB LATER
"Darn...I can't believe I dropped that cool crown..." Cynthia moped as the exited the tomb no worse for wear behind some pink cheeks and a shiver or two.
"Gible..." her partner patted her on the back, before gesturing at the other interesting stuff they had taken from the temple, cheering the two up.
Riolu promptly slid on out, trapped in a large ice cube.
Looking around, Cynthia quickly reached for a sharp rock and began chipping away at the ice, Gible joining her with a gnawing on the large block of ice.
...
"Rol..." the Riolu that kept following them whimpered, even as she approached the single, massive Topaz Crystal, illuminated only by a single ray of light in the cavern.
"Oh, don't worry about it!" Cynthia smiled his way, "After all, what could possibly go wrong?"
She picked up the crystal, even as a loud thumping began to ring through the now dark chamber.
"...Oh, that I guess..." Cynthia laughed weakly even as Riolu adopted a 'not this again' expression.
ONE SUSPENSEFUL TENSION BUILDING SCENE LATER
With a single punch, Riolu shattered the giant boulder that had been rolling at them.
"Thank you!" Cynthia thanked Riolu for the save, who just shook his head at the entire thing.
...
In adventuring, in life, and the passing of days, the clock moves forward.
Eventually the 10 year old becomes 11, and from that comes changes.
One of which, was theoretical wisdom.
The now older girl now searched the ruins with more than just her bare hands and the occasional harmonica and hats.
Now she had a used, sizeable backpack filled with a wide variety of potentially useful things.
Of course, it was not quite the most useful thing to have in this current task.
"...The Resting Place of My Fairest Wife, Taken from Dirtiest of Origins, May be Entered only with That Pokemon." Cynthia recited the message inscribed upon the wall of the dimly lit cavern. No light was found within it beyond the lamp that was being held by Riolu, with most of the cavern being a underground lake. Only a narrow shore, dominated by the inscribed wall and a single, thick door that would be hard to break down existed above the water.
"Ru?" Riolu murmured.
"...Every puzzle has an answer..." Cynthia mused to herself, turning to the lake as she thought through the statement for a possible solution.
As she did so Gible dug through her bag in search of anything that could help: Rope, compass, water bottle, hatchet, harmonica, gloves, several spare Pokeballs...nothing that would really be of use.
A Magikarp leapt from the water, splashing about as it returned to it's liquid home.
Several more of them also burst forth, each time making Cynthia's face change slightly from perplexed to 'I got it'.
The change was full with the 7th karp.
"That's it!" Cynthia declared.
"Gible?" "Ru?" Her Pokemon asked, Gible getting a shirt in the face for her question.
Several more articles joined the shirt as Cynthia burst into the water, disappearing into the water below.
Several Water-Pokemon were thrown into the air from below like one searching through cloths might toss shirts: Magikarp, Barboach, even a rather small Whiscash.
Gible and Riolu exchanged confused looks, before Cynthia burst out of the water holding a brown fish above her hair.
"Behold, the key!" (Bas!)
Riolu and Gible exchanged confujsed looks as to how a fish would be the key to getting in, but the inmistakable sound of massive doors sliding open rang through the chamber, even as a stark Cynthia came to shore with the brown fish under her arm.
...
The walls of the tunnel the three had ventured down were made of sold stone, a pattern unbroken for miles upon miles into the earth with no imperfection.
Thus, the large boulder that blocked the path was quite the noticeable block, particularly as it did not match the roof.
"Hmmm...this boulder feels deliberate, wouldn't you say?" Cynthia ventured to her exploration partners. Gible nodded in agreement, while Riolu just looked around nervously.
"These walls appear to be made of solid stone, the sort that Onix really love. They can dig through it and communicate with screeches without risking cave ins. This boulder is too tough to beat up, so I suggest we shake it apart." Reaching into her bag, she pulled out a pair of ear protectors which she plopped first on Gible's head, then on her own.
"Riolu, Screech!"
Acknowledging the request her Riolu cleared his voice, before letting loose a powerful sonic screech. The walls around them endured it with stalwart strength, while the boulder trembled, coming apart at the seems.
Every moment the screech lasted, the more the blocking barrier crumbed.
Soon, it was naught but pebbles before them.
"You know Riolu," Cynthia stated as she freed her ears from the protective barriers, even as she moved to free Gible's ears, "You really are good at screaming."
Riolu blushed, before the three stepped through the gravel field and into a round chamber.
The chamber itself was lit only by her lantern, revealing many Unown runes.
She scrutinized them, moving her lantern along as she read them.
"A partial symbol of Time, a summoning of It and a tiny fragment of It's power. What is, what was, and what could be and could have been." Cynthia recited, wondering what exactly that meant. She noticed a flash of blue in the corner of her light's reach, and shifted towards it.
A blue orb met her sight, sitting atop a marble pillar like a trophy piece. The orb was marked with grooves and lines that made her think of a Combee, though she doubted that they were thinking of them when they made it.
Riolu whimpered and even Gible looked a bit apprehensive. Cynthia smiled and approached the orb.
"What are you worried about you guys, it's just an orb." Cynthia stated as she grabbed it with both hands. After all, it wasn't like this one would be poisoned...
A female Garchomp, powerful beyond description, beat a Chimchar with Dig, while on fire.
Her mother, looking like she did in the photos taken not long after Cynthia had been born if a lot sweatier and more tired than she had ever seen, holding a baby in her arms, even as the Doctors told her it was a Girl and her father ate a muffin.
A boy with a Pikachu stood facing her in a stadium
The female Garchomp took out a Weavile shooting ice with Dragon Rush.
Her first day of school, being teased by other kids for saying she liked ruins
Rips in space and time opening up over Mt. Coronet, as if time and space were broken
The female Garchomp blasting a Murkrow out of the sky with Giga Impact
Her first encounter with Gible. She missed that old shirt
A battle raging in a destroyed city. A gray haired youth in a blue coat with a sword, a graying woman with dark hair in red and black who had a whip in one hand and her other was filled with blue psychic energies, and a yellow and blue metallic suit (probably human) marked with C.G 2099 firing lasers fought an army of Pokemon who were pale and transparent, like ghosts.
The female Garchomp blocking a Frenzy Plant with only her arms, and smashing a Torterra with Brick Break
Her entering this very chamber with Riolu and Gible
A teenage her hovering over an ice cream cart, pondering what flavor to get...
She regained focus after taking a blow to her legs. Riolu and Gible bound to her side, even as the orb rolled out of her hands along the floor.
Apparently the Unown Runes had meant 'touch this orb, and you look into time itself. Beware of sanity damage.'
"Well then..." Cynthia admitted in a shaken tone, "Perhaps we should move that thing with the sack and not my bare hands, or at least until I have some lottery numbers."
Neither of her Pokemon bought her bad attempt at joking.
...
"...A Draconid funeral site? Well, he certainly got a little lost didn't he?" Cynthia reflected as she walked out of the hidden little cavern, various symbols of the Hoenn-originating dragon people in her arms.
They had a lot of Rayquaza motifs. She wondered if that was a thing with them.
"Gible..." her dragon muttered.
"I am an aspiring treasure hunter, not a whatever kind of person maps ocean currents. Maybe there is some sort of current the poor guy got stuck on. Maybe he just took a wrong turn somewhere. He didn't say what happened to him with wall inscriptions."
Riolu was silent, more focused on looking around as if expecting the trees to come alive and beat them over their heads.
She'd call that an unfounded concern if she hadn't just heard that old story from the Kalos region about just that.
...
"Finally, it's the weekend!" Cynthia declared to her Riolu, who had been until then peacefully sleeping on her bed.
Riolu moved to the side as she flopped down to the second grade sleeping apparatus: a test in hand with a solid 94 in red above several math problems before falling to the ground.
"You know what time it is?!" Cynthia lifted her little head up with an eager smile as Riolu gulped.
"Ru?"
"No, we did that on Wednesday. It's time to find explore the Gracidea Sanctuary Ruins!"
Riolu did not looked thrilled.
...
In ancient times, the ruin adorned field on top a mountain plateau had belonged to a king who wished to attract the legendary Gratitude Pokemon.
Now, it was just crumbling stone, and a lot of weeds.
Good for the Pokemon, but not really good for her treasure collection.
"...Zzzzz..."
Of course, when you are exhausted from both an math examination (with same day return for extra stress) and climbing up a large hill, little girls tend to fall asleep on the grassy bushes.
Gible and Riolu exchanged looks at their sleeping friend/psuedo master, before Gible promptly fell asleep next to her. Riolu sighed, before resolving to stand guard.
...
"Oh, this is much better!"
Cynthia's wide smile snapped any tiredness out of Riolu, who now just looked terrified.
Gible looked bored.
As it was the weekend, the three had time to look for more ruins, and they had most certainly found it.
A black obsidian door in the mountain, littered with warning laden ruins and a general sense of doom from it.
"The death pit of the legion of the 108 most deadly criminals of an ancient lost civilization!" Cynthia beamed, "They say that they were trapped in here alive inside with all of their stolen plunder, and eventually died of starvation and lack of oxygen!"
Riolu looked at her with a 'why on earth would you want to go into such a place' look.
"Oh don't worry about it, Gible can Dig us all out if we get stuck in there, long before we have to eat each other!"
"Gible!"
"Ru..."
...
A lamp in hand, Cynthia led her two partners inside the eerily quiet ruins, eyes pealed for anything of interest.
Gold, Silver, Rubies, Sapphires, Emeralds...the stuff that everyone wanted. She'd settle for some Topaz and Opals of course, as well as any cool helmets.
She needed more of those.
She stopped suddenly, Gible bumping into the back of her leg and whimpering as she rubbed her nose. Cynthia held a finger to her mouth, a call for silence, before she continued more slowly.
The slowness was rewarded with the site of a woman, covered in a strange purple glow. The woman was old and graying, and in a lab coat.
Behind her were several other people of various ages and genders. None of them were moving.
"What's going on...is there a Pokemon nearby?" Cynthia whispered to her partners. Gible shook her head doubtfully, while Riolu whimpered and pointed below the woman.
Cynthia followed with her vision, and saw what Riolu was pointed at.
"Is that...a keystone of some sorts?" She questioned out loud. The stone twitched, before purple mist billowed out of it, taking on a deeper color and some green spots as it reached for them.
"TOMB!" the Pokemon shouted, making itself fully known.
Spiritomb, the bound form of 108 evil spirits. Bad news.
The Pokemon grabbed Riolu and Gible, who struggled desperately to escape but were engulfed and stopped struggling.
Cynthia's eyes went wide with fear as the green face of Spiritomb looked her over, face twisted into a grin fit for nightmares.
"Let them go..." she said quietly.
Spiritbomb laughed. But, it wasn't just a laugh. It was over a hundred laughs, a hundred and seven to be precise. A hundred and seven different laughs, executed in unison, at her, each and every last one of them unhinged, with only one thing that unified them-undying hatred and malice, all directed at her. It echoed through the hall, and her heart seized and she stepped back involuntarily.
Her knuckled tightened till they were white, and she reached into her bag with determination.
"I said..." Cynthia said with more firmness, a hammer in hand, "let them go!"
She then charged, her arm swinging up in an arc.
Spiritomb moved it's form up, as if mocking her. However, that was not what she was aiming to hit.
No, she instead slammed her hammer down on the keystone.
Spiritomb's form flickered, stunned by the blow to the stone. It's current victims fell out, plopping down on the floor.
Cynthia lifted her hammer again, but purple mist restrained her hands and began pulling her in, hammer and all.
The last thing she saw before being engulfed were Gible and Riolu, freaking out at the sight of her and attacking Spiritomb.
...
"That's how you two met?"
"My word, she attacked a Spiritomb with a hammer? That is absurd! Cynthia has never acted that rashly in the entire time I've known her."
The graying woman laughed among her gathered assortment of Professors, Explores, and Ruin Maniacs. She loved to tell that story from nearly a decade ago now.
It was more entertainment than this party was at any rate. She didn't know why an energy company would be so interested in hosting a gathering of archaeologists, and the host was a bit of a drag.
He made ruins seem lively.
"Oh, Cynthia was a child then. She was a remarkably talented child, but a child none the less. And young children who bond with Gible are often known for behaving recklessly, but with good hearts. Honesty I am somewhat glad that Spiritomb nearly killed me: I got to meet Cynthia and convinced her parents to let me take her on as an apprentice. All I had to promise them was that I'd feed her regularly, and ensure she got a good education. I like to think the doctorate proved I upheld my end of the bargain. She was a wonderful student, she's like a granddaughter to me."
"She filled up two entire wings of the Celestic Museum of Natural History all on her own." One of her comrades in history, Professor Clover, grinned, "My own niece, little Robin, looks up to her like an idol."
"She's not the only one: remember when I told her that the only way Celestic Town would get any real attention is if she became Champion? Well, darn me if she didn't just go and do that! She's a real gem, that girl."
"Speaking of, where is Cynthia?" Professor Clover inquired.
"Oh, she had a call to take. She stepped on out."
...
Age had done wonders to the young explorer.
In ten years she had reached heights not just in archaeology and battle, but in centimeters as well. She now stood over six feet tall, and had been well blessed by the advances of age.
Many liked to joke that you could tell a woman's talent by simply looking at her. Now Agatha had beaten upside the head the fool who had suggested that ages ago, but Cynthia certainly had the physical talent to match his disproved hypothesis.
She was as always adorned in black, a finer set of clothing than she had ever known as a child, though she looked a lot less cheerful than she had back then.
That was however, only because of the phone call she was having.
"...But please, reconsider us. The U.T.P could truly use your cooperation!" the unknown speaker at the other end of the phone begged.
"I said, no," she told the speaker tersely. "Frankly, your theories are beyond bogus, and I will have no part in it."
"But line..."
She hung up on the speaker, rather miffed.
"And the worst part is, that call was still more friendly than the host," she muttered, before she felt a nice breeze waft on by.
It was so nice that the weather had finally stabilized after that Shamouti incident. Perhaps now she could finally check out that new ruin. She heard it had lava traps.