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Told in present tense. ", "count": "86", "submission_left_submission_id": "3370418", "submission_left_file_name": "5117507_Rylasasin_stars_of_iron_p13a2.rtf", "submission_left_thumbnail_url_huge": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/huge/5117/5117507_Rylasasin_stars_of_iron_p13a2.jpg", "submission_left_thumbnail_url_large": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/large/5117/5117507_Rylasasin_stars_of_iron_p13a2.jpg", "submission_left_thumbnail_url_medium": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/medium/5117/5117507_Rylasasin_stars_of_iron_p13a2.jpg", "submission_left_thumb_huge_x": "269", "submission_left_thumb_huge_y": "123", "submission_left_thumb_large_x": "200", "submission_left_thumb_large_y": "91", "submission_left_thumb_medium_x": "120", "submission_left_thumb_medium_y": "55", "submission_right_submission_id": "3606749", "submission_right_file_name": "5544041_Rylasasin_p13a4.rtf", "submission_right_thumbnail_url_huge": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/huge/5544/5544041_Rylasasin_p13a4.jpg", "submission_right_thumbnail_url_large": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/large/5544/5544041_Rylasasin_p13a4.jpg", "submission_right_thumbnail_url_medium": "https://nl1.ib.metapix.net/thumbnails/medium/5544/5544041_Rylasasin_p13a4.jpg", "submission_right_thumb_huge_x": "269", "submission_right_thumb_huge_y": "123", "submission_right_thumb_large_x": "200", "submission_right_thumb_large_y": "91", "submission_right_thumb_medium_x": "120", "submission_right_thumb_medium_y": "55" } ], "description": "Wow that took a LOOONG time. Sorry about that, but I hope it was worth the wait.\n\nBut what's this? Stic and Seer finally getting some sexytime? How did this start and when? Find out next time!\n\nThe rest of Part 13 can be found [url=https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yoUld6sbW4eXZnta-9WmdA8Bdik78QDRUMrXxighFGY/edit]here[/url]. I don't update it very often, but if you check back every now and then you might see it updated.\n\n[url=https://inkbunny.net/submissionsviewall.php?rid=c6a9fd4348&mode=pool&pool_id=59838&page=1&orderby=pool_order&random=no&success=]Also, obligatory link to the comic itself to which this is a fanfiction of.[/url]", "description_bbcode_parsed": "Wow that took a LOOONG time. Sorry about that, but I hope it was worth the wait.

But what's this? Stic and Seer finally getting some sexytime? How did this start and when? Find out next time!

The rest of Part 13 can be found here. I don't update it very often, but if you check back every now and then you might see it updated.

Also, obligatory link to the comic itself to which this is a fanfiction of.", "writing": "[color=#dbdee1]Act 84: [/color]Dungeon Drug Bust\nAs the Ghost Bear Pack remains in the Ghost Isle to wait for the next orders, something else happened around the same day in another part of the world...\nFor the past few days the New Sands Republic authorities have been investigating to find the source of 'drugs', their search bore...unexpected results. The drugs didn't come in from the outside as extensive investigation did not find any sort of smuggling, and they weren't made within the walls of Sandstone itself because making a drug lab, let alone acquiring processed chemicals inconspicuously, would be impossible to do. They found pieces of paper with things written in a language that they couldn't figure out at all, when this piece of evidence made it to Sandgun they quickly figured out one very important thing about these papers...they are receipts, receipts for all the drugs that were being sold to that street dealer. As from who these are from, judging by the language it's from the same human faction that is being their ally in this world, the NDA (New Dawn Initiative). This discovery brought forth more pressing questions, such as why would their allies start causing disruption in Sandstone like this after all the help they provided? Naturally, this is some questions that are better answered quickly before tensions and distrust start rising up, so Ranii and Luca were told to go question Matias about it as soon as possible.\n\n\"I still don't believe Matt's responsible, or his buddies.\" Ranii argues on the way there. \"This has got to be some sort of frameup job.\"\n\n\"I don't believe it could have been them either, there is just no way...\" Luca shares the same opinion as his packmate on the matter. They will get to the bottom of this though, true the lead they got on it is not what they expected but surely there some explanation for this...\nThey get to their usual spot to get to where Matias is, the 'magna gate' in that spot in the desert. They activate it and use it transport themselves to the human's underground hideout, where they find him doing his usual routine of using the NDI's 'Nexus' computer to monitor things in the region and keep the NSR informed of the bandit's movements when ever possible. It's a been a full time job for him.\n\n\"Hey! Matt!\" Ranii shouts out. \"We need to talk.\"\n\nThe man turns his head around to face them. He looks tired-ish. \"Hello. If this is about the bandit leaders' possible location, i nearly have it. Tell Stic i'm doing my best here okay?\"\nLuca perks up at that, but get focus back on what matters and shakes his head. \"We ain't here for that. I will keep it brief, one of yours was spreading these things called 'drugs' in Sandstone, disrupting the well being of the citizens.\" He presents one of the receipts to him. \"However, i am sure that this is not true, but someone is trying to push the blame on your people so you will need to prove your innocence.\"\n\"...What?\" Sounding like he is not believing what he is hearing, the human takes the receipt and looks it over. The expression of disappointment he gives them afterward doesn't really seem to herald the fact he is about to give any good news. \"These are legit...\"\nThe Lucario can not believe what he is hearing. \"...What are you saying? So did your people really did this.\"\nMattias raises his a hand to gesture Luca to stop thinking whatever he is thinking. \"No... I mean yeah- I...Please just listen to me. I don't have anything to do with this, me and others have a interested in helping the Avali Illuminate's goal. However...i supposed it was only a matter of time until someone that would step on everyone else's toes would show up.\"\n\n\"Someone in the org being a little corrupt?\" Ranii asks. \"Sounds like someone needs to do some house cleaning.\"\n\n\"I won't go into technicalities because that's what this bad actor is using as an excuse to do what he does.\" Mattias said before handing the receipt back to Luca.\n\"Is there nothing you can do then...?\" Luca asks, worried that they might have reached a dead end here and the drug problem will go unsolved.\n\"There is something we can do, but I'm gonna need your help. The rules prevent me from coming into direct conflict with kin without a lawful cause, and outside of our world the laws are extremely lax as of now.\" The human points to them. \"I can help you find who this bad actor is so you can deal with them. If you manage to stop them it should discourage others from trying similar disruptive businesses. Just tell me how the drugs have been coming into town.\"\n\"Well that's the thing, we don't know...\" The Lucario sighs and shakes his head. \"smuggling something into Sandstone wouldn't be easy with it being in high alert, and the amount of those substances that made it through were absurd, there is just no way so much of that stuff could have been smuggled in so fast with no one batting an eye.\" Suffice to say he is at a loss at how so much of it got into the town in the first place, the guards in the entrance were handpicked by Stic himself, they aren't mons who could be in on it.\nThis explanation makes the human think, trying to figure out this conundrum, at first he is as confused as Luca is but he might have found something. \"...Hhhhmm, that is unusual, and I know it's impossible for there to be a drug lab, Pokémon in this world don't have the talent for the chemical arts, not to mention it wouldn't be easy to hide. So these drugs MUST be have been coming from outside.\"\n\"...Like a secret passage of some kind?\" Luca hazards a guess, as unlikely as he thinks that is.\nMattias nods to that. \"Yes, but not an obvious one. Regardless, I know where you can look. Go back to where those drugs were being stored, and we will go from there. You have those nanites in your body now too, right Luca? It will be easy for me to contact you and Ranii to guide you when you are there. I will also look more into who could be behind this, with that receipt you gave me I should be able to get you a name after some digging.\"\n\nRanii nods along as she listens to him and his plan.\n\"Well it's not much to go on but it's the best we got.\" She agrees. Though it would seem as if she has a theory of her own.\n\"Do you think maybe they set up shop before the whole Grove invasion took place?\"\n\n\"Before the Grove invasion you say?\" Mattias seems to consider that possibility for a moment. \"That wouldn't be impossible. But taking that into consideration it would make it odd for these drugs to only be appearing now...but still, it's food for thought.\"\n\"What exactly are you sending us to find back there in the crime scene?\" The Lucario asks him. \"We need to know what we are looking for exactly...\"\n\"Right, I suppose I should tell you, but I'm not 100 percent sure until you find it. But I suspect the smuggling method that was used must involve teleportation.\"\nLuca's ears perk up. This theory does make some sense. \"Huh...is it really possible for a pokémon to teleport like that?\"\n\"While Psychic-types ability to teleport is nothing to scoff at, it has it's limits. It would take an extremely powerful psychic pokémon to teleport from far away to a precise location they can not see while taking so much cargo with them.\" The human explains. \"And I find that highly unlikely because I find it hard to believe that someone with the mental capacity to pull off such a feat would be careless enough to leave behind such a blatant clue like that.\"\n\n\"Well, what kind of clues should we look for?\" Ranii asks.\n\n\"Something that would be hiding in plain sight in a dusty basement for one.\" Matias knows this ain't much to go on but he won't be able to offer much guidance until he has visual on the place, which he plans to get through them through the connection of their nanites. \"I know it's not a lot to go on but it has to be where the drugs were stored en masse. If that's where you found them, that's where you might find where they are coming from. Have you searched the room from top to bottom?\"\n\"Well, personally we did not. Some other NSR agents were sent to confiscate the drugs.\" The Lucario tells him. \"...But we didn't really think about the possibility of there being something hidden there, the room itself was somewhat hidden by itself but...Hhmmmm...\" He seems to have realized something. \"...If it was one of your own, you think it's possible they used one of those 'magna' things to teleport the drugs into the town itself?\"\nThe man takes that deduction into consideration, and is rather impressed Lucas went and thought of that. \"That is one possibility, a stone floor covered in sand would be ideal to conceal a magna circle under.\"\n\n\"That... will have to do.\" Ranii nod. She turns to Luca.\n\"Well, it's not much to go on, but it's the best shot we have.\"\n\n\"Alright then, go. I will use the nexus here to contact you through...your nexus connection when you get there.\" Matias says, finding it a bit awkward using the name 'nexus' for his computer here when the Avali have a computing network that shares the same name. Luckily this hasn't caused a lot of confusion yet.\n\"Right now.\" Lucas nods and turns to Ranii. \"Let's go back and check out that Meowth's place again then. If Mattias is right we're gonna get an express trail to whoever is making these wretched 'drugs'.\"\n\n\"Right.\" Ranii nods to her compatriot. She turns towards Mattias one last time.\n\"Well, see you later. Let's hope this trail digs up something.\"\n\nOn their way back to Sandstone, they would get word from Mattias over the comms. Luca shows that he is still not quite used to what the nanite provides as the faint 'beeping' and the alert that he has an incoming hail appearing in his vision causing him to flinch in surprise.\n[i]I managed to figure out who you are looking for exactly. His name is Rico Xander, a misfit from the Xander family with more ambition than wisdom. Has a history of 'experimenting' with questionable methods to boost sales figures, which resulted in him getting arrested multiple times by authorities of whatever place he chooses to operate in. His latest scheme is fabricating low-quality drugs with higher addiction chances to force more repeat customers.[/i]\nLuca wasn't expecting to get such detailed intel so soon, one moment they didn't know who this mysterious drug-maker was but now Mattias just gave them a name and motive. \"How did you figure all of that out?\" He asked out loud...just assuming he needs to speak verbally to be heard instead of considering that he could just think the words in his head and that would have worked just as well.\n[i]I simply scanned the barcode on the receipt you gave me, and the rest came easy. Because he needed to make the sales 'official' in order to pump his sales number, he had to hand out these receipts with the shipments of products. Perhaps he was hoping it wouldn't result in a paper trail straight to him...he underestimated the Avali Illuminate intelligence and assumed the likes of me would side with him and cover his trail because we are part of the same organization.[/i]\n\n\"Well, that was fast.\" Ranii commented.\n[i]So what do you want us to do when we catch up with this Rico guy?[/i]\n\n[i]-I informed the Sandgun base of this to clear out any misconceptions and add context before our relationship could be damaged, they said that he is being a criminal and must be treated as such. That means you must detain him. But i need to warn you that Rico Xavier is fond of resisting arrest, so as much as if bothers me to say this even if it is this guy...if the worst happen and he ends up eliminated that would be acceptable but not preferable.-[/i]\nLuca narrows his eyes. Of course it couldn't be exactly easy, could it? \"I see. I fought a human before, he was quite physically strong...would this one be the same?\" He asks as he remembers how that one human he fought all those years ago powered through whatever he could throw at him, not even cutting off one of his hands slowed him down.\n[i]-I wouldn't know for sure, the number of humans that fit that list is not small. But the one you are going after makes extensive use of his muscle-enhancement products and...other products too. But he does fit the bill of being strong...especially with those cybernetic arms of his-[/i]\n\nRanii has likewise fought humans before. Not of the same type that are now helping them, obviously. But having fought pirates, Occassus and USCM Remnants, the like, she at least has some experience with them. The USCM in particular had some cybernetic enhancements here and there, the Occasus... Well, they always preferred the more 'fleshy' kind of 'enhancement'.\n[i]Right, duly noted[/i]\n\n[i]-That is all for the moment, I shall contact you again soon. I will just be seeing what you are seeing for the time being.-[/i]\nMattias went silent then, he 'ended the call'. This leaves Luca and Ranii free to go back to what they were doing. They get back to Sandstone and make their way over to where that Meowth and his lackeys were operating from, the place has been picked clean for illicit substances and the like, and for the moment it is off limits to the public. They find the place is mostly how it was, what was once a storage room for the drugs is now an empty, very dusty room.\n\"Okay, this is it...\" The Lucario said as he eyed the place, not really spotting anything that stands out at first sight, there is a broom in the corner though. The blue jackal wonders if that could be it somehow, so he goes to poke at it, then picks it up...well, it seems like it's just a normal broom instead of some sort of secret lever. \"...Of course.\" He sighs.\n\n\"Hmmm... let me.\"\nRanii takes out her matter manipulator, and attempts to 'remove' the various objects of the room, one by one, particularly the ones leaning against walls to see if they are hiding anything behind them.\n\nUsing the matter manipulator to move things around, it causes quite a bit of dust and sand to get displaced as well, which reveals something. The sandy floor hid a magnagate ring right in the very center of the room.\nLuca looks down at it and then back to his packmate. \"So that's where it is.\" It seems like this was the reason this old broom was around here, to move around the dirt to and from whenever needed. He just uses it to sweep away the sandy dust to reveal the rest of the blue circle drawn on the floor, as soon as there was nothing obstructing it it began lightning up and turning active.\n\n\"Ha! Knew it.\" Ranii says triumphantly as it's revealed.\n\n[i]-Great, you found it.-[/i]\nMattias contacts them right away, having been watching everything for their point of view.\nLuca would throw the broom away and look at the inactive magnagate. \"Well, what now then? Does it still work...?\"\n-It looks like a one-way portal, but there is a way to reverse the polarity...in theory. I'm going to try and reassure you by saying that your odds of survival going through a magnagate are way above average-\nThat statement makes the Lucario blink. Not something good to hear but at least Mattias is honest, like always. \"How do we...do that?\"\n[i]-Some simple adjustments should do it. I'm going to outline the sections that you need to remove, just wipe it with appendage of your choice over it.-[/i]\nRani and Luca would see some sections on the circle drawn on the floor begin to glow and stand out, this is their HUDs trying to bring attention to what the human just mentioned.\n\n\"Got it. Standing by.\" She acknowledges. A teleporter. She's used plenty of these in her life, so she knows how they work. Mostly.\n\nIt might certainly be strange to work with for someone like Ranii, drawing...in this case re-drawing something on the floor to summon a portal is less technological and more arcane. Still, after she and Luca do it, it works, there is a swirling portal in the center of the room now, and they can feel that it has some suction to, the surrounding sand and dust in the room spiraling as it funnels into this unstable-looking magnagate.\n\n-I know it looks like it's having a fit, but jump in and brace yourselves in case it gets turbulent.-\n\n\"Got it. Standing by.\" She acknowledges. A teleporter. She's used plenty of these in her life, so she knows how they work. Mostly.\n\nThis sure doesn't look friendly, compared to the magnagate they used to get to Matt's hideout. The Lucario looks a little concerned, and he decides to grasp one of Ranii's hands as they prepare to jump in...just to be sure the both of them aren't going to get separated. \"...Ready?\"\n\n\"Ready as I'll ever be!\" Ranii replies as she grabs his paw.\n\nThey both jump into the magnagate and the trip proves to...really not like using a teleporter. This one feels more like jumping down into a hole that feels like it's either going very fast or too slow...and it becomes impossible to tell if they are falling up, falling sideways or even falling up in this bizarre tunnel of shifting colors that is like an express pipeline to somewhere. The sensory overload is intense enough that Luca's eyes roll up and he ends up foaming at the mouth. When it was over, it was like they were spat out up into the air before falling down on top of a rock surface in a completely different place...\n\nRanii is not doing so well herself. Her nanites kick into overdrive to dull the sensory overload. Warnings display on her HUD, yet she takes little time to read them. She shakes her head, shaking off whatever dizziness that her nanites weren't able to mitigate.\n\"Luca..\" She says groggily. \"Where the hell are we?\"\n\nThe stone walls around them form a perfect square save for a hallway that leads, somewhere. This is not the shape of a mere cavern, it is a mystery dungeon.\nLuca whines and growls from his headache, he grasps at his head with one paw to try and soothe the pain, his own nanites are being some help for this too at least. \"Damn it...\" He wipes away the saliva from his mouth as he sits himself. \"I suppose we are not in Sandstone anymore...Is Mattias still in contact?\"\nAs it turns out, he is.\n\n\"Welp.\" She says to her packmate. \"Nothing to it but to get on with this.\"\n\n\"Right, so this is a dungeon then?\" He can't remember the last time he went into one of these, ever since his guild days were behind him dungeon delving stopped being one of his duties. He gets back up and reaches over his own back to grab one of his swords. \"Let's go.\"\nFinally starting the venture into this mystery dungeon, Luca and Ranii go down that hall until they get into another open room, where they see a trio of Drillbur and Krokorok in the center, they are all kneeling in prayer, the Krokorok is poking at the sand with a stick.\nThe Lucario knows what this is...it's that \"Maze\" religion that pokémon that live in the dungeons still follow even today. \"Hhhmmm, they seem busy over there...\"\n\n\"Great. I'm getting Occassus flashbacks now.\" Ranii grumbles. She obviously doesn't seem to like religious nonsense that much. \"Let's... just move on then, right?\"\n\nLuca just gives her a look of understanding before looking to that preaching pokémon. \"We are just passing by.\"\n\"JUST PASSING BY?!\" The Krokorok suddenly shouted, sounding offended yet still happy. \"Hahaha...Brother, the maze calls for our devotion, can't you hear it?\" She said as she began approaching them.\nThe Lucario slightly grits his teeth and tenses up, getting prepared to act if he needs to because he doesn't like her tone. He has a bad feeling about this.\nThe sand krok looks them in the eye and tilts her head. \"Ah, I see...so you must have forgotten to strengthen your connection to the maze, yes? I can see it in your eyes, you do not have the gift of expanded consciousness...\" She said before reaching for a satchel strapped to her tail, from it she takes a couple of colored pills. This must be the source of that 'expanded consciousness' she is on about. \"Here! ingest it...the maze's gift!\" She offers it to them...\n\n\"Well, that explains it then.\" Ranii whispers. \"This guy has them all hocked up on drugs.\"\nFinally she decides to speak up.\n\"Maze's gift you say? Hmm say, where did you get these?\"\n\n\"Have you forgotten, sister...?\" The clearly drugged sand-croc stares at her intensely for a moment, worrying Luca who thinks she might attack all of the sudden and is expecting any sudden movements. But she doesn't do any of that. Finally the Krokorok is able to confirm that Ranii is not under the effects of the same thing she is based on her eyes, and she can tell neither is Lucario for that matter. She looks worried now. \"Oh that's terrible...sister for how long have you been devoid of the wonders of enlightenment? Hhhmmm...this is not good. Not good at all. nononono...\" The Pokémon looks at the Avali with pity. \"Well...upon such a case I suppose it is for the maze to decide what happens to you now. The maze will lead you to where you must go. Shall it lead you to forgiveness? Or perhaps penance? Only the maze knows. So walk, walk and you will find your final answer.\" With that last ominous sentence, she backs way from the two and goes back to preaching to those other pokémon.\nLuca blinks and slowly moves his hand away from his blades. \"That went better than expected, i thought we had a fight on our hands just then...\" He comments. He then remembers something. \"We should probably bring Pixie with us for the next one, yeah?\"\n\n\"Yeah.\" Ranii replies. \"A bit of bad luck there. She just had to leave for that... personal business back up North just before this mission...\" She sighs sadly. \"Welp, there's nothing we can do about that now but to carry on.\"\nShe looks over to the pokemon preaching elsewhere.\n\"And speaking of carrying on, we should probably.\"\n\nHe nods. \"Yeah, let's go. Hope this 'maze' doesn't lead us in circles.\" The place does have the habit of reshaping itself, after all. Lucas always questioned the whole idea, as far as he knows the dungeon's habit of change is random and there is really no pattern to it.\nLeaving these pokémon behind and heading for the next path they find, Luca and Ranii would come across something more...concerning. They find a wider 'room' with multiple female pokémon lying about, they are either moaning or groaning tiredly, and most importantly they are all pregnant. In the center of this place there is a pile of Pokémon eggs.\nLuca's eyes go wide as he processes just what he is looking at exactly, it's not something he was expecting to find in this place. Is this some sort of breeding ground? \"What is going on here...?\"\n\n\"On second thought...\" Ranii quickly comments upon seeing this. \"...Maybe it was a good thing she didn't come along for this.\"\nRanii still wasn't sure just what she was looking at. A bunch of pregnant mons. Most of them looked like they were barely aware of the situation they were in, if at all.\n\"There's no way this is consensual.\" She laments.\n\n\"Huh? Who dares approach?\" They could hear something big coming from the other side of the room, it turns out to be a charizard. He also looks like he is under the effect of some sort of drugs, but he is still thinking clearly enough to know that these two do not belong here. \"Hmpft, so it is a couple of guildies coming to invade this sacred place?! You have a lot of nerve coming here...\"\nLuca looks like he is prepared to reach for his swords. \"What is this?! What have you done to these Pokémon?!\" He demands to know, the whole thing angers him greatly.\nThe fire lizard grins. \"This is the miracle of life that the maze is providing us. We will make a better, stronger generation that will surpass you and your precious 'iron'. These females you see have the honor of bearing the seed of the strongest pokémon around...and that is me.\" Then he looks to Ranii, eyeing her with a mixture of malice and desire. \"...And I could always use one more to further the will of the maze. Perhaps you coming here was it's way of rewarding me for my devotion, i always wanted to break one of you guildies~\"\n\n\"Oh like hell you will!\" She yells loudly as reaches her hand out and the spear materializes in her paw. She twirls it around once, the spear tip pointing towards the charizard threateningly.\n\"And besides,\" She quickly adds in a little more softly. \"We aren't in the same egg group anyway.\"\nShe didn't really study the egg groups that the humans had provided her and Luca with that carefully, she'd put it off in lieu of other things. But somehow she doubted that 'big dumb misogynist charizard' shared an egg group with 'space alien'.\n\nHer weapon materializing like that out of nowhere stuns the Charizard, who thought the only other mon with Iron here was the Lucario, still he is quick to recompose himself. \"I don't know what magic tricks you are using, but that doesn't look like Iron to me! So don't think you can scare me with that.\" If only he knew just what this weapon of her's was...\nBefore their fight starts though, there is the sound of an eggshell cracking, and one of the eggs that happens to be right besides the fire lizard hatches into a Shinx. The newborn pokémon does not know what is going on, but does instinctively know who its parent is.\nSeeing the newborn, the Charizard smirked and picked him up, holding him in front of himself. \"Do you see this?\"\nLuca already has his swords at the ready, the way his lizard is holding that little Shinx so carelessly is really angering him. \"What do you think you are doing?! You better put them down or I will make sure to really hurt you!\" He threatens him. He wants to move in but without knowing what this pokémon's intention is with this newborn he doesn't want to risk it so soon, as much as he wants to jump in there to introduce him to his swords.\nHolding the scared feline in one of his clawed hands, he reveals that in the other one he is holding something else...could that be some sort of chemical? It appears to be in the shape of a light blue diamond.\n\n\"BEAR WITNESS TO THE POWER OF THE MAZE'S BLESSINGS! WITH THIS WE GROW MORE THAN MERELY IN NUMBERS!\" The Charizard exclaimed loudly before shoving the item into the Shinx's mouth, forcing him to swallow it. Then he simply drops the pokémon to the floor by letting go of him...\nThe Shinx fell to the ground, it's body so small and light that the 'thud' was barely audible. And then it looked like it's body began glowing, it was evolving right there and then. It was Luxio by the time it was getting up, and then a Luxray when it was up on it's feet. It's like this pokémon's body got forced straight into adulthood...that can't be healthy, can it?\n\n\"Just when I thought you couldn't get any more disgusting.\" Ranii growls. \"As if you apparently didn't ruin enough lives here!\"\n\n\"Hmpft, enough talk. Let the maze be witness to the justice I am about to deliver upon you.\" He said as he pushed the confused Luxray forward. \"You! Fight!\" He ordered, though clearly he himself is about ready to fight as well. \nThe Luxray hisses, baring his fangs and claws as he rushes towards Luca with the intent to attack... \nLuca was about to draw his sword still but he analyzed this mon as he approached. He's not strong, he can tell. To compare, his memory of Chia's body has him recollect how he had scars and muscles to show. This Luxray's body is fair and untarnished, it never saw battle in its life. So he reasons that he will not need his swords for this one, instead he sees the Luxray's going to try to swipe at him with its claws and he easily stops it by catching it's wrist. \"Ranii, this lizard doesn't look like he is playing around. Watch out.\" He warns her, given that Avali and fire don't mix. \n\"Now BURN!\" The Charizard inhales before breathing out a torrent of flames, like a flamethrower. He's aiming this attack at Ranii. It's also notable that he is being rather indiscriminate with these flames, not caring if he hits any of the pregnant females present, though by virtue of being pokémon themselves they still scream in pain when the fires hit them.\n\nRanii gets the warning just in time, and leaps up into the air just as the fire passes underneath her. The screams of the victims in the way of the fiery blast fills her ears, but she has no time to worry about that at the moment. She straightens her wings, gliding over to a spot with none of the females behind it.\n\nHe sprays fire around quite a bit, but even this fire lizard can only keep this up for so long until he runs out of breath to sustain his flames, which gives Ranii an opportunity.\nMeanwhile the fight between Luca and Luxray quickly begins going in the former's favor right off the bat. The Lucario applies a strong punch to the feline's chest, causing it to stagger. He was confident that he has this in the bag, there is no way that this inexperienced pokémon right off the egg can give him much trouble...but it does something slightly unexpected. The Luxray goes for an unexpected bite aimed at his arm, its teeth, as sharp as they look, don't quite penetrate the skin but it still hurts...especially since they are electrocuted. The sound that comes out of Luca's mouth is a slurred mixture of pain and surprise from the electricity coursing through him. But still he retaliates with a kick punch to the Luxray gut, making it let go. \"I'm fine, just got a bit shocked over here...!\"\n\nRanii, concentrated on the battle in front of her, realizes she has to end this quickly to avoid any more of the victims from getting hurt. With her spear in hand, and with opening in sight, she leaps upon the Charizard, aiming her spear straight for his lung.\n\nShe pierced the fire lizard straight through the chest with her spear, it goes through the front and nearly comes out through his back even. The Charizard's roar of agony didn't last long as he was coughing up blood and running long on air. This would certainly kill any mon, even one of this size but...it seems like this Charizard is holding on to life with determination. He's unable to breathe fire anymore with his lung punctured, yet still he's able to speak, if barely. \n\"You....think this is it...?\" He grasps the spear piercing his chest and begins pulling it out, his grip on it way tighter than Ranii's. \"You 'civilized' scum...with your damn iron...\" He's able to pull the weapon out of himself, even though he begins bleeding a lot now he seems willing to try to stab the Avali with her own spear as some form of retribution. \"THE MAZE WILL TAKE YOU ALL!\" But of course he is unaware that this weapon is more than simply 'iron' that he can use it himself.\n\nRight before the spear could hit its mark, the Charizard noticed it sparking glowing in his hand as he tried to stab her with it. All the winged fire lizard could muster as he looked at it was an out-of-breath, confused \"...wha...?\"\n\nBefore he can ponder more upon it, suddenly a painful bolt of power shoots straight through his body, like being hit directly by a very powerful lightning bolt. But this is no mere electricity, as even if they were a ground or grass type it would offer little protection. The pain in his hand is indescribable, and it soon shoots out throughout his whole body.\n\nThe Charizard couldn't even express his pain vocally because of his punctured lung, he just spasmed violently as he was 'electrocuted' by a weapon he is holding unexpectedly turning against him. When the weapon fell out of his hand he had already collapsed, not even able to let out a last breath as he has none right now. After getting stabbed through a vital organ and shocked like this, he's most certainly well past the point of saving even if Ranii and Luca wanted.\nLuca meanwhile, just got done shocking the Luxray into unconsciousness. He looks to the fallen fire lizard and then to the Avali. \"The big bastard had it coming...\" Though he ponders what exactly did he do to forcefully evolved this electric type he just fought, fighting the poor thing felt...wrong. It had no idea how to use it's own power and mostly just flailed at him. \"...Can't say i expected to see a new born mon' evolve like that so soon, much less have to fight it.\"\n\n\"Yeah.\" Ranii looks on as she catches her breath and rejoins her comrade, still hyperventilating slightly from the battle. Her eyes look upon the now unconscious Luxray.\n\"Even when the Miniknog was experimenting with clone soldiers, they weren't this bad. At least they gave them some basic training before forcing them to die before... whatever they pointed them at. And this...\"\nShe pauses.\n\"This is like the discount version of the miniknog's short-lived clone trooper program.\"\nShe shakes her head.\n\"Though that leaves the question...\"\nHer focus shifts towards the other pregnant females.\n\"...What are we gonna do with all these other ones?\"\n\n\"It wouldn't be right to leave them like this...\" The Lucario looks around at all the pregnant female pokémon around them, he himself does not know what they could do...but he figures that perhaps Mattias certainly could. \"Mattias, we need your help. You can see this, right?\"\n[i]No, I'm afraid I can only hear you when you talk through the communication that your nanites provide you. Why, what happened?[/i]\n\n[i]Long story short, it seems they're trying to make an army... from scratch. We have a bunch of pregnant rape victims here. I... Really don't think I need to go into further detail.[/i] Ranii replies.\n\n[i]-Alright that is...very awful, it seems you found a breeding program, how extensive and organized is it?-[/i]\n\nLuca has another look around at this awful place, there must be more than a dozen of females here. \"I count more than ten, it looks like they they were all just used as seem fit. They were also doing something to force the newborns into growing into adults in mere moments. Can you do something about this?\"\n[i]-...-[/i]\nThere is just silence.\n\"...Mattias?\"\n[i]-Yes, i can do something about it, it will mean we will have to take direct hand in the dungeon if the interference is already been this severe. But have you found Xavier?-[/i]\nRight now the Lucario kind of wishes to do that so he can dish out some pain for what this 'Xavier' has been doing to this place. \"No...not yet...What demented mind can even justify doing something like this?\"\n[i]-It is pokémon breeding, a concept that was considered questionable very long ago in our past, and today it is considered 100 percent unethical. It involves breeding pokémon over and over again, sometimes even with their own parents, to create a pokémon with the best possible genetic values for battling. However that alone wouldn't be enough to create an effective army, the newborns require delicate training to get going, perfect genetics or not but...-[/i]\nAs Mattias explains over the comms, Luca walks over to the dead Charizard lying on the floor, spotting that blue diamond-shaped edible thing that he fed to that electric type to force him into adulthood. \"And i assume there is a way to forgoe training by just forcing them to grow up...?\"\n[i]-...In theory, but it wouldn't exactly be cheap to sidestep training like that, with the usage of 'EXP candy'. And they aren't made through the chemical arts, which means someone supplied Xavier with them. The fact that Xavier seems to be simply giving such things to the locals without consideration is...moronic to say the least. There are protocols to follow-[/i]\n\n\"I think it's safe to say that this 'Xavier' has gone beyond going rogue.\" Ranii cuts in. \"I don't think he has any real consideration for those 'protocols'\"\nShe looks over to Luca.\n\"If nothing else, it proves though that there is no real replacement for good old fashioned training and experience. It's why the aforementioned Miniknog clone army project failed miserably. They could get the numbers, sure, but they realized that without said experience and training, they were better off just using robotic drones like everyone else does. Avali included.\"\n\n[i]-This isn't enough to have him considered 'going Novel', though he will be left at the mercy of the Avali illuminate law, the full extend of it...if you bring him in that is-[/i]\nLucas nods to her before looking at this consumable thing that seemingly grants pokémon power when eaten, this 'EXP Candy'. He is not going to eat it, in his opinion he saw enough to know that he doesn't like but he will just pocket it so it isn't just lying around. \"So, we are going?\" There he spots another path that heads to another part of this dungeon, perhaps they are not far...Though there is something that he wonders regarding the rather uncaring tone Mattias has when it comes to Xavier, sometimes it sounds like he doesn't care if his fellow human lives or dies. \"Do you not care what happens to him?\"\n[i]-...With him it has gotten to a point that i don't, for me and many others. This isn't the first time Xavier did things that are...controversial and got imprisoned for it. He does serves his sentences when his defenses in court fail but he never really stopped getting into trouble. As a result unless you want someone who's willing to do very dirty work, no one wants anything to do with him and would rather not have him around at all...but as per the rules we must follow, we only really 'retire' when we die-[/i]\n\n\"Well, in that case, we'll capture him if we can, but if we're forced to defend ourselves to the point of lethal force, we'll have to put him down.\" Ranii acknowledges.\n\nNext Ranii and Luca come across a set of stairs that go deeper into the dungeon, looks like it's the only path forward...taking it takes them to an area that feels different, much less maze-like. There they find another group of religious maze inhabitants prostrating themselves before being that looks like a big golem.\nIt has large yellow bands on its shoulders and wrists, and a yellow sloping section on its chest that appears to be its head. This section contains seven black circular \"eyes\" arranged in a specific pattern. It has six gems around its head, the upper ones are red, the middle ones are cyan, and the bottom ones are gray. There is something odd about this though, it looks a bit too humanoid, like it's a person wearing a costume...a big person, sure, but still strange. \"Yes, yes! Continue showing me your faith...all of you shall be rewarded with paradise when the time comes and the time is indeed very close. The maze, that is me...shall grant all the ultimate happiness...yes.\" Their voices sound like someone is speaking in a voice synthesizer to give themselves a more booming, echoey voice to sound like some sort of higher being.\nLuca watches this from a distance, could that be the one they are looking for? Someone pretending to be 'the maze' to take advantage of all these dungeon dwellers who are made to take drugs so their grip on reality gets even more slippery. He could blast them from here if wanted but he looks to Rani to see if she has any particular idea...or perhaps they could just tackle this head on. \"...That has to be this Xavier guy.\"\n\n\"So how do we go about this?\" Ranii asks her companion. \"You think we should just go the direct route or? I'm not even sure we could take all these guys on at once.\"\n\nLuca thinks for a moment as tries to survey the area to come up with some plan, but he can't see a way that doesn't involve them getting spotted. \"I don't see any other way, but it doesn't seem like any of these Pokémon are particularly tough, if we work together we could handle them.\" He ponders how else they could get through this. \"...Could we even convince them that they aren't giving worship to a pretender? We could turn their superstition against them somehow...if they listen to us in the first place.\"\n\n\"Well that's a great idea.\" Ranii comments to her partner. \"There's only one problem with that thought. If I know cultists, it's that they are extremely resistant to reasonable thinking.\"\n\n\"Yeah, that is indeed an issue...\" If only they could make these Pokémon see that what they are worshipping is just someone wearing a costume. Moreover can this costume hold itself together? \"Maybe if we could...blast that thing off of him. Aura Sphere maybe?\" It is an attack where he throws a glowing blue ball that never misses and explodes on impact, so he figures he might use it to attack Xavier and only Xavier with it and not anyone else in the way.\n\n\"Hmm, might work. Certainly more than I can do at the moment.\" Ranii nods. The only other idea she has is if she stabs the thing and rips it off. Though that would actually require getting on stage which would draw undue attention to themselves. Of course that's going to happen either way, but in her mind, it's better to keep the element of surprise while they still have it.\n\n\"Right, here goes then.\" Taking in a breath, the lucario brings his paws together, forming a glowing blue sphere between them that expands into the size of a soccer ball, then he runs out of their hiding spot before launching it forward. This projectile really does not miss, it weaves between any other Pokémon before hiding that person on the stage with the strange costume. The resulting explosion of the aura sphere raises up quite a bit of dust on the stage.\nThe many Pokémon who were paying reverence to the 'avatar of the maze' are surprised and taken aback by this attack on the entity they were worshipping. Shouting and other voices of anger amongst them ring out as they turn their attention to the offender...that being Lucario.\n\"A guildie?!\"\n\"What is this guild bastard doing here?!\"\n\"How dare he attack The Maze!\"\nYeah, it seems like they are indeed rather mad about what he just did there.\n\nLuca's Aura Sphere really did a number on that disguise the human was wearing, it was torn to shreds, revealing a muscular but disheveled man with bloodshot eyes and very dry lips. Surprisingly he is still standing after that attack. He wasn't exactly trying to sound high and mighty like a divine being before but now he has dropped any pretense of it in his surprise. \"Wha?! What the fuck? Why the hell are you two here!?\" He recognizes them as Pokémon from the more civilized places, he knows that they must have ties with the Avali but he does not know their names.\nLuca wants to go at him, but there are many confused pokémon in the way, the devout worshipers of the maze now seeing the human and trying to make sense of what they are looking at. \"You got nowhere to go, we know of the horrendous things you got going, human! You did something to have all these pokémon do what you were saying, and you forced them to make a breeding pit with the intent of making an army!\" He accuses him.\nThe Pokémon, meanwhile, are starting to voice their confusion and conflictions.\n\"We were tricked...?!\"\n\"What is that...thing?!\"\n\"Don't be fooled by these two interlopers, they...they are the ones trying to trick us!\"\n\"How dare they attack the maze!\"\n\"NO! I don't want to be here anymore! That's not the maze! WE WERE LIED TO!\"\n\"Traitors! Punish them for betraying their beliefs!\"\nThe fact that they are all drugged probably did not help in preventing this from devolving into an orgy of violence amongst the maze worshippers, thankfully there is no iron involved so killing one another is unlikely to happen.\nXavier is pissed at how things have escalated, he can't even use these pokémon as meat shields now. \"Fuck you two! You weren't supposed to be here!\" The jig is pretty much up, but it looks like the human still might have somewhere to run, he runs over to the back of the cave and punches a pressure plate on the wall, which opens up a secret passage that he wastes no time and goes into it.\n\n\"Quick, after him!\" Ranii shouts. She runs after Xavier, into the cave, leaving the fighting mons outside to their own devices. Even if she could help them, which she is sure she cannot, catching Xavier is the priority now. Catching or killing...\nAt this point, she's ready for either.\n\nRanii and Luca chase after the man until they get to a large cavern that looks like it's being used to store all of Xavier's drugs, there are huge containers of it here. And there is a ton of high-tech looking chemistry equipment on a spacious desk in the end of the room, which the human goes to hide behind. This is it, he has nowhere to run to anymore.\nStopping behind the desk like he intends to take cover behind, the frantic man looks back at them with an angry scowl. \"What do you want!? Haven't you already ruined enough of my operation!?\"\n\n\"We're pizza delivery. One large with a toping of 'fuck' and a side order of 'you'.\" Ranii says sarcastically and nastily. \"No, really, what do you think we're here for, jackass? We're here to take you in. Or kill you. Which one we do is entirely up to you. For what you did to these mons, and tried to do to Sandstone, we're fine either way really.\"\n\n\"Hmpft...I should have went for the former capital instead...\" He mumbled before pointing at them. \"Kill me you say?! You can't do that without getting into trouble!\"\n\"Yeah I don't think so, human! So surrender already or else...\" Luca says to him, making it clear that he and Ranii are not gonna back down from this. \"You are using this dungeon for whatever horrible ideas you have!\"\nXavier gives the most exasperated sigh. \"Why do you even care about what happens in this dungeon in the middle of nowhere? These pokémon were drifting in complete ignorance before I came along!\"\nWhile they might want to approach him to try and apprehend him, Luca is sensing something off about this. He can read that the human has something in store for them but he doesn't know what. He places a paw on Ranii's shoulder so she doesn't approach unprepared. \"Ranii, he's got something up his sleeves...\" He whispers to her.\n\n\"As for getting into trouble, well, like I said, it's really up to you.\" Ranii says. \"Obviously just straight up killing you out of the blue would cause... problems. However, attacking us after being given a chance to surrender would simply constitute self-defense. As for why we care? Do we even really need to answer that?!\" She takes a breath. \"No, you know what? Enough stalling! Either you surrender here and now and come quietly and face the consequences for your actions, or do whatever it is you think you're going to get away with yet so we can kill you under the self-defense clause.\"\nShe growls a bit.\n\"Either way works fine enough for me.\"\n\nHaving had enough, Xavier reaches under the table for a hidden weapon, which looks like an overly big assault rifle. \"Say hello to my little friend!\" He declared before opening some rather heavy, but thankfully very inaccurate, fire. It's like that thing shoots large, explosive cartridges.\n\"Duck!\" Luca pushes Ranii behind one of the many crates before the explosive projectiles begin flying.\n\nRanii does not need to be told twice. She ducks behind the crates as well as the projectiles begin flying.\n\"Welp...\" She says to Luca behind the box. \"Killing in self defense it is then.\"\n\nLuca nods to her before lowering his head when there was another burst of explosive rounds fired against their cover. What appear to be chemicals and drugs getting scattered about as the containers get blasted open by the shoots. \"Any ideas, Ranii?\"\n\"I'm through being nice! Now both of you are going to eat Jetgun!\" Xavier shouts as he momentarily holds his fire but keeps his weapon trained at where they are taking cover, waiting for them to expose themselves.\n\n\"I have something resembling an idea. I'll throw the spear around the corner, it'll hone in on him. He'll either try to shoot it down, and we can jump him there. Or he'll think it's fake and he'll get stabbed. Either way, we do that, jump out, and take him down. Charge the strongest attack you got, and once you're ready I'll throw this thing.\" Ranii says to her packmate.\n\nLuca doesn't have the most varied in range options for moves, but Aura Sphere has served him well thus far. So he prepares another glowing blue sphere of aura between his paws and charges more of his power into it in the hopes to make it do more damage. \"I'm ready. Let's do this, Ranii.\"\nThey should probably act soon, these boxes that they are taking cover behind are well on their way to getting destroyed. The floor around it is already a mess of drugs destroyed by all the explosive rounds.\n\n\"Alright. One... two... THREE!!\"\nWith all her strength, she tosses the spear over her head. Just as she predicted, the spear turns mid air, pointing at Xavier and zooming towards him, like a shark that has just smelt blood in the water.\n\nFor someone who seems to be high on his own supply, Xavier acted quickly and with precision to catch Ranii's spear with his hand by the blade. It cut through his cloves to reveal some of his mechanical hands, which resist the electrical discharge that the spear generates when it gets grasped by anyone who isn't Ranii. \"Hah! Nice try!\" He would be free to start shooting again, with the Avali and Lucario now being much easier targets while out in the open.\nBut Luca launched his attack as well, the aura sphere flying through the air and striking true. The explosion knocks the man's aim off. Still, seeing that he might recover from that, Luca reaches for his sword and goes for a bit of a risky move, dashing straight for the human...\n\nRanii holds her hand out, summoning the spear again in her hand as she joins her packmate in the charge. As the spear reappears in her hand, she holds it in front of her in a charge.\n\nXavier's unable to fire at them in time, but he's still able to defend himself with his cybernetic hands, once more he catches Ranii's spear by its head as she comes charging against him. \"You thought that would work?! It's practically the same thing you tried before!\" For Luca though defending himself becomes a little difficult as he is still holding his weapon in his other hand, he blocks a slash from Luca's sword using his other arm, his cybernetics are sturdy enough to stand up against their melee weapons.\nThe Lucario's weapon is not being held in place by the human though, so even though the blade of one of his swords bounced right off as it got blocked he still had room to go for something else. \"Don't think about forgetting about me.\" He takes his blade lower next, managing to stab the human in the gut.\nThat...definitively hurt Xavier, but he seems able to fight through the pain of having a blade stuck in the lower half of his torso...He's probably on something to be able to handle so much trauma as well as he is. \"You stupid dog!\" He hits Luca with a backhand across the face, a strong, cybernetic backhand.\n\"Arrgh!\" Luca gets pushed back quite a bit from getting slugged in the face like that. One his swords left stuck on the body of the human. Shaking the dizziness off, the Lucario grips his other sword with both paws and prepares to go for another strike.\n\nWith Xavier distracted by the pain of the sword in his side, and his attention focused on Luca, Ranii unsummons the spear and resummons it back.\n'Third time's the charm. Hopefully.' She tells herself as she pushes the spear in another stab, this one aimed right at the cybernetic monster's heart.\n\nThe spear went through the muscles on his chest but...it failed to penetrate through his bones, it's like they are made of metal. Xavier smiles in psychotic confidence as he prepares to shoot her at point blank range with his weapon.\nBut Luca sees the chance to help her finish him off. \"NO YOU DON'T!\" Spurred to act quickly to save his packmate's life, The Lucario hits the rear-end of Ranii's spear with Force Palm, knowing that it can take the blow. The result of this is Ranii's entire spear piercing all the way into the human's chest and out his back like a giant nail being hammered into him.\nXavier's eyes go wide in a mixture of shock and pain, he begins coughing blood before finally succumbing and falling to the floor with Luca's sword and Ranii's spear still impaled in his torso.\n\nRanii stands in stunned silence, besides the huffs and puffs of exhaustion from the excitement, the thought of having been mere seconds away from getting blown away still fresh in her mind.\nFinally, she turned to Luca.\n\"Thanks Lu.\" She says to him. \"You really saved my ass there.\"\n\n\"Don't worry about it, it's what packmates do, right?\" He gives her a reassuring smile before looking down at the fallen human, his sword is still impaled on Xavier's chest so he pulls it out of him. \"Okay, we got him. Now what?\"\nAs Luca questions that they get contacted by Matias once more.\nWe just arrived outside the Mystery Dungeon, Sandgun base provided a dropship to pick you and Xavier up, what is your status?\n[i]\"Xavier is dead, he tried to fight back.\"[/i] Luca tells him over the comms.\n[i]...I see. In that case stay there, we will be making our way down to you.[/i]\nA few minutes later Matias comes to where they are, accompanied by some pokémon from the Sandgun base.\n\nAccompanying Mattias is a familiar pair: Easani and Duci. \n\"Yeesh, these guys really did a number on each other.\" Easani comments. \"If I didn't know any better, it'd almost look like The Grove was invading again.\"\n\nEasani and Duci were brought along with some other 'mons from Sandgun to pacify the dungeon pokémon, help those that are suffering particularly bad from drugs, secure the pregnant females and break up that big fight among the cultists before they hurt each other too badly.\n\"That room with all the females...\" The Decidueye asks, slightly shaken by what she saw there. The Grove did try to impregnate all the females they could in their invasion, she didn't think she would see something like that again. \"I thought I saw the last of such things when the Grove got pushed off of the Land of Sands.\"\nMatias walks over to Ranii and Luca, looking over at the human lying in a pool of his own blood. \"Did he told you anything about what he was doing here?\"\nThe Lucario shakes his head. \"No, the bastard was violent and uncooperative...in fact I was hoping you would have known something about what the hell was all that back there.\" After seeing all of this, he wants some answers.\n\"In fact I did find quite a few things.\" Matias says to him before explaining. \"It turns out a few of us are really wanting to take full advantage of doing tests and experiments that would be...difficult back in our world. The rules don't cover what we can't do here, you see?\"\n\"Then what is all this then? Making them worship him as some sort of god, trying to breed an army, and spreading these 'drugs' in Sandstone. Why did he do all this then?\" He's not usually this agitated, but after all he saw today he is slightly annoyed even with Mattias. \"I thought you were supposed to be wholly helping us.\"\nThe human can more than see that the Pokémon he's talking to is not in a good mood, but he doesn't change his tone or expression as he continues. \"And we are, but some of the more ambitious actors started getting involved. Disguising as a god as his cover to get the dungeon dwellers to his cause. That breeding pit was not for an army, it's 'IV Breeding' to get the best genetics for pokémon. And the drugs...the drugs are a sale strategy experiment, making subpar extra addictive versions of already-existing drugs to cut back on production costs while inflating sales numbers.\"\n\n\"So basically this guy was some sort of hocked up bean-counter?\" Ranii groans. \"You know, when they say that 'bean counters ruin everything', this [i]isn't[/i] what they have in mind.\" She says with a chuckle, trying, most likely in vain, to lighten the mood just a little bit.\n\nLuca begins simmering down, he got blindsided by the fact he had to fight a human just now, he assumes that every human like Mattias wouldn't cause trouble for them. \"Okay, well I'm glad that's over with...I guess now it's up to you and the Illuminate to go talk about this, yes?\" He then looks to Xavier again, narrowing his eyes.\n\"...Something the matter?\" Mattias asks him.\n\"His aura's still lingering in him.\" The Lucario says. \"Usually when someone dies their aura just dissipates in less than a minute but this is still there...\"\n\"Nothing escapes your sights huh? Yes, you did nail him, and if not for his implants Xavier would indeed be dead right now. Currently though? He's in a state of suspension, and is not going to wake up without specific outside stimuli...after getting healed of course.\" The man explains. \"You did nail him rather fatally, you pierced a lung, a heart and severed his spine...it's no wonder he's like this right now.\"\n\"So you're telling me that he's going to live?\" The Lucario sounds slightly upset about this, he admits he was more than willing to kill Xavier for all the trouble he made.\nMattias nods. \"It's highly likely that he will live, yes. I'm afraid we aren't easy to put down unless our bodies are extremely damaged. But he will have to face the Avali's justice when he comes to, I do not know what that's gonna entail but I am very much sure his lawyer won't be able to pull him out of this one.\"\n\n\"He's... still alive?\" She blinks. And slowly starts looking over to him.\n\"... You gotta be fuckin' [i]kidding[/i].\"\n\n\"More like dying very, very slowly.\" Mattias says. \"But I digress, you did very well putting a stop to him, he would have moved his operations somewhere else to continue his shady dealings elsewhere.\"\nLuca sighs and nods. \"This won't happen again, right?\"\n\"Rest assured, now that I know that some questionable actors have sights on our endeavors here, I will be working to be sure they won't overstep their boundaries like this. Now...\" Matias steps aside and gestures to the exit of this drug lab cavern. \"You've earned some much needed rest i'm sure. Just wait in the ship outside, we will finish cleaning up here and securing Xavier to transport him and his 'product' all back to Sandgun, from there you can go back to Sandstone and give Stic the good news.\"\n\n\"Well, alright. As long as this guy doesn't threaten anyone again...\" Ranii looks over to Luca. \"And who knows? Maybe Pixie will be back from her 'business trip?' Then we can tell her all about this back on the ship.\"\n\n\"Yeah, sounds good.\" Luca said to her as they both followed back the way they came.\nLeaving the dungeon was a rather simple matter, as if the dungeon itself wanted to give them a path back, they found a stair that led to the surface where a dropship was waiting. Then they just had to wait a bit as the shoddy drugs and Xavier were also loaded into it before they could hitch a ride back to the Sandgun base where they could take the teleporter straight back to the government building in Sandstone to go report to Stic about their success.\n\nOnce they arrive back at the Sandstone manor, they find Shrewn isn't there to meet them. That's pretty normal though, as he's a busy shrew even these days. Ranii can only assume he's either busy or going on something else And it's not like the pair doesn't know the way, they've been here quite a few times by now.\nThey reach the door, they open it without knocking. As again, that's fairly normal for the pair by now. What isn't however, is the sight that greets them:\nSeer and Stic, both in the office. That part is fairly normal these days. What isn't however is the position they are in: the former sitting on the desk in front of Stic, whom has one paw wrapped around her back and the other rubbing the side of her buttcheek. The two are engaged in a naughty, passionate kiss. Seer's legs are spread apart, while Stic's status remains blocked by her body. However, it's quite clear that had the avali and lucario pair arrived a moment later, it's highly likely they would have been treated to the sight of their boss happily making love to the espeon on the desk.\nSo lost are the pair in their makeout session that even Seer, with her future sight, didn't even see the pair arrive. She is however the first to notice.\n\"Mmph! MMPH!\" She yells into the kiss, quickly and awkwardly pushing him just a bit away. \"Hun, we've got company.\" She calmly tells him.\n\nLuca was expecting to see his father figure doing paperwork again, but what's on top of the desk this time isn't any papers that need signing or anything like that, it's Seer and she is wrapped into a very passionate hug with Stic. \"W-what...?\" He's bewildered by the sight. Seeing Stic getting intimate with someone like this is something that never crossed Luca's mind from how long he has known him.\n With the Espeon blocking most of his view as they kissed, the Meowstic did not see the arrival of Luca and Ranii as he kissed Seer. They were just starting their love making too, he clearly stuck his member in Seer's love tunnel fairly recently and he was really about to get into it. Stic was left confused when she yelled into the kiss and pushed him away, at first he was concerned that he hurt her or something of the sort until she told him exactly why they stopped. \n\"Huh?!\" He leans to the side to look past her and he sees the Lucario and the Avali standing in the doorway. He's embarrassed but takes a moment to sign in relief as it's better getting caught in the act by those who he trusts the most. \"Aaah...hello there, Luca, Ranii...\" He does try to sound like he is trying to brush it off but his erection will not subside, not now that they were just getting started. \"I...I can explain.\"", "writing_bbcode_parsed": "Act 84: Dungeon Drug Bust
As the Ghost Bear Pack remains in the Ghost Isle to wait for the next orders, something else happened around the same day in another part of the world...
For the past few days the New Sands Republic authorities have been investigating to find the source of 'drugs', their search bore...unexpected results. The drugs didn't come in from the outside as extensive investigation did not find any sort of smuggling, and they weren't made within the walls of Sandstone itself because making a drug lab, let alone acquiring processed chemicals inconspicuously, would be impossible to do. They found pieces of paper with things written in a language that they couldn't figure out at all, when this piece of evidence made it to Sandgun they quickly figured out one very important thing about these papers...they are receipts, receipts for all the drugs that were being sold to that street dealer. As from who these are from, judging by the language it's from the same human faction that is being their ally in this world, the NDA (New Dawn Initiative). This discovery brought forth more pressing questions, such as why would their allies start causing disruption in Sandstone like this after all the help they provided? Naturally, this is some questions that are better answered quickly before tensions and distrust start rising up, so Ranii and Luca were told to go question Matias about it as soon as possible.

"I still don't believe Matt's responsible, or his buddies." Ranii argues on the way there. "This has got to be some sort of frameup job."

"I don't believe it could have been them either, there is just no way..." Luca shares the same opinion as his packmate on the matter. They will get to the bottom of this though, true the lead they got on it is not what they expected but surely there some explanation for this...
They get to their usual spot to get to where Matias is, the 'magna gate' in that spot in the desert. They activate it and use it transport themselves to the human's underground hideout, where they find him doing his usual routine of using the NDI's 'Nexus' computer to monitor things in the region and keep the NSR informed of the bandit's movements when ever possible. It's a been a full time job for him.

"Hey! Matt!" Ranii shouts out. "We need to talk."

The man turns his head around to face them. He looks tired-ish. "Hello. If this is about the bandit leaders' possible location, i nearly have it. Tell Stic i'm doing my best here okay?"
Luca perks up at that, but get focus back on what matters and shakes his head. "We ain't here for that. I will keep it brief, one of yours was spreading these things called 'drugs' in Sandstone, disrupting the well being of the citizens." He presents one of the receipts to him. "However, i am sure that this is not true, but someone is trying to push the blame on your people so you will need to prove your innocence."
"...What?" Sounding like he is not believing what he is hearing, the human takes the receipt and looks it over. The expression of disappointment he gives them afterward doesn't really seem to herald the fact he is about to give any good news. "These are legit..."
The Lucario can not believe what he is hearing. "...What are you saying? So did your people really did this."
Mattias raises his a hand to gesture Luca to stop thinking whatever he is thinking. "No... I mean yeah- I...Please just listen to me. I don't have anything to do with this, me and others have a interested in helping the Avali Illuminate's goal. However...i supposed it was only a matter of time until someone that would step on everyone else's toes would show up."

"Someone in the org being a little corrupt?" Ranii asks. "Sounds like someone needs to do some house cleaning."

"I won't go into technicalities because that's what this bad actor is using as an excuse to do what he does." Mattias said before handing the receipt back to Luca.
"Is there nothing you can do then...?" Luca asks, worried that they might have reached a dead end here and the drug problem will go unsolved.
"There is something we can do, but I'm gonna need your help. The rules prevent me from coming into direct conflict with kin without a lawful cause, and outside of our world the laws are extremely lax as of now." The human points to them. "I can help you find who this bad actor is so you can deal with them. If you manage to stop them it should discourage others from trying similar disruptive businesses. Just tell me how the drugs have been coming into town."
"Well that's the thing, we don't know..." The Lucario sighs and shakes his head. "smuggling something into Sandstone wouldn't be easy with it being in high alert, and the amount of those substances that made it through were absurd, there is just no way so much of that stuff could have been smuggled in so fast with no one batting an eye." Suffice to say he is at a loss at how so much of it got into the town in the first place, the guards in the entrance were handpicked by Stic himself, they aren't mons who could be in on it.
This explanation makes the human think, trying to figure out this conundrum, at first he is as confused as Luca is but he might have found something. "...Hhhhmm, that is unusual, and I know it's impossible for there to be a drug lab, Pokémon in this world don't have the talent for the chemical arts, not to mention it wouldn't be easy to hide. So these drugs MUST be have been coming from outside."
"...Like a secret passage of some kind?" Luca hazards a guess, as unlikely as he thinks that is.
Mattias nods to that. "Yes, but not an obvious one. Regardless, I know where you can look. Go back to where those drugs were being stored, and we will go from there. You have those nanites in your body now too, right Luca? It will be easy for me to contact you and Ranii to guide you when you are there. I will also look more into who could be behind this, with that receipt you gave me I should be able to get you a name after some digging."

Ranii nods along as she listens to him and his plan.
"Well it's not much to go on but it's the best we got." She agrees. Though it would seem as if she has a theory of her own.
"Do you think maybe they set up shop before the whole Grove invasion took place?"

"Before the Grove invasion you say?" Mattias seems to consider that possibility for a moment. "That wouldn't be impossible. But taking that into consideration it would make it odd for these drugs to only be appearing now...but still, it's food for thought."
"What exactly are you sending us to find back there in the crime scene?" The Lucario asks him. "We need to know what we are looking for exactly..."
"Right, I suppose I should tell you, but I'm not 100 percent sure until you find it. But I suspect the smuggling method that was used must involve teleportation."
Luca's ears perk up. This theory does make some sense. "Huh...is it really possible for a pokémon to teleport like that?"
"While Psychic-types ability to teleport is nothing to scoff at, it has it's limits. It would take an extremely powerful psychic pokémon to teleport from far away to a precise location they can not see while taking so much cargo with them." The human explains. "And I find that highly unlikely because I find it hard to believe that someone with the mental capacity to pull off such a feat would be careless enough to leave behind such a blatant clue like that."

"Well, what kind of clues should we look for?" Ranii asks.

"Something that would be hiding in plain sight in a dusty basement for one." Matias knows this ain't much to go on but he won't be able to offer much guidance until he has visual on the place, which he plans to get through them through the connection of their nanites. "I know it's not a lot to go on but it has to be where the drugs were stored en masse. If that's where you found them, that's where you might find where they are coming from. Have you searched the room from top to bottom?"
"Well, personally we did not. Some other NSR agents were sent to confiscate the drugs." The Lucario tells him. "...But we didn't really think about the possibility of there being something hidden there, the room itself was somewhat hidden by itself but...Hhmmmm..." He seems to have realized something. "...If it was one of your own, you think it's possible they used one of those 'magna' things to teleport the drugs into the town itself?"
The man takes that deduction into consideration, and is rather impressed Lucas went and thought of that. "That is one possibility, a stone floor covered in sand would be ideal to conceal a magna circle under."

"That... will have to do." Ranii nod. She turns to Luca.
"Well, it's not much to go on, but it's the best shot we have."

"Alright then, go. I will use the nexus here to contact you through...your nexus connection when you get there." Matias says, finding it a bit awkward using the name 'nexus' for his computer here when the Avali have a computing network that shares the same name. Luckily this hasn't caused a lot of confusion yet.
"Right now." Lucas nods and turns to Ranii. "Let's go back and check out that Meowth's place again then. If Mattias is right we're gonna get an express trail to whoever is making these wretched 'drugs'."

"Right." Ranii nods to her compatriot. She turns towards Mattias one last time.
"Well, see you later. Let's hope this trail digs up something."

On their way back to Sandstone, they would get word from Mattias over the comms. Luca shows that he is still not quite used to what the nanite provides as the faint 'beeping' and the alert that he has an incoming hail appearing in his vision causing him to flinch in surprise.
I managed to figure out who you are looking for exactly. His name is Rico Xander, a misfit from the Xander family with more ambition than wisdom. Has a history of 'experimenting' with questionable methods to boost sales figures, which resulted in him getting arrested multiple times by authorities of whatever place he chooses to operate in. His latest scheme is fabricating low-quality drugs with higher addiction chances to force more repeat customers.
Luca wasn't expecting to get such detailed intel so soon, one moment they didn't know who this mysterious drug-maker was but now Mattias just gave them a name and motive. "How did you figure all of that out?" He asked out loud...just assuming he needs to speak verbally to be heard instead of considering that he could just think the words in his head and that would have worked just as well.
I simply scanned the barcode on the receipt you gave me, and the rest came easy. Because he needed to make the sales 'official' in order to pump his sales number, he had to hand out these receipts with the shipments of products. Perhaps he was hoping it wouldn't result in a paper trail straight to him...he underestimated the Avali Illuminate intelligence and assumed the likes of me would side with him and cover his trail because we are part of the same organization.

"Well, that was fast." Ranii commented.
So what do you want us to do when we catch up with this Rico guy?

-I informed the Sandgun base of this to clear out any misconceptions and add context before our relationship could be damaged, they said that he is being a criminal and must be treated as such. That means you must detain him. But i need to warn you that Rico Xavier is fond of resisting arrest, so as much as if bothers me to say this even if it is this guy...if the worst happen and he ends up eliminated that would be acceptable but not preferable.-
Luca narrows his eyes. Of course it couldn't be exactly easy, could it? "I see. I fought a human before, he was quite physically strong...would this one be the same?" He asks as he remembers how that one human he fought all those years ago powered through whatever he could throw at him, not even cutting off one of his hands slowed him down.
-I wouldn't know for sure, the number of humans that fit that list is not small. But the one you are going after makes extensive use of his muscle-enhancement products and...other products too. But he does fit the bill of being strong...especially with those cybernetic arms of his-

Ranii has likewise fought humans before. Not of the same type that are now helping them, obviously. But having fought pirates, Occassus and USCM Remnants, the like, she at least has some experience with them.  The USCM in particular had some cybernetic enhancements here and there, the Occasus... Well, they always preferred the more 'fleshy' kind of 'enhancement'.
Right, duly noted

-That is all for the moment, I shall contact you again soon. I will just be seeing what you are seeing for the time being.-
Mattias went silent then, he 'ended the call'. This leaves Luca and Ranii free to go back to what they were doing. They get back to Sandstone and make their way over to where that Meowth and his lackeys were operating from, the place has been picked clean for illicit substances and the like, and for the moment it is off limits to the public. They find the place is mostly how it was, what was once a storage room for the drugs is now an empty, very dusty room.
"Okay, this is it..." The Lucario said as he eyed the place, not really spotting anything that stands out at first sight, there is a broom in the corner though. The blue jackal wonders if that could be it somehow, so he goes to poke at it, then picks it up...well, it seems like it's just a normal broom instead of some sort of secret lever. "...Of course." He sighs.

"Hmmm... let me."
Ranii takes out her matter manipulator, and attempts to 'remove' the various objects of the room, one by one, particularly the ones leaning against walls to see if they are hiding anything behind them.

Using the matter manipulator to move things around, it causes quite a bit of dust and sand to get displaced as well, which reveals something. The sandy floor hid a magnagate ring right in the very center of the room.
Luca looks down at it and then back to his packmate. "So that's where it is." It seems like this was the reason this old broom was around here, to move around the dirt to and from whenever needed. He just uses it to sweep away the sandy dust to reveal the rest of the blue circle drawn on the floor, as soon as there was nothing obstructing it it began lightning up and turning active.

"Ha! Knew it." Ranii says triumphantly as it's revealed.

-Great, you found it.-
Mattias contacts them right away, having been watching everything for their point of view.
Luca would throw the broom away and look at the inactive magnagate. "Well, what now then? Does it still work...?"
-It looks like a one-way portal, but there is a way to reverse the polarity...in theory. I'm going to try and reassure you by saying that your odds of survival going through a magnagate are way above average-
That statement makes the Lucario blink. Not something good to hear but at least Mattias is honest, like always. "How do we...do that?"
-Some simple adjustments should do it. I'm going to outline the sections that you need to remove, just wipe it with appendage of your choice over it.-
Rani and Luca would see some sections on the circle drawn on the floor begin to glow and stand out, this is their HUDs trying to bring attention to what the human just mentioned.

"Got it. Standing by." She acknowledges. A teleporter. She's used plenty of these in her life, so she knows how they work. Mostly.

It might certainly be strange to work with for someone like Ranii, drawing...in this case re-drawing something on the floor to summon a portal is less technological and more arcane. Still, after she and Luca do it, it works, there is a swirling portal in the center of the room now, and they can feel that it has some suction to, the surrounding sand and dust in the room spiraling as it funnels into this unstable-looking magnagate.

-I know it looks like it's having a fit, but jump in and brace yourselves in case it gets turbulent.-

"Got it. Standing by." She acknowledges. A teleporter. She's used plenty of these in her life, so she knows how they work. Mostly.

This sure doesn't look friendly, compared to the magnagate they used to get to Matt's hideout. The Lucario looks a little concerned, and he decides to grasp one of Ranii's hands as they prepare to jump in...just to be sure the both of them aren't going to get separated. "...Ready?"

"Ready as I'll ever be!" Ranii replies as she grabs his paw.

They both jump into the magnagate and the trip proves to...really not like using a teleporter. This one feels more like jumping down into a hole that feels like it's either going very fast or too slow...and it becomes impossible to tell if they are falling up, falling sideways or even falling up in this bizarre tunnel of shifting colors that is like an express pipeline to somewhere. The sensory overload is intense enough that Luca's eyes roll up and he ends up foaming at the mouth. When it was over, it was like they were spat out up into the air before falling down on top of a rock surface in a completely different place...

Ranii is not doing so well herself. Her nanites kick into overdrive to dull the sensory overload. Warnings display on her HUD, yet she takes little time to read them. She shakes her head, shaking off whatever dizziness that her nanites weren't able to mitigate.
"Luca.." She says groggily. "Where the hell are we?"

The stone walls around them form a perfect square save for a hallway that leads, somewhere. This is not the shape of a mere cavern, it is a mystery dungeon.
Luca whines and growls from his headache, he grasps at his head with one paw to try and soothe the pain, his own nanites are being some help for this too at least. "Damn it..." He wipes away the saliva from his mouth as he sits himself. "I suppose we are not in Sandstone anymore...Is Mattias still in contact?"
As it turns out, he is.

"Welp." She says to her packmate. "Nothing to it but to get on with this."

"Right, so this is a dungeon then?" He can't remember the last time he went into one of these, ever since his guild days were behind him dungeon delving stopped being one of his duties. He gets back up and reaches over his own back to grab one of his swords. "Let's go."
Finally starting the venture into this mystery dungeon, Luca and Ranii go down that hall until they get into another open room, where they see a trio of Drillbur and Krokorok in the center, they are all kneeling in prayer, the Krokorok is poking at the sand with a stick.
The Lucario knows what this is...it's that "Maze" religion that pokémon that live in the dungeons still follow even today. "Hhhmmm, they seem busy over there..."

"Great. I'm getting Occassus flashbacks now." Ranii grumbles. She obviously doesn't seem to like religious nonsense that much. "Let's... just move on then, right?"

Luca just gives her a look of understanding before looking to that preaching pokémon. "We are just passing by."
"JUST PASSING BY?!" The Krokorok suddenly shouted, sounding offended yet still happy. "Hahaha...Brother, the maze calls for our devotion, can't you hear it?" She said as she began approaching them.
The Lucario slightly grits his teeth and tenses up, getting prepared to act if he needs to because he doesn't like her tone. He has a bad feeling about this.
The sand krok looks them in the eye and tilts her head. "Ah, I see...so you must have forgotten to strengthen your connection to the maze, yes? I can see it in your eyes, you do not have the gift of expanded consciousness..." She said before reaching for a satchel strapped to her tail, from it she takes a couple of colored pills. This must be the source of that 'expanded consciousness' she is on about. "Here! ingest it...the maze's gift!" She offers it to them...

"Well, that explains it then." Ranii whispers. "This guy has them all hocked up on drugs."
Finally she decides to speak up.
"Maze's gift you say? Hmm say, where did you get these?"

"Have you forgotten, sister...?" The clearly drugged sand-croc stares at her intensely for a moment, worrying Luca who thinks she might attack all of the sudden and is expecting any sudden movements. But she doesn't do any of that. Finally the Krokorok is able to confirm that Ranii is not under the effects of the same thing she is based on her eyes, and she can tell neither is Lucario for that matter. She looks worried now. "Oh that's terrible...sister for how long have you been devoid of the wonders of enlightenment? Hhhmmm...this is not good. Not good at all. nononono..." The Pokémon looks at the Avali with pity. "Well...upon such a case I suppose it is for the maze to decide what happens to you now. The maze will lead you to where you must go. Shall it lead you to forgiveness? Or perhaps penance? Only the maze knows. So walk, walk and you will find your final answer." With that last ominous sentence, she backs way from the two and goes back to preaching to those other pokémon.
Luca blinks and slowly moves his hand away from his blades. "That went better than expected, i thought we had a fight on our hands just then..." He comments. He then remembers something. "We should probably bring Pixie with us for the next one, yeah?"

"Yeah." Ranii replies. "A bit of bad luck there. She just had to leave for that... personal business back up North just before this mission..." She sighs sadly. "Welp, there's nothing we can do about that now but to carry on."
She looks over to the pokemon preaching elsewhere.
"And speaking of carrying on, we should probably."

He nods. "Yeah, let's go. Hope this 'maze' doesn't lead us in circles." The place does have the habit of reshaping itself, after all. Lucas always questioned the whole idea, as far as he knows the dungeon's habit of change is random and there is really no pattern to it.
Leaving these pokémon behind and heading for the next path they find, Luca and Ranii would come across something more...concerning. They find a wider 'room' with multiple female pokémon lying about, they are either moaning or groaning tiredly, and most importantly they are all pregnant. In the center of this place there is a pile of Pokémon eggs.
Luca's eyes go wide as he processes just what he is looking at exactly, it's not something he was expecting to find in this place. Is this some sort of breeding ground? "What is going on here...?"

"On second thought..." Ranii quickly comments upon seeing this. "...Maybe it was a good thing she didn't come along for this."
Ranii still wasn't sure just what she was looking at. A bunch of pregnant mons. Most of them looked like they were barely aware of the situation they were in, if at all.
"There's no way this is consensual." She laments.

"Huh? Who dares approach?" They could hear something big coming from the other side of the room, it turns out to be a charizard. He also looks like he is under the effect of some sort of drugs, but he is still thinking clearly enough to know that these two do not belong here. "Hmpft, so it is a couple of guildies coming to invade this sacred place?! You have a lot of nerve coming here..."
Luca looks like he is prepared to reach for his swords. "What is this?! What have you done to these Pokémon?!" He demands to know, the whole thing angers him greatly.
The fire lizard grins. "This is the miracle of life that the maze is providing us. We will make a better, stronger generation that will surpass you and your precious 'iron'. These females you see have the honor of bearing the seed of the strongest pokémon around...and that is me." Then he looks to Ranii, eyeing her with a mixture of malice and desire. "...And I could always use one more to further the will of the maze. Perhaps you coming here was it's way of rewarding me for my devotion, i always wanted to break one of you guildies~"

"Oh like hell you will!" She yells loudly as reaches her hand out and the spear materializes in her paw. She twirls it around once, the spear tip pointing towards the charizard threateningly.
"And besides," She quickly adds in a little more softly. "We aren't in the same egg group anyway."
She didn't really study the egg groups that the humans had provided her and Luca with that carefully, she'd put it off in lieu of other things. But somehow she doubted that 'big dumb misogynist charizard' shared an egg group with 'space alien'.

Her weapon materializing like that out of nowhere stuns the Charizard, who thought the only other mon with Iron here was the Lucario, still he is quick to recompose himself. "I don't know what magic tricks you are using, but that doesn't look like Iron to me! So don't think you can scare me with that." If only he knew just what this weapon of her's was...
Before their fight starts though, there is the sound of an eggshell cracking, and one of the eggs that happens to be right besides the fire lizard hatches into a Shinx. The newborn pokémon does not know what is going on, but does instinctively know who its parent is.
Seeing the newborn, the Charizard smirked and picked him up, holding him in front of himself. "Do you see this?"
Luca already has his swords at the ready, the way his lizard is holding that little Shinx so carelessly is really angering him. "What do you think you are doing?! You better put them down or I will make sure to really hurt you!" He threatens him. He wants to move in but without knowing what this pokémon's intention is with this newborn he doesn't want to risk it so soon, as much as he wants to jump in there to introduce him to his swords.
Holding the scared feline in one of his clawed hands, he reveals that in the other one he is holding something else...could that be some sort of chemical? It appears to be in the shape of a light blue diamond.

"BEAR WITNESS TO THE POWER OF THE MAZE'S BLESSINGS! WITH THIS WE GROW MORE THAN MERELY IN NUMBERS!" The Charizard exclaimed loudly before shoving the item into the Shinx's mouth, forcing him to swallow it. Then he simply drops the pokémon to the floor by letting go of him...
The Shinx fell to the ground, it's body so small and light that the 'thud' was barely audible. And then it looked like it's body began glowing, it was evolving right there and then. It was Luxio by the time it was getting up, and then a Luxray when it was up on it's feet. It's like this pokémon's body got forced straight into adulthood...that can't be healthy, can it?

"Just when I thought you couldn't get any more disgusting." Ranii growls. "As if you apparently didn't ruin enough lives here!"

"Hmpft, enough talk. Let the maze be witness to the justice I am about to deliver upon you." He said as he pushed the confused Luxray forward. "You! Fight!" He ordered, though clearly he himself is about ready to fight as well.
The Luxray hisses, baring his fangs and claws as he rushes towards Luca with the intent to attack...
Luca was about to draw his sword still but he analyzed this mon as he approached. He's not strong, he can tell. To compare, his memory of Chia's body has him recollect how he had scars and muscles to show. This Luxray's body is fair and untarnished, it never saw battle in its life. So he reasons that he will not need his swords for this one, instead he sees the Luxray's going to try to swipe at him with its claws and he easily stops it by catching it's wrist. "Ranii, this lizard doesn't look like he is playing around. Watch out." He warns her, given that Avali and fire don't mix.
"Now BURN!" The Charizard inhales before breathing out a torrent of flames, like a flamethrower. He's aiming this attack at Ranii. It's also notable that he is being rather indiscriminate with these flames, not caring if he hits any of the pregnant females present, though by virtue of being pokémon themselves they still scream in pain when the fires hit them.

Ranii gets the warning just in time, and leaps up into the air just as the fire passes underneath her. The screams of the victims in the way of the fiery blast fills her ears, but she has no time to worry about that at the moment. She straightens her wings, gliding over to a spot with none of the females behind it.

He sprays fire around quite a bit, but even this fire lizard can only keep this up for so long until he runs out of breath to sustain his flames, which gives Ranii an opportunity.
Meanwhile the fight between Luca and Luxray quickly begins going in the former's favor right off the bat. The Lucario applies a strong punch to the feline's chest, causing it to stagger. He was confident that he has this in the bag, there is no way that this inexperienced pokémon right off the egg can give him much trouble...but it does something slightly unexpected. The Luxray goes for an unexpected bite aimed at his arm, its teeth, as sharp as they look, don't quite penetrate the skin but it still hurts...especially since they are electrocuted. The sound that comes out of Luca's mouth is a slurred mixture of pain and surprise from the electricity coursing through him. But still he retaliates with a kick punch to the Luxray gut, making it let go. "I'm fine, just got a bit shocked over here...!"

Ranii, concentrated on the battle in front of her, realizes she has to end this quickly to avoid any more of the victims from getting hurt. With her spear in hand, and with opening in sight, she leaps upon the Charizard, aiming her spear straight for his lung.

She pierced the fire lizard straight through the chest with her spear, it goes through the front and nearly comes out through his back even. The Charizard's roar of agony didn't last long as he was coughing up blood and running long on air. This would certainly kill any mon, even one of this size but...it seems like this Charizard is holding on to life with determination. He's unable to breathe fire anymore with his lung punctured, yet still he's able to speak, if barely.
"You....think this is it...?" He grasps the spear piercing his chest and begins pulling it out, his grip on it way tighter than Ranii's. "You 'civilized' scum...with your damn iron..." He's able to pull the weapon out of himself, even though he begins bleeding a lot now he seems willing to try to stab the Avali with her own spear as some form of retribution. "THE MAZE WILL TAKE YOU ALL!" But of course he is unaware that this weapon is more than simply 'iron' that he can use it himself.

Right before the spear could hit its mark, the Charizard noticed it sparking glowing in his hand as he tried to stab her with it. All the winged fire lizard could muster as he looked at it was an out-of-breath, confused "...wha...?"

Before he can ponder more upon it, suddenly a painful bolt of power shoots straight through his body, like being hit directly by a very powerful lightning bolt.  But this is no mere electricity, as even if they were a ground or grass type it would offer little protection. The pain in his hand is indescribable, and it soon shoots out throughout his whole body.

The Charizard couldn't even express his pain vocally because of his punctured lung, he just spasmed violently as he was 'electrocuted' by a weapon he is holding unexpectedly turning against him. When the weapon fell out of his hand he had already collapsed, not even able to let out a last breath as he has none right now. After getting stabbed through a vital organ and shocked like this, he's most certainly well past the point of saving even if Ranii and Luca wanted.
Luca meanwhile, just got done shocking the Luxray into unconsciousness. He looks to the fallen fire lizard and then to the Avali. "The big bastard had it coming..." Though he ponders what exactly did he do to forcefully evolved this electric type he just fought, fighting the poor thing felt...wrong. It had no idea how to use it's own power and mostly just flailed at him. "...Can't say i expected to see a new born mon' evolve like that so soon, much less have to fight it."

"Yeah." Ranii looks on as she catches her breath and rejoins her comrade, still hyperventilating slightly from the battle. Her eyes look upon the now unconscious Luxray.
"Even when the Miniknog was experimenting with clone soldiers, they weren't this bad. At least they gave them some basic training before forcing them to die before... whatever they pointed them at. And this..."
She pauses.
"This is like the discount version of the miniknog's short-lived clone trooper program."
She shakes her head.
"Though that leaves the question..."
Her focus shifts towards the other pregnant females.
"...What are we gonna do with all these other ones?"

"It wouldn't be right to leave them like this..." The Lucario looks around at all the pregnant female pokémon around them, he himself does not know what they could do...but he figures that perhaps Mattias certainly could. "Mattias, we need your help. You can see this, right?"
No, I'm afraid I can only hear you when you talk through the communication that your nanites provide you. Why, what happened?

Long story short, it seems they're trying to make an army... from scratch. We have a bunch of pregnant rape victims here. I... Really don't think I need to go into further detail. Ranii replies.

-Alright that is...very awful, it seems you found a breeding program, how extensive and organized is it?-

Luca has another look around at this awful place, there must be more than a dozen of females here. "I count more than ten, it looks like they they were all just used as seem fit. They were also doing something to force the newborns into growing into adults in mere moments. Can you do something about this?"
-...-
There is just silence.
"...Mattias?"
-Yes, i can do something about it, it will mean we will have to take direct hand in the dungeon if the interference is already been this severe. But have you found Xavier?-
Right now the Lucario kind of wishes to do that so he can dish out some pain for what this 'Xavier' has been doing to this place. "No...not yet...What demented mind can even justify doing something like this?"
-It is pokémon breeding, a concept that was considered questionable very long ago in our past, and today it is considered 100 percent unethical. It involves breeding pokémon over and over again, sometimes even with their own parents, to create a pokémon with the best possible genetic values for battling. However that alone wouldn't be enough to create an effective army, the newborns require delicate training to get going, perfect genetics or not but...-
As Mattias explains over the comms, Luca walks over to the dead Charizard lying on the floor, spotting that blue diamond-shaped edible thing that he fed to that electric type to force him into adulthood. "And i assume there is a way to forgoe training by just forcing them to grow up...?"
-...In theory, but it wouldn't exactly be cheap to sidestep training like that, with the usage of 'EXP candy'. And they aren't made through the chemical arts, which means someone supplied Xavier with them. The fact that Xavier seems to be simply giving such things to the locals without consideration is...moronic to say the least. There are protocols to follow-

"I think it's safe to say that this 'Xavier' has gone beyond going rogue." Ranii cuts in. "I don't think he has any real consideration for those 'protocols'"
She looks over to Luca.
"If nothing else, it proves though that there is no real replacement for good old fashioned training and experience. It's why the aforementioned Miniknog clone army project failed miserably. They could get the numbers, sure, but they realized that without said experience and training, they were better off just using robotic drones like everyone else does. Avali included."

-This isn't enough to have him considered 'going Novel', though he will be left at the mercy of the Avali illuminate law, the full extend of it...if you bring him in that is-
Lucas nods to her before looking at this consumable thing that seemingly grants pokémon power when eaten, this 'EXP Candy'. He is not going to eat it, in his opinion he saw enough to know that he doesn't like but he will just pocket it so it isn't just lying around. "So, we are going?" There he spots another path that heads to another part of this dungeon, perhaps they are not far...Though there is something that he wonders regarding the rather uncaring tone Mattias has when it comes to Xavier, sometimes it sounds like he doesn't care if his fellow human lives or dies. "Do you not care what happens to him?"
-...With him it has gotten to a point that i don't, for me and many others. This isn't the first time Xavier did things that are...controversial and got imprisoned for it. He does serves his sentences when his defenses in court fail but he never really stopped getting into trouble. As a result unless you want someone who's willing to do very dirty work, no one wants anything to do with him and would rather not have him around at all...but as per the rules we must follow, we only really 'retire' when we die-

"Well, in that case, we'll capture him if we can, but if we're forced to defend ourselves to the point of lethal force, we'll have to put him down." Ranii acknowledges.

Next Ranii and Luca come across a set of stairs that go deeper into the dungeon, looks like it's the only path forward...taking it takes them to an area that feels different, much less maze-like. There they find another group of religious maze inhabitants prostrating themselves before being that looks like a big golem.
It has large yellow bands on its shoulders and wrists, and a yellow sloping section on its chest that appears to be its head. This section contains seven black circular "eyes" arranged in a specific pattern. It has six gems around its head, the upper ones are red, the middle ones are cyan, and the bottom ones are gray. There is something odd about this though, it looks a bit too humanoid, like it's a person wearing a costume...a big person, sure, but still strange. "Yes, yes! Continue showing me your faith...all of you shall be rewarded with paradise when the time comes and the time is indeed very close. The maze, that is me...shall grant all the ultimate happiness...yes." Their voices sound like someone is speaking in a voice synthesizer to give themselves a more booming, echoey voice to sound like some sort of higher being.
Luca watches this from a distance, could that be the one they are looking for? Someone pretending to be 'the maze' to take advantage of all these dungeon dwellers who are made to take drugs so their grip on reality gets even more slippery. He could blast them from here if wanted but he looks to Rani to see if she has any particular idea...or perhaps they could just tackle this head on. "...That has to be this Xavier guy."

"So how do we go about this?" Ranii asks her companion. "You think we should just go the direct route or? I'm not even sure we could take all these guys on at once."

Luca thinks for a moment as tries to survey the area to come up with some plan, but he can't see a way that doesn't involve them getting spotted. "I don't see any other way, but it doesn't seem like any of these Pokémon are particularly tough, if we work together we could handle them." He ponders how else they could get through this. "...Could we even convince them that they aren't giving worship to a pretender? We could turn their superstition against them somehow...if they listen to us in the first place."

"Well that's a great idea." Ranii comments to her partner. "There's only one problem with that thought. If I know cultists, it's that they are extremely resistant to reasonable thinking."

"Yeah, that is indeed an issue..." If only they could make these Pokémon see that what they are worshipping is just someone wearing a costume. Moreover can this costume hold itself together? "Maybe if we could...blast that thing off of him. Aura Sphere maybe?" It is an attack where he throws a glowing blue ball that never misses and explodes on impact, so he figures he might use it to attack Xavier and only Xavier with it and not anyone else in the way.

"Hmm, might work. Certainly more than I can do at the moment." Ranii nods. The only other idea she has is if she stabs the thing and rips it off. Though that would actually require getting on stage which would draw undue attention to themselves. Of course that's going to happen either way, but in her mind, it's better to keep the element of surprise while they still have it.

"Right, here goes then." Taking in a breath, the lucario brings his paws together, forming a glowing blue sphere between them that expands into the size of a soccer ball, then he runs out of their hiding spot before launching it forward. This projectile really does not miss, it weaves between any other Pokémon before hiding that person on the stage with the strange costume. The resulting explosion of the aura sphere raises up quite a bit of dust on the stage.
The many Pokémon who were paying reverence to the 'avatar of the maze' are surprised and taken aback by this attack on the entity they were worshipping. Shouting and other voices of anger amongst them ring out as they turn their attention to the offender...that being Lucario.
"A guildie?!"
"What is this guild bastard doing here?!"
"How dare he attack The Maze!"
Yeah, it seems like they are indeed rather mad about what he just did there.

Luca's Aura Sphere really did a number on that disguise the human was wearing, it was torn to shreds, revealing a muscular but disheveled man with bloodshot eyes and very dry lips. Surprisingly he is still standing after that attack. He wasn't exactly trying to sound high and mighty like a divine being before but now he has dropped any pretense of it in his surprise. "Wha?! What the fuck? Why the hell are you two here!?" He recognizes them as Pokémon from the more civilized places, he knows that they must have ties with the Avali but he does not know their names.
Luca wants to go at him, but there are many confused pokémon in the way, the devout worshipers of the maze now seeing the human and trying to make sense of what they are looking at. "You got nowhere to go, we know of the horrendous things you got going, human! You did something to have all these pokémon do what you were saying, and you forced them to make a breeding pit with the intent of making an army!" He accuses him.
The Pokémon, meanwhile, are starting to voice their confusion and conflictions.
"We were tricked...?!"
"What is that...thing?!"
"Don't be fooled by these two interlopers, they...they are the ones trying to trick us!"
"How dare they attack the maze!"
"NO! I don't want to be here anymore! That's not the maze! WE WERE LIED TO!"
"Traitors! Punish them for betraying their beliefs!"
The fact that they are all drugged probably did not help in preventing this from devolving into an orgy of violence amongst the maze worshippers, thankfully there is no iron involved so killing one another is unlikely to happen.
Xavier is pissed at how things have escalated, he can't even use these pokémon as meat shields now. "Fuck you two! You weren't supposed to be here!" The jig is pretty much up, but it looks like the human still might have somewhere to run, he runs over to the back of the cave and punches a pressure plate on the wall, which opens up a secret passage that he wastes no time and goes into it.

"Quick, after him!" Ranii shouts. She runs after Xavier, into the cave, leaving the fighting mons outside to their own devices. Even if she could help them, which she is sure she cannot, catching Xavier is the priority now. Catching or killing...
At this point, she's ready for either.

Ranii and Luca chase after the man until they get to a large cavern that looks like it's being used to store all of Xavier's drugs, there are huge containers of it here. And there is a ton of high-tech looking chemistry equipment on a spacious desk in the end of the room, which the human goes to hide behind. This is it, he has nowhere to run to anymore.
Stopping behind the desk like he intends to take cover behind, the frantic man looks back at them with an angry scowl. "What do you want!? Haven't you already ruined enough of my operation!?"

"We're pizza delivery. One large with a toping of 'fuck' and a side order of 'you'." Ranii says sarcastically and nastily. "No, really, what do you think we're here for, jackass? We're here to take you in. Or kill you. Which one we do is entirely up to you. For what you did to these mons, and tried to do to Sandstone, we're fine either way really."

"Hmpft...I should have went for the former capital instead..." He mumbled before pointing at them. "Kill me you say?! You can't do that without getting into trouble!"
"Yeah I don't think so, human! So surrender already or else..." Luca says to him, making it clear that he and Ranii are not gonna back down from this. "You are using this dungeon for whatever horrible ideas you have!"
Xavier gives the most exasperated sigh. "Why do you even care about what happens in this dungeon in the middle of nowhere? These pokémon were drifting in complete ignorance before I came along!"
While they might want to approach him to try and apprehend him, Luca is sensing something off about this. He can read that the human has something in store for them but he doesn't know what. He places a paw on Ranii's shoulder so she doesn't approach unprepared. "Ranii, he's got something up his sleeves..." He whispers to her.

"As for getting into trouble, well, like I said, it's really up to you." Ranii says. "Obviously just straight up killing you out of the blue would cause... problems. However, attacking us after being given a chance to surrender would simply constitute self-defense. As for why we care? Do we even really need to answer that?!" She takes a breath. "No, you know what? Enough stalling! Either you surrender here and now and come quietly and face the consequences for your actions, or do whatever it is you think you're going to get away with yet so we can kill you under the self-defense clause."
She growls a bit.
"Either way works fine enough for me."

Having had enough, Xavier reaches under the table for a hidden weapon, which looks like an overly big assault rifle. "Say hello to my little friend!" He declared before opening some rather heavy, but thankfully very inaccurate, fire. It's like that thing shoots large, explosive cartridges.
"Duck!" Luca pushes Ranii behind one of the many crates before the explosive projectiles begin flying.

Ranii does not need to be told twice. She ducks behind  the crates as well as the projectiles begin flying.
"Welp..." She says to Luca behind the box. "Killing in self defense it is then."

Luca nods to her before lowering his head when there was another burst of explosive rounds fired against their cover. What appear to be chemicals and drugs getting scattered about as the containers get blasted open by the shoots. "Any ideas, Ranii?"
"I'm through being nice! Now both of you are going to eat Jetgun!" Xavier shouts as he momentarily holds his fire but keeps his weapon trained at where they are taking cover, waiting for them to expose themselves.

"I have something resembling an idea. I'll throw the spear around the corner, it'll hone in on him. He'll either try to shoot it down, and we can jump him there. Or he'll think it's fake and he'll get stabbed. Either way, we do that, jump out, and take him down. Charge the strongest attack you got, and once you're ready I'll throw this thing." Ranii says to her packmate.

Luca doesn't have the most varied in range options for moves, but Aura Sphere has served him well thus far. So he prepares another glowing blue sphere of aura between his paws and charges more of his power into it in the hopes to make it do more damage. "I'm ready. Let's do this, Ranii."
They should probably act soon, these boxes that they are taking cover behind are well on their way to getting destroyed. The floor around it is already a mess of drugs destroyed by all the explosive rounds.

"Alright. One... two... THREE!!"
With all her strength, she tosses the spear over her head. Just as she predicted, the spear turns mid air, pointing at Xavier and zooming towards him, like a shark that has just smelt blood in the water.

For someone who seems to be high on his own supply, Xavier acted quickly and with precision to catch Ranii's spear with his hand by the blade. It cut through his cloves to reveal some of his mechanical hands, which resist the electrical discharge that the spear generates when it gets grasped by anyone who isn't Ranii. "Hah! Nice try!" He would be free to start shooting again, with the Avali and Lucario now being much easier targets while out in the open.
But Luca launched his attack as well, the aura sphere flying through the air and striking true. The explosion knocks the man's aim off. Still, seeing that he might recover from that, Luca reaches for his sword and goes for a bit of a risky move, dashing straight for the human...

Ranii holds her hand out, summoning the spear again in her hand as she joins her packmate in the charge. As the spear reappears in her hand, she holds it in front of her in a charge.

Xavier's unable to fire at them in time, but he's still able to defend himself with his cybernetic hands, once more he catches Ranii's spear by its head as she comes charging against him. "You thought that would work?! It's practically the same thing you tried before!" For Luca though defending himself becomes a little difficult as he is still holding his weapon in his other hand, he blocks a slash from Luca's sword using his other arm, his cybernetics are sturdy enough to stand up against their melee weapons.
The Lucario's weapon is not being held in place by the human though, so even though the blade of one of his swords bounced right off as it got blocked he still had room to go for something else. "Don't think about forgetting about me." He takes his blade lower next, managing to stab the human in the gut.
That...definitively hurt Xavier, but he seems able to fight through the pain of having a blade stuck in the lower half of his torso...He's probably on something to be able to handle so much trauma as well as he is. "You stupid dog!" He hits Luca with a backhand across the face, a strong, cybernetic backhand.
"Arrgh!" Luca gets pushed back quite a bit from getting slugged in the face like that. One his swords left stuck on the body of the human. Shaking the dizziness off, the Lucario grips his other sword with both paws and prepares to go for another strike.

With Xavier distracted by the pain of the sword in his side, and his attention focused on Luca, Ranii unsummons the spear and resummons it back.
'Third time's the charm. Hopefully.' She tells herself as she pushes the spear in another stab, this one aimed right at the cybernetic monster's heart.

The spear went through the muscles on his chest but...it failed to penetrate through his bones, it's like they are made of metal. Xavier smiles in psychotic confidence as he prepares to shoot her at point blank range with his weapon.
But Luca sees the chance to help her finish him off. "NO YOU DON'T!" Spurred to act quickly to save his packmate's life, The Lucario hits the rear-end of Ranii's spear with Force Palm, knowing that it can take the blow. The result of this is Ranii's entire spear piercing all the way into the human's chest and out his back like a giant nail being hammered into him.
Xavier's eyes go wide in a mixture of shock and pain, he begins coughing blood before finally succumbing and falling to the floor with Luca's sword and Ranii's spear still impaled in his torso.

Ranii stands in stunned silence, besides the huffs and puffs of exhaustion from the excitement, the thought of having been mere seconds away from getting blown away still fresh in her mind.
Finally, she turned to Luca.
"Thanks Lu." She says to him. "You really saved my ass there."

"Don't worry about it, it's what packmates do, right?" He gives her a reassuring smile before looking down at the fallen human, his sword is still impaled on Xavier's chest so he pulls it out of him. "Okay, we got him. Now what?"
As Luca questions that they get contacted by Matias once more.
We just arrived outside the Mystery Dungeon, Sandgun base provided a dropship to pick you and Xavier up, what is your status?
"Xavier is dead, he tried to fight back." Luca tells him over the comms.
...I see. In that case stay there, we will be making our way down to you.
A few minutes later Matias comes to where they are, accompanied by some pokémon from the Sandgun base.

Accompanying Mattias is a familiar pair: Easani and Duci.
"Yeesh, these guys really did a number on each other." Easani comments. "If I didn't know any better, it'd almost look like The Grove was invading again."

Easani and Duci were brought along with some other 'mons from Sandgun to pacify the dungeon pokémon, help those that are suffering particularly bad from drugs, secure the pregnant females and break up that big fight among the cultists before they hurt each other too badly.
"That room with all the females..." The Decidueye asks, slightly shaken by what she saw there. The Grove did try to impregnate all the females they could in their invasion, she didn't think she would see something like that again. "I thought I saw the last of such things when the Grove got pushed off of the Land of Sands."
Matias walks over to Ranii and Luca, looking over at the human lying in a pool of his own blood. "Did he told you anything about what he was doing here?"
The Lucario shakes his head. "No, the bastard was violent and uncooperative...in fact I was hoping you would have known something about what the hell was all that back there." After seeing all of this, he wants some answers.
"In fact I did find quite a few things." Matias says to him before explaining. "It turns out a few of us are really wanting to take full advantage of doing tests and experiments that would be...difficult back in our world. The rules don't cover what we can't do here, you see?"
"Then what is all this then? Making them worship him as some sort of god, trying to breed an army, and spreading these 'drugs' in Sandstone. Why did he do all this then?" He's not usually this agitated, but after all he saw today he is slightly annoyed even with Mattias. "I thought you were supposed to be wholly helping us."
The human can more than see that the Pokémon he's talking to is not in a good mood, but he doesn't change his tone or expression as he continues. "And we are, but some of the more ambitious actors started getting involved. Disguising as a god as his cover to get the dungeon dwellers to his cause. That breeding pit was not for an army, it's 'IV Breeding' to get the best genetics for pokémon. And the drugs...the drugs are a sale strategy experiment, making subpar extra addictive versions of already-existing drugs to cut back on production costs while inflating sales numbers."

"So basically this guy was some sort of hocked up bean-counter?" Ranii groans. "You know, when they say that 'bean counters ruin everything', this isn't what they have in mind." She says with a chuckle, trying, most likely in vain, to lighten the mood just a little bit.

Luca begins simmering down, he got blindsided by the fact he had to fight a human just now, he assumes that every human like Mattias wouldn't cause trouble for them. "Okay, well I'm glad that's over with...I guess now it's up to you and the Illuminate to go talk about this, yes?" He then looks to Xavier again, narrowing his eyes.
"...Something the matter?" Mattias asks him.
"His aura's still lingering in him." The Lucario says. "Usually when someone dies their aura just dissipates in less than a minute but this is still there..."
"Nothing escapes your sights huh? Yes, you did nail him, and if not for his implants Xavier would indeed be dead right now. Currently though? He's in a state of suspension, and is not going to wake up without specific outside stimuli...after getting healed of course." The man explains. "You did nail him rather fatally, you pierced a lung, a heart and severed his spine...it's no wonder he's like this right now."
"So you're telling me that he's going to live?" The Lucario sounds slightly upset about this, he admits he was more than willing to kill Xavier for all the trouble he made.
Mattias nods. "It's highly likely that he will live, yes. I'm afraid we aren't easy to put down unless our bodies are extremely damaged. But he will have to face the Avali's justice when he comes to, I do not know what that's gonna entail but I am very much sure his lawyer won't be able to pull him out of this one."

"He's... still alive?" She blinks. And slowly starts looking over to him.
"... You gotta be fuckin' kidding."

"More like dying very, very slowly." Mattias says. "But I digress, you did very well putting a stop to him, he would have moved his operations somewhere else to continue his shady dealings elsewhere."
Luca sighs and nods. "This won't happen again, right?"
"Rest assured, now that I know that some questionable actors have sights on our endeavors here, I will be working to be sure they won't overstep their boundaries like this. Now..." Matias steps aside and gestures to the exit of this drug lab cavern. "You've earned some much needed rest i'm sure. Just wait in the ship outside, we will finish cleaning up here and securing Xavier to transport him and his 'product' all back to Sandgun, from there you can go back to Sandstone and give Stic the good news."

"Well, alright. As long as this guy doesn't threaten anyone again..." Ranii looks over to Luca. "And who knows? Maybe Pixie will be back from her 'business trip?' Then we can tell her all about this back on the ship."

"Yeah, sounds good." Luca said to her as they both followed back the way they came.
Leaving the dungeon was a rather simple matter, as if the dungeon itself wanted to give them a path back, they found a stair that led to the surface where a dropship was waiting. Then they just had to wait a bit as the shoddy drugs and Xavier were also loaded into it before they could hitch a ride back to the Sandgun base where they could take the teleporter straight back to the government building in Sandstone to go report to Stic about their success.

Once they arrive back at the Sandstone manor, they find Shrewn isn't there to meet them. That's pretty normal though, as he's a busy shrew even these days. Ranii can only assume he's either busy or going on something else And it's not like the pair doesn't know the way, they've been here quite a few times by now.
They reach the door, they open it without knocking. As again, that's fairly normal for the pair by now. What isn't however, is the sight that greets them:
Seer and Stic, both in the office. That part is fairly normal these days. What isn't however is the position they are in: the former sitting on the desk in front of Stic, whom has one paw wrapped around her back and the other rubbing the side of her buttcheek. The two are engaged in a naughty, passionate kiss. Seer's legs are spread apart, while Stic's status remains blocked by her body. However, it's quite clear that had the avali and lucario pair arrived a moment later, it's highly likely they would have been treated to the sight of their boss happily making love to the espeon on the desk.
So lost are the pair in their makeout session that even Seer, with her future sight, didn't even see the pair arrive. She is however the first to notice.
"Mmph! MMPH!" She yells into the kiss, quickly and awkwardly pushing him just a bit away. "Hun, we've got company." She calmly tells him.

Luca was expecting to see his father figure doing paperwork again, but what's on top of the desk this time isn't any papers that need signing or anything like that, it's Seer and she is wrapped into a very passionate hug with Stic. "W-what...?" He's bewildered by the sight. Seeing Stic getting intimate with someone like this is something that never crossed Luca's mind from how long he has known him.
 With the Espeon blocking most of his view as they kissed, the Meowstic did not see the arrival of Luca and Ranii as he kissed Seer. They were just starting their love making too, he clearly stuck his member in Seer's love tunnel fairly recently and he was really about to get into it. Stic was left confused when she yelled into the kiss and pushed him away, at first he was concerned that he hurt her or something of the sort until she told him exactly why they stopped.
"Huh?!" He leans to the side to look past her and he sees the Lucario and the Avali standing in the doorway. He's embarrassed but takes a moment to sign in relief as it's better getting caught in the act by those who he trusts the most. "Aaah...hello there, Luca, Ranii..." He does try to sound like he is trying to brush it off but his erection will not subside, not now that they were just getting started. "I...I can explain."", "pools_count": 1, "title": "Stars of Iron P13A3: Dungeon Drug Bust", "deleted": "f", "public": "t", "mimetype": "text/rtf", "pagecount": "1", "rating_id": "2", "rating_name": "Adult", "ratings": [ { "content_tag_id": "4", "name": "Sexual Themes", "description": "Erotic imagery, sexual activity or arousal", "rating_id": "2" }, { "content_tag_id": "5", "name": "Strong Violence", "description": "Strong violence, blood, serious injury or death", "rating_id": "2" } ], "submission_type_id": "12", "type_name": "Writing - Document", "guest_block": "t", "friends_only": "f", "comments_count": "0", "views": "100" }