• Nova Whitlock late teens self proclaimed crystal girl. Believes she has psychic powers (and she just might!) and wants to become a psychic Gym Leader.
  • Galarian Rapidash - her quirky lifetime companion/amateur reality warper
  • Galarian Slowbro - a tank in pokemon form, very loyal to Nova for her patience with him as he evolved.
  • Espeon - an older mon that was once abandoned and was trying to prove itself fighting bully pokemon in Hulbury. Nova helped it and it’s slowly learning to to trust again. Uses it’s psychic powers to help Nova’s empathy with pokemon at times.
  • Alolan Marowak - A gung ho pokemon that Nova saved from a tribe of Kanto Marowak and has now sworn a life debt to her
  • Delphox - A wise and aloof pokemon that joined Nova after realizing she has powers. Rivals with Steve’s Infernape.
  • Bewear - A Bewear that was lost on the Crown Tundra Mountains. Nova was kind to it and offered to help it get home, but it decided to join her on her travels instead.
• Peyton Ginsly preteen trainer who wants to prove cute pokemon can be champions too. High energy and always racing to the next gym fight.
  • Sylveon - his very mothering Eevee who evolved into Sylveon when Peyton finally was respectful after a gym battle, showing he’s growing up.
  • Rillaboom - One of the Grookey brothers, a mischievous pokemon that follows the lead of his brother
  • Togetic - the group found Togepi’s egg when stopping Team Crown from stealing eggs from a daycare. Togetic can now fly and get into even more trouble with it’s Brave nature.
  • Hisuian Arcanine - A quirky oddball of a dog that Peyton bonded with the most after the group revived it.
  • Amura - Peyton lost to Amura in a wild battle, but then rescued him from a frozen lake and Amura decided to join him. Amura’s a flighty but incredibly strong fighter.
  • Pangoro - Peyton met Pangoro when he was guarding some injured weaker pokemon. The party healed the pokemon and Pangoro had no other plans, so it joined Peyton after a battle.
• Steve Solarverse mid twenties, a self proclaimed local celebrity in Hulbury and musician. Traveling partly to babysit Peyton, and partly so that he can make an album of duets with each of the Gym Leaders.
  • Toxtricity - Steve’s hardworking partner that he’s showered with love over the years. Toxtricity’s favorite song is Smoke on the Water and he practices hard so he can play music with Steve.
  • Rillaboom - The elder grookey brother. Equally mischievous and likes playing drums.
  • Noivern - Noibat tagged along with the group after they rescued it’s pack leader Noivern from Team Crown out of worry for the Noivern in need of medical help.
  • Amp Rotom - Rotom lives in Steve’s Amp, moving in after scaring the group in a haunted house for awhile. It enjoys being an Amp so much it decided to sign on.
  • Infernape - Steve taught it rhythm to help it’s attack flow and it decided it’d like to travel with him.
  • Kingdra - a Trumpeteer Steve impressed via a music battle. Has a habit of being thrown directly into the line of fire and is skittish as a result.

The Party, Steve the “local celebrity” musician who wants to make a mixtape of duets with every gym leader, Nova the horoscope girl who wants to be a psychic type gym leader, and Peyton the “cute pokemon” trainer who wants to be champion set out together from Hulbury towards Motostoke. They fall down a cave in the East Galar Mines and encounter a Nosepass stuck due to some magnetic rocks confusing it. They help it and it helps them get out of the mine. They have to fight an Onix before the leave, and find a set of wishing stars deep in the cave.

The trio reach the bridge over to Motostoke to find the path blocked by Team Crown, nationalist criminals. They team up with a trio of rookie trainers Timmy, Ginny, and Winny to defeat them and get into the city. They register for the gym challenge and stay in a hotel near the stadium. That night, all the steam vents that heat the building are overflowing with dangerous steam. The trio investigate the boiler room to find some ghastly turning all the valves up. They defeat the ghastly and are about to face off with their Gengar boss when the champion Lily James enters, scaring off the Gengar. Lily praises them but disappears quickly when press shows up at the hotel wondering what’s up.

Opening Ceremonies!

They do some shopping, Steve wins a battle at the battle cafe, then they make for Wedgehurst to get Dynamax Bands made. They encounter some Slowpoke and Bidoof, the Bidoof moved into the area recently and started building dams with the Slowpoke’s favorite food. They help the Bidoof find new wood sources so the Slowpoke can keep theirs, and one Slowpoke decides to go with Nova. They train a bit before the day is up.

The players head to the Rest Stop train station in a snow squall. Peyton battles a trainer named Elina and loses. He doesn’t take it well. They arrive in Wedgehurst, heal their pokemon, meet Sonia who’ll make a set of dynamax bands for them, and crash at the pokemon center.

They go shopping for a new outfit to Steve can wear to impress Sonia at Elina’s boutique before going to the Lab. They look in the window to see Sonia captured by Team Crown!

They fight Team Crown, get their bands, then get an invite to the berry festival next day in Postwick.

The berry festival in Postwick. Peyton and Steve catch Grookey brothers that were pranking the festival. They return and heal, then get coffee with Sonia. Steve spills his drink on her by mistake.

They return to the wild area to head back to the Gym Circuit. They train, meet a Jigglypuff that narrowly beat Steve in a sing off. They train more and then meet Franklin, a trainer looking for a special mushroom in the woods.

They go with Franklin into the woods to find the mushroom. They find it at the end of the day, Ponyta defeats the Beedrills nearby and they return to camp with Franklin.

They battle Franklin then split up. They pass the watchtower ruins and get creeped out. They try to travel through the night but are cut off by a Houndoom and it’s pack. They see Elina being spirited away into a ghost dimension and follow. The meet Solomon, a ghost hunter, and together rescue her. They fight a dynamax Misdreavus in their escape then head to sleep at sunrise.

They sleep the morning away after their harrowing night. Next day they travel back to Motostoke and have dinner with Elina and Solomon before splitting up. They go to Rainbow Factory to meet Olivia, who tells Steve she’ll do a duet with him if he can get Kabu to come to one of her parties.

Peyton has a practice battle with Elina he wins before the group make their way to Kabu’s gym. They undertake a challenge from him to convince him to come to the party, which they succeed.

They then visit a pokemon spa for their starters and bump into Lily, who tells them Kabu is Olivia’s father. Later they bring Kabu to the party, it sparks Kabu taking more of an interest in Olivia’s world and Olivia sings a duet with Steve.

The group makes their way towards Turffield. On the way they help some school kids catch a Mudbray for their friend.

They run into the Johnson trio, Timmy, Ginny, and Winny as they reach the entrance to the Galar Mines. They pair off to battle, Peyton and Nova scoring wins against their rivals. That night, they all reflect on their growth recently, in battle and musically, and rank up to Amateur.

The group wake up late and head into the mines. They decide to wander down the mine shafts to find the strong pokemon the signs warn about. They find a girl named Heidi taking her slowpoke to a shellder lake in the mines. On the way Peyton and his Grookey go on a wild ride in a minecart and Peyton bonds with Grookey. At the lake a dynamax Cloyster attacks, the fight is rough but Nova’s Slowpoke evolves and the Cloyster retreats. They head out of the mines and camp at the exit.

The group train in the morning before heading to Turffield. The group encounter some farms chasing off some Nickit they think are stealing in town. The group investigate at the market scene of the crime, and get an idea that the zigzagoon recently seen in town are the actual cause. They find the zigzagoon nest and battle with them to teach them a lesson. They return to Turffield and Steve holds a low key concert with town’s folk joining them outside the pokemon center.

Nova and Steve help a guy with a Geodude hanging out on a historical monumnet in the morning then the trio train their pokemon to Amateur with a soccer game. They head for the Turffield gym to find the Leader is away hunting Poachers.

They go to Route 5 to find the gym leader and Peyton spots him in a blind shortly before sundown. They help him watch for Poachers and Nova spots them. The trio take them down without Mick’s help and he returns to his gym.

Nova and Peyton undertake the Gym Challenge, where they must steal a ball from a Corvisquire nest. They take a lot of knocks from the bird before Ponyta finally gets them the balls they need to move on and fight Mick.

Peyton is harassed by Stantler’s Confuse Ray and it takes Eevee and and Grookey to defeat it, then he loses to Herdier. Nova loses Slowbro to Sawsbuck, but Ponyta stomps Sawsbuck before she and Herdier dynamax, both coming to 1 hp before Herdier deals the finally damage.

The group head out on a request from Mick to get wood from a Torterra so he can make a new instrument to play with Steve. When they camp, they encounter a Lillipup that was confused by a group of Spinda by accident. They help a Spinda from the group get Persim berries to cure the Lillipup, taking some for themselves as well.

The group find the Torterra they were looking for, actually a Dynamax’d one! They curbstomp some Team Crown Grunts who were attacking the pokemon and in thanks for driving them off, the Torterra lets Steve take some wood from it’s back. They make their way back to Turffield.

The group mostly head to bed after talking strategy (or lack of) with Timmy and Ginny in the Pokemon Center, though Steve and his Grookey go out for a late night training session that exhausts Grookey a bit. The next morning Nova and Peyton prepare mentally to rechallenge Gym Leader Mick and do so, with Nova having a challenging rematch between Slowbro and Sawsbuck that ends in a last second victory, while Ponyta triumphs with ease over Herdier. Peyton’s Eevee sweeps Stantler and Herdier both by dynamaxing early and hitting hard while Mick didn’t.

Steve gives the wood he retrieved from the Torterra to Mick who asks them to gather up the locals in the gym that night for a concert, where Steve and Mick play together (Mick on his newly made Didgerydoo).

The PCs do some shopping and head out of Turffield, Hulbury bound. They run into a robbery by Team Crown on at the Nursery on the route and manage to blow a tire so they can’t get too far away. They hunt down Team Crown and after a brawl, rescue the eggs stolen from the Nursery. At the Nursery, they restore the eggs all to their incubators and find an extra which Peyton keeps. Steve hits on the girl running it by fixing up her home while Peyton learned how he takes care of the egg, and just as they leave the egg hatches into a Togepi!
Steve trained with Toxel while Peyton watched over Togepi, who played with a knife (Eevee was pissed) and then was rescued from walking into fire. The group makes it to Hulbury without issue before sundown.

At Hulbury, the trio visit their homes and tell their parents about their new pokemon, in Steve’s case his roommates. They run into Solomon who invites them to lunch the next day to talk about what they’ve been up to. Nova bonds with Nurse Moon in the pokemon center and gets advice on crystals, meets a vendor in the open air market named Eda who senses something in Nova and gives her a crystal pendant and the articuno chess piece from 2000 movie. Peyton and Togepi train, Steve and Toxel practice guitar.

The group each recieve a poke-gear from their respective households to keep in touch. They meet Solomon but their lunch is interrupted when a flock of Murkrow start to cause havoc and one steals Togepi. After a chase through the city, they find an Espeon protecting Togepi and face off against the Murkrow. The group battle against the Murkrow, defeating them without issue.

They take Espeon to the pokemon center, Nova stays with Espeon while Steve and Peyton investigate the Murkrow. Nova learns the Espeon is older and often tries to prove itself helping wild mon’s in town. Steve and Peyton learn that Murkrow aren’t normally like this and that the gym leader might have more info.
Espeon escapes the pokemon center and after failing to keep up, Nova meets up with the others and go to the Gym. The receptionist tells them that the best chance to talk to the leader is to do the gym challenge and they need to anyway, so they sign up.
They checkout the lighthouse to see if they can attract the Murkrow with a large shiny light, they meet the Alolan lighthouse keeper Remi who has her Raichu help, but it doesn’t help.

The group heads to the gym challenge in the morning. They enter the windsurfing race Gym Leader Ezra is using for a challenge. Steve kicks ass and takes the lead with Peyton and Nova on his heels. Nova notices Espeon being bullied into a cave by Murkrow on the shore and bails from the race to help it, Peyton and Steve follow suit.
They find a dynamax Honchkrow acting unusually in the cave and the injured Espeon. It uses GMAX moves without a GMAX form and is dynamaxed away from a nest. They defeat it, Nova protects Espeon from it’s finally attack, then Solomon and the gym leader arrives. They stall the Honchkrow’s second wind while Nova captures the Honchkrow.
Ezra takes the Honchkrow to send to Magnolia Labs for help, telling them this counts as a gym challenge win. Steve and Peyton “train” by playing on a beach making an obstacle course while Nova has a heart to heart with Espeon before catching it and hitting up the boardwalk with her team.

Today is the day to challenge the Hulbury Gym. After running into various familiar faces in the Lobby, Peyton is the first to challenge Ezra. Peyton’s Eevee is taken out instantly by Ezra’s high speed Swellow, and Peyton is quickly cornered with only Grookey by his side. Grookey holds out and manages to take out Swellow, only to face off with Fearow. Grookey is battered about as the two Dynamax, until Grookey’s steely resolve has him dynamax-evolve into Thwackey! Peyton emerges victorious after a tough fight.
Nova’s challenge is far more in her favor: Pidgeotto and Fearow both are taken out by her Galarian Slowbro. Both riding the high, they meetup with Steve and friends in the lobby. Peyton gets interviewed by Lanie, a 40’s style reporter for Wyndon News. Peyton then invites everyone back to his parents for a BBQ!

Peyton and Timmy have a battle at the BBQ, Thwackey makes short work of Riolu, but Scorbunny barely manages to defeat him. Timmy surrenders at that point though.

Nova and Peyton head out for some morning training on the beach with their teams. They eventually stumble on Lighthouse Keeper Remi’s Alolan Vulpix wandering the beach with heatstroke. They help it out and bring it to the lighthouse. They find the lighthouse messy and Remi not there. They snoop a bit and find a laptop with the name of a ship, the Magikarp’s Revenge, and coordinates in the bay.
After calling Steve to have him meetup with them (he was training in the woods), they windsurf out to the bay and find the ship being rocked by heated battle! Nova sneaks up the back of the ship while Peyton and Steve join Remi fighting a Dynamax Kingler on the deck, owned by a Pokemon smuggler! Nova starts freeing the captured Alolan Vulpix while Peyton, Steve, and Remi defeat the Kingler. A damaged piece of the deck hits Espeon, though Nova got hurt too while trying to protect it.
After defeating Kingler, Officer Jenny arrives and everyone heads back to Hulbury on her boat. The Vulpix are safe and Remi will watch over them in the lighthouse until they can get back home.

Ezra runs into them at the shore. He reminds Steve of the yacht party that night and confirms Steve will still be playing. The group get dinner at Peyton’s and heal their mons before heading to the boat.
The disgruntled former entertainer Bently is rude to Steve as they get on the boat full of models (Ezra works as one). The first set goes well while Nova and Elina (who joined them) oogle Ezra and Peyton records the show. During break, Nova and Elina spot Bently by the power room and Steve loses 500 dollars on a dice game (but he was confident).
The second set is interrupted by the power being cut, which was done by Bently. Steve has his Toxel power the amp and saves the show, which angers Bently. He releases his Graveler and Carkol, whose weight rocks the boat and knocks people off. Ezra and Peyton rescue people while Steve and Nova, with Grookey and Peyton, defeat Bently. Ezra and Steve end the cruise with a duet for Steve’s album of Backstreet Boy’s.

Peyton, Nova and Steve leave Hulbury behind and head through the Eastern Mines once again to reach Motostoke. An injured wild Noibat interrupts their travels that insists they follow it after they heal it. The group stumble on Team Crown Grunts capturing Noibats who immediately attack. The grunts attack the trainers while the battle goes on, but a nut kick from Nova and an excellent use of pocket sand from Steve keep them from causing problems. The grunts escape further down the cave and the trio follow when the Noibat insists.

They find a Noivern being experimented on by Charles, Team Crown’s leader and a scientist in his employee. Charles recognizes them from their actions with the Honchkrow and admits to being the reason it was stuck dynamax’d. Charles releases his Grimmsnarl which pounds on the party’s pokemon for a turn before the battle is interrupted by the dynamax Noivern escaping. Charles and his people escape through a tunnel while the trio fight the dynamax Noivern in the cave, eventually catching it so they can bring it to get help. The Noibat decides to stay with them because it’s worried about the Noivern. It guides them out of the mines towards Motostoke.

The trio head for the pokemon center on arrival. They drop off injured pokemon to heal up and visit a Technical Record shop while they’re being treated. Steve gets protect for Toxel and Nova gets drain punch for Slowbro. Peyton gets a TR for a zigzagoon that teaches Double kick and is told about a recent challenger of the gym that taught an Eevee double kick. They then pick up their pokemon and sleep.

Steve wakes up to find Noibat missing from his room, it is instead with the Noivern’s pokeball. They get Nurse Gloom to call Kabu, who stops by on his morning jog. Kabu has the connections to get to Sonia at Magnolia Labs and does so. Sonia promises to help the Noivern and suggests to the Noibat it can stay with Steve until the Noivern is healed. It accepted.

Peyton insists they go to the wild area to find Everleigh, the girl the shop keeper mentioned yesterday. Steve and Nova bond with Noibat and Ponyta respectively while Peyton searches. It’s Eevee who finds Everleigh. Everleigh battles Peyton as a “test” and wins handedly with her own Eevee before helping the group as a whole train with their TRs. All but Slowbro learn their new moves before sundown, and Everleigh heads off into the wild area while they return to the city.

Each member of of the party spends the evening differently. Peyton takes Eevee to the pokemon spa, Nova has a picnic and grooming session with her team (including the still wary of people Espeon), and Steve takes Noibat to see an acoustic show at a cafe (Noibat likes it alot).

Nova wakes up at the crack of dawn to meditate with Slowbro on the move they were learning the day before. Slowbro masters drain punch after the session. The group reconvene at the Rainbow Factory, Gym Leader Olivia’s nightclub/gym. Nova and Peyton enter the gym challenge where they have to go through a series of steampunk themed obstacles with help from their pokemon. Both succeed with flying colors, though Elina, one of their rivals, fails. The group talk to Elina about her loss, pick up her pokegear number, then Steve offers to train with her.

Steve and Elina have a heated battle between Grookey and Lapras. Grookey learns to use will points in a close battle, as well as putting a custom razor leaf attack into play, but Lapras manages to eek out a win.

Peyton is the first one to challenge Olivia. He leads with Eevee against her Purrserker, who ramps up it’s defense with Iron Defense and reduces Eevee’s with Screech. The two trade a few points of damage and Peyton switches to Togepi at the end of the round. Togepi battles it out with Purrserker for awhile, not able to do much damage against it’s strong defense and taking hits in return. However, Togepi manages a clutch late round Yawn attack that puts Purrserker to sleep! Eevee returns to the field to whale on the sleeping Purrserker, closing the gap so that even when it woke up, a quick attack was enough to KO the Purrsereker.

Peyton’s duo are both at 2 Hp as Mawile takes the field for Olivia. Mawile gets a massive hit against Togepi and knocks it out after armoring up with Iron Defense. Mawile is only lightly damaged as Eevee takes the field again. Eevee manages to dodge big attack after big attack, takes a critical hit but surviving with 1 Hp, chipping away at Mawile’s health. Mawile over extends and uses up all it’s actions, and Eevee gets a 4th and 5th action pair of hits with Double Kick that win Peyton the battle! Peyton is a good winner to Olivia as well, and Eevee is so proud of her psuedo son that she evolves into Sylveon!

Nova leads her battle with Slowbro, fighting Olivia’s Togedemaru. Togedemaru takes a Drain Punch attack early, but retaliates with a Nuzzle attack that paralyzes Slowbro. Even with the reduced Dex, Slowbro would go on to take hit after hit, dodging two for every one, brawling with the high speed Togedemaru with chip damage until in a final burst of a Drain Punch, he pummels the mouse pokemon into the arena floor!

Mawile returns to fight against Slowbro, and after a round of his godly dodging talents begin to leave him. He takes one hit, miss his counter attack, then takes a massive crunch attack that finally drops the beast. (not before terrifying Mawile with his steely resolve!) Nova releases Espeon into his first battle. Espeon leads with a full field swift attack that batters the mostly healthy Mawile. Mawile moves into close combat range, landing two hits on Espeon. Espeon, reading Nova’s mind for commands, breaks free of the melee and launches a Confusion attack for maximum damage against Mawile. The special attack breaks Mawile’s natural steel defenses apart, leaving Espeon and Nova victorious!

The group does a little shopping before heading out into the Wild Area for the long trek to Hammerlocke. They start off working off some energy with some training for the day.

Still riding a high off their gym fight, the party goes to find a Dynamax den to battle. Steve specifically looks for a ground type to fight and they find a Krokrok! The trio are more than up to the challenge of fighting it and defeat it handly.

The group starts making head way on their trip today. Half way through the day, they spot a Steelix harassing a trainer and their Toxricity. They fight off the Steelix and rescue the trainer, who introduces himself as Axel. Axel is heading to the Toxel Swamp in the Wild Area to evolve his Toxel and offers to travel with the group to show Steve the way there for his Toxel.

The group takes a break after yesterday’s big Steelix fight and does some more training.

Axel tells them they’re coming up on the Toxel Swamp as they get ready in the morning. He leads them into the swamp, deep in the woods, and tells Steve he and Toxel need to go in alone. Steve obliges and enters the swamp with Toxel. As he walks the swamp starts to overwhelm his and Toxel’s senses till they find themselves in an endless smokey plane of shallow water. A Toxricity appears and attacks them, with Toxel defending Steve. A stray attack comes for Steve and Toxel dives to take the hit for it’s trainer. Toxel and Toxricity disappear into the water before Toxel emerges as a Toxricity. The enemy Toxricity also reappears, but only to nod in approval before the smog overwhelms Toxricity and Steve again. They find themselves not far from where they left Nova and Peyton, Toxel indeed having evolved. Axel’s Toxel evolves on it’s own journey as well, and after they all leave the swamp they part ways with Axel.

Steve is itching to battle with Toxricity and Peyton is always itching to battle, so they head out to find some trainers. They lock eyes with a scottish Corviknight taxi pilot and a timid bug type trainer who release a Honchkrow and Parasect respectively. A savage attack by Parasect takes out Sylveon early and Honchkrow/Parasect team up to take out Toxricity. Meanwhile, Nova goes treasure hunting and finds a Twisted Spoon.

As they party travels, they stumble on a pokemon they don’t recognize wrecking a campsite. They sneak closer, until Nova is caught mere feet from the pokemon. Nova makes an empathetic request for the pokemon to calm down so they can help it, and Espeon translates those feelings psychically. The pokemon calms down and the group start trying to help it find the thing it’s looking for in the camp. They’re interrupted by Lily, the champion, arriving in a hurry. Lily is surprised to find the Hisuian Arcanine calm and explains the scientists at this camp just revived Arcanine and it went berserk looking for it’s child, Growlithe. Lily recovers the fossil from the wreck and takes everyone to the cave the scientists were hiding out at to revive Growlithe and reunite the two.

Lily explains that she found the fossil in some volcanic tunnels nearby and is headed back there. She offers for the group to go looking for Fossils as well, since Nova in particular is smitten with Hisuian Growlithe. They head to the tunnels and do an initial search, but only find a galarian fossil. A Tyrantum tries to scare them out of the caves, but Lily and the group drive it away. They do more fossil hunting, finding a second galarian fossil, before Peyton has to tap out due to heat exhaustion. The remaining three try and different approach and manage to find a Hisuian Growlithe fossil before they too have to leave due to the heat. Lily, after cooling off outside, says she has more champion work to do in the caves and bids the trio good bye.

That night, Nova feels a psychic pull as she tries to sleep. It’s overwhelming and she goes to follow it, sending Ponyta to wake up the boys before going towards the source. The rest of them catch up to here quickly enough. Peyton and Steve find themselves caught in illusions without realizing it, seeing an Eevee in need of rescue and a young woman in a pit trap respectively. Ponyta, Sylveon, and the rest of the party’s pokemon are caught in illusions as well and Nova is the only one to see the Zoroark attacking an Abra that send out the psychic call for help.

The Zoroark turns it’s attentions to Nova and keeps her trapped in illusions as well, approaching with a hungry look on it’s face. Just in time Ponyta is able to break free from the illusions to protect her trainer! Nova and Ponyta battle the Zoroark, though it’s wholly focused on Nova. It eventually gets behind Nova and threatens her to have Ponyta stand down. Nova orders an attack on the Zoroark anyway, telling Ponyta she must do it to protect their friends. Ponyta does, blowing Zoroark back and battering Nova with Fairy Wind. In the split second before Nova faints from injury, Ponyta decides she’s ready to evolve so she can protect her trainer and evolves into Rapidash! Rapidash uses heal pulse to stablize Nova and the two then wipe the floor with Zoroark.

The illusions are broken and the group returns to camp. Nova also realizes, with some help from Espeon, that the Articuno chess piece that had been glowing purple while she was sensing the Abra’s distress call glows in response to psychic power. Too tired to deal with that, the group crashes after a very long day.

The group wakes up to find themselves in the midst of a massive rainstorm. It doesn’t deter them from getting in some training and trekking to the camp of the scientists they met with Lily to revive their Growlithe fossil. The rather quirky scientists help them revive Growlithe, whose extremely quirky himself. The three trainers take the rest of the day to play and bond with Growlithe and eventually, it’s Peyton who decides to catch him.

The rain from yesterday has not let up yet. The group travel, even going through the eye of the storm before realizing it only will get worse from there. They spot a large mansion in the middle of the wild area and decide to take cover inside. Already suspicious of ghosts, they poke around a bit before they hear sounds upstairs. They find Solomon trapped in a sauna by a Rotom upstairs. Toxtricity gets past Rotom’s shocks with his natural electric resistance and frees Solomon, while the Rotom escapes through the floor.

Solomon explains he’s on a job to ghost bust the place and recruits them to help, since the ghosts won’t let them out anyway. Steve and Peyton head downstairs to search for the lead ghost, while Solomon and Nova investigate a room upstairs. Nova enters a room filled with dolls that all float up and start to chase the upstairs group downstairs. Steve and Peyton, investigating the dining hall, spot this but when they try to leave their room, the Chandelure hiding as the chandelier drops a fire spin trapping them into the room!

Peyton’s Sylveon and Steve’s Toxtricity make short work of Chandelure, while Nova and Solomon are pinned against the wall in the kitchen by evil dolls. Solomon points out one of the dolls is controlling the rest before Rapidash’s Run Away ability gets them out of the corner they were backed into. The doll manages to get past everyone but Nova, who hits it with a grand slam frying pan attack that destroys it completely and knocks out the shuppet controlling it. After all that, they decide to explore together. They find a study with a piano that Peyton plays poorly, it annoys the three Honedge resting in the room. A quick battle later, Steve tunes and plays the sheet music they found on the piano and opens secret stairs to the basement.

In the basement, they find a Cofagrigus that’s clearly the ringleader of the ghosts squatting in this house. They battle it, Solomon showing off Absol’s new Mega Evolution in the process, until Slowbro is bored and finishes Cofagrigus off. Solomon and Absol tell the ghosts to scram and not squat in people’s homes, and they flee, letting the trainers leave. They exit the house to the sight of a rainbow and clearing skies while their pokemon play in the mud.

The group wake up the sound of Steve’s guitar amp blaring. Steve and Peyton head outside to see the Rotom from the house possessing it! It bounces around the camp until Steve plays music with it, the Rotom appears to really enjoying being his Amp while he places and decides to join his team.

The group do some training with their mons before heading out. In the afternoon they reach the edge of the Dusty Bowl, a badlands area of the wild area. They met Timmy, Ginny, and Winny and decide to travel together. Timmy, frustrated by the lack of pokemon to battle on their path, kicks a stone that turns out to be a Pupitar! The Pupitar and it’s friends kick up a massive sandstorm which ends with Peyton, Nova, and Steve split up!

Timmy, Peyton, and Toxtricity each other and then start looking for the Pupitar or the others, whichever they find first. They find a Phanpy in a valley that Timmy wants to catch. He goes to battle with it only for a pair of Donophon to join it!

Nova, Noibat, and Growlithe find Ginny in the craggy area they ended up in. Ginny has a heart to heart with Nova about how Nova always seems calm and collected before gym battles and Nova explains that she’s not at all, a comfort to Ginny. The two stumble on a group of Marowak dueling and an Alolan Marowak trying to break them up. The Marowak all turn on the Alolan Marowak and after following them, Nova and Ginny jump into help fight the Marowak that cornered the Alolan one.

Steve, Rapidash, and Togepi find Winny, whose being excessively guarded by her Ponyta. Winny confides in Steve that her Ponyta doesn’t listen to her at all and it’s starting to become and problem. Steve gives her some advice on getting Ponyta to respect her, but before they can talk to her pokemon it gets into a fight with a Mudsdale!

Nova and Ginny jump into to help the Alolan Marowak and start battling. Nova ends up taking on two with the Alolan Marowak helping out. An already injured Slowbro is knocked out and Alolan Marowak takes a big hit as well. Espeon comes out just as a big attack is going for the ALolan Marowak, and Nova dives to protect it! Nova is hit by the attack instead, and blacks out…

Ponyta takes a pot shot at the Mudsdale, ignore Winny’s protests. Steve gives her some solid advice about earning Ponyta’s respect and she tries to interpose herself between Ponyta and Mudsdale to force Ponyta to stand down. However, Mudsdale uses Bulldoze, an area of effect move! Ponyta is forced to take massive damage as he protects Winny from harm, throwing her on his back while trying to escape. Steve steps in with Grookey to protect Winny. Grookey pulls off a massive combo between Razor Leaf and Knock off that obliterates most of Mudsdale’s health and inspires him to evolve into Thwackey. Mudsdale flees in rightful fear. Winny is doubting herself as a trainer but after a heart to heart with Steve, she starts to feel better and they go off in search of their friends.

Peyton takes on a Donphan while Timmy tries to catch Phanpy and battle the other Donphan. Donphan is major threat to Peyton, it’s Magnitude attack knocking out Sylveon completely. Thwackey comes out to defeat the Donphan after taking a few hits himself. Peyton turns to Timmy to find the boy running from the Donphan with his newly captured Phanpy, screaming for Peyton to run too. The two boys bolt away while the Donphan gives chase!

Steve and Winny first see Peyton and Timmy running towards them with a Donphan on their tail, then see Ginny, Espeon, and Nova unconscious on Ginny’s Thievul followed by a Marowak coming from the other direction. The group gathers behind a ledge, Nova wakes up in time to hear Ginny and Timmy both have no pokemon in battle condition and Winny is healing them up.

Peyton, Nova, and Steve set up to fight the Donphan and Marowak with Togepi, Thwackey, and Rapidash. It’s a difficult fight with Donphan launching Magnitude attacks whenever it can and Marowak proving to be a tanky fighter. Togepi is knocked out, as is Thwhackey before Marowak goes down. Growlithe and Noibat replace them, and with a concentrated effort, Donphan is finally defeated. The collected trainers setup up camp right where they stand, too tired to move any further.

The Alolan Marowak (who had been psychically carried along by Espeon) wakes up and, in his own way, declares he has a life debt to Nova for trying to save him. Nova welcomes him to the team as her fourth mon.

After resting and healing with a special berry curry made by Winny, the group spends the morning making the last trek to the gates of Hammerlocke. Timmy stops everyone before they enter, declaring it’s time for some battles.

Peyton and Timmy start with Sylveon and Lucario. Sylveon does pretty big damage to Lucario with Moonblast before Lucario uses it’s Reversal to bring the pain back around to Sylveon. Peyton then has Hisuian Growlithe come out and Timmy swaps in Raboot. Raboot’s fire attacks chip away at Growlithe but once Growlithe lands an Ancient Power Raboot is obliterated. Lucario returns and Endures a hit from Growlithe before using Reversal to defeat Peyton’s second mon.

Steve and Winny are next. Toxtricity and Ponyta are the first mons out, and despite the steps Ponyta and Winny have made at bonding, Ponyta ignores her and recklessly Flare Blitz’s Toxtricity and the recoil knocks him out. Toxtricity stays out as Winny releases Wooloo. Wooloo is a staunch defender and takes minimal damage from Toxtricity, but it’s also a poor combatant and can’t break Toxtricity’s defenses. Eventually Wooloo takes enough chip damage that Winny calls the fight for Steve.

Last is Nova and Ginny. Ginny releases Thievul to battle Galarian Rapidash. Rapidash has some near hits with her super effective Megahorn, but Thievul is too quick and makes use of Sucker Punch to battle back Rapidash. Nova turns to her sweeper Galarian Slowbro who takes a few hits from Thievul before it lands a Drain Punch to one shot the fox pokemon. Ginny then sends out Dartrix who uses Foresight to limit Slowbro’s options. Dartrix takes some big hits from the Hermit Crab Pokemon before, at the last minute, it succeeds with a Sucker Punch that takes down Slowbro.

Each pair up now sits at 1-1 win rates as they enter Hammerlocke together after a day of intense battling.

The party drops their pokemon off with Nurse Scry, an excessively creative fellow in a beret. They head out to kill some time and run into Sonia. Sonia invites them on a tour of Magnolia Labs, a Galar Particle research lab built into where Rose’s power plant once was. Togepi tries to sneak into one of the Galar Particle machines while Sonia was distracted, but Steve manages to stop her before she grew gigantic.

Sonia introduces them to her assistants who run her part of the lab when she’s traveling, Patrick and Madeline. Patrick and Madeline are also both in charge of helping the stuck in Gigantamax state Noivern and Honchkrow the group encountered near Hulbury. They tell the group they’ve made some significant progress, but for now the two pokemon are in special pokeballs to help them be more comfortable. Patrick guides them out and gets Steve’s Pokegear number so that he can update Noibat on Noivern’s health.

After their tour has ended, they’re already in the gym so they sign up with a mid twenties girl who has an aging Boltund resting at her feet. She gives them a riddle: “What pokemon is central to a Galarian Myth debunked in the past decade?” The answer is all they need to battle the gym leader. Pondering over that, the group heads back to the pokemon center for dinner and sleep.

Peyton decides they should go to the battle Cafe for breakfast. After eating their regular meal, everyone wants to buy treats for their pokemon. Peyton and Steve are very low on funds after a few losses in the Wild Area, so Steve battles for the two of them at the Battle Cafe, betting their combined 1000 Poke. His opponent is Franklin and his Paras, a trainer they haven’t seen in well over a month. Toxtricity and Paras trade a few blows before Toxtricity’s poison type superiority wins the match. Franklin thanks them for the battle and moves on, since Paras was terrifying Peyton.

Nova and Steve buy treats for the whole team, restoring a bit of their team’s willpower, while Peyton gets a special treat just for Togepi. Togepi gains a happiness from the special treatment, but Peyton’s Thwackey loses a happiness as it hasn’t been getting much attention from Peyton and this is the straw that broke the camerupt’s back.

After breakfast they decide to work on the riddle. Nova remembers seeing a sign for the Hammerlocke Vault, a museum in town, and they decide to start there. The receptionist tells them that most of the tickets for the day have already been bought, but if they win a Museum Discovery Scavenger Hunt (a promotion for kids), they’ll get free entry. Each of them sign up and get their individual clues, which lead to symbols they have to copy down around town.

Nova’s clue leads them to the lucky pokeball statue in Hammerlocke. A trainer is refusing to let anyone else touch or investigate the status so he can horde all the good luck for catching a Noctowl he can. Nova tries to talk him down off the statue but he sticks to his guns, throwing out his Doduo. Nova releases Slowbro who one shot obliterates Doduo with a zen headbutt attack. The trainer is in utter awe of Nova and runs off at her command with a “yes Ma’am”. The group find the symbol on the Pokeball statue with little effort after that.

The next clue leads them to Hammerlocke’s moat. Marill treat the moat like a lazy river these days and the Marill motion for the group to join them, recognizing the flyer of the scavenger hunt they have. Togepi rolls free of Peyton to join them and the group goes diving after it. Peyton literally dives and hurts his arm, and Nova is bopped in the head by Peyton trying to help him. Steve however catches up to Togepi and eventually the rest do as well. A lazy trip around the river with Marill nets them the symbol they were looking for.

The last clue they have leads them to a kid’s playground, filled with hopscotch courses and a tree house. Some kids have laid claim to the park and won’t let anyone up into the tree house unless they win at Hopscotch against the lead brat’s Greninja. Peyton has Sylveon challenge Greninja, but she’s soundly beaten. Togepi then insists it wants to try, and despite the brutal insults the middle schoolers were throwing, Peyton trusts in Togepi. Togepi gains a loyalty and Metronome’s a bounce attack, doing a perfect hopscotch run that even Greninja’s agility couldn’t beat. The lead brat starts yelling at his Greninja, but his father arrives and tells him off for being generally horrible before he and Greninja drag the boy away. The party finds it’s last symbol in the treehouse.

They take a quick stop at the Boutique on the way back to the museum, having gotten very wet in the river. Steve makes a new outfit reminiscent of Eddie Munson, complete with patches from his various band names over the years. Nova puts together a witchy fit complete with cool hat. Peyton gets a Sylveon themed ribbon cowboy jacket to match his partner’s evolution.

They return to Hammerlocke vault and the receptionist directs them to the right room to find the answer they’re looking for once she realizes they’re here for the gym challenge. They find a massive tapestry with the following on it’s plaque.

The Legend of the Galarian Dragon.
> Long ago, generations after the Darkest Day, the earth shook and rumbled. The descendent of the Hero Kings, the current King of Galar, called upon the Hero’s Sword and Shield to investigate what was causing this destruction.

Deep from within the mountains of Galar came a dragon nearly the size of the mountains it rose from. It rampaged, offended what Humans and Pokemon had done to it’s land while it slept below the earth. The King knew it was his duty to challenge this beast before it could destroy everything his forefathers had built.

The King underwent a quest to find three guardian spirits in the Crown Tundra. The spirits each offered the King a boon upon the Hero’s Sword. The spirit of war gave him the ability to fight like the Hero Kings of old. The spirit of wisdom gave his sword the ability to conduct Galar Particles, and the spirit of shadows cursed the blade to turn the beast to Stone when it was impaled with the blade.

Using the blessed sword, the King caused his own Pokemon to grow to a size large enough to face off against the dragon. Between the Sword, the Shield, and the King’s Pokemon, the Dragon was finally cornered. The King plunged the Hero’s Sword into the Dragon, and it turned completely to stone. The Kingdom rejoiced as the King hid away the location of the sword and Dragon, so none may use the Sword nor unleash the beast.

Recently, the Darkest Day incident has revealed that the Hero’s Sword and Shield are actual items in the possession of the Legendary Pokemon Zacian and Zamazenta. Due to this, Galarian Historians believe the myth of Galarian Lugia to be just that, a Myth.

Armed with that knowledge, the group return to the gym to give their answer to the lobby girl. She confirms their answer and signs them up to battle the next day. (Steve has decided to battle too, not as part of the league tournament, but for the fun of getting a badge.) Steve also asks if he could pitch doing a duet to Luke, the active gym leader. The girl tells them he’s coaching on the pitch right now and they’re welcome to ask.

Steve does just that, and despite making some compromises, the bookish Luke isn’t sold. Luke is a coke bottle glasses, oversized clothes wearing man is mid twenties and he establishes he’s not much for the stage, he prefers his thesis work on the historical impact of Hammerlock Stadium’s statues. They settle on think it over, but after Luke leaves one of his gym trainers approaches Steve. Percy, the trainer, was at Steve and Olivia’s show in Motostoke and is a big fan. Percy tells Steve that Luke gets extremely fired up after battling and he’s like a whole different person, so Steve should ask him after battling with him.

The group start to leave the stadium when Nova notices the security guard on the elevator down to Magnolia Labs is missing. Not only that, she spots a black suited person in the elevator as it’s doors close. Espeon seems to sense something wrong as well, and Nova leads the group into the elevator without explanation. She explains her observations as they descend and Steve gets a call from Patrick, the lab is under attack by Team Crown! Patrick seems to lose his phone right after sharing that so they aren’t able to get more information from him.

The lab is indeed tossed when they arrive. Marowak insists on acting as Nova’s body guard, which she allows. Marowak gains a happiness from getting such an honor. They wander and run into a pair of Team Crown Grunts. A chaotic battle ensues where the trainers are just as involved as the Pokemon. Team Crown has an Obstagoon and a Falinks while the players use Twhackey, Noibat, and Alolan Marowak. Obstagoon tanks hit after hit while Falinks absorbs them in attempts to make it’s Reversal attack more deadly. Noibat uses Tailwind to keep it’s allies out of harms way and it encourages the grunts to go for the trainers instead. Nova is grabbed and silenced for almost a full round while Steve trades punches with a grunt. Steve is even licked by Obstagoon, giving him the Paralysis condition. Steve’s opponent even tries to grab Peyton and force Steve to surrender, but Steve wasn’t having it. Nova and Peyton slip free, Thwackey Wood Hammer’s his way through most of Obstagoon’s health, and Falinks is battered down by Alolan Marowak without ever hitting the Tailwind boosted party.

The grunts try to run after Falinks is defeated, but Nova in particular was not about to let them escape. They finally pin them in a hallway and they surrender. Using their own zipties, the group tie them up. The grunts drop that they aren’t the only ones here and are really the least of the group’s concerns, which the players begrudgingly agree to.

The party leaves the grunts behind to head downstairs, further into the lab. They try and be stealthy on this floor, but Steve and Peyton are spotted by a trio of grunts guarding the stairs further down into Sonia, Patrick, and Madeline’s lab. Steve and Peyton release Togepi and Thwackey, while the still hidden Nova reaches for Slowbro’s pokeball to fight the Team Crown Drizzile, Thievul, and Greedant.

The battle commences! Drizzile takes a few good hits early on while Thievul and Greedant fly under the radar. Thievul puts a target on it’s back in the second round when it uses Beat Up with Greedant, Drizzile, and it’s own Trainer to obliterate Slowbro in one shot. Nova is livid and goes after the trainer with her frying pan, beaning him good. Rapidash comes out after that and cuts Greedant’s health in half with a few psychic attacks.

Togepi is the next one to knock out a Pokemon, using ancient power to take down Drizzile. Togepi tries to ride it’s good luck to take down Thievul, but Thievul sucker punches the egg pokemon and knocks it clean out. Drizzile’s trainer takes the chance to grab Peyton and keep him from releasing a Pokemon in the next round. Thievul’s trainer recalls the fox pokemon to protect it from further attacks that round.

Thievul is released at the end of the round and uses it’s high initiative to take out Rapidash with another Beat Up attack. Nova starts working to free Peyton while Steve’s Thwackey, paralyzed early on by Greedant’s body slam, covers the group of them. Despite It’s deadly move set and speed, Thwackey is able to knock out Thievul with a well placed knock off attack.

Thwackey is taken out by a Spit Up from Greedant, and the party gets up close and personal with the Crown Grunts for the rest of the round. Steve is nearly grabbed as well and it takes both Nova and Steve to free Peyton, but they manage to survive to a new round.

Peyton release Growlithe, Nova releases Espeon, and Steve throws out Noibat. Greedant stays up just long enough to knock out Noibat with another Spit Up before it finally faints. Toxtricity, Growlithe, and Nova intimidate the Crown grunts into surrendering. The party zip ties them and heals their unfainted pokemon before descending to the lowest floor, Sonia’s lab.

There they see Sonia backed against a wall and her assistants already gagged and handcuffed by Charles, the apparent leader of Team Crown and one of his “Knights”, Galahad. Charles acknowledges the party before releasing the two experimented on dynamax pokemon, Noivern and Honchkrow!

The battle against the two dynamax pokemon starts off with Espeon, Sylveon, and Toxtricity taking the field. The party’s pokemon deal crushing blows to Noivern, cutting through it’s Gmax’d HP pool so fast that Galahad, who stayed behind to grab Sonia, released a Boltund to join the fray.

Sylveon is the first pokemon to be knocked out, followed shortly after by Noivern. Boltund paralyzes Hisuian Growlithe who comes out to replace Sylveon. Blows are traded and the fight pulls Galahad’s full attention, keeping Sonia safe from kidnapping. Toxtricity is fainted as Honchkrow absorbs hit after hit, but as it runs low on health Galahad recalls Boltund and retreats up the elevator up to the the roof after Charles while the party finishes off Honchkrow.

Sonia tries to stop Galahad, but he shoves her aside. It was however a misdirect and she recovers the special pokeballs for Noivern and Honchkrow, recalling them before they revive via their strange gmax overload. Sonia and the party race up the elevator only to find Charles and Galahad had escaped in a flying bus. A bit too late, Leon and Lily appear on Charizard and Corviknight back respectively. Leon is more concerned with Sonia’s safety, but after confirming it and a few long looks, he and Lily go after the bus.

The party and Sonia talk to the police and bring the captured grunts up to be arrested. Nova threatens the ones she terrified with her frying pan as they’re taken to the cars, putting the fear of Nova in them. Officer Jenny is impressed and says if Nova wanted to, she could make a great cop. With reassurances that the champion and league will look into Team Crown’s now more serious terrorist status, the party exhaustedly slump to the pokemon center.

After the long day yesterday, the group spends some time relaxing. Steve settles into the pokemon center and plays some acoustic music through out the day with Toxtricity and Twhackey playing with him. Nova goes to check out a vintage house in the city based on a travel brochure’s recommendation. Slowbro breaks a chair while walking through, but Rapidash leads them out a backdoor and Nova forgives Slowbro, who gains a Loyalty. Peyton was going to hit up a spa but Twhackey refused and pointed out an eating contest that was more his speed. Peyton goes along with it, entering with Thwackey. Thwackey gets competitive with Peyton and loses, which frustrates him further. He takes the other to the spa before heading back to the center in the evening.

The gang kill some time before evening when Luke is taking challengers. Steve is the first to fight Luke. He leads with Toxtricity who fights Luke’s Magmar. Magmar is battered by Shock Wave attacks that take him out. Next Luke sends out Marcargo who gets some strong hits on against Toxtricity, but Toxtricity holds on to defeat Marcargo for a proper sweep.

Peyton is the second to fight Luke. He leads with Growlithe against Luke’s Pyroar. Growlithe dances around Pyroar while it fails to hit the faster mon, tanking hits from the rock/fire type. Pyroar finally gets off a hit with Hyper Beam which wipes out Growlithe in a single shot. Peyton sends out Sylveon next who takes out the heavily injured Pyroar. Luke releases his ace, Arcanine. Arcanine and Sylveon duke it out down to 1 hp a piece before Moonblast takes out Arcanine.

Nova leads her fight with Slowbro against Luke’s Houndoom. Houndoom uses Odor Slueth to keep Slowbro from dodging and batters Slowbro with feint attack and fangs but Slowbro is unfazed. Slowbro wipes out Houndoom with a powerful Drain Punch attack and Luke has to release Arcanine. Arcanine manages to take out the injured Slowbro, but fails to touch Rapidash who replaces him. Rapidash wipes out Arcanine and everyone gets the Obsidian Badge!

After the battles are wrapped, Luke busts into the broadcasting booth. He’s all fired up and calls out to Steve to do that duet he requested earlier. Steve joins him in the booth and the broadcast continues, televising Steve and Luke doing “The Heat is On” for the whole Stadium. Steve gets his first taste of national celebrity playing and adds another mixtape to his collection.

The party starts off the next day mostly bright and early, enjoying breakfast and a quick run in with the Johnson trio before packing up to leave Hammerlocke. On their way out the building, a woman in a trench coat with red hair and Lucario introduces herself as Detective Stephanie Taylor. She asks them if a photo she has of Galahad matched the man they met in the lab raid. They confirm and she explains she’s been following the cases of Team Crowns leadership for a while now, as they had more serious criminal ties before Team Crown. She gives them her number in case they get any leads, and also comments that Officer Jenny said Nova wanted to go into detective work. Nova confirms that, and Detective Taylor tells her that being a psychic type specialist is a big help, much like she and her Lucario use it’s aura powers to sense lies.

They start some errands before leaving town, first being a visit to Delibird supply. It’s an unlucky trip, and the store isn’t stocked with any held items that would support their Pokemon.

The second stop is a Pokeblock shop, direct from Hoenn. They meet Shannon, the kindly clerk, who sets them up to make their first pokeblocks. Steve also tries to see if he can net a sponsorship deal with the new chain, but Shannon tell him he’ll have to talk to the owner, she can’t make those decisions. The group make their first pokeblocks, which end up Sweet, despite everyone’s interest in making sour blocks. Shannon explains that if you want a specific flavor, it helps to have your pokemon who like that flavor pick the berries for it in the mix. Nova and Steve have Noibat, Toxtricity, Rapidash, Espeon, and Slowbro help with their contributions, while Peyton has Thwackey run the show. Thwackey appreciates the special attention and gains a happiness (1–>2). The next set they make are tie dye in color, having primary flavors of Sour, Dry, and Spicy, much more to the group’s liking!

As they go to leave, the group meets Jasmin, the owner of the chain who just came in from a jog. She’s a savvy business woman with a good attitude, but despite Steve’s best attempts to impress her, she isn’t sold on his current level of fame to invest in him as a sponsor. When he brings up his show with Luke the night prior, she tells him he should prove his fame somewhere other than the Stadium and come back if he’s serious about a sponsorship. She has to take a call and ends the conversation, but Steve still considers it a win.

They finally head for the west exit of Hammerlocke and bump into the gym lobby staffer with the aging Boltund. She thanks them for resolving that lab raid and comments she doesn’t know what would have happened to her if she hadn’t been out to lunch. She also comments that Patrick and Madeline weren’t rescued yet, as far as anyone knows Team Crown still has them. She doesn’t hold them up any longer before heading back to the gym with her good boi in tow.

When they get on the route, they are quickly stopped by a landslide that’s blocked a narrow pass. A crew says it’ll take a day and a half to get the path cleared for all the people blocked, but also mentions there’s a Gogoat rental place back a ways they can use to cross. The party takes advantage of this and rents three Gogoat from Spencer, the dapperist rancher anyone’s ever seen. He gives them a 50% off discount as well, because the only Gogoat he has left don’t know the route yet and are going to need help navigating.

The group sets on on Gogoat back, traveling up the cliffs towards Stow n Side. After an hour they find a grassy clearing the Gogoat stop to snack at. Peyton and Steve decide to train, retraining Sylveon, Noibat, working to overrank Growlithe, and ranking up Rotom.

Togepi notices some Bonsly blending in while they train. Togepi startles them with Peyton and they back up against one of the cliffs. With some quick thing from Peyton and godly ancient power use, Togepi uses Ancient Power to lift and rescue the Bonsly that back off the cliff. The Bonsly treat Togepi as a hero as does Peyton, and Togepi’s joy at being a hero causes it to evolve into Togetic! It’s foolhardy personality does continue to be indulged in though, and it loses a point of loyalty.

A passing pokemon professor with a massive brown beard and shaggy hair blocking his face climbs up to their cliff. Peyton challenges him to a battle, his Togetic versus the professor’s Piloswine. Togetic does good damage with ancient power and magical leaf before hitting with a Yawn while Piloswine was low on actions. Piloswine couldn’t use it’s Endure to survive another magical leaf while asleep the next round and went down, netting Peyton a win. They shake hands and the professor redones his climbing gear and starts climbing further up the cliffs.

Peyton and Steve realize as they mount up that Nova got lost when they arrived at this bluff. They head out to find her and continue on their trip.

The group joins up again and in the excitement of finding Nova, Steve falls down a big old hole. At the bottom is an Aggron which turns into a raid battle. The group narrowly defeat it after a few KOs on their side.

The group recovers a nugget from their raid battle with Aggron and leaves the den. Night has fallen and it’s been a long day, so they heal up their pokemon and head to bed. Steve and Nova are awoken by the sound of Steve being slapped in the middle of the night: It’s the Jigglypuff from the Wild Area! It has a group of Chimecho as back up and wants to have another musical show down.

Steve accepts, Toxtricity, Thwackey, and Rotom all chiming in their own music as his band comes together. Steve plays hits like Smoke on the Water and Sweet Pokemon o’ Mine that bring the rock while Jigglypuff and the Chimecho bring some more pop beats to the mix. It’s neck and neck until Steve busts out Galarian Rhapsody, out playing Jigglypuff and driving it off in a huff. It’s a big moment for him and his team, resulting in a Happiness and Will recovery for him. (Peyton wakes up to catch most of the concert.)

The group sets out the next day and starts to rejoin the main path to Stow n’ Side, making for much easier travel. After a few hours they stumble on research tent setup near the trail and an old friend, Everleigh! She’s here with friends Sandra, a bookish girl around Steve’s age whose trying to get the researchers here to restore a fosssil and Cortez, a fighting type specialist. Cortez pulls Nova aside when she’s introduced as a psychic type trainer, asking her for help with special training. Everleigh offers to train with Peyton while Steve relaxes and watches.

Cortez explains he has a Mienshao that’s developed a fear of psychic types. He asks Nova to let Mienshao interact with her psychic types so it can get used to them to which she readily agrees. Rapidash is chaos as usual while Espeon and Mienshao acknowledge each other with respect. After getting used to them, Cortez explains to his Mienshao that if they can learn the move Calm Mind, it’ll help Mienshao defend itself against psychics. Nova teaches the two fighters how to meditate and it lets Mienshao learn the move!

Everleigh and Peyton go to train, but Togetic quickly starts acting bratty and harassing Thwackey. Peyton puts a stop to it and Everleigh has a heart to heart with him that no matter how much he loves his cute pokemon, sometimes he has to be the trainer and his pokemon need to know that. He takes the advice well and Everleigh devises a plan to help him build that trust with Togetic. Everleigh explains via hand signal where to dodge her Jolteon’s Discharge attacks and Peyton will tell Togetic where to dodge. The plan works and Togetic gains a loyalty.

Steve’s observation of his friends is interrupted when Sandra asks him for the chair he borrowed. He flirts a bit after a stammering start and she seems flattered! He offers to help her with the researchers being too easily distracted from fulfilling their promise to restore her Sail Fossil. The quintuplet, mousey brown haired researchers with coke bottle glasses are too focused on the excavation they’re doing and won’t set up the machine. Steve tries to woo them over by talking up Sandra and his fossils, but they don’t take the bait. Steve then threatens to operate the machine himself, which doesn’t work and the quntuplets just observe him. Then he realizes Rotom can operate the machine and lets Rotom do so, restoring his fossil first as a test run. Out of the machine comes Arctovish, a very loud fish pokemon!

After the success with Arctovish, Steve and Sandra strike a deal that the scientists will help with reviving her fossil and they can hold onto Arctovish, who they’d like to study. Sandra is incredibly grateful for Steve’s help and they’re able to revive her dream partner, Amaura. After Amaura is revived, the Everleigh group splits with the party, but not before Steve gets a kiss on the cheek from Sandra.

The party arrives at Stow-on-Side just after dark. They return the rental Gogoats and head to the pokemon center meet Nurse Rye. They crash after healing their teams.

Next day they go shopping at the bazaar market in town for held items. Nova stumbled on the scene of a theft, a shop keeper accused three people of stealing a Dragon Fang from her. Security comes to keep the three from leaving and Peyton puts the fear of the real police in them.

Nova tries to investigate with her eyes but doesn’t draw any damning conclusions. Espeon uses the galarian articuno chess piece to suggest she try and be truly psychic. Espeon helps her enter a meditative state and guides her to touch the minds of those around her. She investigates the three suspect’s minds, connecting to each with a key sense. The businessman’s mind was the scent of freshly printed paper, the archeologist’s was like flowing sand, and the medicine woman’s was like a myriad of tea leaves and herbs. Nova gleans insight from the these headspaces, seeing a vision that leads her to believe the old woman was the thief. Nova also checks out her party’s minds, seeing Steve’s as a lofi track mixed with smoke on the water and Peyton’s a chaotic eevee playground.

Nova returns to the present, the glow of the chess piece fading as her psychic powers remain dormant, and accuses the woman. She crumbles under everyone’s collective stares and the issue gets resolved. The shop keeper is so grateful she doesn’t charge Nova for the charcoal she wanted, and gives Peyton/Steve discounts on their held items.

Shopping done, they head to the gym to sign up for the gym challenge. A 50+ year old former accoutant with a jovial boomer attitude checks them in and passes on they should review their battle basics and be ready for a pair battle in this gym. Steve tries to get an in to the gym leader, but doesn’t have any luck with the older man.

The trio discuss what “battle basics” means as they leave the gym. They spot a very crowded bookstore in the distance and find out from those waiting that the gym test involves knowing type match ups, effectiveness, and other combat basics. They get one of the few remaining in stock books so they can brush up.

Peyton and Thwackey spend the rest of the day training in rocky-esk fashion, while Nova and Marowak train by training them secretly. Steve has Thwackey and Noibat train against Toxtricity, teaching them how to get past Tox’s shockwave. The group gathers after dinner and Steve turns to the book they bought into a catch song to help them remember, and they hit the sack.

Peyton and Nova spend a quiet morning getting ready for their Gym Test and Challenge. They arrive to the challenge and find the pitch divided by electric fences. They’re asked to choose two types out of three in a fight against another type to advance, and if they get it wrong the gym trainer gets closer. The two easily figure out the hint in the gym leader’s introduction that they’re looking for a Positive and Negative match up, so between the catchy song from yesterday and their own knowledge, they clear the test with flying colors.

As the sunsets, the gym battles begin. Gym Leader Molly is a bookish girl with a dark academia aesthetic, black hair in a bob, and a serious expression. She quips “My speciality is positives and negatives and I know how to use both to my advantage” before the battle and starts off with Manectric and Plusle. Peyton releases Thwackey and Nova leads with Slowbro.

Manetric sets up Electric Terrain and Plusle debuffs Thwackey with Fake Tears before Manetric lets out a massive discharge attack. The attack covered the entire battlefield but Thwackey and Slowbro were able to tank it as well as Plusle. Thwackey is able to punish Manectric with Wood Hammer, knocking it out in the first round, and Slowbro pounds on Plusle to take it out as well.

Round two sees Molly release Ampharos and Minun. Ampharos uses Signal beam out of the gate to eliminate Thwackey. Minun uses Fake Tears on Slowbro who puts serious effort into eliminating the electric mouse from the fight. Ampharos uses the opportunity to bring Slowbro all the way down to 1 HP.

The third round brings Hisuian Growlithe into the mix, who takes on Ampharos. They clash with Power Gem attacks and throw other attacks at each other but only chipping each other at first. Minun attempts to use Swift to take out Slowbro, but doesn’t manage to pull it off. Minun gives the last of it’s power to Ampharos to use a Discharge attack that eliminates Slowbro and weakens Growlithe.

Round four brings Galarian Rapidash into the mix. Ampharos is alone now and focuses on Growlithe, knocking out the Hisuian mon with Discharge. Rapidash takes a bit of damage from this as well, but that makes her get serious. Rapidash lances through a Dragon Pulse at a slow, terrifying walk using Psycho Cut and eliminates Ampharos with a massive damage attack, ending the battle.

Molly hands them their Gemini badges and admits she’s quite impressed with their skills. Before she heads off to heal up for her next fight, she asks if they’ll meet with her after she’s done with all the challengers. Thinking of Steve’s need to ask her for a mixtape, they accept without question.

The trio make their way to the pitch after the battles and gets stopped by a reporter. The reporter admits to being a fan and gets a few statements from them, including Peyton warning Lily that he’s coming for her.

The group meets with Molly who explains that she’s working on restoring a nearby windmill so it can provide power to Stow-on-Side as part of her PhD. There are ground types that she can’t repel with her electric types that keep getting in the way of the final steps and she wants the party to help her finish the job. They accept, and Steve requests his mixtape with her as a reward. She’s hesitant but accepts.

Steve then treats the party to Tacos before heading back to the pokemon center, healing up, and crashing while reading the type advantages book to their pokemon.

The party meets with Molly in the morning and heads to the windmill. They go straight for the large concrete basement complete with dug out caverns by the ground types. Molly starts doing her final repairs on the large column in the center that sends the windmill’s electricity down to town and the party stakes out looking for trouble. Before long, Diglett come swarming towards the column, along with a Gligar!

Steve’s Thwackey duels with the Gligar while Marowak and Togetic battle the numerous Diglett. The Diglett go down in a single hit in most cases, but there’s a lot of them that finally overwhelm Marowak. Slowbro comes out just as the Diglett numbers start to thin and Thwackey puts a final attack into Gligar to defeat it. Then the group sees a Gigalith approaching, with an explosion on it’s mind. Togetic, Noibat, and Slowbro all team up and stop it when it was mere moments from exploding on the windmill electronics.

After Gigalith faints, Molly lets them know the machinery has been repaired. The ground types stop approaching as well, apparently bothered more by the repair process than the functional windmill itself. The group heads up and out of the windmill back to town.

After returning to Stow-on-side, the party heals up and heads to the Gym to meet Molly. She admits she’s really not comfortable singing so Steve asks if she plays an instrument. She says while nerdy, she’s been teaching herself the Ocarina, which Steve says is just fine. The group go to the park with the statues of the Twin Kings to play. Steve plays acoustically for awhile to build Molly’s comfort level, playing a very free form, jazzy session before getting to the song for his album. They finally play an Alice Cooper vibes song for his mixtape.

The group says their good byes to Molly after the song. Molly takes Steve’s number when offered (though he doesn’t think he won any cool points with her) and blushes when Nova compliments how adorable she is. Molly thanks them again for the help with the windmill and returns to the Gym.

As it’s still early, the party heads straight for Glimwood Tangle. Rapidash messes with an Impidimp which ends up with a Foongus being knocked from the canopy. Peyton is coated in a red powder, but it doesn’t bother him. Once they start traveling again, they run across a rampaging Pinsir. As it turns out it’s Frankin’s Pinsir and he is following close behind. Peyton dips, ducks, dodges, dives, and dodges Pinsir to separate it away from Nova and Peyton, bringing him next to Franklin and Pinsir. Pinsir’s rampage drops some Foongus from above and Franklin is coated in the same red powder from before, Rage Powder.

Franklin turns wrathful instantly, releasing Parasect (who gets a secondhand dose of Rage Powder) to fight Peyton while Pinsir keeps Nova and Steve from interfering. Peyton releases Hisuian Growlithe who gets some strong clashes against Parasect, but faints when Parasect unleashes a round of Fury Cutter attacks on him. Thwackey is sent out next and takes out Parasect, but not before Parasect weakens him with X Scissor.

Franklin then calls Pinsir to the fight. Pinsir uses Storm Throw and knocks Thwackey out, forcing Peyton to go for his third Pokemon Togetic. Nova and Steve try to grab Franklin and knock some sense into him, but they aren’t able to get a hold of him. They decide to help defeat Pinsir, as even Togetic is taking a beating. Rapidash, Togetic, and Noibat work together to finally fell the rampaging Pokemon. Franklin devolves into a temper tantrum that Peyton can’t keep calling his bug pokemon ugly. Steve finally figures out that the Rage Powder can be cleared with Noibat’s Tailwind and Peyton admits the bugs were pretty cool, now that he’s faced his fear of them.

Franklin apologizes profusely on the rest of the trip to Ballonlea. He’s exhausted after they reach the pokemon center (run by Nurse Spry, a super enthusiastic atheletic girl) and heads to bed. Nova, Peyton and Steve take a walk and pass the gym. They spot a sign on the door saying that they should “go to Axel’s house for battle requests”, but it’s much too late to do that now. They head back to the pokemon center after playing with their mons a bit and crash.

They think back to some of their recent encounters, Peyton besting his fear of bugs, Steve beating Jigglypuff in a musical contest, and Nova tapping into her real psychic powers, and go to bed thinking that they’re really becoming Aces.

After getting up, the group heads out to find Axel’s house. They bump into Timmy, Ginny, and Winny while leaving the Pokemon center: their rivals had a very difficult time in Glimwood Tangle but insist they’re significantly stronger because of it.

The group then starts asking around for directions. They try to ask a group of kids playing with their Stunky who say they’ll give the directions only if the group buys them a cake from the nearby bakery. Steve does so, but also gets directions from the bakery clerk. Steve decides the cake looks good and he’d like to keep a portion of it, but the kids take offense to that. They flee with their 2/3rds of the cake and have Stunky try to stink up the party. The party manages to get away with a combination of pokemon moves and natural agility.

The group arrives at Axel’s house and find out it’s the same Axel from their journey through the Wild Area. He’s playing guitar in his backyard and simply tells them to play the opening rift of Smoke on the Water for his gym test. Peyton and Nova clear this easily and he says he’ll fight them right here. Steve finally calls out that they’ve met before and Axel offers Steve a challenge as well: but this time one in the stadium.

Peyton challenges Axel first. Axel leads with a Nidoking that’s an iron wall to Peyton’s team. Growlithe and Togetic both couldn’t break Nidoking’s defenses and it’s a quick loss. Nova brings out Galarian Slowbro to fight Axel’s Galarian Slowking and Slowking makes short work of it’s relative. Galarian Rapidash comes out to duke it out with Slowking, but despite an excellent showing Slowking wins against her as well. Axel is awkward with his victory but explains that he, the Chircester, and the Spikemuth gym leaders have the role of toughest leaders.

The party heads back to the pokemon center to drop off their injured mons. They’re not too down on themselves, realizing they have a lot of training to do now that they’re Ace rank trainers. Nova trains with Alolan Marowak, doing forms on the oversized mushrooms in the area that make it harder to balance. Peyton and Thwackey do a parkour filled race around town, and Steve orchestrates Noibat and Thwackey training together to improve Noibat’s Air Cutter power.

Once done, they head back to the pokemon center and pick up their injured pokemon. Steve offers the chunk of cake he kept and the group shares with their pokemon.

Steve opens his eyes to a hazy, etherial space. He blinks and the space changes to Olivia’s stadium in the Rainbow Factory. He’s setup across the pitch from her, at the start of a gym battle!

Steve opens with Toxtricity and Olivia sends out Togedemaru. Toxtricity managed to hit Togedemaru with a shock wave that does a few points of damage, but Togedemaru’s steel typing and high dexterity let it reduce the battle to chip damage on either side. With both around half health, Steve brings out Noibat.

Noibat manages to use Tailwind before Togedemaru hits it with a massive Zing Zap attack that knocks it out instantly. Steve isn’t brought down by this, instead bringing out Thwackey. Thwackey manages a critical hit with Knock Off that finally stops Togedemaru’s pinballing around the arena.

Olivia then releases Alolan Sandslash, and Steve takes the chance to bring Toxtricity back out. Toxtricity, true to form, gets a big hit with Shock Wave that blows through Sandslash’s health. Sandslash goes down not long after.

Olivia releases her ace, Mawile. The Deceiver pokemon batters Toxtricity with strong physical attacks and sweet scent to keep him from avoiding. Mawile then beans him in the chin with an Iron Head attack that brings down Toxtricity.

Thwackey returns to the battlefield, each trainer at one mon that’s mostly healthy. Thwackey and Mawile trade chip damage, Thwackey avoiding by the skin of his teeth and doing as much damage as he can manage against the stronger mon.

Thwackey manages to bring Mawile down to one health thanks to damage Toxtricity did. Mawile returns the favor with a massive attack that brings Thwackey to one. Thwackey makes a point point accuracy attack for the win, but Mawile moves with a massive burst of speed that avoids the attack and sets it up for a four damage finishing move.

Thwackey faints and Steve finds himself back in that hazy etherial space. There’s a cackling in the space and a Spiritomb reveals itself. Solomon appears and tells Steve that the Spiritomb is haunting his dream, and that he sent Absol to help him. Absol mega evolves and uses Night Slash with combined with Thwackey’s Knock Off eliminates the Spiritomb instantly. Steve wakes up in the Pokemon center as if nothing had happened.

The group meets up with Timmy Ginny and Winny at the Pokemon center. They decide to do some training battles with their rivals. Steve battles with Winny first, Winny leads with Quagsire and Steve leads with Thwackey.

Quagsire is hit hard by a razor leaf from Thwackey while Quagsire misses it’s opening attacks. Quagsire gets a lucky Ice Punch that does one damage but freezes Thwackey. Quagsire brings Thwackey’s health down low but Thwackey gets out of the ice via a critical failure by Quagsire.

Thwackey finishes off Quagsire after getting free. Noibat came out to fight Winny’s Rapidash. Noibat manages to confuse Rapidash, but Rapidash fights through it and overwhelms Noibat with a Flare Blitz. Noibat faints and Thwackey returns to the battlefield. Thwackey manages to bring Rapidash down to one with a well placed Razor Leaf attack, but Rapidash brings them both down with Flare Blitz, ending the battle in a tie.

Peyton and Timmy fight next. Timmy’s Donphan battles Growlithe and with it’s double effective Ground moves, Donphan makes short work of Growlithe. Timmy swaps out to Lucario while Peyton sends in Thwackey. Thwackey is on fire in the battle, his evasion is through the roof and he consistently clashes Lucario’s powerful attacks. He sets up Screech as well, really punishing Lucario when he does score a Razor Leaf hit off a will point.

Lucario is at half health and manages a close combat beat down on Thwackey which should have knocked Thwackey out… But Thwackey blocks the attack with his sticks and evolves into Rillaboom! In a total upset, Rillaboom uses wood hammer and takes out Lucario, winning the match, if not the whole battle. Nova decides to skip a fight and just trains with Ginny.

Everyone heads back to the pokemon center to heal and crash for the night. The next morning they buy some supplies and head back through Glimmwood Tangle towards Stow-on-side. They stop to train, Thwackey and Rillaboom facing off to test out Rillaboom’s new power and Espeon practicing it’s move roster so it can use all it’s moves quickly to enable Last Resort.

The group exits the forest to the sound of an emergency alert on their Pokegear. The radio informs them that there’s been a criminal attack on the Stow-on-Side stadium, and they can see smoke in the distance!

The party moves to investigate the attack but before they can get to the police at the base of the massive stairs up to the stadium, Steve gets a call. He answers to hear Molly asking him to tell someone or check out the statues of the hero kings, as she overheard the grunts in the stadium saying the stadium attack was a diversion but can’t get out herself. Steve and the crew take it on themselves to investigate. They pass the police line and see Lily joining the fight, as well as Detective Stephanie Taylor directing the police.

Steve climbs up to to find a hole blaster in the wall behind the statues, revealing stairs into some kind of dungeon. They head down and hang a right before running into Team Crown grunts moving supplies! A battle begins with Sylveon, Toxtricity, and Galarian Rapidash facing off against a Sandconda. It gets a few hits in but the trio make short work of it. That’s when back up arrives and the grunt reveals another Pokemon. Pincurchin and Galarian Meowth are next to fight the party. Toxtricity is swapped out for Thwackey.

Galarian Meowth tanks some hits and then uses all of it’s actions to pressure Rapidash with Fury Swipes. The two end up in a deadly battle while Sylveon dances around Pincurchin’s attacks trying to help. Thwackey tries to pull Pincurchin’s attention but doesn’t manage. After a heated combat, Rapidash is taken down by Meowth just before Sylveon bests Meowth. Pincurchin gets a good hit on Sylveon before Thwackey takes it out.

A third grunt appears and the original one runs as he’s out of Pokemon. The third grunt releases Grapploct and the second sends out Centiskortch. Peyton brings out Rillaboom and Nova brings out Slowbro. Grapploct is absolutely pummelled by the monkey brothers and taken out quickly while Centiskorch makes good use of it’s type advantage. It manages to do significant damage to Rillaboom and Thwackey before three wipe it out as a group.

The grunts run further into the dungeon and the party searches the supplies. They find 4 lemonades and a revive, a lucky break for them.

After healing up some of their injured Pokemon, the party begins to explore the area. They find two rooms with large bird statues, the pokemon depicted not like any they’ve seen before. A warm tone one is labeled “The Spirit of War” and a darker stone one is “The Spirit of Shadow”.

The party keeps exploring till they find another Team Crown Grunt who immediately orders his Arctozolt to attack them. He also uses some kind of custom dynamax band that allows Arctozolt the power of Gigantmax without growing larger. This G Max Overdrive makes Arctozolt a Raid Battle.

Arctozolt takes out Toxtricity, Slowbro, Rillaboom, and Growlithe, and manages to paralyze Rapidash and bring Thwackey down to one before finally Togetic, Marowak, and Noibat bring it down. Marowak’s lightning rod ability and Noibat’s Tailwind were just the combination needed, though big hits from Toxtricity, Rillaboom, and Growlithe cleared the way for them.

The Grunt flees and the party gives chase, but they slow up and approach the corner he runs around quietly. Below they see Charles, the leader of Team Crown, with his two right hand men Belvedere and Galahad… and a massive red pokemon with a sword in it’s back. The mountain of a pokemon appears to be sleeping, but Crown has hooked up various machines to it and Sonia’s assistants are being forced to operate them. The group sneaks away to heal up with whatever they can find in the prior room.

After reviving Rillaboom and healing who they could, Steve gets the idea there should be a third statue and they should search the whole place before confronting Team Crown. The find a third one near the entrance that strangely matches the look of Nova’s chess piece. This one is labeled “Spirit of Wisdom”. They start to investigate theories around the statues when there’s a massive roar and the entire mountain shakes.

They run through the collapsing dungeon for safety to see the red dragon pokemon busting through the plateau with a huge roar. Charles is on it’s back with the sword removed from the pokemon before he leaps off and disappears. The pokemon bounds towards the stadium, crushing a wing of it as it lands. The force of it’s roar launches arrested Crown grunts and police officers alike, even so far as to launch Lily into the air towards the party. The pokemon climbs and crushes buildings in a beeline for the wild area, leaving Stow-on-Side a mess.

Lily releases Zacian, the legendary sword pokemon, to catch her as she falls. She spots the PCs and asks them what they know, then tells them to go to Sonia and tell her anything they can. Lily races off on Zacian to attempt to stop the beast.

The group wanders about as the police and emergency services people begin to attempt to organize the chaos in Stow on Side. They try to stop by the pokemon center but see a massive line, so they instead go looking for Molly. They find her with a minor leg injury but otherwise okay. She doesn’t know much more than they do. The party also tells the police about the cavern they were just in, who go off to investigate officially.

The party then decides to head out to Route 6 and not burden the town with another three people. They camp out and conk out almost immediately, though not before they hear an emergency alert that the beastly pokemon is rampaging in the Wild Area and there’s a surge of dynamax pokemon, so all trainers should avoid the wild area.

The group gets their mind off yesterday’s events with some training. Espeon and Nova practice combat forms to get them out quickly and efficiently, Steve builds Noibat an obstacle course to practice his dexterity, and Rillaboom finally clicks with his new form and becomes Ace rank.

The group gets to Hammerlock without incident. They heal up their injured at the pokemon center and while they wait, battle 3v3 against some boy scout types at the battle cafe. Rillaboom, Espeon, and Thwackey made short work of the opponent’s Kabutops, Noctowl, and Sunflora. After heading back to the pokemon center the party crashes, though there’s another emergency alert like the first.

The group starts the next day off with more training, this time giving Growlithe, Slowbro, and Thwhackey the spotlight. After that, they go to find Sonia as Lily requested. At her lab they meet her and Detective Stephanie Taylor, both worried about the goings on. By comparing notes, Sonia is able to hash out a few facts.

1. The beastly pokemon is Galarian Lugia, a legendary pokemon talked about in Galar’s past. (The legend is quoted in an earlier session)
2. The bird statues where they found Lugia must mean the spirits mentioned in the legend, which might be the galarian legendary birds.
3. The sword Charles took from Lugia’s back is the blessed one in the legend, that had the power to turn Galarian Lugia into stone, dynamax pokemon, and gave one fighting skills.

Lily even arrives, taking a short break from the battle against Lugia and the dynamax pokemon that all the gym leaders and other league staffers are involved in currently. Hearing everything, the three women ask the party to be the ones to investigate the Crown Tundra for the legendary birds as they’re all needed here. The party accepts and Lily tells them they should go by train south as it’s the safest way currently. Stephanie recommends they bring any allies they can think of along, safety in numbers and all, and the party gives Solomon a call.

The group wakes up early to fit in training before they leave. Peyton and Growlithe go for a run with the goal of going till they exhaust themselves. Nova and Slowbro practice Slowbro’s psychic abilities by grabbing food from the pokemon center buffet. Steve has Noibat practice his evasion by dodging things thrown by Rillaboom.

After breakfast, the party does some shopping, picking up healing items and travel gear for the Crown Tundra. They also update their outfits, Peyton gets a Glaceon winter coat, zip off cargo pants, and really high socks. Steve gets a turtleneck and ski pants with a down vest, matched with a beanie. He choose a green and purple color scheme. Nova gets a big cape like jacket with a hood that comes to a vaguely witch like point. She wears it over layered tops and shorts over tights with knee high boots. Her outfit has a black and purple color scheme.

After preparing, the party meets with Solomon at the train station. They all board the train and enter the wild area on it, which is filled with dynamax storms. They can see fighting in the distance but they’re able to catch up with Solomon and ride peacefully till they go through a tunnel half way through the trip to Motostoke. They come up on a Dynamax Camerupt which forces the train to make an emergency stop.

Solomon works to keep stampeding Numel away from the train while the party engages. A massive Eruption attack takes out Togetic in the first turn of the fight, leaving Slowbro and Noibat to lead the charge. Slowbro does some big damage with Water Pulse and confuses Camerupt. Camerupt uses it’s first breakpoint to cancel out Noibat’s Tailwind.

Sylveon joins the fight in the next round. She provides some protection in the form of Light Screen. A few round pass of exchanges blows, the party using their will points liberally to avoid the dangerous attacks from Camerupt. Camerupt increases it’s defense at it’s next breakpoint via Amnesia. The trio bring it down to the next breakpoint which it uses to Gigantamax!

Gigantamax Camerupt uses G Max Flare to drop a miniature sun onto the party. Slowbro tries to cover the others but the damage is massive, it takes out Slowbro and Sylveon. Noibat holds on by a thread and Steve has him charge forward with a Bite attack. Noibat, with all the adrenaline of surviving this long, critical hits with a Bite right on Camerupt’s nose. He even flinches the massive Pokemon, holding on though shaking and snorts of fire as he evolves into Noivern!

The people in the train cheer and shout as the tide of the battle changes. Peyton’s Rillaboom comes out along with Rapidash and the two help bring Camerupt to it’s last breakpoint. It choses to eliminate status penalties on it with a restorative stance and steels itself. It launches G Max Flare after G Max Flare but the team clashes and evades, chipping away Camerupt’s final health bar. Finally Rillaboom pulls out it’s ace in the hole, a massive wood hammer attack that slams the Camerupt for huge damage, finally felling it. The train is ecstatic, cheering for the party as Solomon congratulates Steve on Noivern’s evolution.

After the train gets back on track, the rest of the trip to Motostoke is uninterrupted. The party disembarks to heal up, then gets right back onto the train to continue south. They spent the rest of the daylight hours traveling to Wedgehurst.

The train into the Crown Tundra from Wedgehurst is an overnight train where they’re the only passengers. Peyton and Steve talk flash move combos before heading to bed while Nova and her Pokemon play cards.

In the morning the train pulls into Crown Tundra station. The weather is poor, the visibility is bad and the hail is harsh. Still, there’s no where else to go besides Freezington so the group heads out. Peyton leads, riding on a sled being pulled by Growlithe. Nova, Steve, and Solomon walk.

The first leg of the trip goes well, but on the second Growlithe slides down a valley. He and Peyton aren’t injured thanks to Peyton’s quick thinking, which earns Growlithe a loyalty. Steve and Nova check on him from the top of the valley, but Solomon slides down as well. They decide to go through the valley rather than split up, so Steve and Nova slide down as well.

They travel through the valley for a while till they find a frozen over lake. A troupe of Amura with an Aurorus are lounging in the area. They slowly work their way up to them and they prove friendly. Peyton asks an Amura if it wants to join his team, and it challenges him to a fight. Amura is phenomenal in combat, bringing Growlithe and Sylveon to 1 HP each, then escaping two Pokeballs. Peyton is forced to surrender at that point, conceding to the wild pokemon.

As they start to pack up to leave the valley, fighting pokemon under the lake cause the ice to crack. Amura falls in and Peyton dives in right after it. With the help of Rillaboom he rescues Amura, who is wrapped up by it’s friends. The party moves on and finally sees Freezington in the distance when Amura returns, wanting to join up with Peyton! With that happy moment, the group heads for Freezington.

Once the party reaches Freezington, they make their way to a community center type building with chimneys lit. They’re greet by their friend Elina, whose in the Tundra visiting her grandfather! She welcomes them in and they catch up over lunch. They meet Elina’s grandfather who has a problem, A wild pokemon has started haunting the old cemetery where his wife is buried. Elina’s fear of ghost types is keeping her from helping alone, so the party decided to wait out the snowstorm by helping Elina before heading further into the tundra.

The group meet the pokemon in question, a Frostlass and end up surrounding it as it appears. It doesn’t attack immediately, so Nova tries to ask it what it’s doing here. Ever sensitive to pokemon, Nova learns that the Frostlass is visiting it’s old trainer’s grave and means no harm to anyone. Elina can even sympathize with the ghost type.

Just as they think there’s nothing left to do but tell Elina’s grandfather everything’s okay, there’s a rumbling from outside the cemetery. A Krookodile and it’s Krokorok lackeys are trying to use the cemetery as new homebase, and Frostlass has been defending the cemetery! The party join in the fight. Amura, Rapidash, and Noivern make quick work of the Krookodile and it’s peons before sending them scampering off.

Saying their goodbyes to Frostlass, whose deciding what it wants to do now that the cemetery is safe, they head back to Freezington. They have dinner, Peyton and Amura do a little training in the snow, Nova attempts to mount Rapidash to be a ‘Galarian Princess’ per the pokedex description (Rapidash eventually stops goofing around to allow it), and Steve pulls out his harmonica to keep his musician skills sharp without a guitar.

The next morning the group checks in with Freezington’s mayor to see if anyone in town had clues about the birds. The don’t get much from the mayor, but review the map and decide to head south to the only landmark they can make out, a reddish spot in the south.

On their way out of town a trainer flies in looking for them. She introduces herself as Sophie, Solomon’s older sister and the Spikemuth interim gym leader. She’s brought a pokegear module that detects galar particles, a gift from Sonia. Sophie joins up with them on the quest to find the birds.

Following the sensor, they split off the path to the reddish spot and come to a dynamax den. It’s empty, and they find 3 Oran Berries, 1 Aspear Berries, 1 Persim Berries, and a TR for Psyshock.

Next they come up on a bridge that’s being guarded by a Pangoro. The Pangoro isn’t hostile, but won’t let them pass. With some keen observation the party realizes that Pangoro is guarding something in a bush on the other side of the bridge. They offer three oran berries in the assumption it’s an injured pokemon, and it proves correct. Pangoro heals an injured Spinda and it leaves with it’s friends.

Peyton then asks what Pangoro’s plan is, and if it’d like to join up with him. Pangoro has no other plans, but wants to battle first. It faints Rillaboom, then Growlithe takes some heavy hits to bring Pangoro low enough that it surrenders and decides to travel with Peyton.

The party continues on their trek south. They come up on a cliff face around sunset that prevents them from continuing straight south, but notice a cave in the distance. Steve has Noivern scout it while they eat dinner, Noivern asserts it’s safe so they camp there. Slowbro, Noivern, and Amura get training sessions before going to bed. Slowbro and Noivern rank up but end up tired from the exertion, Amura is otherwise fine.

In the morning the party heads into the cave system, trying to angle south. They make good progress and come up on a river dividing a cavern they need to cross. Nova is able to team up with her psychic pokemon to create a “bubble” of air through the river that the whole party can make it through.

They end of at a large cavern that’s half lake which contains the exit. A Tyranitar is rampaging due to a Seadra trumpeting loudly in the water to impress Goldeen. Steve takes it on himself to battle the very cocky Seadra musically, Seadra is soundly beaten and Steve extends a hand for it to join him. The Tyranitar goes for a nap after the music stops, and the party successfully sneak past it to the exit.

Steve then decides he’d like to battle with Tyranitar. He turns around, attempts to wake Tyranitar gently, but it was so aggravated it awoke in a rage. Seadra scores a big hit with Hydro Pump, then Tyranitar batters Seadra down to one HP. Steve sends out Rillaboom who chips Tyranitar’s health into the red before Steve brings out Toxtricity. Toxtricity isn’t able to paralyze Tyranitar before an Earthquake brings him to one, so Steve brings out Rotom. Rotom is obliterated in a single attack. Toxtricity comes out again and tries his best, but can’t paralyze Tyranitar. Steve cuts his losses at that point, letting Tyranitar claim his victory and rest.

Exiting the Lakeside Cave the party stops to rest for a bit and train with Galarian Rapidsash, Amura, and Rillaboom. They then have two paths, a longer one around the lake, or a set of cliffs that are shorter. They choose to climb, Nova breaking her streak of difficulty climbing by doing it by herself while Peyton and Steve learn from Sophie that pokemon can be helpful to climb.

They camp for the night atop the cliffs, only a short ways from the dynamax tree. As they settle in for the evening they spot fire by the tree, a Delphox and Infernape are having a heated battle. They move closer, but by the time they get close the two split off. Curious, Nova, Solomon, and Sophie follow Delphox while Peyton and Steve follow Infernape.

While Steve and Peyton do their best to follow Infernape, Nova uses her psychic talents with Espeon’s guidence to find Delphox quickly. Nova connects with Delphox in the ethereal meadow where it was resting. Nova earns it’s respect first through that connection, then through a battle with Slowbro. Delphox accepts Nova’s offer to get stronger together, then leads her off to find Infernape.

Meanwhile Steve finds Infernape and it’s practicing timing against some homemade targets. Steve challenges it immediately and Seadra nails it with Hydro Pump, nearly fainting it. Infernape scampers away, leaving Steve to give chase. Peyton turns back to tell the others what happened.

Steve reflects on how cocky he came off to Infernape and as continues the chase, he stops for a bit to play the harmonica and reflect on his actions. This leads to Infernape doubling back, curious about the music. Infernape is able to execute attacks in tune with the music, and Infernape is impressed with how much the music helps. Steve apologizes and also says Infernape can handle Delphox no problem with his music at it’s side, so they head back towards the Tree.

Back the tree, the galar particles are missing but it’s not noticed as Infernape and Delphox square off. Their battle is interrupted before it can begin though when a Gmax Feraligator arises from the lake, overpowered by the excess particles. Feeling responsible, Infernape and Delphox (along with Sylveon) fight the water type. It’s a surprisingly easy battle, and Infernape officially joins Steve’s team.

The group sleeps in and realize the excess particles that built up while Delphox and Infernape were blocking access to the tree were the heading they were following. They recheck the particle radar and find a new heading to the north east. They train with Growlithe, Rapidash, and Rillaboom before heading back through the lakeside cave. They swim through a river tunnel to come to the Frigid Sea, in the far east of the Crown Tundra. They scramble from the now icy water and warm up.

The party travels along the ice flows bordering the coast for a while before they stop at a beach alcove. They camp, Pangoro, Rillaboom and Peyton get into a jumping jack contest that Pangoro wins and makes Rillaboom jealous. Steve treats Seadra to a pokeblock and apologizes for always throwing him into danger.

Nova meditates with her party and her psychic senses pick up another presence meditating, though it’s energy isn’t psychic, more like Ki or Chakra. She sees a Meinshao meditating atop a nearby cliff, over looking the waves. She tries to reach out to it psychically, startling it at first before it observes and eventually leaves the area.

In the morning the group resumes their travel north, following the Particle Radar. They come upon an iceberg near the shore that has a number of Eiscue and Piplup looking concerned at the top of. The investigate and find a melted hole straight through the iceberg. Steve has Seadra investigate and Seadra is able to toss a Fire Stone up and out. It slips through Nova’s fingers but Espeon is able to lift the stone away from the ice and preventing a second hole. The Piplup and Eiscue freeze the damaged sections of their iceberg, happy to have it restored.

Peyton offers the Fire Stone to Growlithe, but Growlithe is more preoccupied with sliding down the iceberg and having fun than the promise of becoming strong. Peyton doesn’t push Growlithe, instead saving the stone for later and sliding down the iceberg with him. Afterwards the group resumes the trip north.

Hours pass and they come across a narrow section of ice that two Gyarados seem to be fighting over. IN an attempt to avoid a fight, Steve has Rotom and Noivern try to distract the Gyarados long enough the party can sneak by but Noivern is caught getting into position. Thankfully, Rapidash interposes herself between the super effective Twister attack and Noivern, neutralizing it with her Fairy typing.

A fight begins, with Rapidash running on rainbow roads in the air to attack the waterborne Gyarados, Noivern pelting it from the sky, and Amura holding down the fort by the party. Rapidash tanks Hyper Beam and does major damage along with the rest, bringing Gyarados quite low before it’s fellow can get back from the distraction Rotom made. However, it reveals a mega stone and mega evolves, regaining it’s strength!

Rapidash continues to eat Dragon type attacks easily while Noivern struggles to do big damage after a couple key misses. Amura is taken out by a Hydro Pump from the Mega Gyarados, and Rapidash confuses the normal Gyarados with an attack that burns half it’s health. Gyarados is the first to drop, then Mega Gyarados not long after.

The party continues forward and follows their galar particle radar away from the shoreline. They camp at the mouth of a cave that leads up to the eastern mountains. Peyton and his team play some games to relax and recharge, while Steve and Peyton train with Rillaboom and Rapidash respectively.

The next morning they make their way into the cave. It’s an upward climb and cold, but they make good progress. They stumble onto a Nosepass that seems confused and running into boulders. Peyton has Pancham break a boulder and they realize the boulders are magnetic, like the very first time they encountered a Nosepass. Slowbro helps break some of the boulders and eventually Nosepass gets it’s bearings again. it leads them to an overlook of the mountain’s edge.

Also on the same overlook is the Meinshao they met before. Nova tries to psychically connect with it, but no connection forms. She speaks to it for a moment before it decides to leave.

The party resumes their trek up the mountain tunnels. They spot a pink blur through a snowed in exit, but don’t make an effort to detour to see what it was. They keep traveling till they find an ice tunnel that connects two cave mouths. They start through it when it shatters! A Bewear is thrown through it by a Crabominable, Vanilluxe, and Abomasnow. The three seem to be bullying the Bewear, who just seems lost.

The party steps in to help Bewear. Delphox, Pangoro, and Slowbro faint in the battle while Tox manages to hold his own the whole battle. Meinshao appears for the tail end of the battle, looking to help Bewear. After driving off the ice types, Meinshao offers Bewear an escort down the mountain. It however sticks with it’s rescuers.

They camp at the end of the ice caves to the summit of the mountain. In the distance they can see the ancient castle that overlooks the Tundra. Tox trains his poison and electricity usage simultaneously, while Marowak practices melting icicles before they crash. Nova and Bewear bond that night by the fire, Nova ending up sleeping in his massive arms.

The party wakes up and heads for the castle. At the Castle’s massive archway gate Sophie reveals she’s The Maiden of Moltres, a chosen partner of Galarian Moltres and won’t let them pass if they can’t defeat her. She insists that she’s the least of their worries once they go inside to meet the birds, and that she couldn’t live with herself if she just sent them off to die.

Peyton jumps at the challenge to fight Sophie’s Houndoom. He sends out Hisuian Growlithe for the one on one bout. Growlithe makes use of his Rock typing to clash some extra damage onto Houndoom but Houndoom is incredibly fast. It makes ample use of Sucker Punch which hits Growlithe hard, bringing him down to 1 HP. Peyton and Growlithe share a moment of resolve and decide to use the Fire Stone, Hisuian Arcanine takes the field with a second wind, but it’s too little too late as Houndoom takes the win.

Nova is next, sending out Slowbro. Slowbro has even more trouble with the Sucker Punches from Houndoom, and within a round Houndoom takes out the Psychic type. Steve steps up next, letting Seadra take the field.

Sophie chooses to Mega Evolve Houndoom here, changing it’s moveset to be special focused and even more powerful. Sophie also wreathes Houndoom in Dark Type energy using her bond with Moltres, but the change in typing wasn’t necessary. Seadra does some damage via clashes, but isn’t able to hit a with an attack on the powered up Houndoom. Houndoom eventually connects with it’s Inferno move and Seadra ends up cooked.

Sophie informs the trio they’ve failed her trial, and then goads them as they stand around unsure of what to do. They insist they don’t want to give up and that they’re stronger together which Sophie approves of. She bestows all of her power from Moltres onto Houndoom and tells them they can try and beat her together then. Bewear is even inspired to fight for Nova. The Raid Battle with Houndoom is long and brutal. Pangoro and Noivern are fainted before Houndoom is finally defeated.

Sophie finally relents and reassures them that this was a necessary test, the trials they’ll be facing are dangerous and they had to be ready. She says the legendary birds are waiting for them, She and Solomon will meet with them after.

The party scrounges up whatever healing they have left to revive Infernape, Slowbro, and Arcanine. They step through the castle’s gate, leaving Sophie and Solomon there.

They make their way up the path to a courtyard. Overhead they see Galarian Moltres before it covers the courtyard in shadowy flames. These flames surround the party and they are each alone in the dark. Peyton sees Lily and Everleigh who try to convince him to turn back and give up their quests to get the bird’s aid. Nova sees Solomon who does much the same, asking her to retreat back to the gate. Steve sees Sonia, who begs him to get to safety because she cares about him.

Each of them refuse these calls to retreat. The people they saw fade into the dark and they follow wisps of flame towards each other. As they reunite they are beset by Charles and Galarian Lugia. Charles boasts he’s already won the fight and they should surrender, less Lugia destroys them. While Steve and Peyton deny him, Nova taps into her psychic abilities to confirm everything they’re seeing is an illusion. Between Nova’s abilities breaking through and the group’s strong denial they dispel Galarian Moltres’s illusions. It approves of them, and flies further into the castle.

They advance further through the castle grounds. They come up on a fork between a path further in and an isolated courtyard. As they try to go further in Galarian Zapdos crashes into their way. They’re driven back to the courtyard and pinned in far side. Zapdos collapses buildings in a Z shape, making a set path back through the courtyard. It awaits at the exit.

At the first bend in the path, the Tyranitar they fought back in the caves appears, looking for a rematch. Peyton steps up to fight it with Sylveon. Sylveon no sells some big attacks from the psuedo legendary, but isn’t able to score a hit outside of clashes. Rillaboom after she faints and takes out Tyranitar.

The next bend reveals Meinshao, the one from the path to the peak. Nova and Slowbro step up to this fight, but Meinshao paralyzes Slowbro out of the gate with Force Palm. Nova has Slowbro retreat after a few basically free hits, sending out Delphox. Delphox makes short work of Meinshao with it’s considerable talents.

The final bend in the path is guarded by Zapdos itself. Steve and Infernape step up to battle it. Zapdos takes a couple of heavy hits from Infernape that it returns in kind. Infernape is brought down by just two attacks, Close Combat and Drill Peak. However Infernape’s hits were enough to impress Zapdos, as when Toxtricity comes out and launches an attack Zapdos is ready to step back. It nods in approval of the group and then clears their path further into the castle, running ahead of them. Already exhausted but knowing they have to press on, the party makes their way after Zapdos, deeper into the castle.

The party steps up to a final courtyard, one that’s outside the castle itself. Here Galarian Articuno presents itself in a swirling mist. It presents swirling visions of the Galarian King who asked for the legendary bird’s blessing on his sword, the same sword Charles has now. It asks them a single question, “What do you wish from us?”

The group discusses this, as they don’t have a solid answer. They discusses Galarian Lugia and Galarian Articuno warns them that Lugia is a mad titan, not a Pokemon that can be reasoned with. Too much has changed for Lugia during it’s long petrification and it’s used to being a ruler of the land. Steve still wishes to give it a chance to see the a world where Pokemon and People live together.

The party decides what they wish is for the sword to no longer have it’s abilities. They remove it’s ability to petrify what it impales, dynamax Pokemon, and bestow fighting ability to it’s wielder. Galarian Articuno grants this, then teleports them, Solomon, and Sophie back to Hammerlocke.

They head for a Pokemon center while Solomon and Sophie go find out where the defenses are based out of. In the pokemon center they see news coverage of trainers volunteering to hold back hordes of berserk dynamax pokemon alongside gym leaders and the champion herself. Each volunteer wears a league track jacket. Turffield was damaged by by the dynamax pokemon but through the valiant efforts of Galar’s trainers, the dynamax pokemon and Galarian Lugia have been kept to the Wild Area.

The party meets up with Lily, Sonia, and Sandra in Sonia’s lab, which has become an HQ of sorts. Sonia helps Steve figure out that if they catch Galarian Lugia, they can slowly introduce it to the modern world as it will be conscious but contained. Meanwhile Nova is curious about Charles’s whereabouts. Lily says he’s been missing since he freed Lugia. Nova give Detective Stephanie Taylor a call to see if she knows. Detective Taylor is looking into it, but is currently being slowed down by all the berserk pokemon. She promises to call back with more information when she has it.

The party breaks off to shop with some funds from Sonia, as well as get some rest. They know their plan: Find Charles, beat him, then try to convince Galarian Lugia to stand down or fight it too.

The party spends the morning training in town. It’s busier in town than normal since the Wild Area is currently off limits to the average trainer. They dig in though, training everyone except Arcanine, Rillaboom, and Pangoro. They train through lunch then decide to check in with Sonia to see what they can do to help out.

They meet up with Sonia at her lab, also seeing Everleigh, Cortez, Sandra, and Olivia there. Sonia explains her ongoing missions for the trainers to investigate and just seems exhausted. They mingle a bit, namely Steve and Sandra having a flirtatious catch up that was interrupted by Peyton not reading the room. After making a note to get together another time, Steve and the gang take on a request to investigate a train with supplies that derailed in the wild area.

They head out into the wild area to follow the tracks of the derailed train. Steve sends Noivern on ahead but it’s forced back before it can find anything by the sheer number of dynamax wild pokemon. They travel via Arcanine, Rapidash, and Noivern along the tracks, narrowly avoiding a fight with a Dynamax Venusaur.

They find the derailed train being picked over by Team Crown grunts. Thinking smart, they sneak around and box Team Crown in with Rillaboom’s Drum Beating and Arcanine’s Rock Slide while Nova snagged 2 Ultra balls from their air bus. After some hot challenging words from Team Crown, pokemon are sent out for a battle!

Team Crown uses Alcremie, Coalossal, Dragapult, Drednaw, Flapple, Hatterne and Greedant. Togetic, Toxtricity, Delphox and Slowbro are fainted, the Rillaboom brothers are brought to half while Arcanine and Seadra are dropped to one health. The party earns 12000 poke from them, and Steve finds a Magnet.

The party uses their pokemon to reset the derailed train car back onto the track and calls Sonia to have a train pick up the stranded cars. They hitch a ride home, bringing Team Crown’s Stephanie, Brutus, Percival, and Kenny.

The party brings their exhausted teams to the pokemon center and has them heal up. Steve spends the time waiting playing music for the pokemon center and earns 100 pokedollars in tips, then the group eats in the center. Rapidash ends up running a gambling corner for a bit, making 300 pokedolla

With the money they got off of Team Crown, the party hits the shops of Hammerlocke. Peyton picks up a high performance food sack along with the rest of the supplies, which gives Amura a boost while training. Steve visits Morris’s Costume Emporium to get matching band T shirts for his team. Morris is the one running the store, a laid back guy who does the graphic design and tailoring. He also has a Yamper with a secret mean streak that finds Peyton lost in the warehouse like store and chases him back to the front counter. Steve spend 700 Pokedollars for shirts/capes with “Steve and The Amps” on it, along with art of his team. Morris says they’ll be ready as early as end of day.

The party then goes to do some training focusing on team work, before hitting up Sonia for another job. They take on the task of finding what happened to the Johnsons, they had an errand to run they haven’t come back from up town. They go to the address and find it to be a mansion with a battle court in the front yard, despite being in the city. They knock using the Salamance head knocker on the door.

An older man greets them, in his late 50s with salt and pepper hair and a well groomed beard. He’s dressed in a dress shirt and slacks, but casually so, like appearance isn’t that import to him. He introduces himself as Jimmy Johnson, the Johnson trio’s father. He tells the party the trio are grounded, because he’s not about to let them fight criminal organizations without proper supervision, especially since they couldn’t best him in a fight. The party (asides Nova, who was too busy swooning) convinces him to let them fight him, and if they win, the Johnson’s can head back out to helping deal with everything going on. Jimmy agrees… and casually reveals he’s a former champion via photos on the mantle while he gathers his pokeballs.

Jimmy’s contest is a double battle, where two of the three party members will have a pokemon in at the same time. Each of them can provide two mons to the fight, totally 6. Jimmy will fight alone, and provide only four. Jimmy leads with Metagross and Salamance, while Peyton and Steve lead with Pangoro and Noivern.

Pangoro has Metagross’s number through the first round, while Salamance has Noivern’s. Noivern gets off Tailwind, but Salamance brings Noivern to 1 with Dragon Claw, then will point rerolls into a perfect success to clash and faint Noivern’s critical hit Air Slash. Metagross is swapped out at 1 HP and Salamance flies on it’s last action.

Delphox comes in for Noivern, and Gyarados comes in for Metagross. Pangoro triple Comet Punches Gyarados to half health, before it clashes a move then Parting Shot’s into Arcanine. Arcanine came in with zero actions however, so despite being ready to fight Gyarados and Salamance were able to dogpile him and eliminate him. Delphox, who spent most of the round missing, finally connects with a brutal Psyshock that wipes out Gyarados, then offhandedly Flamethrower’s Salamance out of the fight.

Metagross is sent out with Gengar, while Pangoro rejoins Delphox. Gengar is bullied by two big Psychic type hits and is eliminated with ease. Pangoro clashes Metagross’s last ditch attack and Metagross faints. Jimmy is impressed, and lets his kids rejoin the battles against Team Crown. The party gets 9360 pokedollars for winning, split to 3120.

After thanks from the Johnson trio, the party heads back to Sonia’s lab for another way to help out. They take on a request to investigate a strange, heavy mist that has taken over the Lake of Outrage in the western wild area. The three set out to the lake, arriving in the vicinity by evening.

They begin to explore, making their way through the low visibility fog that has engulfed the area. They find the shore line and Steve sends Seadra out to investigate the waters. While Seadra is gone they spot a lavender sparkle in the water, even through the fog. Seadra returns and motions them further down the shoreline where a Dragalge is bullying a trio of Mantine. The party makes short work of the Dragalge, which drops a Dragon Scale that causes Seadra to evolve into Kingdra!

The Mantine offer the party a lift across the lake when they ask if the Mantine can help the find the source of the fog. They each spot the sparkle on the way over, but can’t make out what it is. Across the lake, they find a large number of smaller, weaker pokemon that seem to be hiding out. As the group wonders how they got here, a form emerges from the mist.

Suicune appears from the Lake itself, and immediately attacks the party, thinking they’re there to hurt the wild pokemon! A battle ensues where the party holds their own with their superior numbers, then a Wooper breaks up the fight by telling Suicune the party meant no harm. Suicune relents it’s attack and listens to the party’s reasons for being here. It’s fine with their visit, and is obviously the cause of the mist, so the party is able to report back that Suicune is causing the mist to protect the weaker wild pokemon from the rampaging dynamax ones.

Exhausted, the party crosses back across the lake on Mantine back. They make a quick camp as soon as they’re on dry land and crash.

The party slept in after their late night. They wake up and jump right to training before calling Sonia’s lab to see what else she needs doing. Sonia was worried she hadn’t heard from them but was happy the mist wasn’t a new problem to deal with. She requests the party swing by the Dusty Bowl on the way back to Hammerlocke where two dynamax mons are coordinating and causing problems for the volunteers protecting town.

The two mons turn out to be Marowak and Donphan from the party’s trip across the Northern Wild Area! It’s a tough fight, but the party perseveres and Nova comes away with a Thick Club for Alolan Marowak thanks to a Knock Off by Steve’s Rillaboom.

The party returns to town. After dropping off their pokemon at the Pokemon Center, Steve makes a trip over to Morris’s Costume Emporium to pick up his order. Morris has it ready for him. The party does some more shopping for supplies before resting up for tomorrow.

The party heads down to Sonia’s lab so they can find out how else they can help. They arrive just in time to hear Sonia speaking to Stephanie Taylor, who reveals she found Charles’s base. He’s camped out in a mansion in the wild area, the very same one the party rescued Solomon from. Stephanie has to get back to town, her Lucario is weak and she’s been scouting too long. Sonia is willing to let the party take the fight to Charles since they have a history, giving them a map card for their Pokegear to navigate them there.

The party sets out, traveling carefully to avoid conflict on the way and camping.

The party cleans up camp early in the morning to fit in some training before the big day. They approach the mansion from the top of a hill, hiding in the bushes to observe the air buses and tent surrounding the mansion front door. They decide to observe the guards for any patterns. They don’t find any, but a pair get in fight and split up, one heading in their direction. The guard spots Peyton’s jacket through the bushes but the party uses his curiosity (and Steve’s Rillaboom) to jump him and steal his uniform.

With the stolen uniform, they execute a plan where Steve is bringing “captured trainers” to Charles. A lieutenant stops him though and tells Steve to take them to an airbus to be sent to the “other base”. Steve offloads Nova and Peyton there and decides to mingle through the area to blend in. He starts up a conversation with a group that thinks he looks familiar, vaguely recognizing him from his Rainbow Factory show.

Nova and Peyton have Espeon psychically crush a tent as a distraction and try and sneak to the door. Peyton is spotted though, so he decides to race around the camp and tie up everyone’s attention. He’s too fast and the whole camp ends up chasing him, so Nova sneaks into the mansion with Steve. Nova has Delphox create a smokescreen when Peyton runs past the front door to let Peyton sneak in. The camp is still on high alert, but no one saw them enter the mansion.

Knowing they only have so much time before the grunts check inside, the party decides to investigate upstairs. They hear voices at a set of double doors and kick in the door with Steve in front. Charles and his two admins Belvedere and Galahad await inside, going over their plans. Charles offers them a chance to surrender, which they don’t take. Charles reveals that this mansion is a former Trick Mansion and the room splits in thirds, setting Nova up against Charles, Steve against Galahad, and Peyton against Belvedere.

Steve wins against Galahad first, defeating Galahad’s Sirfetch’d, Runerigus and Boltund with only a few injuries on his side. Kingdra had Runerigus and Boltund dead to rights by the end, and Steve decided to move to assist Nova.

Peyton fought with Belvedere, losing Pangoro to Stonejourner. Arcanine comes out and does good damage, working his way through Galarian Weezing without issue. Belvedere brings out his final mon, Mr Rime against him but…

Meanwhile Nova loses Delphox and Bewear against Charles’s powerful team of Intellieon, Grimmsnarl, and Hydreigon. Kingdra arrives to back up Nova, but is obliterated by a Draco Meteor, Charles had been ready for the back up to arrive. Belvedere presses the switch again, combining the battlefields again. Despite the team up, Hydreigon and and Mr. Rime are taken out by the party’s teams.

Charles is nonchalant in defeat and offers the party a seat on his round table. They refuse, making sure they know how evil he is and that his nationalist ideas are terrible. Charles surprisingly agrees, saying that this was always about power and his was manipulating the nationalists to do it. Galahad is shocked, but Belvedere was in on it from the start. Galahad tries to throw a punch at Charles but Charles knocks him out.

Nova then tries to trick Charles by accepting his round table offer, planning to bean him in the head with her frying pan when she gets close. Charles was ready though, blocking with his sword and using the ensuing chaos to drop down a trap door with Belvedere. Peyton and Steve give chase through the trapdoor while Nova heads down the stairs to block the exit. They manage to pin Charles in the foyer because she did, and then Stephanie Taylor arrives with backup. The Jennys with her arrest Charles and his knights, along with the rest of Team Crown.

The celebration is cut short though, when Sonia calls with an SOS that Galarian Lugia is almost through to Hammerlocke. The party hops in a flying taxi and heads there immediately, healing up with items on the trip. They’re told Lily and Hop are the last line of defense right now and they’re exhausted. The party arrives to see Galarian Lugia climbing the steps to Hammerlocke, giving a knock out blow to Zacian who falls next to Zamazenta. Lily and Hop are stuck it’s path, facing down the monsterous Legendary.

Peyton decides to have Espeon psychically fly him over Galarian Lugia towards Lily, but it’s too much too quickly for Espeon. Peyton is saved from a crash landing behind Lugia via Rillaboom jumping from it’s pokeball. Steve tries to fly down with Noivern, but Noivern is caught up in the odd winds around Lugia and falls, leaving Steve’s Rillaboom to catch them as well. Nova then joins them by riding down a rainbow road created by Rapidash, leaving the three faced off with Galarian Lugia, but on the opposite side of Lily and Hop. Steve tries to talk Galarian Lugia down, but it throws attacks his way Rillaboom has to pull him out of. They grit their teeth, knowing a fight is the only option.

Galarian Lugia comes out fast and strong. It hits like a truck and seems to barely feel the party’s attacks. The battle starts off hard and strong, Galarian Lugia’s frequent wide range moves cutting holes in the party’s defenses. The party’s heavy hitters like Amura, Slowbro, and the Rillabooms go down hard, but they threw out as much damage as they could against the beast. The trainers are forced to balance their attention between healing their backline and giving commands to prevent there whole teams from being wiped.

Despite the challenges some of the party’s mons step up in a big way. Togetic absorbs multiple dragon type moves with his type advantage and gets off a 5 Power Grass Whip with Metronome. Espeon does consistent damage for half the battle, evading and dodging attacks like the expert battler that he was. Infernape is able to break two of Lugia’s breakpoints with Close Combats before fainting.

It’s a long and hard fight but they bring Lugia to 1 Hp with Kingdra, Marowak, Espeon, Sylveon, and Toxtricity still standing, but heavily injured. The party tosses almost a dozen Ultra Balls in an attempt to peacefully reign in Galarian Lugia but none manage to hold it. With their supply exhausted, the party’s mons are finally brought down. Galarian Lugia bares down on the party, who hide among the rocks thrown about in the battle.

At the last moment, Zacian intercepts an attack coming straight for the party. Lily leaps off Zacian’s back, thanking the party for buying her enough time to recover. Zacian uses Sacred Sword and defeats the weakened Lugia. Sonia runs up while it’s stunned and recovering it’s strength, presenting a master ball. Lily hands it off to the party who throw the oversized dynamax ball at Lugia. It seals the legendary away, ending the long ordeal since it’s awakening.

Lily takes Lugia’s ball and promises to keep it safe. She thanks the party again for their hard work as people watching from the gates of Hammerlocke erupt in cheers, then a stampede of people towards the party. Lily, ever one to avoid a crowd, offers to fly the party back into town. Flying over the crowd they see familiar faces waving and shouting to them. The Johnsons are with their ex champion father, who gives the party a nod. Molly and Olivia are bouncing with joy along with other gym leaders. Leon is flying on Charizard nearby and gives them a big thumbs up. And finally on the stairs to Hammerlocke, at the back of the back, is Nurse Boom whose echoing praise overpowers the crowd. The camera pans up on Hammerlocke as the eternal dynamax storm of the last few weeks finally ends.