#wfrp open

                                      There was just so much... pink. Everywhere.

                    From the moment the young man had woken up, he noticed that                     there was an intense brightness coming from outside window, but                     he didn't expect it be all from these flowers that seemingly sprung                     up overnight. Honestly, as if the forest wasn't strange enough.

                    But that didn't stop Curtis from letting out his whole team to enjoy                     the sight. They were all fascinated by the strange sight, baby Crys                     in particular who was currently chasing around the falling petals                     with endless vigor under Zap's supervision. He had to return Arian to                     his ball later due to the strong sunlight, but so far everyone seemed                     to be enarmored with the sakura.

                    Curtis heard footsteps in the grass behind as he watched over his                     Pokémon from a distance. Though he felt slightly nervous, he fought                     and pushed the feeling down as he turned to acknowledge the other                     peron's presence. Seemed like was getting better at this.

     The shriek of a pokemon unknown to him woke Sir Aaron in a small state of panic before looking around and seeing Lucario and Pidgeot nestled a few feet away in the tree house. “ We have to find out where we are,” he whispered to himself.

Deciding his faithful friends needed their rest he went out into the forest to try and find any clue as to where he had wound up and why he couldn't seem to remember anything after he left the palace. 

     Having walked for almost an hour Aaron found himself along the shores of a beach. Never before had he seen the beauty of water so clear as he could see the tentacruel and remoraids swimming around. But as he gazed upon the lake he was met with the despair as the thought dawned on him that there was no end to the lake in sight. “All lakes lead to somewhere, i’ll have to get Pidgeot to fly me over it when i get back” he said to no one in particular.

     Aaron, proud of his discovery of the lake, went back on his way to the tree house but along the way realized that he had not come in contact nor seen traces of any other people since he had been there. He pondered if he was truly alone here with his team or if others were here and if so did they know how he had gotten there?

It almost felt like eternity. Step by step, the young trainer lingered through the coppice, closely followed by her Zorua. What was this place? How could it be that every path she took brought her back to exactly where she started? Instead of being worried, Touko got more annoyed with every step.

“This definitely isn’t funny. Could this be a wild Pokémon’s illusion?”

Unfortunately, it was not. It was real. She heard a soft whimpering behind her. It seemed like Zorua was very exhausted. “Heh, I guess you need a break, do you?” The girl bowed down to her beloved Pokémon and reached inside her bag, pulling out a few Pecha berries which immediately were eaten by it. “You can rest now, just get back inside your Pokéball.”

As wanting to sit down in front of a tree, Touko got distracted by a shimmering thing she spotted on the ground. She looked closer and saw that it was a key which she picked up afterwards. But where could it fit? There were just trees and greenery around her, no buildings at all. Her head was buried in endless thoughts. Suddenly, something really fast grabbed the key out of her hand and ran away with it. “Hey! Give it back!!” she screamed angrily, looking at the wild Riolu getting away with that precious and kind of strange item. After all, it could have been good for nothing, but the girl had a feeling that she was dependant of that key - and that was why she ran after that sneaky Pokémon.

However, it was too fast. She probably followed it for half an hour without success. She didn’t have any power left to continue. Her anger slowly turned into desperation.

It didn’t take too long and she collapsed of exhaustion. The ground was very uncomfortable to rest on, but she had no other choice. Her legs didn’t want to carry her anymore. With that, she just stared into the nothingness. It was time to give up. The environment of the forest was consuming her, as well as all her sorrows.

What if she would never be able to leave this forest? Neither she would never be with her friends again, nor some day reunite with him. What a frightening thought. After all the years she had spent outside her home region she finally realised how homesick she was.

“Hang on! Wait for me--!”

Keith sighed in defeat as he watched his Pokemon disappear into the trees. The Buizel, albeit easily overexcited at times, wasn’t usually this disobedient. He could see why he was so psyched up, though -- rain was coming down in sheets now, drenching the forest and its unfortunate inhabitants. Of course Keith had dealt with nasty weather before, but he would have much preferred to stay inside this time around. 

He had lost track of the days since his unwilling arrival in the forest, and still wasn’t any closer to figuring out what was going on or why he was suddenly a part of it. He and his partner Pokemon had both become restless at this point, searching persistently for a way out and failing every time. Now the weather had taken a turn for the worse, and his Buizel was apparently too excited about it to listen to him.