Lord of Evil

Deep Ground Online (Hiatus)

The walk home was uneventful, though Thomas was certainly glad for it. He wasn't sure how much time he had to log in to deep ground before he missed anything, though he didn't want to rush. He got to his apartment block and ascended to his room. He walked inside and shut the door, dropping the book onto the floor, undoing his shoes and taking his jacket off. He dropped them to the side before carefully depositing his drink onto a nearby table. He then sat on his bed and unlocked his phone once again. He'd gotten a message that told him about odd activity in the black city. Thomas wasn't sure why but he felt that there would be more to it than that. That was one of the reasons he bailed out, though not the only reason. There was also the new update to contend with and he couldn't fall behind on experience either. There were professions, skill cards and other stuff he had to think about, but he'd do that later.

He sent a quick reply before locking his phone and laying into his bed. As he closed his eyes he dove into deep ground.

---

Welcome, Puppet Master

---

The puppet master awoke, blinking, to find himself sitting cross-legged in a dark room surrounded by candles. He stretched his arm outwards, studying his fingers. Reflexively he turned his palm away from himself and activated his second skill.
"Puppet creation." He muttered.
A metallic form rose from the ground where his palm was pointed. Its head emerged first followed by a freakishly thin neck. Sleek limbs followed a shiny torso and it soon emerged at its full height, standing attentively. The puppet master lowered his hands and sat for a while, thinking. He would preferably have 2 puppets scout out the situation at the black city to minimise risk but the skill had a lengthy cooldown so that wasn't an option.

The puppet master rose from his sitting position and walked over to the bottom left corner of the quite large room. That corner held his stock of weapons, weapons he'd collected over his time playing deep ground. They were mostly uncommon as he sold all of his common weaponry and rares were hard to come by, though he also kept his main weapons there. He picked out some good ones, though they were only uncommon, and pocketed his own weapons before going back to his summoned puppet. His puppet's equipment wasn't limited to Stephen's weapon restrictions, though they couldn't wield 2 handed weapons. He offered the weapons to the puppet, a one handed sword and a pistol, and the puppet reached to take them.
"I don't have much of a choice here." Thomas thought. "If I want to check out the black city I'll have to do it myself."

The puppet master summoned his own blade and studied it for a moment before sheathing it to let it hang at his side, and the puppet mirrored his action.
"It's just you and me for now." The puppet mastered rasped as he turned around.

He began walking into the darkness and the puppet followed.
"You and me against the travelling system." He continued.
The puppet did not respond, though he didn't expect it to either.
"Let's see what happens."

The puppet master and his puppet began heading to the black city.

Deep Ground Online (Hiatus)

Hey, what happened to a general power level thing for weapons? I want some options man, idk what I'm doing

A Pure White Beginning [Pokémon]

Stephen was snapped awake as the throng of trainers moved forward and he rose quickly to retake his position. He looked blearily around and spotted Wynne and the strange scarred trainer before settling down close by.
"Looks like this is it, Jim." Stephen told the spearow.
"Caw!"
The line moved forward as butterflies danced in his stomach and he entered the pokemon lab.

Immediately on entering he calmed down a little. The pokemon lab was familiar, he'd snuck into it plenty of times before. Granted, today it was a lot busier than usual but it helped that the location was familiar. Stephen quickly walked over to pick up a pokedex but stopped at the indigo league form. Jim looked quizzically down at the paper and wondered why Stephen had stopped.

If Stephen were to be completely honest with himself, he was conflicted. If he took Jim out of his head, if he took Wynne out of his head, if he took his parents out of his head, he realised that he had no real motivation to go on a pokemon journey. Sure, he wanted to see the rest of the world, but he could easily do that without being a trainer specifically. He could be a pokemon professor like Oak, he could be an archaeologist, news reporter, even a pokemon ranger, perhaps. Failing those he could even be a chef or an office worker or something. If he really stopped to think about it he could be pretty much anything and have a more comfortable existence. But... where was the fun in that?

Stephen closed his eyes as he remembered the words of his father. Despite his rather loud and brash statements, his father had a penchant for knowing when Stephen was troubled by something. One summer, some time ago, Stephen had asked Wynne why she'd wanted to become a trainer and she'd told him, though he couldn't see the appeal. He listened to other children talking about why they wanted to become trainers, be it becoming pokemon champion, capturing rare pokemon or winning contests, and he still couldn't understand why they wanted to do it. When he went home that day his father had asked him what was wrong, so Stephen asked him why he became a trainer. Stephen's father had laughed and told him something that resonated with him from then on.
"I didn't really have a specific reason, and it didn't really matter what I wanted to do as a trainer in the end," His father had said. "because I could do anything. To me, a trainer is the freest job there is."

Stephen was snapped out of his musings by a sharp impact on his forhead. His eyes snapped open to see Jim leering impatiently at him.
"Come on, we don't have all day!" Jim's eyes seemed to say.
Stephen smiled and picked up the pen.
"I know, Jim, I know." Stephen said to the bird. "No going back."
As Stephen signed the forms he was strangely at peace. If he thought about it he couldn't really discount Wynne, Jim or his parents. They meant far too much to him to discard so easily. He was a trainer now, like his father, and he could go wherever he wanted. He could research pokemon if he wanted, dig up pokemon fossils, win pokemon contests in other countries. He could go anywhere and be anything, and perhaps he could be the pokemon champion if he wanted to, though he'd let Wynne go first.

Thinking of the pokemon champions as he finished signing the forms he looked around the pokemon lab as Jim puffed up his chest triumphantly now that they were officially trainers. Stephen finished the form and went to hand it up to professor Oak.
"Professor, where's Blue?" Stephen asked.

A Pure White Beginning [Pokémon]

The plan on my end is to think it up as I go along so I don't really have any preferences.

A Pure White Beginning [Pokémon]

Alright then, let me write this up...

Deep Ground Online (Hiatus)

Thomas stared at the ticket for a little while before Emma let go of his arm and he noticed Aaron coming up to them. As Emma talked amicably Thomas began to think. He had choices now, he could either run away or stick around. The thing he had to talk to Emma about was journalism club stuff and it was best left between the journalism club, so he'd lost the main reason to stick around. In fact, the only thing holding him back was an obligation to socialise. But he was pretty sure he didn't want to do that either.

Thomas stood quietly as the gears turned in his head before his phone buzzed in his pocket. He fished it out and opened the message, reading the contents before making a discontented face.
"Sorry Emma, I've gotta bail out." He said, shrugging, before putting his phone back into his pocket.
He walked over to where the other boy stood before handing him the ticket.
"Aaron Flecther, right?" He asked. "Have fun with my subordinate, would you?"

With that done, Thomas turned took a step away before he stopped and turned back around.
"Almost forgot. Emma, make sure to show up at the clubroom tomorrow at lunch." He told her. "See you there. Oh, and good luck Flecther."
He waved at the pair before heading off to the exit.

@KoL@Mega Birb

A Pure White Beginning [Pokémon]

Hm... Does Gary/blue still exist?

Deep Ground Online (Hiatus)

Hey, people, I'm sorry for the delay, I'm kinda sick so my posts might take some time to come.

@KoL

Well it's nice that you said something, I was about to think that you got in an accident or something.

Y'all dead tired from exams and stuff or are y'all just dead?

A Pure White Beginning [Pokémon]

That makes sense. Another question though, what are we going to do about the pokemon that have to be traded to be evolved? I'm pretty sure the anime has different rules on it so will we go with those?

Deep Ground Online (Hiatus)

It's 3 in the morning, why am I awake?

@Mega Birb

Why would you still be asleep? >:3