The return to the Obsidian Bastion was a somber one. While the "leak" was sealed, the visual of the Glistening Glasswoods on the horizon had spread through the survivors like a virus. People weren't just afraid of the Warden anymore; they were afraid of the unknown.
Zeth sat in the corner of the ruined galley, turning the Grand-Mastered Steel Coat over in his hands. The metallic fabric felt like liquid silk but was heavier than lead.
"It's useless to us," Aria said, sitting across from him as she cleaned a gash on her Gabite's shoulder. "Neither of us has a Steel-type Pokémon to use it on. It's just dead weight in our packs."
Zeth nodded, his eyes narrowing as he looked toward the groups of trainers huddling by the makeshift fires. "We can't use it, but someone here can. And in this place, a catalyst like this is worth more than gold."
Zeth didn't go to the trainers; he made them come to him. He hung the Steel Coat on a jagged piece of obsidian in the center of the Promenade Deck. Under the violet light of the Gate, the coat shimmered with a rhythmic, pulsing sheen that drew eyes from across the ship.
Within the hour, the "Council of Wreckage" had gathered.
"A Grand-Mastered catalyst," a veteran trainer whispered, his eyes wide as he looked at the heavy, metallic cloth. He held a Pokéball containing a heavily scarred Onix. "That's enough to force a Steelix evolution even in this high-pressure air."
"I don't want your gratitude," Zeth said, leaning against a rusted railing. "I need resources for the Glasswoods. We're heading into a zone with high reflectivity and razor-sharp terrain. I need supplies, and I need a Mount."
The crowd murmured. Finally, a quiet, older woman stepped forward. She was a civilian, but she carried herself with the stillness of a retired Ranger.
"I have a Rhyhorn (Lvl 34)," she said. "He's too slow for the Ravine, but his hide is thick enough to ignore the glass shards. He's a sturdy Blue-tier, but he's reached his limit with me."
She held out a weathered wooden box. Inside were three Perfection-Grade 'Sitrus' Extracts—concentrated healing fluids capable of stabilizing a Pokémon even after a devastating blow.
"The Steel Coat for the Rhyhorn and the extracts," Zeth said. "Aria needs a mount that can carry the heavy supplies, and I need those extracts for whatever is waiting at the end of this."
The trade was completed. The veteran trainer got his catalyst, and the Bastion gained its first heavy-duty transport Pokémon. But the preparation didn't stop there.
Zeth turned his attention to his own team. The Primal Spark had dimmed after sealing the leak, but it had left a residue on his skin—a faint, silver-violet dust that hummed with energy.
"Houndoom," Zeth called.
The black hound trotted over. It was exhausted, its matte fur covered in toxic soot. Zeth rubbed the residue from the Spark into the Houndoom's iron-infused horns. He didn't think about the math; he just felt the connection through the Silver Thread. The Houndoom didn't evolve in tier, but its horns took on a crystalline edge, vibrating in tune with the magnetic pulses of the island.
As the "Night Cycle" of the Ravine ended, the survivors watched from the deck as Zeth, Aria, and the newly acquired Rhyhorn stood at the edge of the Obsidian Ledge.
The path to the Glistening Glasswoods wasn't a chain. It was a bridge of frozen light—a natural phenomenon caused by the Quartz Island's energy overflow.
"The Glasswoods are different," Aria warned, checking her gear. "The light there is refracted. What you see isn't always where it is. And the Pokémon have adapted to be nearly invisible."
Zeth looked at the Rhyhorn, now laden with the remaining ship's supplies and the "Solder-Casks."
"Then we don't rely on our eyes," Zeth said. "We're moving into the second territory. Keep the Rhyhorn in the center. If we lose the supplies, we lose our leverage."
They stepped onto the bridge of light. Behind them, the SS Anne looked like a tiny, broken toy caught in a web of iron. Ahead, the trees of glass waited, their leaves clinking in the wind like a thousand breaking mirrors.
The bridge of frozen light didn't feel like stone. Under the Rhyhorn's heavy hooves and the trainers' boots, it vibrated with a high-pitched, crystalline chime. As they descended from the iron-rich heights of the Ravine, the atmospheric pressure shifted. The air became thin, cold, and unnervingly clear.
Below them lay the Glistening Glasswoods.
From a distance, it looked like a forest. Up close, it was a geometric graveyard. The "trees" were towering pillars of silicate and quartz, their branches made of razor-thin sheets of translucent glass. Every time the wind blew, the leaves didn't rustle; they clinked together with the sound of a thousand shattering mirrors.
"Don't touch the foliage," Zeth warned, his voice muffled by his breather. He looked at a nearby "shrub" whose leaves were as sharp as surgical scalpels. "One slip and you'll bleed out before the Rhyhorn can even turn around."
Aria checked the Rhyhorn's harness. The beast was slow, but its rocky hide was the only thing capable of pushing through the undergrowth without being shredded. "The light is already starting to play tricks. Look at your shadow, Zeth."
Zeth looked down. Instead of one shadow, he had four, each pointing in a different direction. The ground was so reflective that the violet glow of the Gate was bouncing off every surface, creating a "hall of mirrors" effect that made depth perception impossible.
They hadn't been in the Glasswoods for twenty minutes before the first "glitch" occurred.
Aria's Gabite suddenly hissed, its fins flared in a defensive stance. It slashed at the empty air to their left. There was a dull thud, and for a fraction of a second, a patch of the forest floor rippled like water.
"Something's there," Aria whispered.
"Not one thing. A pack," Zeth corrected. He reached for the Silver Thread of his Aura, but the reflection of the glass was even distorting his energy-sense. It was like trying to see through a kaleidoscope.
From the crystalline thicket, a Kecleon (Lvl 38) slowly phased into view. But it wasn't the green lizard of the Kanto jungles. Its skin was a jagged, shimmering silver, perfectly mimicking the texture of the glass trees. Its eyes rotated independently, tracking Zeth and Aria with a cold, predatory focus.
Behind it, three more shadows detached themselves from the "trees." These were Starmie (Lvl 36–39). They didn't float in the air; they clung to the glass pillars like massive, jeweled ticks, their central cores pulsing with a rhythmic, hypnotic red light.
[Environmental Hazard: The Refraction Field]
Effect: 50% chance for any physical or ranged move to "Miss" due to visual displacement.
Psychic Pressure: The Starmie's cores create a low-level confusion field.
"They aren't attacking yet," Koji whispered, his hand on his Swellow's Pokéball. "They're waiting for us to lose our footing."
"They're waiting for the Starmie to finish the 'Lure'," Zeth said. He could feel the psychic hum of the Starmie's cores vibrating against the Primal Spark on his hand. The red light was reflecting off every leaf, filling the trainers' vision with a rhythmic, dizzying pulse.
"Close your eyes!" Zeth roared. "Aria, use the Gabite's tremors! Koji, get the Swellow into the canopy—don't look at the stars, just listen for the wing-beats!"
The Kecleon lunged. It moved with a whip-like speed, its tongue lashing out like a serrated cable. It caught the Rhyhorn's supply crate, attempting to drag their food into the thicket.
"Houndoom, Flamethrower—don't aim at the Kecleon, aim at the ground!"
Zeth's command seemed counterintuitive, but as the white-hot fire hit the glass floor, the heat caused the silicate to crack and fog up. The "Fog of War" broke the reflections. The Kecleon, suddenly visible against the opaque, blackened glass, screeched as its camouflage failed.
"Now, Crunch!"
The Houndoom blurred forward. With its new crystalline-edged horns, it didn't just bite; it shattered the Kecleon's defensive positioning. The lizard was thrown back into a glass tree, which shattered upon impact, raining down shards like shrapnel.
The Starmie responded by spinning. They detached from the trees, becoming serrated discs of jewel and bone. They used Rapid Spin, moving so fast they became blurs of refracted light.
"They're using the reflections to multiply!" Aria cried out. In her vision, there weren't three Starmie—there were thirty, all closing in from every angle.
Zeth knelt, placing his hand on the vibrating glass floor. He let the Silver Thread sink through his boots and into the structure of the Woods. He wasn't looking for the Starmie; he was looking for the Vibration Source.
"They're only real when they hit the glass," Zeth muttered. "Rhyhorn! Bulldoze! Maximum resonance!"
The Rhyhorn let out a guttural roar and slammed its front legs into the floor. The shockwave didn't just move dirt; it sent a ripple through the entire Glasswood sector. The "Mirror-Starmie" flickered and vanished as their holographic reflections were disrupted by the physical shaking of the glass.
The three real Starmie were caught mid-spin, their balance shattered by the tremor.
"Croagunk, Mud-Bomb the cores!"
The purple frog leaped from the Rhyhorn's back, firing spheres of thick, mineral-heavy mud. The mud coated the Starmie's central jewels, snuffing out their red light and their psychic field. Blinded and heavy, the Starmie crashed to the floor.
The forest went silent again, save for the sound of falling glass. The remaining Kecleon retreated into the deep woods, unwilling to fight a group that could see through their illusions.
Zeth walked over to one of the downed Starmie. It wasn't dead, but its core was flickering weakly. He noticed something wedged into the star's geometric points—a cluster of Glass-Light Berries.
[Resource Acquired: Glass-Light Berries (High-Grade)]
Property: When consumed, they temporarily sharpen a Pokémon's vision, allowing them to see through illusions and cloaking.
"We need to harvest as many of these as possible," Zeth said, tossing a berry to Aria. "The further we go, the thicker the refraction gets. We're going to need to 'see' the path if we want to find the center of this zone."
Aria looked at the horizon. The Glasswoods didn't end. They seemed to spiral inward toward a massive, rotating prism that sat at the heart of the forest.
"That prism," Aria said, "it's not just a landmark. It's a lens. It's focusing the Gate's energy into a single beam."
Zeth looked at his charcoal map. "The Warden uses the Ravine for power. The 'Lens' uses the Glasswoods for focus. We're moving from the battery to the engine."
He looked at the survivors' tracks behind them. They were alone now. The distance between the SS Anne and the scouting party was growing, and the "Bridge of Light" was starting to fray.
"We don't go back," Zeth said, climbing back onto the Rhyhorn. "We push to the Prism. If we can tilt the lens, we might be able to signal the League—or burn a hole right through the Warden's Quartz Island."