Since things had come to this, it was time to eat first.
Summer in the desert stretched the daylight far longer than it did back in the Norlandia Alliance, somewhat like the high-latitude regions of Nova's old life, and the endless hours of sun had left his schedule more than a little scrambled these past few days.
It was already half past five in the evening, nearly time for dinner, yet the sun showed no sign of yielding to the horizon. It would linger in the sky for at least two more hours.
Dinner was already prepared. Nova personally measured out cat food, dog food, and the rest of the feed, filling each bowl by category for his companions.
Looking at the two half-dead Mightyena, Nova felt a flicker of pity and scooped out an extra helping of Growlithe's dog food, setting it down in front of them.
The pair of Mightyena had clearly lived lives much like Purrloin's, scraping by without ever tasting a proper meal. They devoured the food eagerly, and the nourishment slowly eased their wounds until they could stand and walk again.
Nova studied them for a moment, weighing what he saw. Their strength was unremarkable at best, hardly beyond what a novice trainer might scrape together for muscle. A professional trainer would find them fit only for menial tasks on a reserve squad, and anyone competing at an elite level would see them as a serious liability to carry.
No wonder the trio had only trusted them to guard the camp.
With dinner settled, Nova made himself a sandwich with a slice of premium Oinkologne ham, and ate with evident enjoyment.
He walked over to the Stocky Man, who drifted in and out of awareness from the lingering Toxic poisoning, and gave him a light nudge with his boot.
"Anything else you want to tell me?" Nova asked. "If it's worth something, I'll spare you a bit more Antidote."
But the man could only mumble broken fragments.
So that settled it. This man was a gambler, and a reckless one at that. No surprise the three of them had turned to scams together; once gambling debts pile up, no sum of money is ever enough.
Nova gave him a little water, which cleared his head enough that he began pleading for the Antidote.
"Let's be clear, I run my business honestly," Nova said. "For the camp's location, which you gave me earlier, I paid out two hundred thousand for three doses of proper Antidote. I'm losing money as it is.
If you want the same amount again, you'll need to hand over something worth three hundred thousand."
"Pokémon! Take all my Pokémon!"
"What use would I have for your Pokémon? Do I look like I'm short on mouths to feed, that I need a few more useless ones?"
"Then what do you want... I'll give you anything..."
"Tell me about the Secret Realm," Nova said.
At those words, the man's expression faltered for an instant before settling back into a fawning smile. "What Secret Realm? I don't know what you're talking about."
Nova nodded slowly. "You don't know. Fine, then."
With that, he stood and walked off, leaving the man lying there in confusion.
Was this really how a negotiation was supposed to end?
Shouldn't there be more haggling first?
Nova didn't think so. He had real business to attend to, and even though he planned to take a detour through the Tamar Desert, that didn't mean he had time to waste.
Whether the Secret Realm the man had mumbled about in his delirium was even real hardly mattered to Nova. If there was information to be had, he'd take it and set it aside for whenever he had nothing better to do.
If the man still wanted to play games, then Nova had nothing left to say to him.
An unexplored Secret Realm carried a different order of danger compared to an ordinary Uninhabited Area. Even a small gap in the intelligence could change the entire outcome of an expedition.
If he ever decided to explore a place like that, Nova would sooner go in blind and work it out for himself than be steered wrong by unreliable, possibly malicious, information.
The Stocky Man was still scheming over how he might strike a better bargain next time, unaware that Nova had already lost all interest in him.
Moments later, his blurred vision could no longer make out which way Nova had gone. He couldn't even feel the pain in his body anymore. It was as though the vicious poison and the burns scarring his arms had been miraculously healed.
What he didn't realize was that this was the most merciful farewell Nova ever gave a collaborator.
A stinger some thirty centimeters long shot upward from the base of his neck and drove straight into his brainstem, paralyzing his entire nervous system in an instant.
A second later, he stopped breathing.
With the spoils gathered, Nova prepared to return to his original path. He would rest for the night and check on the Taritar tribe's situation the next day before deciding anything further.
But just as he was about to mount Corviknight and leave, he noticed the two Mightyena, who had regained enough strength to move, whimpering softly at him.
Weak as they were, they weren't foolish. The desert was no place for Mightyena to survive on their own, and once Nova left, their odds of making it here alone were next to nothing.
So they did everything they could to prove they were worth keeping around.
Fortunately, Nova had a capable translator close at hand.
"You're telling me these three also had a desert off-road vehicle," Nova said, "and that you two know exactly where it's parked?"
"That's right!" Little Love said.
Well, that was certainly worth looking into.
A proper desert off-road vehicle ran well over five hundred thousand league coins, easily counted among a trainer's most valuable assets.
That explained a lot. No wonder these three, despite having such unremarkable Pokémon, had still managed to roam the desert freely and wear down an entire Rhyhorn herd over the course of a week. They'd had a good vehicle backing them the whole time.
That made things clear enough.
A craftsman is only as good as his tools.
Guided by the two turncoat Mightyena, Nova soon found the vehicle half-buried beneath a dune only a few hundred meters off.
It wasn't really Vibrava's fault for missing it during the earlier scouting. Azir had been sweeping the skies for threats to the group, not searching the ground for a half-buried vehicle tucked beneath such a small dune.
The vehicle's contents had already been carried back to camp, but Nova found one more useful item still sitting in front of the driver's seat.
It was a simple hand-drawn map of the desert. In the upper left corner, a black five-pointed star marked a single word: "Secret Realm."