They had scaled a large part of the first layer, taking around three more hours after waking up just wandering the corridors and following a trail of slowly increasing destruction. By now the group didn’t need Larry to lead them towards their goal, because it was becoming abundantly clear where they were meant to go. The large wall that made up the back of the first layer of Mt. Silver had been broken at a point, leading to a large-scale rock slide that had buried a large body of water in a shower of rubble.

  From the entrance, it hadn’t been very obvious with the far-side wall of the cave being veiled in darkness. The closer they got and with the morning sun finally beginning to shine into the cave entrances again, the destruction became clearer to see and everyone in their group had already realized that the rock slide must have stemmed from the fight between Moltres and Tyranitar.

  One of the rangers behind him whistled in admiration, “Whew, that fight must’ve been one for the ages. They don’t call Tyranitar Pseudo-Legendaries for nothing. Shame it all went down deep in some dark, dank cave.”

  Valerie looked at the destruction in the distance with reverence, Larry had since returned to her side since his lead wasn’t needed anymore, “Yeah…” She looked down at Larry in amazement and whispered to him as she pointed at the rock slide, “Do you think you could do that one day?”

  The destruction was impressive to Larry, but his mother had stated that she could bring down the entire mountain if she wanted to. She must’ve held back to let Larry flee since if she used her full strength she might’ve hurt him. He smiled fondly as he nodded back at Valerie, ‘I guess in the end she learned a thing or two about friendly fire…Even if it didn’t work out in the end.’

  “...Wow…”

  Maxie nodded back with a grin, “Just drink it in people, you don’t see this in your league matches.” She looked around with an anxious smile, “That night vision of your Larvitar has really helped us out big time Valerie. Last time we were running around in circles like headless Torchics.”

  In response, Larry pumped his chest as Valerie smiled back, “It's not me you should be thanking but Larvitar himself. He’s the reason I’m here and he’s the reason we got this far.”

  “You’re right,” Maxie slowed and gave Larry a pat on the head as a thanks before returning to her position. “From what I’ve seen up until now, we’ll probably be forced to close off Mt. Silver for trainers with how precarious most of the first layer currently is. A real shame considering how special this place is.”

  “Which Pokemon did the most damage? That Moltres or the Tyranitar?” Nicholas chimed in.

  Arin groaned, “It's all that humidity man! Tyrantiar can reshape this place all they want, some kind of cave is still going to be here with how huge the place is. That Moltres on the other hand…”

  “You saw all those empty basins of water and cooked Magikarp we walked past, didn’t you? Sure, some simply got drained underground, but the others were literally boiled! So much steam rising to the top of the cave can’t be too good for the ceiling, it's a wonder the entire place hasn’t caved in yet anyway.”

  ‘I…think I get it…’ Larry wasn’t a geologist, so his knowledge of caves wasn’t the best, but Arin seemed to know what he was talking about. “Should we be in here then?!” Valerie asked anxiously.

  Waving off her concern, Maxie began, “Ah, we brought some Ground and Rock-Types with us for exactly that reason. Smaller natural rock slides and cave-ins can be prevented or defended against by the right Pokemon” she grinned back at Valerie, “and we’re dead anyway if it falls down on top of us!”

  “Ahaha… That's good then…” Gulping audibly, Valerie vowed to keep her eyes on the walls and ceiling from now on.

  …

  They were dangerously close now to the epicenter, traversal had become exponentially harder as gashes in the ground and general destruction around them had slowly begun to increase. Graveler had relegated himself to most of the handiwork, pulling up patches of ground and knitting walkways back together in an attempt to help the humans. Right now they were once again walking along a walkway with two hilly shoulders on both sides of it, the corridor had been mostly spared due to the hills on both sides so they were making good headway.

  Yet, something had been bothering the ranger Pokemon in the group.

  “You guys hear that?” Arcanine’s ears quirked around as it turned its head from side to.

  “Hear what?” Larry asked dumbly as he strained his own hearing.

  “Shuffling. Steps. A lot.” Lairon pointed out and Arcanine nodded back.

  “You guys hearing something?” Maxie asked the Pokemon and Arcanine nodded back tensly. Immediately, the rangers tensed, “Give me a direction.”

  Acanine turned his head left, and Lairon turned right, “Both sides? That’ll be a challenge…You got an idea of what it is?” Sniffing the air, Arcanine breathed out a small licking flame, “Fire-Type, huh?”

  As the tension rose, Valerie and Larry looked at the shoulders anxiously, he was beggining to hear it now too, ‘A Fire-Type? It must be the Magmar!’

  Larry addressed the Rangers Pokemon, “You guys think it's those Magmar from before?”

  “It might…” Arcanine muttered in recognition, “We haven’t seen any other Pokemon, so it's likely.”

  He was about to try and play a game of Charades with Valerie and the Rangers to get his words across, but he didn’t need to as their enemies made themselves known with a rain of small fireballs that washed over them.

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  “Graveler!” Arin called out and a giant boulder flew above their head, impacting almost all of the flames before they were able to fall. No next attack came, as their attackers made themselves known.

  Five Magmar scaled the sides of the walkway in front of them and stared down at them challengingly.

  “Magmar, huh?” Maxie spoke up first, she addressed the Pokemon amicably, “We mean no harm, we’re here to investigate what has happened in the caves of Mt. Silver and nothing more. We’ll be out of your territory soon.”

  The leading Magmar didn’t even spare the ranger a look, instead staring straight at Larry. He recognized the voice of the Magmar as it talked, “The great mountain queen's young has returned it seems…” It turned to its kin, clear disdain evident in his voice, “and it has brought humans with it.” This was the Magmar which had welcomed them into the cave where Moltres roosted.

  “Uhm, hello…” Larry wanted to step forward to defuse the situation, but Valerie held him back, fear in her eyes.

  It called out suddenly, pointing a finger at Larry accusingly, “Why did the great mountain queen attack one of the legendary winged mirages as it awoke!”

  “It attacked us first!” Larry cried back defensively.

  “Larvitar? What’s going on?” Valerie asked, looking between the Magmar and her Pokemon frantically.

  “And look what it got us!” It spread out its arms theatrically, “Almost all of my kin were killed by your mother's reckless actions!”

  “W-What?!” Larry reeled back at the revelation, “I-I didn’t know!”

  Another Magmar retorted while tearing up, “My young Magby is dead! Swallowed by a fissure! All because of that stupid Tyranitar!”

  “This isn’t looking good…” Maxie muttered, the group was slowly retreating from their Pokemon and bunching up as they prepared for a fight.

  “I-I didn’t know! I’m sorry!” He cried out once again in panic. Larry had never thought about the clear consequences of such a large-scale fight, expecting the nearby Pokemon would simply be able to flee.

  “Oh, you’ll be sorry!” The Magmar patriarch exclaimed as the air began to heat up. Heat flared away from the Magmar as everyone readied themselves, Arcanine readied a fire attack of its own as Lairon and Graveler raised stone walls in defense.

  “Rock Blast!” Arin cried out to his Graveler.

  “Lairon! Protect!” A translucent bubble formed around their team as a shotgun blast of rocks shot toward the Magmar on their left.

  The Magmar collectively jumped down from their vantage points and shot streams of fire at the bubble surrounding them. The light of the flames burned his face as Valerie called out to him from afar, “Larvitar! Are these the Magmar you mentioned in the interview?!”

  “Yeah!” Larry called back, still unsure if they were fighting the Magmar.

  The Rangers had no such reservations, the flames stopped, their shield went down and they went into action, “Arcanine! Bite!”

  Arcanine rushed forward with speed Larry had never seen from any cave-dwelling Pokemon, it crashed into the left Magmar’s side and bit down on its arm. Lashing its head to the side and yanking the Pokemon to the ground.

  “Now Lairon! Rock Slide!” Nicholas called out, the Pokemon stamped its feet against the ground and an avalanche of rocks slid down the left side of the walkway, seemingly appearing out of thin air as it crashed into the Magmar, halfway burying the one still prone underneath a shower of rocks as Arcanine rushed back to its trainer.

  “Good one!” Nicholas cried out to Lairon, who only gave back a curt “Yeah!”

  After catching their footing, the Magmar cried out again with a sneer, “Going to stay behind your human protectors? You’ll die! Just like your mother!”

  “What!?” Larry cried back in shock, “She isn’t dead!”

  The Magmar ignored his retort, looked at each other knowingly before they charged something in their snouts. A little light, like a small firefly flew out of each of their snouts languidly before whizzing towards them.

  “That's Confuse Ray!” Maxie yelled, “Dodge!”

  Valerie looked around anxiously, “Larvitar, dodge underground!”

  Larry cleared his mind with a shake of his head, he didn’t have to think about the Magmar patriarch's words. He took Valerie's command and dug himself underground at top speed, he disappeared in a cloud of dust, digging himself forward, ‘If Valerie wants to fight, I’ll fight!’ He rushed forward with a slightly nostalgic thought, ‘It’s hunt or be hunted for wild Pokemon anyway.’

  Appearing underneath the patriarch Magmar, Larry shot up like a Ground-TE imbued rocket. The leading Marmar stumbled back at the super-effective move, but only had a simple bruise to show for his effort.

  Now, standing between multiple enemies, Larry wanted to dig back down but was hit by a Flame Punch before he could, “Ough!”

  “Larvitar!” A concerned cry escaped Valerie.

  He flew back towards the trainers and skidded to a stop harshly. He got to his feet as quickly as he could as he heard the ranger cry out from behind, “Snap out of it, Graveler!” Behind him, Lairon and Graveler unfortunately weren’t quick enough to dodge the Confuse Ray, only Arcanine seemed to have managed to dodge the projectiles successfully.

  The Magmar once again started a group attack as they released a deluge of scattering flames, shooting them straight towards their group.

  “Arcanine!” Maxie cried out, unsure how to block the many scattering flames without their Rock-Types.

  “Larvitar! Rock Slide, then Sandstorm! The Magmar need to see us to hit us!” Valerie commanded from the backlines.

  Looking above, Larry pushed Rock-TE up into the air and materialized a shower of rocks to block the flames. They were snuffed out one after another, a few strays managed to pass through but hit no one.

  “Good thinking, Val! Get something over your mouth to block the sand people!” Maxie called out behind him as he continued his preparation. Larry used the shower of dust and debris from the many attacks in his sandstorm, slowly spinning up a small twister of sand and dust between himself in front of the trainers and the Magmar.

  “Not hiding behind those humans anymore, eh?” The Magmar called out in a jeering tone, “Instead, the son of the great mountain queen has resigned himself to hiding behind a veil of dirt and dust! Haha! Let’s help the poor thing with its efforts, why don’t we?”

  He was unable to see the attack, but before long, his sandstorm was invaded by an ashy, lung-clumping smokescreen. “Koff! Koff! Argh!” Larry was fighting to catch a breath, but the thick, acrid smoke the Magmar had released was too much for him and he was forced to abandon his sandstorm.

  Digging back underground, Larry fled out of the inside of the sandstorm. He resurfaced in between his fellow teammates. Acanine instead of attacking, had helped Lairon and Graveler catch their bearing since its mostly Fire-Type attacks wouldn’t be effective against their enemies anyway.

  “Are they ok again?” Larry asked Arcanine, the smoked-out sandstorm slowly reducing in front of them.

  “They have to be!” Arcanine called back, watching Graveler still shake away the last of its confusion.