The Shadow of Takeryuu, Chapter 7

Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3 - Chapter 4 - Chapter 5 - Chapter 6 - Chapter 7

The trip to the mines was not easy. Faerie shadows constantly swooped down at them, eyes aglow, but Eunji and Min were quick to dispatch them. Eunji let the flow guide her as she led her friends into a dark shaft in the side of a mountain, a hole that looked like a bottomless pit.

Wai Ren held a fire mote in its lantern as they wandered down hewn-out tunnels that led from cavernous rooms to low-ceilinged corridors. Every once in a while, they would stumble upon a faerie shadow or two, and while it would attack them on sight, it was nothing the girls couldn’t handle.

Then they started finding rooms that weren’t empty. These areas were full of Neopets, their clothes worn, clutching their arms to stay warm as they slept on the floor, guarded by shadow sentinels. These must have been all of the Neopets who were taken away by the spectres, Eunji realised.  She wished she could help them, but the shadows there were too numerous for her and Min to take on alone. They would have to keep going to find the source.

Finally, deep into the heart of the mountain, Eunji’s senses led her to a corridor that glistened with gems still set in their native rock. Around a bend shone a dim purple light, and Eunji’s feathers bristled. She looked back at her friends to see if they were ready for this.

They nodded, and Eunji smiled at them. She was fortunate indeed to have such wonderful friends. Taking a deep breath, she stepped around the bend and her eyes widened.

 

 Not gonna lie, this is one of my favorite comics in the whole series.

I guess when I was a kid, I took it for granted, but as an adult, I just find it wild that Bill invented actual time travel and everyone acts like this is completely normal. So clearly it means he's a Time Lord.

Also that the Pokémon world has the technology to manipulate time and yet all they do with it is transfer Pokémon between the present and three years ago.

Also I'm shocked that this hasn't caused any reality-warping temporal paradoxes.

... And also I should probably just stop overthinking a video game.

 Here's a bonus science cat! I couldn't leave out the Archduke of Physics himself.

 I understand the translation teams like to give Twins matching names... but this is taking it a bit too far.

(Although, I love that one of the sets of Twins in the Battle Tower in FireRed and LeafGreen are named Jen and Kira which is an obvious reference to the 1983 fantasy film The Dark Crystal. We can keep that one.)

 More amigurumi! I decided to make an adorable li'l Smilodon because carnivores are cute too! My secret goal is to make scientifically accurate plushies of underrepresented prehistoric animals. When I told my niece, she thought I was ridiculous. Never underestimate a pedantic nerd, kid. :)

In learning amigurumi I am also learning a surprising amount about embroidery! It's like two skills in one! A lot of the patterns I see call for safety eyes, but I've been trying to work on embroidering eyes instead because a) I'm too cheap to buy safety eyes, b) safety eyes aren't 100% safe; you can get them out of crochet if you try hard enough, and toddlers are always capable of more mayhem than you expect, and c) embroidered eyes can give a plush more personality and individuality.

Learning a new skill (or more like two new skills at once) is fun! Give it a go if you've been feeling down. Few things lift the spirits like expanding your horizons!

 When you're playing Crystal on the 3DS Virtual Console 15 years after the Game Boy Color days, this guy's dialogue comes across as a bit... smug.

I never owned a Game Boy Printer, but I suspect it would have been one of those things that I'd play with for half an hour and then never touch again. So I think my parents were smart not to buy me one. #superfluousperipherals

 The next illustration in my line of scientist cats! This one was fun. Not the least because I got to draw Galapagos tortoises.

P.S. Darwin Cat is a British Shorthair breed. It just seemed to fit him.