As we travelled north, the days quickly became noticeably colder. In just the week we had moved out of the Coronal Mountains and into the northern forests, I had gone from casually wearing a t-shirt and not feeling overly cold to either wearing the coat Cynthia had gifted me or some other long-sleeved top. Part of that was due to the constant wind, blowing through the forest from the north, but it wasn’t just the wind, the temperature itself had gone down, too.

When I asked Kedrik about it, I was told that fall would last for quite a while north of the mountains and in about two months, winter would roll in with incredible force. At that point, travel would quickly become impossible, as freezing hail storms would batter against the Coronal Mountains south of us. Unless we were on the other side of the mountains at that point, we’d have to wait for spring to cross them.

But those considerations were secondary, first, we had to get to Snowpoint City.

With Kedrik’s local knowledge and the accurate information we had been given by Gunther, we managed to avoid quite a few potential pitfalls and detours. What’s more, the information regarding the exact territories of different Pokémon allowed us to actively look for some of them, in order to train our partners or capture them.

That was the case with the Snowers Claire was interested in, their territory was a long and wide hilltop, covered in stout fir trees, all of which were between one and three metres in height. Hidden between those trees were the Snower, similarly in size compared to the trees and the same shape, standing motionlessly and trying to appear like just another tree, waiting in ambush for a careless Pokémon to approach before they struck with their Ice-hard branches or spat freezing wind at their foes. It was a good strategy but due to their typing, the Snower were complete fodder for Lucas and myself. Champ, Lucas’ Monferno, and Charm could trample them, even if they were supposedly stronger than our partners. Their fire was just too strong.

We remained in the area for almost two days, splitting the group to carefully scour the hillside for Snower, fighting and defeating them in order to give Charm and Monferno the best training possible. It was almost a little cruel, it certainly was brutal, but at the end of the day, our Pokémon gained a lot of strength from the battles to the point that Charm fully mastered the use of his Flamethrower, a feat that made me ecstatic. One step after the other, my dear partner was working on being the best he could be.

Similarly, Aura was getting a bit of a workout, his strength sufficient to deal with the weaker Snower, which would yield no benefit to Charm, so he, too, got some training. His growth continued to be amazing, possibly due to his innate potential, possibly due to his incredibly low age but either way, he was getting stronger quickly.

What’s more, Claire, who had been moving around with Lucas and Kedrik, managed to snag herself a Snower with good potential, adding yet another useful partner to her roster. Catching the Snower turned out to be quite problematic, as she told me later, simply due to the bad match-ups she was suffering under. Her Twiggy was incredibly vulnerable to the Ice-Type attacks, while Nuts wasn’t much better off. Myna took similar amounts of damage compared to Nuts, but at least, she could use her flying-type attacks to strike back and had the agility to avoid some of their attacks. Not so much when it came to the wide attacks with Icy Wind, but it worked, to a point.

That left her only Yo, her Meditite, to do the heavy lifting. Well, Yo and her companions, so it turned out quite well and she managed to catch Chris, as she named the Snower for some reason. Her names struck me as weird at times, but if that was what made her and her partners happy, who was I to gainsay her? It wasn’t as if the names I was giving my partners were creations of awesome literary prowess.

In addition to the training our partners got, we trainers received an in-depth course on Northern Sinnoh herbs and spices, thanks to Kedrik and Lisa. While Cynthia had given me lessons on most of the common types of berries, valuable due to their ability to process valuable minerals from the soil, nutrients that could facilitate and guide the growth of Pokémon, she had also told me that there were many more plants that could contain such minerals. However, due to the sheer variety, the difficulties in processing and a couple more factors, we had never gone into them. There simply hadn’t been time.

Now, with these two natives of the forest, it was time for lessons.

Which grasses could be plucked, which leaves actually contained minerals that could be extracted if they were cooked just right and, maybe most importantly, which of those were safe for human consumption, adding some much-needed variety to our usual fare of porridge, nuts and dried berries, all those were lessons told by Lisa and Kedrik.

What’s more, some of those mundane-looking leaves that we might even have trampled carelessly were actually somewhat valuable, especially if they were harvested carefully and stored the correct way. Sure, we got a stipend from the League while travelling but having additional money was always useful.

Amusingly, I noticed that my partners had their own tastes when it came to the herbs, tastes that didn’t necessarily correspond with the minerals they needed for their optimal growth.

Little Vio, for example, was a complete sucker for a herb with a minty, fresh taste, it was somewhat sharp but quite nice. However, given that it would guide her growth in a direction of physical strength, while neglecting her mental abilities, I had to be quite stingy, keeping it from her as much as possible.

In comparison, Charm had an absolute sweet tooth, happily snacking on the berry-and-charcoal mix I had received from Greta, to the point that I had to be careful he wouldn’t gorge himself, eating it so fast that his body couldn’t process the nutrients correctly.

It was similar for all of our partners, they all had their own preferences and it was on us trainers to guide them to their full potential, even if that meant I had to pamper Vio quite a bit, cuddling and brushing her hair, to make up for the fact she couldn’t enjoy her minty leaves.

Finally, after a lot of battles, training and walking past more trees than I could even begin to count, we reached the Acuity Lakefront, looking across Lake Acuity and towards the mountain holding Snowpoint City. It was the last stretch of distance, moving along the shores of the lake, before climbing the slope and entering Snowpoint City itself.

Looking across the lake, I made a mental note to visit the other two great lakes as well, the sheer size of the thing was something I could hardly fathom. It was massive, stretching almost to the horizon, with only vague shapes visible in the distance. It made me wonder what marvels might be hidden beneath the calm surface, what Pokémon might lurk in its depths. Just like the Underground, the depths of the lakes were a challenging space, difficult for humans or weak Pokémon to traverse and yet, it might just be that difficulty that made them so attractive to me.

But exploring such areas would have to wait, for now, I had other fish to fry. Somewhere nearby, in the vicinity of Lake Acuity, was the Uxie, the legendary Guardian of Knowledge and the entity that I hoped could help me restore my memories. It had taken me almost five months to travel this far, constantly training my partners and also myself, hopefully gaining the strength to make that Guardian acknowledge me, or at least arouse its interest to the point that it helped me.

Before I could plan my future, I needed to understand my past, or there would be no foundation for my plans, nothing more but idle dreams without any connection to reality. I needed to know and this was my best chance to gain that knowledge.

Travelling along the shore of Lake Acuity, I occasionally threw an idle glance across those seemingly endless waters and the reflections therein. What would I find at the end of this journey?

Who was I, who had I been? Why did I suddenly appear on Mount Coronet at that very moment?

Would my memories even hold the answers to those questions?